A New Kind of DIY

I'm as new to yard work as I am to home ownership. Growing up, I had no interest in helping my mom in the garden, and I sure as hell wasn't helping my dad mow the lawn. As an adult, gardening peaked my interest. I like being outdoors, and I love to eat like to cook. It seemed like an obvious choice once we had a yard of our own.

The problem with our yard is that we have a lot of shade. It was difficult finding a spot that got enough consistent sun to effectively grow a vegetable garden. We also wanted to use an area that the dog wouldn't get into (she really likes tomatoes). There was one area in our yard that met both of these criteria, but it definitely wasn't the most convenient spot.

{via Trulia}

I forgot to take a "before picture," so I had to use one from the old real estate listing! Do you see that nice little brick retaining wall to the right of the playset? It's isolated, it's sunny, and it's covered in vegetation. I figured two out of three wasn't too bad, so I grabbed a shovel and a rake and got to work. It turned out that this "vegetation" was a giant and deeply rooted azalea bush (as well as a shit ton of poison ivy, but that's another story for another day). I also discovered that the land behind this retaining wall was pretty hilly. So, not only did I have to clear the area, I had to grade the land.

Look at all that junk I got to throw away! What a mess.

Once all of that was over with, I lined the back side of the garden area with some cinder blocks that we had lying around. Then, I planted rosemary, thyme, sage, oregano, basil, tomatoes, jalapeño peppers, and bell peppers in the ground. I planted the lavender in the cinder blocks to give it a nice border. I planted the mint in a pot and then dug the pot into the ground. I had read that mint tends to take over gardens, so I hoped this strategy would help to contain the roots. Finally, I used some stones that we had lying around to create a path between my rows of crops.

It's now been about a month since I began my gardening adventure. We've enjoyed two red bell peppers (yay for fajitas!), countless herbs, and we've almost got a jalapeño! Some days it looks better than others...it's definitely been a lesson in patience! I'm still learning when to water, when not to water, when to prune, and when to just let it be. It's been quite an experience so far, and I'm excited to see how much I can get out of it during Year One!

Office Redo

When you walk through the front door of our house, the first room on the left was very empty and very boring.

We decided to make it Dave's office, which meant that the first item on the to do list was to paint it a "legal color."

Recently, we started to furnish it. Dave really wanted cherry wood to go with his merlot walls, so we found a couple of small tables at some antique stores. We found a particleboard desk on Amazon for like $200...hey, it looks like cherry wood and that's close enough! Real cherry wood probably would have tacked a zero onto that price.

My favorite feature in the new room are these brass scales of justice that we found at a flea market.

The room still needs a lot of work. Since it's near the front door, it echoes a lot of noises from the dog terrorizing greeting everyone who comes to our door. An area rug would be nice. Also, we'd like to create built in bookshelves along the long wall. We had someone come out for an estimate, but they suggested it would cost about $7K to do it their way sooo now we're investigating DIY Ikea options on Pinterest. I don't care how we get it done as long as it has a sliding ladder.

{by Disney / via The Designer Lifestyle}

Does anyone else share the ladder obsession with me?

Upstairs Reveal

When we first moved into our new home, I showed you how we had decorated and furnished the main level. A few months later, I showed you my craft room's furniture, wall art, and my DIY mural. And now, it's time to take this party upstairs. No, not like that!

At the top of the stairs, we have this little landing that seemed perfect for a small seating area.

I'm hoping to decorate up here with leafy things to go along with that tree candelabra. For now, I just have this wedding photo display on the opposite wall:

We were very lucky in that the guest bath was recently updated before we moved in. I love the checkerboard tile.

I know I said my downstairs sunroom is my favorite room in the house, but I'm really proud of this guest room, too. I wanted to do a beach-themed room, but I didn't want it to look so beachy that it would only belong in a beach house. I thought about making the theme more preppy or nautical, but I thought it'd be more fun to make it seaglass and driftwood themed.

I found these shelves at a local flea market, and I found the nicknacks at random antique stores.

We used this chair in our wedding to rest our programs on:

I found this mirror at the same flea market:

My favorite part of the room is the photo collage in the corner. I took the lighthouse photo in Nantucket, and I took the sailboat photo in Martha's Vineyard. As for the other two 8x10s, those were taken on the same small beach in South Shore, Massachusetts. The bottom right is me and my sister, circa 1993. The top left is me and my husband, in 2009. My family has gone to that beach for four generations (since they've been in this country), and we plan to take a fifth generation there someday. The collage includes vintage postcards from that same beach.

The master bedroom is a bit more manly with gray walls and navy sheets, but I love it's modern yet classic look.

So, what do you think?! Which is your favorite room so far?

