Royal Furnishings

Posted on May 22, 2013 by Danielle

They say that behind every successful man is a brilliant woman. Well, I’m proud to announce that behind our old king of sofas is a table fit for a queen.

Okay… that might be a bit of a stretch. None the less, I’m still pretty excited about our latest addition.

It all started with the Pinterest Challenge. As I was looking through all the submissions, this went down:

Me: Hey… take a look at this.

Him: We should do that.

Me: I KNOW!

Him: I’ll go get the supplies.

Most of our conversations don’t normally roll like this. However, when they do and they’re coupled with Tyson having a hole in his work schedule, we run with the idea before anything changes.

Before getting into the project itself, I should probably back up and give you a quick update on the space. In March, I asked you all to weigh in on the furniture arrangement in our formal living area. We had the sofa against the wall at one point and then T-ed it out to see how we liked living with it that way.

The truth is, I hate having all the furniture shoved up against the walls. But Tyson felt like the sofa was cutting off the sitting area. The interesting thing was that as soon as we moved the sofa into the middle of the room, everyone kinda stopped using the space. I (stubbornly) continued to sit there, but found myself sitting sideways on the sofa so that I could see the rest of the house.

So we recently decided to move the sofa back, but not up against the wall. We planned on purchasing a table to put behind the sofa so that we could add lamps and bring additional lighting to the area. At night, the space is desperate for more light.

Then the Pinterest Challenge came along and I ran across this solution created by Chandler from All Precious & Pleasant. Tyson and I both knew this would be a quick and easy project with big impact for our home. So we set out to make a table to go behind our sofa in the formal living room.

The thing is… it’s not a table at all. It’s a shelf. A very low, it could be a table looking shelf. Call it what you will, we were building it.

Tyson purchased a 7 foot board and trim to get started.

After miter cutting all the trim, he glued the pieces on. He also added strips of wood to the underside of the long board for the shelf brackets to mount to.

His goal was to create the illusion of a thick slab of wood for the top and he didn’t want the brackets to get tucked up inside of what he had assembled.

Once the wood glue had dried, he added finishing nails at the joints for extra durability and sanded the whole thing smooth.

Then it was my turn to apply the wood stain. I used Minwax’s Dark Walnut which I had left over from here, here and here. (One little can goes far!) I applied one even coat and immediately wiped it off so that it wouldn’t be too dark.

Some not so blog-worthy photos of me working… yay!

After the stain had dried, I applied three coats of polyurethane (with a light sanding in between each coat) to protect the wood. This will be a natural place to set drinks and I want to help the wood out as much as possible.

Tyson then used wall anchors to install the shelf brackets onto the wall.

The end result was exactly what we needed for the space. Tyson got open seating. I got something that anchors the furniture without feeling like everything is up against the walls.

And now we have a large open wall above the “table” to fill in. We’ve already got some ideas on what might go there, but we’re looking forward to exploring the possibilities. Plus, this queen is ready to shop for lamps and accessories.

What do you think of the new “table”? Any suggestions for the wall above? How do you compromise when you and your spouse aren’t seeing eye to eye on decorating your home?

Spring Pinterest Challenge Round-up

Posted on May 20, 2013 by Danielle

A few weeks ago, I shared the Subway Chalkboard Art that I did for the Spring Pinterest Challenge. Seriously guys… I still can’t get over the fact that I was able to pull off this project.

This is the fifth challenge I’ve participated in and I can honestly say that each one has been a blast. However, I can also honestly say that I never get to go back and fully appreciate all the other contributors of the challenge. At last count, there were over 450 people that shared their projects on Young House Love alone. That’s a lot of blogs to go check out!

So I decided with this challenge, I would intentionally go back through and share my top favorites with you. My main goal was to feature projects that I love and ones that I would also want to tackle myself. Also, I sought out blogs that I haven’t read before, since meeting new people is half the fun of a link-up. Hopefully, these will be new for you too. I’ve received permission from each of these bloggers to include their projects here. The only thing I ask is that if you decide to pin something, please do so directly from their blog. They worked hard and I want to make sure that they receive the credit on Pinterest where it is due.

After spending some time playing with chalk for my own project, Jamie’s project immediately caught my eye.

She used the same technique that I used to transfer the lettering, but for her project she used a chalk marker instead of chalk. I’ve been curious to know how that might work and the marker resulted in some nice crisp edges. Plus, I love the monogram! I’ll be filing this font away for future reference.

Continuing on with typography, Becky used thumb tacks instead of chalk or marker to create her lettered sign.

I’ve never seen this technique before and I was instantly enamored. Oh the possibilities… Especially when combined with all the varieties of nail head trim! This will be popping up somewhere in our home for sure.

Carolina made these very cute wooden pendants that I can’t wait to try.

They’re a completely unexpected look and would be a quick and easy project. There’s a ton of possibilities with this project too and I like that she used Mod Podge to finish off the back so that the threads are protected.

Ashley made this thread holder which I think is just brilliant.

Not only is all of her thread easy to get to and makes for a beautiful display, I think it’s so clever that she included a peg for her threaded bobbins.

Tanya from Dans le Townhouse has an amazing home with mid-century modern furnishings. I love this updated side table that she did for her space.

Tanya did an incredible job of updating this piece, but at the same time staying true to the period. It’s so fresh and classic!

Lyndsey is proving she truly can do A LOT in fifteen minutes with this outstanding stenciled wall.

I’ve seen a lot of stenciled walls on Pinterest lately, but this is one of my favorites. It’s a completely different look and I think this pattern would be cool done on canvas too.

Anna did this gallery wall that I find utterly stunning!

I think the white, empty frames and mirrors create a graphic display that is really interesting and fun. Plus, I’ve been eyeing the giraffe from Z-gallerie for months and would’ve never thought to display it in this way. We recently had a large amount of wall space become available in our home and I would LOVE to try this.

Lastly, you have to check out Katrina at SotaIsSexy. I’m not including a photo because… well, you’ve just gotta see her project for yourself. Katrina ALWAYS does her own unique twist on the Pinterest Challenge and she never disappoints. I make sure to never miss out on her latest offering. This one is the ultimate grill.

Did you participate in the Pinterest Challenge? Do you have a favorite among the ones that I mentioned? Anything you saw during the challenge, that I didn’t mention here?

PS. I actually have one more favorite that I haven’t mentioned, but I will be giving more attention to on Wednesday. I guess you could say we created another Pinterest inspired project. Looking forward to sharing all the details with you then.

Cooking Up A Project

Posted on May 14, 2013 by Danielle

My grandmother was a recipe collector. I don’t have memories of her spending hours in the kitchen, but she was always collecting recipes. Don’t get me wrong, she had some stellar “go-to” dishes that I can’t imagine life without. Most of them were made during the holidays… Tom & Jerry’s, Divinity, Depression Fruitcake… but some of them were just every day things like Open Face Salad. The truth is she worked outside the home and when I spent my summers at my grandparents, she was always quick to play Yahtzee or cards with me instead of being in the kitchen when she got home from work. I liked that about my summers with her.

However, when she passed away several years ago, my mom came across all of her recipes. Many of them were torn from newspapers and magazines, but my favorites were those that she took time to write out in her beautiful handwriting. I made sure to get copies of those for my own little collection.

Speaking of my own collection… frankly, it’s a hot mess.

I keep my cookbooks to a minimum, but I continually find myself collecting recipes that girlfriends have emailed me or items from Food Magazine that look SO amazing. But these clippings don’t really fit in a traditional recipe box. They are starting to take on a life of their own and it’s time to wrangle them in.

Last week, I made a trip to IKEA to pick up a set of their KNUFF boxes. I searched several craft stores and container supply and there’s nothing truly like the KNUFF containers. They come in sets of two for $9.99. They are sturdy and (my favorite) customizable.

Before I could prime the box, I taped off the interior. I like the natural wood finish for the inside, but I have something unique planned for the exterior.

In my prep, I was sure to cover the holes too.

Once everything was taped up, it was time to prime.

Then came a few light coats of black spray paint.

For the next part of this project, I color copied one of my grandmother’s recipes. My plan is to create a decorative border from the antiqued cards that are in my grandmother’s handwriting. Of course, I didn’t want to destroy any of her original recipe cards and they copied beautifully onto a heavy card stock. I also picked up Washi Tape and these decorative frames.

Before applying my copied recipe cards, I marked a 1.25 inch guideline around the bottom of the KNUFF box.

I then applied the copied recipe cards with Mod Podge and sealed the whole box off with a top coat.

Using leftover chalkboard labels and my chalk marker, I was able to make a title card for the inside of the wood frame.

I love having a larger box to put all me random recipes in… one that can stand up easily next to my cookbooks. Tyson loves that life is a little more organized in our home.

Do you have a special memory of your grandparents that makes you smile? What about a family recipe that has been passed down through the years? How do you contain recipe clutter?

This project was made with love and is being included in Victoria Elizabeth Barnes‘ link-up party. To check out all the other well loved projects or to share your own, you can visit Victoria’s site here.

Spring Pinterest Challenge: Chalkboard Subway Art

Posted on May 8, 2013 by Danielle

One of the very first projects that I shared on this blog was how I turned a cabinet door into a chalkboard for our laundry room. It was a project I loved and it seemed like a cute way to kick things off here. On it, I simply wrote “Welcome”.

Welcome to my home, to my life and to this blog.

It was the very beginning of EVERYTHING and I wasn’t sure if I could even write a blog let alone get this one word looking right. I was pleased that it looked fairly neat and I had another post written.

Fast forward a year plus several months later and that sign still says “Welcome”. And I’ve been wondering if there’s something more that I can do with it. So when Young House Love and Bower Power announced that it was time for their Spring Pinterest Challenge, I knew it was time to update my chalkboard.

The Pinterest Challenge this season is hosted again by Sherry Petersik and Katie Bower and this time they are partnering with Emily from Sparkle Meets Pop and Renee of Red Bird Blue. The goal is to get everyone to put their own unique twist on something that they’ve pinned.

My Inspiration

Dana Tanamachi is hands down one of my favorite artists. You may have seen her artwork at West Elm or on the cover of Oprah Magazine. She is a hugely talented hand letter artist and does stunning things with chalk.

Following Dana’s lead, I am combining two popular trends and hoping to create subway art with chalk.

My Pinspiration

There are loads of tutorials on Pinterest of how-to create subway art and chalk lettering. A few that I referenced were here, here and here. However, I found My Sweet Savannah’s post to be the most helpful.

I began brainstorming laundry room words: soap, bubbles, clean, iron… you get the idea.

Then I used Adobe Illustrator to help me create a subway art design with those terms. There are a lot of programs online that you can download to use, but since we already own Adobe Illustrator, I went with that. Sometimes being married to a graphic designer and illustrator has it’s perks.

AI works like several of the online design programs. It’s a matter of typing in your words, playing with fonts and sizing and moving the words around until you have a layout that you like. Seriously, I may be married to a graphic designer and illustrator, but I am not one. I was able to easily figure this out by just playing around to see what happens.

That was the easy step.

This next part would, as my son says, separate the pretenders from the contenders. That is, I had no idea if I could actually get the chalk lettering down the way I had designed it.

I was hoping to use an image projector to help in this process. However, once I started pricing them out and realized we were looking at a few hundred dollar investment, I decided I would need to consider other options.

My chalkboard space is 17.5 inches square. I printed the design off on to two 11 x 17 sheets of paper that I could overlap and leave myself with a half inch border.

You can also take your image file to a local print shop and have it printed on one sheet, but I wanted to see if I could do this challenge completely free and the legal size paper worked.

Once I taped the two sheets together, I rubbed chalk over the entire back of the paper. I then flipped the design over so that the chalk side was against the chalkboard and taped it down to keep it from shifting.

I was able to carefully trace the outline of the letters to get a copy of my subway art transposed onto the chalkboard.

I then began the process of going over the letters and filling them in… one letter at a time.

At first, I thought all the hand lettering would take forever, but it was oddly therapeutic and went quickly. I had the added benefit of being able to take the cabinet door off the wall and work on the floor, moving the board all around.

I also used Q-tips and a touch of water to “erase” and clean up any areas that needed a little extra help.

Unfortunately, there is no natural light in our laundry room, so this photo is not ideal. But I am beyond thrilled with the final artwork.

I still can’t believe it worked the way I had hoped. Tyson keeps asking if I need to seal it so the image doesn’t get smudged or lost, but I would gladly come up with something new, if the need or inspiration strikes.

Speaking of inspiration… it’s party time. Time to check out all the great links that are being shared at the Spring Pinterest Challenge. There is sure to be tons of inspiration and more things to pin. I’ll be linking up at:

Have you ever done chalk art or hand lettering? Are you participating in the Spring Pinterest Challenge? Ever take on a project and wonder if you would find yourself a pretender or a contender? That kid cracks me up!

For even more inspiration, check out these blogs that I’ll also be sharing this post at:

Storypiece

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Royal Furnishings

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Spring Pinterest Challenge: Chalkboard Subway Art

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