Orange Room

In the spring, Carolee (my sister) and I teamed up and took on our first "official" design job.  We chose everything from paint colors, to furniture, to accessories for an entire home.  It was soooo much fun!  We loved it!

We always called this room the "orange room" because of the night table (...we fell in love with it as soon as we set eyes on it!)  The colors in this bedroom are perfect for a lovely fall day like today!


photos by Carolee

Which would you choose? Stair spindles: black vs. white

I did more de-oaking this weekend.  (I'm working on updating my 1980's house.)  Primed the trim in three bedrooms... everything is looking bigger and brighter!  I'm at the point where I need to decide on a paint color.  I know that the trim and the paneling will be white, and the stair banister will be black.  Here's my dilemma... should the stair spindles be white or black?  I think the white is more classic, but the black is less expected.  Thoughts, anyone???


photo from House & Home

photo from House & Home

photo from Elle Decor

Quick fix for my pile of purses

I like to keep several purses handy, so that I can grab the perfect one on my way out the door.  However, they were becoming a bit of a problem in the mudroom.  They were ending up in a big pile, which I would dig through every time I was ready to leave the house.  Visual clutter gets super annoying after a while.  (Even for me... and I can live with it for quite a while.)

I found a quick and easy solution... I put up several simple coat hooks right beside the back door:


Now my purses are easily accessible, and it`s kind of a cute collection!

In case you were wondering... here is what the situation was like before... ugh.

I heart Design Refuge!

My friend Sacha phoned the other night and asked if I was watching tv.  I explained that no, I was trying to catch up on my favorite design blogs.  She wondered how many I kept up with.  Well... let's just say LOTS.  Every day I get hooked on a new one.  One blog often leads to another, and there are just so many fabulously creative people out there.  I could spend hours...

That's why I was super thrilled to find Design Refuge.  It is the ultimate gathering place for design bloggers!  At Design Refuge you will find all of the best design bloggers in one spot... including columns by favorite design bloggers, showcases of recent projects, and features on great new blogs.  The blog roll is already amazing, and the site is brand new!


The site was created by Dagny of Scandinavian Chic:



Dagny's vision for Design Refuge is "...to unite interior design bloggers from all over the world.  We want to empower you and to create a positive community filled with inspiration, networking and a platform to share your projects and experiences!"

How awesome is that?  Design Refuge will definitely be the first stop on my daily tour of design blogs!


ps... guess who's chevron rug diy is featured at DR today!  Yay!!!

Nate Berkus Show

OK... what's going on?  I've been seeing great posts about Nate Berkus, like at Little Green Notebook,  and realized that I haven't been watching his new show!  Crap!  I missed the whole premiere week!  So I went straight to my pvr to set it up to record the show... guess what?   Couldn't even find the show.  That seemed wierd... so I looked harder and finally found the show airing at 1am!  OUTRAGE!  So I set it up to record, and I'll be able to watch tomorrow.

Anyways, Nate's Chicago apartment was featured in Elle Decor last year.  Look at these fabulous rooms:

both photos from Elle Decor


Also... my favorite item from Nate's HSN line:



DIY Details: hand painted chevron rug

If you read my post yesterday, you saw my awesome upcycled area rug!  It was so easy, and so worth the time to reinvent it!  I hated that rug a week ago, and now I love it!


Even though the rug was hideously bland, it did have a couple of things going for it:  it was big (8' x 10') and it had a really flat loop (like a fake sisal rug).  The flat loop made it possible to use paint instead of dye for the stripes.

Here's what I did:

1.  Measure.  I knew that I wanted three zig zags stretching across the rug, so I measured out the spacing of the peaks, and drew three chalk lines across the rug to make sure the peaks were perfectly spaced.

2.  Tape out the first peaks.  To get the first peak, I used my 450 triangle (from my drafting kit - leftover from engineer days! haha!)  If you don't have the triangle, just measure it out.  For tape, I used 2 strips of the 2" green painters tape, and overlapped it just a little bit.




3.  Continue taping.  To keep the spacing perfect without measuring every single time, I made myself a little "jig" by overlapping two short pieces of tape.  I used the jig to make sure that the spaces were the same width as the stripes.



4.  Still taping... Taping takes forever, but it's kind of fun seeing the pattern emerge.



5.  Meanwhile... this is what Beckett was doing while I was taping forever!




6.  Paint.  Finally it is time to paint!  I used Benjamin Moore latex floor paint in black.  It took most of a gallon.  I did one coat, let it dry overnight, and then did the second coat the next day.
*** update for people who have been wondering - I used small roller (about 3'' wide) ***




7.  Remove tape.  Voila, you are done!  I let it dry for a full day before we started walking on it.





Upcycling: My hand painted chevron rug

I'm so excited!  I finished another project and it turned out shockingly awesome!  I had a nasty old area rug that was a relic from my beige phase.  It was literally scheduled for a trip to the dump as soon as possible, but then I saw this post over at Leaf House.  So I decided that my old beige rug was a perfect candidate for an upcycling1 project.

Here's the look I was going for (this fabulous room is by Tamara Styles of Get it Girl Style):

Here's how mine turned out:



Not bad for a few hours of work!  Now I need to get busy accessorizing this room!

I'll post the DIY Details tomorrow.