An Ambitious Adventure

I consider myself to be good at crafting, but I know my limits. I consider myself to be creative, but not necessarily artistic. I've gotten in over my head before with DIY projects, and I know when to put down the glue and glitter and walk away. When I envisioned what I wanted to do with the fourth wall of my craft room, I really thought this was going to be one of those times.

You may or may not know this about me: I'm a big Disney geek, and my latest favorite is Disney/Pixar's Up. In fact, it inspired my husband's proposal, so it now holds an even more special place in my heart. We ended up with a hot air balloon motif throughout our wedding, and I walked down the aisle to the Academy Award winning song "Married Life" from the film. I guess it's sort of stuck, and now Up is kind of our thing.

If you've seen the movie, you may recall the painting that Ellie drew above their fireplace mantle. It was a painting of Paradise Falls, a place where she and Carl planned to travel together. More importantly, Paradise Falls symbolized their hopes and dreams, their love of adventure, and their love of sharing adventures together.

{via Locus}

I love the fact that Ellie figuratively placed their home atop the mountain. To me, it just reiterates that love is the most important part of this adventure.

{via starting small}

So, of course I decided that I could totally paint this on my craft room wall and that this project was totally within my skill level!

As soon as I started sketching out the design, I wondered what I had gotten myself into.

But, I figured I had made it this far, and I may as well keep going. At worst, I could always paint over it. So, I began by painting a blue oval for the background. Then, I colored in the rocks...

...then I painted the waterfall...

...and finally, I painted our home on the top of the mountain. Well, it would look like our home if our home was mustard yellow and lime green.

I was so ridiculously proud of how it turned out. I think it was a good project for someone with limited painting skills because I didn't need to worry about perspective or shading, and the fact that my brushstrokes show just gives it more character.

My favorite part is how the balloon mobile casts its shadows just next to the painting. It adds an element of movement that I really couldn't have imagined.

I learned a lot from this little project: If you're ever feeling intimidated by a DIY project, just go for it. We've all been there. It doesn't always work out. But every once in a while, it does...and it's so worth it.

Deck the Walls

In case you're new around here, the brief update is that I recently turned a very office-like room into a whimsical, colorful craft room. We found some quirky Craigslist gems and completely furnished the room for under $200. The next step was to add even more personality to the walls. I really wanted the room to inspire me - to write, to sew, to create a bunch of crap even if I was the only one in the world who thought it was beautiful. This room was going to be my artistic outlet.

I started by painting one entire wall with chalkboard paint. I've had a couple of people mention to me that there's such a thing as a magnetic base coat to make it even more chalkboard-esque. I've also heard that white chalkboard paint exists (that is, you can blend it with any color to create a colorful chalkboard). I don't have any experience with either of these concepts, but I'd love to hear from you if you've dabbled in this area in your home! Either way, I wanted to pass along those ideas. Having a giant chalkboard in a craft room makes my whole life feel more organized (and it helps with my attention span if I get distracted and need to doodle); I highly recommend it.

Anyway, I added a clip garland that I got at Target to the wall above my sewing machine. I might use this in the future to display fabric swatches that I'm working with, but for now, it has some of my favorite pieces of inspiration. It's like a tangible Pinterest!

First, we have a photo of my dog when she was a puppy. She looks exactly the same now, but her corgi ears looked a little bigger back then; I suppose she grew into them a little.

Next, we have a UF button. I think that's pretty self-explanatory.

Next, I attached one of my favorite DIY projects of all time: the save the date from our wedding.

Next, I found a card that my aunt had given me in 1992. The front of the card has a pastel illustration that she drew of a beach that our family visits often.

After that, I have a button that my sister gave me when I got engaged. The bridesmaids all had "bridesmaid" buttons, and our moms had "mother of the bride" and "mother of the groom." It was a fun way to feel important during showers and such.

Next, I have my name tag from my trip to New Orleans with some Weddingbee girls. It reminds me of where my passion for blogging really began, and that makes me smile.

Finally, I have a birthday card that my sister gave me a few years ago. It's letterpress and it has a mermaid on it. It's pretty much one of my favorite pieces of paper ever, and that's saying something for me.

On the opposite wall, I decided to hang up some artwork. I'd had my eye on this one particular print for quite some time:

{image by wattsalot / via Etsy}
Pin It

I saw Sarah Watts of wattsalot when I first visited ICE Atlanta. And again at the next one. And again at the one after that. So why didn't I buy one of her prints at one of those events? Frankly, I was having trouble deciding.

{via wattsalot}

Pin It

I adore Sarah's style because she perfectly melds Southern tradition with modern, indie charm...which is exactly who Atlanta is.

{via wattsalot}

Pin It

I mean, how can you not love someone who comes up with something like this?!

