Painting a Fireplace...

Now that my family room with the fireplace has been remodeled the tile really bugs me.  I'm not sure what the solution is, I haven't quite worked it out yet. 

Someone I know just bought a house and said she is thinking of painting the beige brick.  I kinda wish my fireplace had brick because after looking at photos of fireplaces that were painted, it seems like a pretty cheap and easy fix!  Much easier to solve than tile problems.  So if you have  brick fireplace and were thinking of painting, here are some nice inspirations (hint: white usually is a winner...it's far and away your safest bet, but there ARE other options if you're brave)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Ongoing Project: A New Office & Library

Remember last month when I blogged about this  if you dont remember you're welcome to go check it out.  But basically I was announcing my intent to start a new project.  Projects take me time.  And the first part is always just the idea part.

So I know I want an office & library, and I know I want it to feel really great and polished, but also comfy and a smidge sophisticated girly maybe.  But that's about all I was sure about.

I was totally torn on color.  But for the past two years I have been obsessed with the idea of a peacock blue room.

Yesterday I came across two pillows the EXACT PERFECT peacock blue.

Kinda like these colors:

You have no idea how excited this made me.  I have been looking for something in the exact correct color all this time.  I now have something I can take into Dunn Edwards and get them to match it to the exact exact color I want.  So now that is making me want to re-paint my family room in these colors too - white with at least one accent wall in this strong color.

Guys.

I'm so excited.

Now to empty out the room and start painting.  I'll keep you updated.  I'm sure it will take me months to get it all finished.  But sometimes coming up with the perfect idea is the hardest part.  

Major Room Make-Over - Sophisticated Chic

I am very PROUD to finally reveal the photos of the room remodel project for Jordan's room which received the finishing touch of a chandelier today.

Remember this project?  Yeah I know, it was a while ago that I started this!

Here are some before photos:

Too bad I didn't really capture how kind of awful the room was before.  Emerald green carpet, yellow and lavender walls, and a general feeling of sadness.  The bed was a massive bunk bed which almost reached the ceiling and became quite cumbersome to climb in and out of - it was meant to leave enough room for a desk underneath, but in effect, it just made the room seem unwieldy and uncomfortable in general.  Nothing really matched and the IKEA dresser we had broke beyond repair.

We started out by putting a million paint chips up on the wall to find the perfect pink.  It was hard!  It took weeks just to get through this part.  It needed to be the perfect pale pink - not so light that you wouldn't realize it was pink, but not dark at all.  Subtle as possible while still being obviously pink and no harsh tones or bubblegummy.  Sophistication was the word and the thing we were looking for.

Once we got everything out of the room we started ripping up the carpet.  Originally I was going to have people come lay new carpet.  But I was getting impatient with certain budgetary constraints of this project and opted to start ripping into it with the help of my kids.  We cut if out with a kitchen knife thank you very much.  

(this carpet survived baby and toddlerhood and preschool and elementary school and all 3 kids lived in this room at one point - you can imagine how bad it had gotten - oh and every time our old dog was sick he went in this room to throw up on this carpet!)

Once we got the carpet and the pad up and thrown into the trash (not that easy of a feat in case you were wondering) we found the old stick on tiles that were underneath.  I said let's chisel those up and get to the old brown concrete floors underneath.  I knew they were there because when we got the loan for the house FHA made us carpet.  Some tiles came off easily.  Other had to be chipped one tedious spot at a time.  

If you're going to scrimp somewhere - don't scrimp on the paint!  I love Dunn Edwards.  

Can you imagine how fun this project was to clean up all those little pieces of tile?  Holy cats.

So for month we toiled away at this project.  My fantastic friend Shannon found us the dresser and the vanity for free!  I repainted them in a "shabby" style with a slightly off white paint.  She also found us the chandelier and night stand.  Jordan's dad bought her a new bed at his place and let her move this bed to our house.  I shopped at Ikea for bedding and curtains and made the curtains that are on the closet door.  We made our own artwork by printing black and white photos that represented places - one for Paris, London, Hollywood, New York and Rome.  These "collage" things have kind of become a signature project for me.  I love making them.  We did the same thing on the back of her door but with black and white photo copies of pictures of Jordan from the time she was a baby up to and including a few recent photos.  In the end I think it turned out fantastic!  

