Go to the Corner

Usually when someone hear's that, they've done something bad.  However this time it's a good thing, well at least for us it is.  Well it's an improvement, not so much a good thing I suppose.  Remember the little counter wall paneling I repainted a couple weeks ago?  Well I fixed the area up & it is looking pretty good right now.  I never took an original photo but that corner use to be where I huge oak tv stand was.  It's so large & we are rather outdated in the fact that we still have the tube televisions that you couldn't even see that corner area.  So it went from a rather invisible "oh this is your TV" to a lovely corner of the living room.

this was the wall after it was painted.

This is the area now all fixed up.

please ignore a.) the horrid footstool, I need to find material to recover it. I was just trying it out under there. b.) the blurred background.  There were pots on the stove lol.

We still need to redo the counter top but that is a future project.  I should have taken pictures of the huge pictures we hung on the wall as well.  Everything pictured we've had but they never really had a "place"  The table has been hidden under a tray.  You couldn't even tell it was a refabbed window.  As I said the footstool is getting recovered & painted.  So though it's not perfect yet it is quite in improvement from our bulky TV corner, plus a few wandering pieces found a home of their own in the pretty corner.

I Have Conquered the Wall...well a mini one anyways.

Yesterday I decided to tackle that ugly little wall with the counter top on it.  I'm not sure what this is called or why it's even there.  We've debated on getting rid of it, but I fear the mess it will make.  None of us here are professionals & we are all heavy procrastinators to boot.  I can see it now, wood slivers sticking out everywhere.  So instead of dealing with that mess I decided that a little primer and a little paint could make this ugly wall into a wall that at least matched the living room.

We started with this:

This is actually the other side because once again I started without taking a before picture.

Then I primed this baby:

heck even this looked better than the ugly paneling.

Finished product:

Now that is better.  There are a few touch ups I need to make with the base board.

However as you can clearly see, anything is better than the before.  We'll be working on the counter piece in the near future.  For now it has been put on the back burner till we can afford to either have it replaced or paint it ourselves.  This apartment is truly a handful, but with the economy believe me it will be worth it in the end.

Any suggestions?  Should we lose this little wall or just leave it as is?  It separates the living room from the kitchen.

The Non-Shabby Side

So I've made it pretty clear that most of our apartment is to be decorated in the "shabby chic" style.  I love pastel colors & distressed furniture.  However with that being said the one room in our house without a theme is our bedroom.  I have the blue walls I've dreamed off and with the black & white frames I've wanted displayed, however things are a bit eclectic in here.  The only real theme is my love for the artwork of Kurt Halsey.  However after stalking many bloggers lately I'm starting to feel my/our room is a bit to young.  I've spent a lot of money on this artwork and really hate letting it go, so I figured I'd sale off some small pieces and keep the big ones and start slowly adding some new artwork instead.

Today will be the fresh start the room needs.  I again forgot to take a before picture of a mirror I've had hanging in here.  In fact it was in my room before we moved only wearing different colors.  In it's first life it was an icky tacky gold color.  I spray painted it purple then when we moved I decided pink was my new favorite color and so it was painted ballet slipper color.  On my wall it has hung for about 10yrs now.  The other day I decided she needed to lose the mirror all together and get a white paint job (mainly white because I don't have black paint & I found these usually expensive black box shelves at Goodwill for $3.99).  Now she is all dressed & ready for her new debut as a frame.

Pictures to come soon.  I'll also be working on the top of our large wardrobe.  There is quite a bit of space up there  that needs filling up.  I'm waiting on a hand sander so I can sand it down & paint it. Anyone have any experience sanding down Ikea furniture?  Obviously this is not one of the natural wood pieces.  It's a nice large piece we got at the end of the last season for $49 marked down.  I'll update with a picture shortly.

While Waiting For the Paint to Dry

So I thought I'd share a couple of my other projects from the day of no sleep.  Some was done while waiting for the paint to dry on the cubby shelf while others happened before.

This plate is what started my marathon.  It was just a plain white plate with some major cracks & crazing in the middle.  I intended to turn it into a cake plate but when I was finished I felt it would be best used as decoration in the future refurb hutch.  Plus I don't think you can eat off of it.  No the Mod Podge is not perfect, but I don't like my shabby to be perfect.

Close up:

The middle is just a piece of scrapbook paper.

Next up was letter art.  I've really been wanting to buy some wooden letters to put over our window on the gray wall.  However finding the & was a bit hard, plus whenever I found one they would be out of an S.  Always the S never the W.  So after viewing some inspiration from one of the many DIY blogs I follow I decided to go the super cheap route...FREE.