{via wattsalot}

Pin It

So yes, I finally decided on the "Gritz" print. Then, I added a couple of accents on either side:

The photo on the left is by Pretty Petal Studio. I made the one on the right...any guesses what those numbers mean?

I'm saving the fourth and final wall for a separate post. I'm just that excited about it.

What do you put on your walls to help you draw inspiration?

Crafting for the Type A

Now that my craft room is painted and furnished, I needed to get organized. This is a challenging concept for me in a craft room because it can get so overwhelming. Normally, I enjoy organization, sorting, and yes, even cleaning. What can I say? It makes me feel like I have control!

{via i heart cosmetics}

With crafts, however, the clutter just seems to build. I always buy too many supplies for a project and end up with random leftovers that I refuse to throw away. How did I end up with 14 dowels, a dozen beads that don't match, and patches of fabric that aren't big enough to do anything with? Well, I've found use for things like that before, so I hoard hang onto them just in case. The problem is that there's no order. I need to find a way to sort through all of these random materials so that I can access them easily in the future...without going insane in the meantime.

Naturally, I looked to Pinterest for some organization inspiration. Here's what I came up with:

{via Francine Clouden}

{via Sew Many Ways}

{via Epheriell Designs}

{via Craftaholics Anonymous}

{via Project Pretty}

{via Scrapbook.com}

Which one is your favorite? Do you have any tips for organizing crafting tools?

One Man's Trash

Those of you who followed me over here from Weddingbee know how obsessed I am with antique stores. I'm a sucker for shabby chic decor. Maybe it's trendy, but I just can't get enough of shabby pieces of furniture and their little imperfections. It's like each piece has a story behind it. This look is quite the opposite of my husband's style; thus, most of our home consists of compromised design so that we can both be happy. But when it came time to furnish my newly painted craft room, I knew I wanted to stick with furniture that was more my style. After all, it's my room!

I shopped around for a few weeks (and stalked Craigslist like it was my job), and finally ended up with three perfect pieces. Best of all, I didn't spend a penny over my budget of $200!

Here's my husband putting the hardware on my Craigslist cabinet:

The cabinet is a combination of plastic and wood that has been painted white. I haven't decided if I want to distress it or not. For now, it's just solid white. I also found a distressed desk and chair set on Craigslist. The chair seat looks like a poodle's butt, but I bought fabric to recover it as an easy update (stay tuned). My favorite piece that I bought, however, was an old sewing table that I found at one of my favorite antique stores. The tabletop was missing, and had been replaced with painted wood - perfect to hold my new sewing machine!

I found the little garland at Target. It has five clips on it to hold pieces of inspiration, and it sticks to the wall easily.

What are your favorite treasures that you've found in someone else's leftovers?

Live Colorfully

Do you like my post title? Do you know where it's from? I'll give you a hint: I ripped it off from one of my favorite designers.

Speaking of designers, today I wanted to talk about some interior design. But what in the world could I be talking about if the title of this post is "live colorfully?" Paint. My husband and I painted all weekend, and I've got the aching biceps to prove it!

When we first moved in, we hired painters to paint our red kitchen a dark gray, to paint our pink guest room a pool blue, and to paint our yellow master bedroom a light gray (photos of those last two rooms coming soon). Those rooms were kind of tricky to paint (and we hadn't purchased a ladder yet), so I'm glad we paid to have them done. Most of the house was fortunately painted in colors we would have chosen, but there were still a couple more rooms that we wanted to redesign. Now that we had been in for a couple of months (and had purchased a ladder), we decided to go the DIY route and paint these rooms ourselves.

Upon entering our home, the first room on the left is a large room that the previous owners used as a playroom. We hadn't used it as anything yet. It's just a giant, green, empty room.

 After much brainstorming (about how my husband could have a lawyer office that smelled of rich mahogany) and much dreaming (about how I could play Belle in a library with a sliding ladder), we decided to turn this room into a study. In order to create this room in a way that lives up to the standards we imagined, we'll probably have to do it little by little over the course of a year or two. We're talking about building shelving, shopping for a couple of leather chairs, and updating my husband's desk set. For now, we decided to start this project with a change from the serene green to a more vibrant garnet.

The other room we wanted to paint was my beige craft room in the basement. I wanted a room that was whimsical and inspiring. We decided to paint three of the walls with the same pool blue paint that we used in the guest room.

For the fourth wall, I had a different plan. What's more whimsical and inspiring than an entire wall of chalkboard?!

These two rooms took two days, on and off, to paint ourselves. It was nice to have someone else paint for us, but doing it ourselves was so much more gratifying. We were incredibly proud of ourselves, and we had fun in the process! I mean, any serious project demands some not-so-serious moments:

Intense tape ball is intense. And look! I'm making an intense face.

Chelsea was exhausted from not helping.

Stay tuned! More on my craft room later.