The end result is a sophisticated shabby pink room for teenage girl.  We're very happy!  

Enjoy the afters:

Ikea Bedding, Artwork by me

free vanity, already had the shabby chair, free mirror (Jordan eventually went over to Shannon's one day to do work off some of our "free")

We just think these are darling even though there's rarely a chance to wear them.  

I love how the light filters through these gray sheers in the late afternoon (Ikea sheers)

There are two of these mirrors - one above the vanity, and one to check your make up before you walk out the door

Place for her change and a bobby pin holder she made in pottery class.  The lamp is vintage with a new shade - my son bought us the lamp at a rummage sale for couple of bucks. 

My oldest son used these in a mural project outside.  Jordan co-opted the cut-outs for her wall. 

This cupboard of dolls is vintage as well. It was not only mine when I was a little girl but it was also my aunts when she was a little girl.  Most of the dolls are story book dolls.  

I couldn't resist a photo of her cute post-it notes...she's the best.

I made a curtain for the closet door from material purchased at Michael Levine when I was in LA - it was on sale in bulk so this whole curtain probably cost about a buck. 

part of the back of her door

We just decoupaged the heck out of that thing.  Jordan did most of the door by herself.  It was her idea after I did the other art work.  And best part - it was FREE!  :)

Fairly inexpensive Ikea rugs I laid on top of the cement floors.  I bought three of them to cover most of the room where you walk.  

It's kinda great yes?

What I learned from Pinterest...

Sometimes Pinterest gets a bit of a bad rap.  It seems that there are a significant amount of people who think it's nothing more than lady porn - looking at pretty food, pretty rooms, pretty vacations and some pretty men.  I'll admit there is something to that criticism.

It's interesting to look at the main page of Pinterest.  It's a little like being able to glimpse the psyche of the collective women of the world.  Besides recipes, jewelry, clothes and wedding ideas, there are a fair amount of body anxiety, inspirational thoughts and snarky commentary on the world that women inhabit.  A women is somewhat likely to pin a photo of the perfect chocolate chocolate chip cookie two seconds after she pins the photo of the girl with washboard abs with some slightly anorexic (pro-ana) sentiment attached to it.  There's nothing quite like Pinterest to expose the borderline psychotic relationship with have with food and exercise.

We want it all.  We want our cake and our abs.  We want Ryan Gosling and that JCrew jacket.  We want great hair and a vacation in the Maldives.  We will pin the photo of the Chanel nail polish, even though we know that in the end we probably won't want to spend $30 on a bottle of it, when we can get Essie on sale at Walgreens.

But I would argue this is kind of a good thing about Pinterest.  Pinterest gives us a chance to explore the possibilities.

But Pinterest has also given me a lot of great ideas - things I've actually used, things I've made, things I've cooked.  I actually think it's been a pretty positive thing for me.  It organizes my thoughts and my desires in a way that I never was able to do before.

Here are things I actually made or did in the past few months because of Pinterest:

Yesterday we made 5 of these for Jordan.  5 in one day and I don't sew!  Thanks to a great tutorial on pinterest. 

This is a genius idea.  I went to the Container store and got a big jar to put in the fridge.  Right now it has Watermelon and Rosemary water in it.  Such a delicious way to make your own nearly calorie free vitamin water! 

I used a lot of the ideas I saw on pinterest for the wedding open house.  

These did not work out this way and we ended up going with regular cotton candy, and separately passing out glow sticks.  But it's a cool concept. 

Bought some of these after seeing this photo and remember how much I've always loved them.

Made a TON of these.  Turned out really well and super cool.  

Delicious and very healthy!

Yeah, he's super cute.  But it got me to look up info on him, find out that he had a british tv show that I'd never seen, and I'm still catching up with the episodes on netflix.  I really like the show - LUTHER.  

Good, but next time I'm making them bigger (lemon monkey bread)

This is my family's newest favorite.  Seriously, my crock pot doesn't make enough of this.

Everyone really liked this too.  I'll definitely be making it again.  

Perhaps this pin going around sums it up better than anything else:

If you want to follow my pins, or find out the original source of the pins I blogged about here, you can find me on pinterest here:  http://pinterest.com/bandanamom/