Craft Room

 Just before we decided to move from our previous house, I finished the last two rooms in our house. Like literally, a couple days before. Isn't that the way it always works. You live in a place for years, and finally get it all beautiful, and perfect, and then you have to give it to someone else. BOO!

Well, at least I got to enjoy this craft room for a month or two, before the whole thing was packed into boxes. The craft supplies you see here, unfortunately, are only about half of what I really have. I know, it seems crazy. It felt crazy when they dumped all the "craft room" labeled boxes in the new study. There wasn't a bit of floor showing....obviously I have a craft addiction problem! 

My new place is coming along, but it's really more function, than form right now. My Etsy business is doing really well, as is my craft booth at a local shop here in town, so I'm working in the space during all of my free time (aka midnight), so it had to be usable. 

It's not to say that this room wasn't usable, because it was. My stuff just seemed to grow on the open  shelves, and I kept running out of room. I purchased two of these shelving units from Ikea, "Gorm". They are super budget friendly, at about $30 each. They are made of unfinished pine. I used a thinned-out stain, and rubbed it on with a staining pad, just to give it a little color. 

 

For storage I used white boxes from Micheals. They usually run $1.00-$3.00, with sales. The look simple enough, and let all my fun decor stand out. 

So if you don't already know, I have a major bird obsession!!

 Like, my family calls me the crazy bird lady... it's fine, I have excepted it :)  and hey, they keep buying me stuff to add to my collection. So I guess it hasn't gotten too out of hand......yet. My craft room is where most of it ends up, so this room had to have color, and lots of it. 

These little birds below are my favorite. I picked up three at Round Top last year. I would have gotten more, but my friend talked some sense into me. 

What are friends for! 

They are made from wood and hand painted, and they sit on top of a piece of drift wood. 

Here are some fun, colorful, and affordable alternatives, to the ones I have in my room. 

These are by 5 Love Birds Nest on Etsy. I'm definitely going to need a few of these ;)

    

On each shelf, I used my supplies as the decor. Alot of what I have, already is full of color. So on the neutral shelving and white boxes, the items really stand out. I did consider painting the rack a color, but I felt like it would have been to busy. 

Flower frogs, hold little note cards.

Above the shelving, in the blank space, I used some large laminated bird cards, that I received as a gift. These cards are about 8"x10", and are numbered with different types of birds. Calendar cut outs could work here as well, or just a collection of prints. 

Here are some beautiful bird prints, that you could use instead, from "Wild Heart Histories" on Etsy.

Love these!!!

      

These color birds on stands, are from West Elm. They have a wire stand, which makes it easy to bend, and mount on them on a wall. I used books to help make a color theme for each shelf.

The birds are no longer available at West Elm, but these Seedpod birds are a good alternative.

This fun chair sculpture came from Urban Outfitters, a fun way to hang jewelry or little nick-knacks.

On the other side of room hang curtians from Ikea. They had a fun red tree print, and at only $12 a pair, they were a great deal,. 

The cabinet is an antique, made by my great, great Grandfather. 

I showed you how I updated this piece on the To Paint or Not To Paint-Antique Furniture.

Before

I used this piece to house some of my painted animals. 

Above it hangs a little collection of art. The "No Rest for the Awesome" sign, was a gift from my best friend, she thinks I'm awesome :) She got it on Etsy from Printed Palette, they have all sorts of great prints.  The hoop art is from one of my favorite shops Three Red Apples on Etsy, I had this piece custom made. The inspirational quote, "and if not, he is still good", is from Raising Up Rubies on Etsy.

More amazing birds! How beautiful are these Bali Starlings?!?

A small couch is on the other side of the room, is the perfect for relaxing....which I never did, not once! But the kids did hang out on it while I worked. 

Since it is a small love seat size, all it needed was two small pillows. The bug pillow was from Target. The striped pillow I made from a sample swatch of fabric, which was discontinued at Calico Corners (and it was free, score).

Here is how the love seat started.

 It was in my moms office for years, and my parents brought it down with some other furniture after my Grandmother passed away. The color was a bit worn, but it was a good solid piece. 

I picked up this great linen textured, coral duvet from Target. It was on clearance for $20!!

I cut it up, and reupholstered the love seat with this. 

The end table was also from Target, but I didnt like the color of the wood, so I painted it in a mint color, to go with the room.

On the wall, I made a little collection of bird things. The antiqued paper print was lacking color, so I painted just a few things on the picture to make them stand out. A West Elm bird, is mounted to the wall above the galvanized shelf.

 In the shelf, fat quarters of fabric are grouped by color. 

The bird print here, is from Jones Design Company. She has all sorts of inspirational, and religious prints. 

A three tiered wire rack, was perfect for holding my tubes of paint. Found this at Hobby Lobby for around $30 on sale. 

I wont show you the whole work table, since it's usually a disaster, but I will tell you that I found a really great drop leaf table, for around $100. It was wide enough to keep the sides down and still have a good sized work space, but skinny enough not take up a bunch of the rooms space. I can pop up one side of the table, so if one of the kids wants to do some art work, it wont disturb what I'm working on. Here is some more of my storage solutions. An antique bread pan, holds my rolls of ribbon. 

This pan has been used for lots of decorating and storage needs over the years. It's held shells, fall decor, Christmas ornaments, the options are endless. These can be found at antique stores, and on Etsy, at shops like Pickers Warehouse, and Territory Hard Goods.

Sadly, this is no longer my craft room, but I like my new one, which I hope I'll get around to showing you before I move out of here!
I'll show you the last couple or rooms, from the old house soon.
You can check out most the house, HERE, or at the top of the page, under "My House".

