One finished corner...

Valentine surprise

I have a bedroom update, but first, have you ever tried to gift balloons on an extremely windy day?  It doesn't work.  All the strings tangle and won't separate.  So my two bouquets of six became one room's worth of ceiling balloons.  I grabbed the scissors and right before I gave into cutting the strings, I decided to just release them.  I think this worked much better.

One completed corner.

I have one corner (and most of a wall) of the bedroom finished.  I tried to hang the mirrors I had just finished painting, but they're very heavy and one of the wires kept snapping.  I put them away and bought the proper supplies when I went out to run errands.

The art wall has been up for awhile, no changes there.  Her back ordered West Elm bedding finally came and I steamed it in the dryer.  I couldn't handle the thought of ironing it.  I think I might hate ironing so I was procrastinating about putting on the bedding.  I survived though and I finished these little mountain pillows.  I read a tutorial for making these pillows, but I ended up just sort of doing my own thing.  I had a sweater dress that shrank and some felt scraps so I made some chalk shapes and cut them out with a rotary tool.  I sewed the felt and sweater into place at the same time.  After they were stuffed and together, I tacked down the felt edges with a buttonhole stitch.  I cut out the rest of the dress and decided to make more.  It's very satisfying.

The side table is the same one we've had for awhile.  It's from Urban Outfitters and I think it's for record storage, but it's also good for books.  The wall sconce is new and also from Urban Outfitters.  I had to finish the headboard before I could decide where to hang it.  It doesn't look like they sell the table anymore, but I kinda' love the little light.

The headboard is what I would call one of my major projects for the room.  The main project, other than painting and papering, was refinishing the dresser.  I looked for some headboard inspiration for awhile.  I know that beds don't have to have them, but it makes it look complete to me.  I love tufting and I saw a great tutorial for a faux tufted twin headboard on Vintage Revivals.  Mr. Husband is a painter so we have a variety of large frames around the house.  I looked around and chose the one I liked best.  I got real excited and bought all the supplies.  I found some great remnant fabric and learned that it's cheaper to buy a foam mattress topper than it is to buy foam (Joann Fabric coupon + twin eggshell topper = best deal I could find).  Alright!  I was ready to go and my materials sat there for a few months.  Um, meh.  I have no idea why I'm this way, but I am.  I think I was intimidated by the thought of messing it up.  When I finally did decide to conquer it, everything went quick and smooth (until I realized that I didn't have access to a nail gun-- we're working on that).  I had another person to help for everything except the tufting.  The directions are easy to follow.  I had some trouble getting my faux tufts to staying so I pressed down harder with my stapler and put 2-3 staples in for each tuft.  I used the same button kit as the tutorial and it worked well, but thicker fabric will take a little forcing.  I used a hammer to press the button backs in (be careful not to flatten the button face when doing this).  I kind of love it.  I would make another.  I'd actually enjoy having a reason to make another.

Right after I finished.  See my scissors?

Here's a bonus photo since the pillows are stacked in front of it in the other photo.  My next big DIY for the room is to cover a bean bag chair in faux fur.  The pre-fab versions that were adult size (Miss Lady is 5'5 and growing) were way too pricey so we got a cheaper chair with the intention of making a cover.  I just ordered the fabric. 
The room should be done in April.  I'm slow and I need to make a trip to Ikea before I can complete it.  So much to do.

xoxo,
b

Halloween House Decorating Contest 2014

Hello, hello!

Last night was the house judging for the north portion of the neighborhood.  I went with an Alfred Hitchcock "The Birds" theme this year.  I also decided to go all out and make myself part of the display.  I covered myself in fake blood and dropped on the lawn; bird attacked woman of Bodega Bay.

 Oh, Blogger is having some formatting issues!

Anyway, happy haunting!

I hear the book is better than the movie, xoxo

b

Close up of the porch at night.

Me before I took my place in the yard.

Birds as high as I could reach.

A Room with a View

(beautiful indulgence and the item I believe will make the room pop)

This rug right here, needs to get under my dining room table.  When it does, I'll have a view in the room.  I have it on hold at the store.  I'm counting down the hours until I can get it.  Then I'll clean up the room and replace the old rug.  EEEEpppp!!!!!