Maybe one day when I can get out to a Hobby Lobby or The Flower Factory I can get all the wooden initials I need.  Till then I'm quite happy with how this turned out.  Thank you Photoshop

The last thing was to paint a icky dark wine bottle:

to white:

again I know it's not perfect and the Fleur de Lil stencil did not adhere so well to a rounded object, but I like it's imperfection.  It will later find a home on top of our wardrobe, once I find all the goodies I wish to place up there.

Cubbies

This past week/weekend has been a nightmare.  All I can really say is that I'm tired of dealing with other people problems when my immediate family (Will included) have enough of their own things to deal with.  I really hope things get back to normal soon.

That being said I tried my best at creating normalcy Monday.  I had a real issue with sleeping so I stayed up a full 24hrs from Sunday to Monday.  I had so many ideas running through my head that I decided that 2am was a great time to get started on a ton of projects, or at the very least get all my ducks in a row.
First thing I did was take before pictures of EVERYTHING since I'm horrible at before pictures I thought taking a group photo of all my goodies at once then individually would be a great idea.  That way when inspiration hits me and I start painting without hesitation I have no worries because photos were taken.  Of course that lasted one day.  I started a new project yesterday & primed an item before taking a photo.  Will says no worries it's still a before, however the gray primer is an improvement on the hideous color this item was.  I like to call it baby poo yellow.

Here is a photo of all the goodies I plan on redoing:

Got all this loot in one day: Lamp, picture cube, light switch cover, desk organizer, shower curtain rings, 2 of the wooden trays, bike basket & the rose candle scones. All of these will be redone.

Yesterday I redid the photo cube & a few days before that I painted the light switch cover gray. The other project yesterday was to take this cubby shelf:

and turn into this cute cubby shelf:

The shelf was $2.99 at Goodwill and all the paint & hardware we already had.  We had 2 gallons of the blue so you'll see it used quite a bit.  The knobs I got off of a shelf my mom had bought but had later broke.  This will later go up for sale, however for now I love it too much so we'll be using it to display some of our shabby nick-nacks.

Cost:


Shelf $2.99
Paint  FREE
Knobs FREE

Never hesitate to look around the house to see what you have, left over paint is a god send.

edit

This is currently where the cubby shelf is hanging out.  Please forgive the paneling, that is a future project.  I'm sure the items will vary when we get new finds.

Get on the Floor

After many set backs the floor is more or less complete on our landing/hallway.  We still need to buy new thresholds but we'll get them eventually.  So this may have been a rather cheap update, in my eyes anything was an upgrade.

Have I mentioned I'm horrible with before photos? ...I have?  Good.  This is after the fact but this is what was covering our hallway floor.

It was a quite stunning 1970's green.  Kind of looked like that stuff they use to put in a screened in porch.

2hrs later this is where we were.

Will & I scrapped all the black rubber up then swept & vacuumed. Please excuse the scuffed door frame & the icky doors.  Those are still on my project list.

24hrs after this is our new floor

I got a bit excited & took the picture right after it was done.  We had to replace a few tiles today due to my being unable to cut straight lines.  Once the thresholds have been replaced I'll take a better picture.

As you can see, even in this crappy photo ANYTHING was an improvement.  The tiles were rather cheap at our local Family Dollar store.  I believe it was $12 for a box and there are plenty of tiles left to redo our tiny tiny bathroom floor.  Currently Kmart is also selling these type of tiles for $9 though the box is not as big.  I'm sure many can afford to do more but I think it was a great project for a renter, or a young couple in their first place.

Hectic Times

It's been really crazy around here lately.  My uncle is in the hospital for multiple reasons that I don't want to go into.  Due to that my mom has talked herself horse so I've been helping her deal with all the talking and phone calls that are having to be made.  On the positive side Saturday is Will and I's 3 year anniversary, we are planning to go to dinner for the first time instead of me cooking.  I've also been hitting up the Goodwill's & thrift stores the last few days.  I think I got some rather promising goodies (pics will be coming soon).  We've also started our floor project for the hallway.  We pulled up the ugly horrid green what seems like outdoor carpeting, which didn't take as long as we expected.  It's all prepped & ready for the new tiling to be laid which I will start today.  I'm excited to see it finished because I know it's going to look amazing with the new paint colors. 
We're also going to take down the closet door & put up drapes instead.  I hope it looks as great as I've seen on other blogs.

Stay tuned for pics of my thrifty goodies as well as the before & afters of the hallway/landing floor redo.