Lamps

Today is Nester's Lampapalooza Party. Here's what I've got to show you . . .

Here's the thrift store lamp I bought for a couple bucks. This picture does not do its ugliness justice. A couple coats of oil rubbed bronze spray paint, add a new lampshade from my closet, throw a tassel at it . . .

Not bad!

Next up, my bathroom chandelier:

I love it, but I hated the chain. I really wanted to sew one of those cute cord covers but didn't have time. So I broke out the hot glue gun.

I cut a very long piece of extra fabric I had sitting in my "to do" pile, and I glued that sucker right on.

Well, I didn't actually glue it to the chain, but I did fold a little hem and glued that. Then I slipped it on the chain.
Can't even tell, can you? My one piece of advice if you try this is, try to go light on the hot glue. It's difficult to get the fabric to bunch up naturally if there is too much glue on it.
This is the most recent addition:

Mr. Jones replaced the nasty builder-brass lights out front. They were pretty cheap, and it made a huge difference.

For more Lampapalooza, stop by Nesting Place.

Budget Bathroom

The Nester has asked us all to share our 10 minute room makeovers inspired by her series called 10 Minutes to a Room You'll Love. Since I did this post before I found out about her party, I am just updating it.

I decorated my master bedroom with things I already had and/or things I got for an insanely great price. The paint wasn't a quick fix, however, but since I copied Nester's paint color, I thought it deserved a nod in this post as well.

My favorite thing in my bathroom is this iron chandelier I had when we moved into our house 3 years ago. It really makes the bathroom feel elegant. I couldn't stand the unsightly chain, though, so I got my glue gun out and glued some fabric right over it.

Recognize this paint color Nester fans? Tobacco Road (well, actually, the Tobacco Road knockoff recipe I got here).

I got this cute mirror from the local thrift store for a couple bucks. I love how the white looks next to Tobacco Road.

I did what Nester told me and hid the Crest, but I do have some silver pieces on a tray (all thrift store) that hold some Q-tips, and other stuff. Is that ok?

I needed some wall art, so I painted some old frames white and put in some pictures of my kiddos' feet at the beach.

This is not my first choice of window covering. I would love to hang some really nice fabric up there. But I'm on a big-time budget right now, and this was in my closet, so it will make do.

Got this cute rug at the thrift store. Brand new. Beautiful hooked rug. For a few bucks. It is a little more "tropical" than I would have picked if I could pick anything, but doesn't it go great with Tobacco Road? It warms up the white floor, too.

This is a pot I got from Home Depot a long, long time ago for not very much money. I just put a cheap little fern in it. Hopefully it won't die.

I like white towels. They look like you're at a nice hotel. They go with any colors. You can bleach the heck out of them. And it takes a little teeny extra time, but I like to roll them up. And when you redecorate a bathroom, you don't have to buy new towels!!

This little pedestal is another thrift purchase. I put some french soap on it by the tub. Some candles, too.

The other day, I did a little upgrade to the toilets. Sooooo easy. I'll show you in a few days.

The Nester's Show and Tell

Nester is hosting a Garland Show and Tell at her place today. I'm gonna have to make this one quick since my house is a wreck, we're hosting Mr. Jones' work party at our house this Friday, and I'm working this week. I'm also using last year's photos because I can't take pictures because I lost my camera battery charger!! I'm dying. Can't find it anywhere. Can't take pictures of ANYTHING. I will snap over this one thing, people.

So anyway, I think the banister garland is better this year because I found some beautiful ribbon, but the most important detail is the same ... pictures of my kiddos. Every year I add little frames with their pictures from the year. Take a look ...

Now, if I can find my battery charger, I'll show you some updated photos. Thanks for stopping by!

Mistreatment Club

This morning, the Nester is having a Window Mistreatment party for all of us who abuse windows. I wanted to have a brand new mistreatment to share with you, but since we just flew in from our California vacation, I didn't have any time. So I will share some oldies but goodies with you.

Here is my favorite. I covered the ugly white blinds in my laundry room to make a fake roman shade. If you want to see how I did it, here is the original post.

And this is what I did to the windows in my bedroom, after I painted the walls Tobacco Road.

Sooooo much better than before!!

Now I'm going to head on over to the party and see what everyone else has cooked up!