(more budget friendly option)

Oops, got a little excited; this rug is going to get under my dining table instead.  It should arrive next week.  Plenty of time to prep the room, pictures when it gets here.

As long as there are tassels... who cares?  Tassels!

Wowie Zowie

The time always gets away from me.  I've been busy though and life has been in transition.  I suppose it's always changing, but sometimes those changes happen like volcanoes erupting.  I finally had that Grey Gardens garden party and jumped on the white walls home trend.  The blogging world controls my design brain.

Rifle paper gift wrap

This paper is my new love.  This paper and the home of Dottie Angel are my current living room inspirations.  My volcanic eruptions led me to a need for a new look in my living space.  It's nice and it feels bright.  I am not quite done with the living room, but I am oh so close.

The old Ikea media cabinet, all dressed up.

xoxo,

b

Blinging the Cube

Hola!  80's movie reference, anyone?  Christian Slater fans?  

Well, I've finished up on some jewelry and gem items, but I got distracted by beautifying my faux office, so we'll start there.  Cubicles, bleh; forty hour a week cages, but why not pretty and who says what's acceptable (upper management?)?

  I couldn't take anymore grey or polar vortex, so I had to brighten up the place and Target has some sort of siren song that calls out to me from aisles of items I simply don't need...  So I caved and found a reason to buy some very lovely wrapping paper and various items from the (not always a) dollar aisle.  It isn't quite done yet because with me, a little almost always turns into a lot, but here's what I've got so far:

The view as you walk into the area.

Yeah?  Nice?  Better than grey!  Cream and gold striped gift wrap from Target, $4 a roll, the plants I already had, and an "over sized" (aka engineer print) print from Staples.  The black and white 3' by 4' pints are about $7.  This is a photo of my daughter taken while we were getting ready for my wedding (photos by Sleeping Robot Productions).

DIY circus elephant planter.

New chair cushion with gold leather tag to match the decor.

I brought my elephant from home and made it's green bits gold.  Then I looked online for a fabulous chair cushion since that seemed to be a common element among office spaces that "have it goin' on", but my taste is expensive and this is a VERY wide open space.  Who want to put a $75 throw pillow on a park bench and see if it's still there later?  Um, not me.  I found the fabric that I had at home that would work best in this space and so, my cushion was free.

Other side!

Another over sized print, more existing plants, same file as before, new photos, and the same frames painted green.  I order a few Nutcracker photos every year that my daughter dances in it.  The 2013 photos just came in a week ago, perfect.  I wanted the picture frames to be a similar to the green of the plants; thank you Martha Stewart acrylic paints.

The frames at home after drying.

The mug my friend made is broken, but now it holds flowers from Mr. Husband.

Yep, that's Target again.  Threshold ceramic container, dollar aisle pens, and some gold clearance pencils.

I discovered the wonders of metallic Sharpies during this process.  Plastic, orange handle scissors?  Not a problem!  Now they're gold!  Yellow top on that ceramic canister?  Not with Sharpie!  And so on, and so on...

Recognize my tiny cake?

And a detail of my new photos in freshly painted frames.

I still need to apply paper to the front portion of wall and re-hang my mirror.  I also think a rug would be a nice finish and make this space amazing.  I encourage you to grab the Sharpies, acrylic paints, gift warp, and stapler and make some bright and crisp fabulousness of your own.

Boxwood

So, I bought a boxwood wreath and it fits perfectly.  Add lights and I think I just found my formal party outfit.  

xoxo,

B

Small Cool

This picture contains a couple of completed and recent DIY's!

Hi, I know I've been gone for awhile.  There was some some life stuff happening and I had to process it.  Once I got that done though, I got back to doing, but not posting.  Anyway, I did submit an entry to the Apartment Therapy Small Cool contest and they accepted.  My goal was simply to get my entry posted so I am quite excited, but since I'm already there, I might as well go for it.  If you have a minute it would be great of you to go give my entry a favorite.  You can use this link.

