Chessboard Review

Posted on April 19, 2013 by Danielle

When I moved Storypiece from wordpress.com to wordpress.org a few months back, I realized that some additional housekeeping would be in order. I knew part of the move would include updating keywords for SEO, improving photo tags and tightening up some of the post formatting. For those that don’t blog, this essentially all comes down to reviewing my older content and making changes so that people can find me on the web and when they do, it doesn’t take a thousand years for the page to load.

All good things, but surprisingly tedious.

As I’ve begun this process, I’m also realizing that if you are new to this blog, you may not have seen some of these older posts. Some of which I’m still pretty excited about. Okay… many of the photos are painfully embarrassing, but the projects themselves are fun.

Like the custom chessboard I made for Tyson.

Last Spring we were given several unexpected items from Tyson’s step-mom, Patty.

One such treasure was a handmade chess set that Tyson’s Mom had made for his Dad when Tyson was a baby.

Tyson didn’t remember the set from his childhood and so I called his Mom to get the full story.

I also decided to make a custom chessboard for the pieces to complete the set. It included the vintage newsprint that the pieces had been wrapped in and really cool metallic paint.

Through the process, I even learned that you can iron old crinkled newspaper. Who knew?!

Of course, we still don’t know how to play chess. But when we learn, we’ve got the perfect set.

So periodically I may bring back a few of these stories. I promise not to reblog every one, just to share the highlights. If you’ve read them before, feel free to skip over the review. And if there’s something that speaks to you, let me hear that too.

Any new tasks in your life that are giving you time to reflect? Have you taken a recent walk down memory lane? Do you know how to play chess and want to come teach our family?

Spring Table

Posted on April 16, 2013 by Danielle

My heart is heavy for the people in Boston this morning. The lives that were devastatingly altered yesterday…. there simply are no words. None. And so instead I’m going to draw my family close, sit a little longer with friends and share something completely superficial and frivolous with you here… just because it makes me smile. Enjoy the people precious to you and pray for those in Boston.

One of the things on my wish list for 2013 is to paint our dining room table.

It was given to us before we were married and it has seen us through hundreds of occasions in the last 20 years. From our very first dinner party to countless DIY projects, this table has seen it all. And in a lot of ways it shows it.

But in an effort to keep my family sane and to stay focused on the three other projects we’ve got going on right now, I’ll wait to update it. Instead, I decided to whip up a new table runner. Here I mentioned that I prefer a table runner to a table cloth. For our busy family, it just makes more sense. But this time, instead of using a scarf, I decided to make my own runner.

The biggest challenge for this little project was finding the right fabric. I was looking for a bold blue to contrast with the oak table and flowers I plan to display. However, we don’t have a lot of blues in our living and dining room and most of what we do have is a robin egg blue. Finding the right design was going to be tricky.

So much like The Dating Game, I had to interview a few candidates.

Fabric #1: Has both dark and light blue with pops of green.

The design and colors are bright and upbeat, but it’s not quite right for the space. It still makes me smile and I have a feeling it will turn up somewhere else in our home.

Fabric #2: Tyson picked this one out and it has a totally different vibe.

The colors work within the room, the pattern is graphic and more masculine. But it’s too subtle for the table. At least for the look I’m going for. We still like it, so I’m sure it’ll make an appearance somewhere else in our house too.

Fabric #3: Hello, Gorgeous!

This Robert Allen fabric was love at first sight! Bold Color – check. Graphic Print – check. Good contrast against the oak table – check. It ties in nicely with the other elements in the room and is everything I had hoped for. It’s a beautiful thing when you find just the right fabric!

To get started, I purchased a half yard of fabric. Standard runners are about 14″ wide so I figured after squaring up the sides and hemming the edges I would be right around that size.

Can I just pause here and show you the back of this fabric?

Polka Dots! How great is that?! I’m not sure that I’ve seen fabric with such decorative detailing on the underside before. I love it almost as much as the front.