1.  My Definition:  Upcycling is taking something that is old/ugly/junky/disposable and transforming it into something of greater beauty and value.

Project Sneak Peek

It feels like fall this week.  Beckett and I are settling into our new routine of being home together while Jack is at school.  Without Jack to play with, Becks is my full time helper.  We had quite a few fun shopping outings to source out tile and hardware for Mom & Dad's kitchen, as well as a few trips to Home Depot (mainly to cruise around in the "race cart.")

Projects seem to be taking a little longer, so nothing that we started this week is complete... but here are a few hints about what we've been up to...

We got a good start on this:

But then we spent some time doing this:


which led to this:

Which would you choose? Countertops: black vs. white

My Mom and Dad have been working on a major reno project this summer.  Well, actually, they started about a year ago, when they bought their 1980's house in Saskatoon.  They ripped out everything that they could live without, and painted absolutely every surface that was paint-able.  Even the old harvest gold appliances were painted to look like stainless steel!  Ha!

Finally, it is time for the new kitchen!!!  They are going for a look that is classic (but but not too traditional) and elegant (but still stylish).  The cabinets are white shaker style.  But here's the decision to be made... should the counter tops be black or white?  Dad likes black.  Mom likes white.  What do you think?  Here are some inspiration shots...

photo from House and Home

photo from Style at Home

photo from House and Home

photo from House and Home

photo from House & Home

photo from Style at Home

Lien on Me

OK... How do I start this story?  The ending is obvious based on the blog title... we now have a "builder's lien" against our house.  Crap.  But I guess I should start at the beginning:

Jeff and I hired a contractor about a month ago to tear down our brick fireplace wall and replace it with a new fireplace, some built-in cabinets and a new mantle.  It was a guy and his wife, we thought they seemed very professional, and they were available to start work the next day!  Hmmm... sounded great... we hired them!  Rookie mistake #1.

Now I have to interject Rookie mistake #2... where Jeff and I trusted the "verbal quote," and allowed them to start work before seeing a written estimate.  I know, I know... super lame of us. 

Anyways, the demo was finished in only 1 day, and it seemed like everything was going great... until we were hit with the bill.  The bill for the demo portion of the project was almost half of what the whole project was supposed to cost!  

At first, we were kind of stunned.  But then we started looking at the sketchy details:
  1. the guy didn't have his own equipment, so he charged us for the rental of the tools he needed
  2. the hourly rate was super high, and he charged out the same hourly rate for his teen-aged assistant
  3. when he showed up 3 hours late on the second day, he said that he was at the dump the whole time so we got charged the astronomical hourly rate for both he and the assistant for 3 hours of supposed "dump waiting time"...  (personally, I think he slept in)   
  4. we were charged more than twice what you would pay at a building supply store for the materials he purchased
  5. we were charged an extra $300 which was unsuccessfully hidden in the disposal fee for the bricks - when asked about it, he claimed that it was to make up for "the use of his truck"
Since we didn't have a written quote to start with, we couldn't really argue with the first 4 points.  But Jeff did phone the guy to explain that we weren't willing to pay for the hidden $300.  It was kind of awkward, but they did reduce the bill by $225.  So Jeff emailed them to say that we still weren't willing to pay the extra $75.  We got no reply, so we put the check in the mail, and kind of forgot about it.  Rookie mistake #3!!!

We received a letter from land titles this week informing us that there is a lien against our house for the full invoice amount!!!  Apparently, you can not file a lien for an amount less than $100, so the guy filed a lien for the full amount!  Even though the check was cashed weeks ago!

The End. 

  

First Day of School

I had a big cry last night about Jack starting kindergarten today.  He'll be away from me all day every day, and I know that I am going to miss him.  About a month ago, I was SO ready for school to start.  Now I feel so bad for thinking that!  I guess I should re-read Buddha Mom, learn to enjoy the moment.

Jack, however, woke up with a big grin on his face and an outfit in mind... his long sleeve button up "spiffy" shirt!    He was so proud to pack his lunch kit and new back pack for the first time.  He went to school happily and with no hesitation at all this year!  That made me happy!

For now, Beckett will still be at home with me.  He is registered for preschool, but needs to master the skill of "potty training" (ugh) before he is allowed to go.  So I'm going to enjoy hanging out with Beckett for the next couple of weeks, because before I know it he'll be a big boy too and be off to school every day.



This was the best picture we could get this morning, and it almost made us late for Jack's first day... 
why do kids always do weird faces when asked to smile?

Kid Art

I love my library shelves.  (I featured them in my last post.)  They are just a collection of Billy bookcases from IKEA, but I have so much fun styling them and switching them up.  Not only are they a great solution for our crazy stacks of books, but they also give me a place to display favorite items.  I love to feature kid art.  It's the best.  I just never get tired of it.  (Well, ok... I admit that I'm getting a little tired of all of Jack's gun-inspired art.  I hope this is just a phase... yikes!!!)

Here are some close-ups of non-gun-related artwork by Jack and Beckett:

Marker (in favorite colors) on pieces of wood that Grandpa Steve prepared.

Eiffel tower painting that Jack brought home from school last year.

OK... I decided to add one of the "gun" pictures.  It's pretty abstract, but it gives you the idea...

Some kind of Spider Man fight scene (... I think.)