An Award and a Bedroom Re-do

This week, Sarah from Nesting in Pleasant View gave me these awards:

She and her sister, Christy, started their blogs because they moved away from each other and wanted to share their lives with each other through blogging. I started my blog for the same reason, when I moved from the West Coast to the East Coast. I, like them, was surprised when Internets started reading my blog, too, and they were actually nice, and shared my values, and they weren't freaky people from the internet, but really great people I call friends. That totally shocked me. They remind me about what's important, make me laugh, help me decorate my house, and inspire me. Honestly, I've never had one rude comment or had any obnoxious people cross my path. (Before blogging, I used to have a mom's group message board, and that group had people with no filters at all).

So Thank You for the nice awards Sarah, and I will bestow them on the following people:

Debbie at This is the Life, who is one funny mom, and we could all use a good laugh every day. It actually turns out that we are kinda' neighbors, and she spotted me at the store the other day! Wow, really small world.

Beautiful, amazing Sandy at For Reluctant Entertainers, who is the epitome of a generous hostess, and is teaching me what is important about entertaining and about being a mom and a homemaker.

Martha at Elizabeth Hill Cottage who is perhaps one of the funniest people I know, was my first blogging friend, she gives great house tours, and she picks out a mean dollhouse furniture ensemble.

One of my new favorite bloggers is Chris at Just a Girl. This will probably be a big surprise to her since I've just been blurking on her blog because I have been so busy this past week with vacation bible school. She has inspired me to get my picture frames on the wall, and I laughed hysterically when I saw her husband's contribution to decor because the EXACT same item has been added to my house. She's got great style and has done some really neat projects.

Melissa at The Inspired Room, not because she daily posts great photos of homes that I drool over and have no idea where she digs up all this stuff, but because she is an awesome chick. You'd think she'd be all snobby and everything because she has such a great blog, but nooooo, she is a really nice person!

And Kimba at A Soft Place to Land who shares my illness for painting furniture. My husband and my neighbors are always laughing at me because my hands and arms look like this:

But this is actually a picture of Kimba's hand, and when I saw it on her blog I knew we were soul sisters. I just love to see what this girlie is going to paint next.

And with that, I think I will just tag you all with these awards because you are all really cool, and I just wish I had an extra 24 hours in each day to read every blog and write to you all because you are all so nice, and your visits to my little blog are truly appreciated.

Your "official instructions" follow: Now go forth and share the love! To the recipients of the award... pick 5 blogs you consider deserving of this award, whether for creativity, design, interesting material, or contributions to the blogging community, no matter what language. Name each nominee and link to his/her blog. Show the award and include the name (and link to his/her blog) of whoever presented you with this award. Link to the Arte Y Pico blog so everyone knows the origin of this award. Post these rules

And now, some before and after pictures of my bedroom. I should be arrested for doing this to it:

And then, as evidenced by the paint splotches if you look closely, I tried to find the right neutral paint color to fix my mistake, with absolutely no success. Until one day, I read this post about Tobacco Road. And I actually printed the photo she took of the paint can and I marched down to Lowe's, and then I did this:

A little bit better? Oh, yeah. Then I took down those AWFUL curtains and mistreated the windows with some trusty toile. Toile is always good. And why do I have a love affair with fabric that has silly pictures of people on it? I have no clue. But I do.

I'm not finished, but I'm finished enough for the time being. I still need to paint the trim, as evidenced by the next photo:

I've also had piles of frames in my bedroom from when I moved 2 1/2 years ago. I couldn't quite bring myself to do anything with them, because the paint was dated and they had old studio photos of my kids. I wrestled with the guilt of not wanting to put dated pictures of my precious babies up. Then I realized ... I'm not throwing the kids away. I'm not even throwing the photos away. I'm just putting up different photos. So get over it. Out came the spray paint cans and a few photos downloaded to Target photo center later, we have some decorated walls in our house and one less pile.

I just love everyday photos of my kiddos. Some I did in black/white and others in sepia.

My next project in the room is to paint the furniture, but I just can't figure out what color to paint everything. This is cheap pine that we've had for a long time, and it is very scratched up. I love black, but I feel like I might have reached the legal limit of black furniture in my house. I just don't know. What do you think? Black, white, cream, some other color? I need your opinions.