Shabby-Beach Bedroom

This year my daugther turned 12, my how the time flies! 

In our last home she wanted a princess mural, she gave me all the details, and I painted it. 

It fit her age at the time. 

For the past two years (in this house), she has been living in an unfinished room.  I know....you'd think I would focus on her bedroom before, lets say, my bathroom....but truthfully, I just wasn't sure exactly what I wanted to do. She trusted me to make it great, just expressing a love for the beach. I love the beachy style myself, half my house is beachy, but I ran into three problems. 1) Trying to make sure it didn't look like the rest of the house. 2)We don't live close to a beach, so it couldn't be to themey. 3) Making it fit a tween, into her teens. 

I wish I could say I had some long weekend of working on it, and had some sort of big reveal....but this room has been coming together for over a year, one piece at a time. I think she appreciates it more, seeing how it all came together, that rooms don't just get slapped together. 

Though, she may have just felt a bit neglected in the design department. 

I tried to go with shabby chic, meets the beach in here. Not a whole lot of bright colors, keeping it simple. So if she starts to grow out of it, I can tweak a few things, to change the mood of the room.  

When we started, she wanted everything white, white walls, bedding, all of it. I couldn't go quite that white, especially for a girl who is super active (and messy). So we brought in some shades of aqua and a little pop of yellow.

Since the headboard was the real statement in the room, I opted for the focal wall to be on a different wall. You may have heard me talk about this "Herringbone Shuffle" stencil before....I wanted this for the longest time, but didn't have anywhere to put it. I finally broke down and ordered it anyways, hoping to stick it in one of the girls rooms. 

It was the perfect addition for the room, and she LOVES it. 

This stencil is a bit tricky, I'll give you the simple how-to here soon. I ended up using 7 colors...a major undertaking! But I think it was worth it in the end.

Trying to figure out what to put on this wall, had been a hard decision. I finally found this fun piece in Round Top, a couple of weeks ago, at one of my favorite antique shops from back home, Old Glory. I knew it was the perfect fit. The reclaimed-trim frame, holds an antiqued piece of zinc, which makes the perfect spot to hang up some pictures with magnets, and you can even jot down some notes with chalk!
And how great that it matched the worn look of the bed.

 My favorite part of the room, is the headboard piece. This was so fun to find and put together. I collected some parts from an old table,  a piece of a bed, and a door...and made them into a headboard. It was not very cool looking before the paint job, which is probably why my husband thought I was nuts! The shutter nightstands, were a recent addition, another one of my crazy schemes, that I roped my husband into helping me with.  A friend had given me 2 sets of shutters, and I knew I had to turn them into something awesome. We wired in the scones, putting a switch just under the headboard, within arms reach.

The easy tutorial for making this whole thing is coming soon!!

She used to have a sea urchin lamp on a side table, and after knocking it over 3 times in her sleep, it couldn't be fixed a third time  :( 

These scones, give off just the right amount of light, and mounted to the wall, it's near impossible to knock these off. 

 The bedding is sort of a mish-mosh. The white duvet and shams, are from Target. The duvet at the foot of the bed, and matching pillows, are from Pottery Barn.
I couldn't find sheets that I liked, that had any color, so I made my own. Using white sheets we already owned, I added a 8" strip of fabric across the top, trimmed with a yellow ruffle. The throw pillow was made from a coordinating fabric. I tried to keep anything beachy out of the bedding, so it was easy to change it later (cause we have a love for change in this house). 

 For all the pieces to make the bed, and nightstands, it cost me about $50. The sconces (from Target) were about $25 a piece. Not bad for a $100 project...I'm not even sure you can buy a new headboard for that, much less nightstands to go with it!

We brought in a bit of the beach, in some of the desk and dresser decor, nothing permanent.

The dresser, is a piece of unfinished furniture from Ikea. This was a really inexpensive option, at $149. Then you can customize it, to fit your room. 

To get the distressed finish...I first stained the wood, then I brushed on a wax based product in certain areas ( this keeps the paint from sticking and makes it easier to sand later). The final layer was the latex-based coat in a turquoise. Once it had set for a couple hours, I went back with some sand paper, and roughed up the areas that had the wax. The paint comes off with less effort this way. I didn't even seal this piece, since it was unfinished. If it gets banged up over time, it adds to the character. I bought some fun yellow metal, and glass knobs at Hobby Lobby.

The rocker is a family piece, and has moved all over, in all of the places I've lived. Originally used by my grandmother to rock my father, and then to rock me and my siblings, and has been used for each of my kids. Now that my kids have grown out of being rocked :(   my oldest daughter has adopted this as her "reading spot". We opted not to paint this, as it is a special piece.

The paper garland was made by my daughter, in one of our weekly, craft project nights.  A very simple project (that you can see how to do here), that she did all by herself. It was a fun contribution to her room.

Where to find it:

Wall color, is Whispering Spring by Benjamin Moore

Wall stencil, Herringbone Shuffle at Royal Design Studio.

White bedding, Simply Shabby Chic, Pieced Lace Mesh Duvet Set, at Target.

The patterned duvet is form Pottery Barn Kids, "Medallion Organic". It is no longer available online, but I did find some on Ebay.

Whale art above bed, is from Home Goods. You can find similar versions on Etsy,  Here and Here

Sconces are from Target, but are no longer available. Here is one that is similar.

Framed metal board, Old Glory  (my favorite antique shop)

Glass jars, Hobby Lobby.

Accent fabrics, Hobby Lobby.

You can find the Herringbone Stencil How-To Here, and the Door Headboard & Shutter Nightstand How-To Here 

This room was also featured on Work It Wednesday!