Summer Vacation

Last month, my parents and my brother and sister-in-law (Justin and Ruth) drove from Pennsylvania to Myrtle Beach for a well-deserved vacation.  So close to my neck of the woods!!!  In fact, they came down to my house for an afternoon.  My parents saw the house while it was still in limbo (and my mom helped during the move-in) and  so it was very rewarding to show off the painting update and everything else that's been done on the road to decorating mi casa.

Anyway, I ended up driving to MB to spend a couple more days at their condo with them.  It was pretty fun to get out of the house for a bit!  One highlight was going deep-sea fishing with Justin and Ruth.  Here's Justin and me on the boat!

It took an hour for us to get from the boat place to the open water.  The ride was pleasant, though, and the view was great.... you know I love me some lighthouses!  I've long thought that if I could be any inanimate object, I'd be a lighthouse.  I like the water and I like helping people.  Also, I really liked Pete's Dragon. 

Finally, we got to the open water and I took a moment to squint in the sun enjoy it.  I love the water! 

We had to move locations a few times because no one was catching anything... eventually, however, there was some success!  Two guys even caught sharks!  What?!  I even caught a couple fish!!  I released them back, though.  Here's one the guy beside me helped take off the hook.  And by 'helped' I mean the kind gentleman did everything for me.  I did pet the fish hello, though, and I baited my own hooks with *squid*. 

That evening, my mom and I went over the Barefoot Landing in MB.  It was all fun and games until this bad pirate got put in the stocks.  

Sadly, I soon had to get home and so did the rest of my family, so we parted ways after breakfasting at Bob Evan's.  By the way, check out my hot mama:

All in all, it was a fun mini-vacation! 

If you could be any inanimate object, what would you be? 

Recycle/Reuse/Reduce

Ahh, nothing makes me happier than an organized space.

Last June, I organized the catch-all drawer in the apartment (a mess that was building for 2 years) and even tweeted about a discovery I made... This year's model-of-doom is only two months in the making and is already threatening a hostile takeover (something catches and the drawer won't open).  

Pretend it's like an I-Spy... can you find a Harry Potter pencil sharpener?  Two packets of flower seeds?  a Concerta stapler?  a Bert from Sesame Street magnet?  two bottles of ink from China?  a rubber ducky?  50 different customer loyalty cards from places like Lowe's, Game Stop, and CVS?  a monogrammed tape measure?  a plastic school calculator, circa 1994?

Ahh, much better. 

I reused the Malley's chocolate boxes again (1 for tablets and extra magnets, 1 for tape/pencil sharpeners), and a silverware drawer liner from the auction house (sections for extra keys, mini tools, eye glass cleaner, The Plague, and all those loyalty cards.  Between the boxes are the ink bottles and extra markers.  Of course, I delighted in throwing out unusable items.  

Also from the auction house, you may recall this little number, the plywood magazine box (one of two):

I covered those babies in contact paper and made myself some awesome magazine racks to hold some of the magazines I receive for free: Martha Stewart, Afar, Elle Decor, Coastal Living, and Health.  I also get Real Simple (thanks, Mom!) and it is kept on the tv stand.  Coincidence?

Also a questionable coincidence is that the green goes super well with the dining room green and thus continues my quest to tie together the great room and dining area.  

What makes you happy?  Organization?  Chaos?  

Dining Room Update

Welcome back!

As my last post said, I felt the dining room needed a little softening to make it flow into the open space of the great room.  So, after toiling for a day or two, I made a few changes.  I think they do wonders for the area!

First, I've been hating on the awwwful brass chandelier since I first saw this house back in September of 2011, so I was more than willing to shut off the power and rewire in a new pendant light ($18 at Lowe's) plus a paper lantern (Pier 1, $10).  

Then, I put the bamboo placemats back on the table.  I also decided the window needed curtains - both for some soft texture and also for privacy.  This is a townhouse and my elderly neighbor sits on her back porch all.day.long and I get antsy about that after awhile.  I could not find any curtains I liked (I wanted greens and yellows to pull together the two rooms) at Target, Kohl's, IKEA online, or Ross... and then I wandered into World Market and found a $30 shower curtain that is absolutely perfect.  

I hung the curtain with little shower clips from Target.

Currently, the curtain's clips are half on one side of the rod's center-bracket, half on the other, which is why it is bunchy on the left.  Eventually I may cut the curtain and hem the cut, then add a band of coordinating fabric to the bottom.  I rather like the casual look right now, though, so I am going to laissez-faire it for awhile.  

And now... the two rooms together, as viewed from the loveseat.  By the way, the temporary new "rug" is a quilt and the green pillows are the old green Pier 1 ones covered with fabric a la this Pin.  Thanks, Mom, for the idea!  

What are your favorite ways to repurpose items?

Eat Your Veggies!

Most of you who know me know that when I get started on a project, I don't like to stop until it's done.  So with the great room finished and looking mighty fine, I was anxious to repaint the dining room because once again, it looked like Perkin's restaurant.  Once again, sorry Perkin's.  Let's have a moment of silence for the awful carcass colors of the dining room before:

I once read a blog where the girl painted five different shades of the same color on her bedroom walls and it took them seven months to decide which one they wanted.  I'm too impatient and too economical for that, so once I chose a green I liked on the card (Valspar's Spring Meadow), I bought it and slapped it on the walls that day.  No arguments.  I chose green because 1) it's my favorite color and 2) it reminds everyone to eat their veggies.  Subliminal messages now in your very own house!

Fun fact - the old owner's left these two giant pieces of plastic in the garage.  Thanks!  So, before painting, I put down plastic on the floors and over the table.  Always make sure you protect your pets from paint, too?! Haha!  All joking aside, Poly crawled in there on her own and I removed her twice... she kept going back.  You can't fight with a cat and I will point out she didn't get a single drop on her.  