I do love this color, and thanks to the Nester, my house is starting to shape up. So I think if anyone deserves those awards, she certainly does. Not only does she share all her fabulous ideas with us, but I'm so relieved that getting something done imperfectly is better than spending too much time making it perfect.

I Love Hot Glue

I've got another little project to show you. One that was waiting for perfection and time I don't have, so it was not happening. I have a chandelier in my bathroom that I love, but have never been happy with the way I hung it. I really wanted to sew one of those cute cord covers and put that over a straight chain. So one day I thought, WWND? (what would Nester do?) Well the answer was easy:

I do know how to sew quite well, but why would I do that when I can spend my extra time with my precious kiddos?! And who is going to get up on a ladder and inspect my sewing anyway?!! I cut a very long piece of extra fabric I had sitting in my "to do" pile, and I glued that sucker right on.

Well, I didn't actually glue it to the chain, but I did fold a little hem and glued that. Then I slipped it right on the chain.
Can't even tell, can you? My one piece of advice if you try this is, try to go light on the hot glue. It's difficult to get the fabric to bunch up naturally if there is too much glue on it.

Sooooo much better.

And here is another lady who is helping me get over my perfectionism:

I have a HUMONGOUS pile of pictures to be scrapped, and it just stresses me out. I thought when I finally got a scrap room to work in, it would get better. But it didn't. So I picked up this book written by Stacy Julian about how she organizes her photos and gets them into books. It totally annihilates the old chronological scrapping method most of us cling to. I really, really, really love this book, and I'm photographing the transformation of my scrap room as I go through this process. I will share it with you once I get a little more work done on it (The "before" pictures are just too embarrassing).

Has anyone else read this book?

Helloooo, is anyone out there?

You are, I know it. Because that is why you guys are such great friends. I've been lame, not posting, not commenting, not visiting. But you people will show up again like you always do. I love ya. My excuses? I started working (earning and not spending -- it's a great feeling), sports x 3 kids, 3 kids period, Mr. Jones MIA at work, vacation, PTO over-commitment, etc., etc., blah blah blah, whine, whine, whine. But now that summer is here I will try to fit a little posting and commenting in here and there.

So I did a little project this morning ala The Nester and her window mistreatments inspiration. This is the window in my laundry room. It's so boring I could fall asleep right there on the spot. I was going to take the blinds down and tack some fabric on instead, but I didn't want to spend any money on upholstery tacks. So I used what I had. I was in Calico Corners Outlet (Oh yeah, I just happened to drive by this store when we were cruising through Amish country in PA and I made Mr. Jones stop) and I saw that their valances/blinds were all on little board frames that stuck out of the wall, so I had an idea.
My blinds stick right out of the door just like CC's valance frames, so I just broke out the glue gun and glued some fabric right on that bad boy.

I glued it across the top and then folded and glued again on the sides, like this:

I used a bigger piece of fabric that I folded in half, and I hot glued the seam so it wouldn't show. Then I hot glued some scrap trim I picked up at CC Outlet. Look at how crooked and imperfect it is.

Then, I just got some big safety pins and pinned the pleats in the back. All done. So easy. So fast. If you look up close you will find all kinds of things wrong with it, but who's going to be inspecting window coverings in my laundry room?!! My family will notice right away, of course, because you know they use this room to do laundry and get cleaning supplies all the time. Not really. I'm glad I didn't wait until I had time to sew perfect blinds. Cuz it would have stayed like the first picture for a few more years.

So the finished product is great because I still have the blinds and can actually close them if I care to. I probably won't though.

Here is something else from my laundry room. I stuck one of those tool peg boards from The Home Depot on the wall to hold my stuff. Apparently you are supposed to put two boards on the wall and mount it to that, but I didn't. I just stuck it right to the wall. I drive Mr. Jones nuts with all the horrible things I do to our walls.

Here's a closeup of the rooster hook that really doesn't hold anything. It just looks cute.

And here's a picture of what my laundry room floor looks like. Just keepin' it real. In case you thought I was clean or organized or something.

I took one more look at the final product, and thought my thrift store lamp might look great in there. A little ambiance while I'm working. I'm worth it.