To create the runner, I used my favorite fusible tape to help me create a quick hem. Fold over the raw edge once with tape.

Press with iron.

Repeat so that all the raw edges are folded in.

Then to finish everything off, I added a simple stitch around the border with my machine. This last step isn’t necessary, but I thought it would be a nice way to reinforce the whole thing.

The table runner was exactly the bright new accent I was looking for as we head into spring.

I’ve dressed it up with white amaryllis…

… and crimson tulips.

It’s been such a cheery addition to our dining room, especially on some of our gray, rainy days. And I can’t wait to see how it looks with the table when we finally get a chance to update that piece too.

What are you doing to get ready for spring? Have you made any recent purchases that brighten your day? Are there any new projects that you are eager to get to?

Also, I want to say a huge thank you to those that joined in the Link-up Party. I was pretty pleased with this first event and I hope to do it again soon. However, for those that are interested, the party is still going on until midnight tonight. So if you have a Favorite Find to share, feel free to link away here!

Labels and Life

Posted on March 12, 2013 by Danielle

The more I work on this blog, the more I realize that I might, in fact, be a tiny bit of a challenge to live with. True story. I’m the queen of “unfinished projects, but let’s start something new anyway”. I have lots of piles all over the house. Things I’m working on… Things I’m gonna work on… Things I’ll never work on, but haven’t gotten rid of yet… and I’m fairly content in ALL of the chaos.

And because I am married to a man who approaches life in a completely opposite way, I am continually impressed, overwhelmed and blessed by the depth of Tyson’s grace for me. He is neat and orderly and likes to see things thru to completion before starting something new. He loves me despite my crazy and that just makes me want to work harder to clean up my act.

Don’t get me wrong, when you visit our home, you’re not walking into an episode of “Hoarders”. But my ability to have things more organized in our home, has LOADS of room for improvement.

Case in point… when I left abruptly last month to visit my mom, my man was surrounded with loose ends to take care of and me trying to navigate him through it all from 1200 miles away. At one point, he was just trying to find a pen in the workroom and me knowing which unmarked box that I store them in just seemed so clearly inefficient.

Sure, he could’ve just searched in the different boxes, but there comes a point where you’d like to grab a pen and get back to the greater task at hand.

So it’s time to get some things labeled.

Look who learned to play with FOTOR this week. Thanks Gilit!

I decided wood stained, chalkboard tags would be perfect since I’m loving both right now and they would be easy to relabel down the road.

Tyson cut me 4″ wood pieces to stain with Minwax in Dark Walnut. I also found and wanted to try out these Chalkboard Labels by Martha Stewart and a Chalk Marker to write with.

I was curious how these products would compare with standard chalkboard paint and chalk.

The chalkboard labels are a nice alternative to working with chalk paint. They are easy to use and gave me a crisp, clean edge that I’m always hoping I’ll get with paint. I didn’t try out actual chalk on these labels and I want to soon.

While the stain dried on the wood pieces, I cut the labels to the size I needed and wrote out the names for each box.

The pen worked really well on the label, but it definitely doesn’t behave like chalk. Once it’s applied, it’s not wiping off. That’s fine for this project, but noteworthy if you are expecting your chalk marker to work like chalk.

I added the labels to the stained wood and then attached velcro to both the tag and the fabric box. This will give me flexibility to adjust the tag placement and move them around if necessary.

We went with a neutral color palette in the workroom and the labels fit in nicely.

Hopefully, anyone can now come in and easily find glue, tape, pens, or stuff to take notes with. Tyson isn’t a crafty guy, so he probably won’t be looking in the first box, but if he’s looking for something tiny and random, it just might be in there. Gotta keep the guy guessing on some things, right?!

Have you tried out chalkboard labels or chalk markers? Is labeling things and organization second nature to you? Have you realized that the way you do things might not always be the easiest way for those around you? It’s definitely enlightening.

PS. For those that are curious, this is not a sponsored review. I’m just sharing what I discovered with these products in our home.