I am excited just to be there and I have my own criticisms of my entry.  I will apologize now for the beyond rough, hand drawn floor plan.  I couldn't locate a real one and Mr. Husband forgot to crank one out so I finally just sucked it up and roughed it.  I keep feeling the need to address every negative (or just not entirely positive?) comment posted and I know I don't have to, but this is just me.  Ima' gonna' cleanse myself here though.

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My Cleanse: you've been warned!

Garlands appear to be controversial.  I like them, but most of all, I like making them.  The ceiling is a great place for storage, especially if you have cats.

It actually isn't dusty and there are no spiderwebs.  How is this possible?  I keep them cleared out.  I was bitten by a brown recluse once and I won't be doing that again.

We are fans of Kitsch.

We constantly have stuff flowing through the house and back out; Mr. Husband has an eBay store and we're artists.

It is dark in there; it's a duplex and there's a lot of stuff near the house that blocks light.

Finally, the house does have 2 bedrooms and 1.5 baths.  My second biggest (or maybe it comes first) criticism of my entry is that I wasn't able to show more of it.  I am far from being a professional photographer and I'm working around a house husband and an adolescent to keep the house clean.  So it was a race to get the home from work in time to get a room organized and still have enough natural light to get a decent photo of it before the chaos happened again.  Real life, who knew?

Done, thanks for playing along.

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Okay, I'm done.  I feel a bit better now, but this is a different kind of experience than I thought it would be and I'm learning some skills that I hadn't thought about as being part of this process.  I think I'm going to go with the positive and say that I am an artist and perhaps my work is just controversial (That works right?).  Still, I'm excited and thanks to you for reading.

xoxo,

b

DIY Inspiration

 I've been thinking of ways to convert the ceiling beam in the bedroom (which I think is actually a heating duct cover) into some sort of art work so it blends with the room instead of just seeming out of place.  I've had a few ideas.  One of them was to install DIY'ed limbs along the sides since I have an assortment of those in the garage and they were part of my original vision.

painted branches

suspended branch

The above are examples from my pinboard.  The outcome would be a mix of what's going on here.  I like it and I do want to use the limbs some where in the house, but I can't seem to stop exploring my options.

Antlers came to mind.  I do love vintage antler mounts.  There's just something about the shape of them that is absolutely great and today while I was browsing images, I saw this:

Fabulousness

 Then I was convinced I had to have vintage antler mounts for the bedroom, especially since yesterday, I saw this:

itty bitties just waiting for a makeover

then of course, I needed more of these (doilies)

So, in a frenzy of ,"This is such a good deal and my DIY will be fabulous!", I hit the 'buy it now' button.  Now I must wait impatiently for the two to arrive.  I picture them hanging in a row across the beam with more fabulous and unnecessary garlands draped in between.  Now I suppose I have to finish painting the beam.  

xoxo,

indulgent b

How it's going...

Tarder Sauce

Left corner

Right corner

This is how the bedroom is coming along.  I think I'm going to add more to wall the bed is on (frames and garlands of course).  I've decided as well that once the small dresser is painted, I'm okay with an open closet.  For some reason I keep taking night time photos with the Ipad so the quality is fuzzy and I have a grumpy cat fixation.  Falling asleep in here is like going to bed in a gallery.  I imagine I might get a similar sensation from doing an overnight at the zoo (the kind where you take a sleeping bag and lay on the floor under the dolphin tank- does everyone have that or is it just here?)

Ah, Tardar Sauce!

I've developed an addiction and it's nerdy as can be.  I love Grumpy Cat cushions and looking at those little kitties.  They look so tiny compared to my kitty cat and their faces are so expressive.  I want to squeeze them, but they live in Arizona so I'll just continue to squeeze my own kitties.

I lived at Brooke's house once.  It was awful.

This is my new throw pillow.  I couldn't stop though, I ordered a couple more and I already know where they're going to live.

I will be calling this a throw pillow.

Something for the bed, to tie the room together.

I don't believe the kitty is grumpy, but I do believe it's very cute.

x's, o's, and kitty scratches,

Ms.b

A couple of finished DIY's

Hola!  I finished painting and (almost) repairing the dresser (1 leg to glue!).  Here it and an ink stain are for you to view:

We're adding rugs... lots of rugs, but we also need to rent a carpet shampooer.

Do you remember this pin?  Originally seen on Poppytalk.

The process was fairly basic.  I chose a color swatch from Benjamin Moore that matched my bedroom and then I bought a bunch of samples.  I also labeled them according to the drawer that they went on so I wouldn't get confused.

Last week I was talking about the Jelly Planter from Angus and Celeste and thinking about a DIY version.  I did order a pink one and I have no idea when it will be here, but I do know where it's going.  Anyway, the jello tins I ordered came Friday and I went forward with my DIY. 

I love it!

I used some green cord that I already had and some Montana Cans flesh spray paint (also already had this for another project).  The plants are some from around the house.  This photo was taken in the living and the planter matches the wall, but the bathroom is white and that's where this planter is living.  I'm happy with it and I have a few more tins to try things out with.  I took photos for a tutorial, but I haven't put that together yet.  Once I work on it a little more, it will likely be available in my Etsy shop.

Saturday

A lot of this today.  It's very raspberry now.

It's the final count down.

The last round of bits are finished.

This is it.  I'm finally tired of wedding blogs and done with Bridezillas marathons. The decorations are as done as they can be before being loaded up and put in place.  The food has been started and all the confirmations have been made.  Other than some meringues that just wouldn't work out, I'm done for a few days.  (I do plan to climb back on my stand mixer tonight and show those meringues who's who.)

  This part is kind of weird.  This part is waiting... I think.  We still need to clean the house for the birthday/ thank you for helping grill party, but that doesn't seem like much.  The house is little and only half of it actually needs to be clean for our at home pre-wedding bit. What to do?

Vegan dark chocolate sorbet, nom.

Maybe go on a baking binge?  I found this recipe for sorbet and I've already made it twice.  I've been substituting coconut milk for the water.  It's very rich and very chocolatey, but it keeps disappearing so it must be good.  Also, zombie musicals are good.

X's and O's,

BMerry

Glitterati

Life is getting busy and messy.  I spent many hours last weekend completing the final step of my "balloon add-ons / bits n baubles".  They are now complete.  212 pieces have been punched, primed, coated, and sealed; ready for stringing.  The last time I did a mass glittering was December so I was indoors.  That got icky, stinky, and messy so this glitter fest was located on the front porch.

xoxo,

B

Where I left off...

The third bed went in and now I'm contemplating a 4th.

We cherpumpled, but since pumpkin didn't make it it was only cherple, but still.

I went with the zig.

Now that I've committed and have a low temp glue gun, it's really coming along.

FINALLY!  A good vegan meringue!  These are citrus flavor.

So, lots happening.  This is a short update through the highlight pictures.  Recipes and tutorials to follow.  I'm great at doing, good at photo documenting, and not so great at keeping up with the blogging.  Oh, well.

xoxo,

B

Oops and Ouch

I injured myself.  I was moving forward just blasting through my many self imposed tasks and it all came to a super painful halt.  I'm told that I pinched the cartilage in my lower back and then it became inflamed and irritated.  It certainly does hurt and today is my first day back with the living since Sunday.  I was moving around stuff in the house to incorporate the future mister, finally re-working the stairwell (it's looking much better), and doing some test baking, but none of this is done because the pain was immense and I gave in.  What else to do?

This is what the stairwell area did look like.

This is an in progress shot of my little make over.  New paint does a lot.

The kitty rug that is now the side door's companion.  It was over sized, but it looks nice cut down.

Now a look at something I did without injuring myself; I hung a painting by Future Husband in an effort to incorporate him into the house and I did not sustain any injuries.

I'm still on the search for the ultimate vegan meringue and making efforts to bake a decent macaron.  Some of my new kitchen indulgences arrived this week, but I haven't been able to stand long enough to try them yet.  I'll hopefully get to that soon.  Foe now I need to make a follow up appointment for my malfunctioning back.