It took a full day to paint two coats in the dining area (one real wall, one half-wall, one wall with windows, one half wall with a door), with small breaks for necessities including a game of Mario Cart.  

Ahh that's nice!  It is deceiving, though, because the color is a bit more radioactive lettuce in person, so I spent the next two days letting it mellow to the eyes (aka get used to it) and figure out how to smooth the room together, since it spills into the great room.  I added the mirrors (auction house finds) first... Stay tuned for more... 

Do the rooms of your home flow together, or do you prefer to decorate each area on its own?

Coming Soon: Dinner on the Patio

In between painting the Great Room and the Dining Room (upcoming post), I worked on getting the garage back to a state where Gus (the car) could fit in.  One thing that needed to be done was something with this table: 

The side was found in Tom's car!  I pounded it on with a nail salvaged from the living room wall before I painted.  While I would have preferred to use a wood stain on the bare wood, I'm nothing if not resourceful, so I just used white paint from a can of flat (ew) paint the old owner left in the garage (big surprise).  It works for now.  I may seal it later... or paint it a different color and consider the white to be primer.  I literally just slapped two coats on in about 30 minutes and I like the rough look it has.  Plus, the price ($0) was amazing.

Why not?  The original goal was to use it a prep table or something for when we grill.  However, I'm currently thinking the driveway is a better place for grilling... because the above picture shows the backyard.  It's a postage stamp.  The good news is... we got a grill!  Tom dropped one off last night.  It's pretty rusty, yet I think it will clean up.  I hope... :/ I'll show it later when it's not so nasty looking.  

...what are your tricks for cleaning rust?

Colors Colors Everywhere

As you may recall, the paint job on the first floor of my house was rather garish.  To put it bluntly, it looked like a Perkins restaurant barfed.  Sorry, Perkins.  The best word in that first sentence, though, is "was" - the bad paint job is gone!  I spent about a week agonizing over colors to determine the perfect shade for the great room (living room + foyer).  The dark and gloomy colors were making me so cranky and made me crave sunshine so after considering 45 different shades of yellow, I settled on Summer Sun by Valspar (Lowe's).

I calculated 530 sq ft for the great room, so I bought 2 gallons of the Valspar Signature so I could do two coats.  Remember, anytime you anticipate needing to use two cans of paint for one job, mix 'em together to ensure uniformity!  I poured the two gallons into a bucket and stirred.  I filled my paint tray out of the bucket on day one, then at the end of day one, poured the mixed paints back into the paint cans so I could seal them up properly.  During the day, I had the bucket covered in foil to keep it clean.

Having never painted a room before, I think my first coat was a bit sparse.  In fact, the rose and baby poo-brown showed through a bit, causing the yellow to look highly radioactive.  After rereading some online tips, I put it on pretty thick the second round.  Wow!  Coat Two definitely covered the rose and baby poo-brown very well!  My technique was simple and developed after reading several websites (This Old House and TLC, which I pinned on my Paint Board).  I cut in with a slanted brush, then rolled those bits (plus a good five inch section adjacent to it) with a small roller going as close to the edge as possible, then rolled the rest of the party with a 9-inch roller.  It took 12 hours for the first coat and about 10 for the second.  That includes mini breaks as I finished each wall (snacks, phone calls, clicking on the Pandora music site to say yes I'm still listening to Meat Loaf)...

To refresh your mind, here's a before...

And here's an after!

Poly loves to be in pictures.  What a ham.

For now, I've purchased new sheers for the window and put the red shade back on the corner lamp.  I think the walls looks amazing, if I do say so myself.  :)  Redecorating coming soon! I'm very excited to finish up the dining room, now, and then decorate with a new color palette.  Speaking of which... here's a teaser about the dining room color...

What are your dream colors for your home?

PS

Of course Lowe's didn't pay me to talk up their paint line.  I wish!

Unwelcomed Guests

One thing I do not like about moving to the south is the buggies.  No, I don't mean Amish buggies (I don't think they have Amish down here) and I don't even mean shopping carts.  I mean what they call "palmetto bugs" which in the north are cockroaches!  Ew!!

I've been blessed with a less than sealed up house, so I have had a few visitors over the last few weeks.  Three visitors, actually, have made their way into my home.  Poly found all three and they were quickly disposed of (by me, not by her).  I have little tolerance for creepy-crawlies that do nothing except bring germs into my house, so I decided to lay off the open door policy.

First, buggies like to eat, so I try to keep the kitchen as clean as possible.  Food is sealed up and put away and counters are wiped down before bed.  This is common sense, really.  I also try not to let dishes in the sink because when your name is cockroach, you probably don't care if the meal you have is a ring of slightly spoiled milk at the bottom of a glass.

Next, I bought some expanding foam at Lowe's and took care of lots of holes and cracks around the house (inside and out) including the place where the satellite dishes' cables came into the house (our bunny ears get better reception now, go fig) and the giant hole under the bricks at the corner of the garage.  I had no idea it would expand that much!  I could carve it down, although for now I just hide the lump behind two cactus.

The third and final line of defense was a concoction of Borax plus powdered sugar around the perimeter of the house and in places where buggies might fancy a little dramatic entrance.  The powdered sugar lures in the creepers and the Borax is supposed to kill 'em.  Horrible, I know.  I feel kind of bad.  ... I placed a bit on rounds of cardboard so I could slide it under the fridge and set it in cupboards...

As well as in a line out on the screened in patio...

I'm certainly no expert on bugs, yet I can say it's been a full week since I did my decorations and I've not seen any roaches inside.  Maybe it's a coincidence... although the borax concoction has been untouched inside except the bit under the fridge that some ants got into and then proceeded to um...die.  So...?

Have you had any luck with homemade bug!defense?