Also, this post is being linked to Thrifty Decor Chick. For more on the party check it out here.

Winter Pinterest Challenge: Mantel Tray Display

Posted on February 27, 2013 by Danielle

Our mantel is normally pretty bare. In the fall, I get it all festive, but the rest of the year, it’s fairly plain.

When we remodeled the fireplace a few years back, we chose to put the TV above the mantel because of the unique shape of the room. It’s works well for us to have it here, but it makes actually decorating the mantel a little more challenging. You can’t have anything too bulky that will block the screen, but having nothing just seems boring.

So last summer when I saw this display tray on Pinterest, I knew immediately I wanted something similar. (I just checked out the source from Pinterest and can’t get over the sectional in the post. Surprise… I love it too!)

Sarah from Thrifty Decor Chick made this beautiful tray and you can read all the details here.

However, it didn’t originally occur to me to make this tray. I truly thought I could drop into one of my favorite stores and pick one up… easy. But after months of searching, I couldn’t find a tray that was the length I wanted. I was looking for something 48″ across with a shallow lip so that it would sit nicely under the screen. We only have a 5″ clearance. I decided it was time to build the tray myself.

And by myself, I mean with the help of my man and his power tools.

Luckily, Home Depot had pre-cut 48″ boards, so Tyson’s help was actually pretty minimal. I picked up one 7″ x 48″ board and three 1.5″ x 48″ boards. This left me with a base, two sides, and a third board for Tyson to cut and make two end pieces for me.

I had also picked up upholstery tacks at JoAnn’s, but Tyson advised that I not use those since the boards were thin and would probably split. But more on that in a bit.

Armed with Minwax Dark Walnut stain left over from this project, I began staining the cut boards.

I then wiped off the excess stain and let the boards dry.

The color is beautiful! I think working with wood stain is official my new favorite.

Once the boards had thoroughly dried, it was time to assemble the tray. This is where things got a little tricky.

I applied wood glue to the long sides and used wood clamps to hold it all together. But things got dicey when I went to add the end pieces. I don’t have clamps that can span the 48″ length and frankly, holding the end pieces to the base and waiting for glue to dry wasn’t gonna happen.

So out came the upholstery tacks. And then this happened.

But I kinda loved that the tack split the wood. So I put in another one. And it split again.

And I loved it even more!

The irregular tack heads and split wood give the whole piece a more distressed look and I’m so happy with the result.

I had been planning on adding rope or drawer handles to each end, but I think the plain ends work just as well.

For now, I’ve filled it with this seashell inspired potpourri. I haven’t used potpourri in over a decade. It’s kinda fun to revisit it.

It’s pretty for spring and the perfect spot for me to add these sand dollars that we found on our beach trip last summer.

I can see changing things out down the road, but for now, this is a nice option.

I’m linking this post up with the Winter Pinterest Challenge hosted by Sherry from Young House Love and Katie of Bower Power.

This time they have asked Megan from The Remodeled Life and MIchelle from Decor and the Dog to co-host.

I was particularly thrilled that Michelle was asked to co-host as she is one of the funniest bloggers I follow and if you haven’t checked her out, you definitely need to. In fact, click on the links to any of these ladies and see hundreds of bloggers sharing their inspired Pinterest posts. There’s sure to be some outstanding craftiness on display.

Ever decide to build something yourself because you couldn’t find it in a store? Do you have a new DIY technique that is quickly becoming your favorite? Are you participating in the Winter Pinterest Challenge? Let me know… I’d love to hear what you all are up to.

And if you’re curious what I’ve done in other Pinterest Challenges, you can read all about it here, here and here.

Storypiece

Stories About Life & Home

Category Archives: project notes

Chessboard Review

Like this:

Spring Table

Like this:

Labels and Life

Like this:

Winter Pinterest Challenge: Mantel Tray Display

Like this:

Share it:

Like this:

Share it:

Like this:

Share it:

Like this:

Share it:

Like this: