DIY Curtains

 As a designer, I have to say that the most impactful/important things in a room are draperies and rugs. People will notice both of these items way before they will notice a sofa or chair. Most of the time these can be the most costly pieces in a room. In the field that I work, most of my clients will spend anywhere from $1500-$5000 on a single window. That is just not in the budget for our house right now so I have come up with some budget saving drapery alternatives:

These buffalo check panels have a silk look to them but are not silk. I bought these panels from Wal-Mart for approximately $15 each. I love them because they have almost every color in my house on them (green box for my green kitchen, red for the front living room, and a green/blue for our master bedroom).

My big splurge lately was on our dining room/front living room panels. I have had my eyes on these for quite a while. I bought these puppies on sale for approx. $89 per panel from Pottery Barn.

I took it as a sign that I was suppose to have these beautiful draperies when I saw them on one of my favorite shows..."Modern Family."

Here are the curtains in our master bedroom. They are from World Market (one of my fav stores). I love them because they have a burn-out pattern on them and they are very light and airy.

Then I started getting crafty and making my own curtains. For our guest bedroom that has twin beds, I had just finished (and when I say finished I mean that everything has been purchased but not yet made) making duvet covers out of sheets. So I took some ready-made, tab top panels that a friend gave me ($0). Then I took the pillow cases that I had left over from the sheet set that I used to make the duvet covers and made these curtains. I took the stitching out of 2 sides of the pillow cases and then cut it into 3 strips. I then gathered them to create the ruffle and attached the pieces to the ready-made curtain. I love the way they turned out:

The other guest bedroom still does not have a definite design direction. I have an awesome antique quilt on the bed with a white linen duvet cover. I had hoped to incorporate some yellow into the room, so when I saw these table cloths at Target I decided that these will work for now. I haven't even invested in a curtain rod yet...these have been put up with push pins. Definitely this is the room that is still a work in progress.

And last but not least, this is the room that I just finished yesterday. Months and months ago (like probably 6...yes I have crafting ADD), I bought two shower curtains from Target. I loved the pattern and the fact that it was a fabric shower curtain. However, the curtain was not nearly long enough so I decided to go to JoAnne's and get a coordinating fabric. And with just a couple of straight stitches, Philip's office now has curtains. This project was easy and very inexpensive (cost about $40 each). None of these prices include hardware, but I tend to go to Ross to find good deals on drapery rods ( I would say they average around $14-$24 each... definitely not bad).

Just a quick side note: I found these pictures on Etsy a while back and absolutely love them. They are printed on real antique dictionary pages and were only $7 each. I framed them in black frames with large white mattes (also on sale at Target). There were so many stamps to choose from, but we tried to pick three that related to Philip (and the moose is probably more me).

 These are the rooms that I have left to put draperies:

Our loft area/ gameroom/ craft space

This is our kitchen windows awaiting a valance one day.

Good luck with decorating your windows!

This chair "Rocks"

So i have been in love with the Eames Rocking chair ever since I saw it at a restaurant. If you haven't ever been to Tillman's Roadhouse, you should go. This restaurant (or restaurants now) is 100% my style. Here is a sneak peak at where the love affair began:

Since then I have seen them everywhere:

p.s. i also love this coffee table

and last but not least:

this rug is AMAZING!

I have never really been a woman stuck on name brands, so of course I found a really good knock-off on overstock.com. One day I hope get one or two of these chairs (maybe to rock in on the front porch...sigh)

So what piece of furniture have you fallen in love with?

Happy summer everyone!

What's Your Sign

No I am not into astrology and all of the non-sense (although I think I am an aries if you are interested) but I have had an idea for a while for my kitchen that I finally finished:

Often Philip will call me and say "Hey good lookin'..." . It always triggers the Jimmy Buffet song that says "hey good lookin', what ya got cookin? How's about cookin' something up with me?" I think that it is a funny song and would be great sign to put up in our kitchen. So for the last couple of months I have been on the lookout for some scrap wood. I have seen fence pickets laying on the side of the road and pallets thrown out, but I needed one larger, solid piece of wood for my vision. Then my friend Toni said that she had some old cabinet facing that she could give me that she had picked up at the Canton Flea Market (1st Monday). Thank you Toni.

Here is the step by step of what I did:

1.)I put picture hangers (2) on the back of the board so that I could hang it on the wall.

2.) I designed the lay out on the computer (ie fonts and size). I am sure there is a more scientific way to make sure that it will fit on the board but I am more of a "guess and check" kind of girl. I rarely do anything very exactly. I then printed the wording off on a Word document. I had to do a little cutting and taping to get the spacing the way I wanted.

        (tip: i used the underline button so that I could make sure that I taped the pieces together straight)

3.) Then I took mylar and laid it over the Word print out (you can find mylar at your local craft store. I think I got mine at Hobby Lobby-aka better name would be Hobby Heaven). I taped it down securely and then took an exacto knife and began to cut out my stencil. Make sure that when doing this step that you do not completely cut out the whole letter if there is a hole in the middle (ie and "o" or an "A"). You have to leave a sliver of the letter still attached.

4.) Next, I laid my homemade stencil on the board and secured it with painter's tape and push pins.

5.) Use a stencil brush ( i am not sure what you call them but it is the flat brush that you just dab) and paint in the stencil. Toni has taught me that you dab on the paint and then on a napkin or paper plate dab off almost all of the paint. Then you are ready to go. Too much paint on your brush will cause the paint to bleed under your stencil.

6.) Let dry for a few minutes (it doesn't take long because you didn't use a lot of paint) and then hang on your wall! 

I love it. I even surprised myself how well it turned out. I did another stencil project earlier in the year for my sister's wedding present and I had to go back and do a lot of touch ups because I am not a good stencil-er. But practice makes perfect (and helpful advice always helps).

Now that you know how to make your own stencil, the possibilities are endless. Good luck!

Dining Room Redo

Sorry that it has been a few weeks since I posted last. I have about three blogs 95% done but I just haven't finished any of them. So I thought that it was about time to show everyone how the dining room ended up.

As you know, my sweet husband asked me what I wanted for my birthday. I told him either laser hair removal or to redo the dining room. I finally decided vanity would have to wait and the dining room was going to get my makeover. I had seen several rooms online that I liked that had board and batten. So Philip (the analytical one) did a bunch of research and watched several "you tube" videos on how to install board and batten and before we knew it we were at Lowe's (for our FIRST trip) buying supplies. 

We decided to spend the extra money and purchase primed wood. One of the best decisions ever. Then Philip borrowed a nail gun from a friend at church and a miter saw from my dad... and we were in business.

The first step that we did was decide at what proportion we would split the room. A design rule that i learned in college is that you never want to cut a room in half. So thirds are much better. We decided that 72 inches off the ground would work and then we put painter's tape up to be sure. The next couple of days were spent painting. I found a red color that I loved and so I painted that on the top 1/3. Then I found a white paint that was a bit shinier and painted it on the bottom 2/3. 

Thank goodness for that drop cloth. It kind of looks like a crime scene (or is it just me who watches too much Law and Order?)

After several coats of paint we started by adding moulding around our windows. We figured that it would look funny having the boards hitting the windows without it so we splurged for some extra trim. Philip mastered the mitered cuts while putting up this stage of moulding. And honestly we think the trim around the windows made the biggest difference (now I want to add it to all of our windows...baby steps). Then Philip started putting up the header boards. We bought 6" slats to be the header and an additional moulding to add on top of it. Philip mitered all the corners at a 45 degree angle (hard work but he did great).

Then came the hardest task-trying to figure out the spacing of the vertical slats. Our goal was to space it out well so that none of the slats would hit an electrical outlet. Now I am sure there is some sort of math formula that would have made this process easier, but math has never really been my thing. So we started taping it off with painter's tape. We would make it about half way around the room and bam, we'd hit an outlet. So then you would have to start over and move everything over an inch. After about three times of doing this I had a genious idea. I would do an architectural drawing and space it out. I was so happy that I was going to be able to contribute. Then it came time to apply the boards. And about three boards in we hit an outlet. I couldn't believe it. Then Philip explained to me that the boards were called 1x4 but they were actually only 1x 3 1/2. Big WHOOPS! So that is when we decided to fly by the seat of our pants. We had to fudge a half inch here and there but I don't think anyone would ever notice. (side note: we/Philip also had to cut the bottom of the vertical slats at a 45 degree angle to hit flush with the base boards).

After all the vertical slats were put up we went back and put in the second row of horizontal slats. This is when we started getting super excited. The second row of slats were the icing on the cake. This step went pretty fast.

Then we went back and calked all the gaps and filled the nail holes. We went back and sanded everything down to make sure that everything was super smooth.

 The final step was to go back and put two more coats of white paint on the wall and slats.

Here are the before pics:

And the final after pics:

Gardening Wars

I bought the house where I live about 2 and 1/2 years ago (before getting married). Before moving in, I had never been a yard person. I grew up on acreage with my family. I mowed the yard a few times with the riding lawn mower but soon got demoted because I have terrible allergies. So yard work has never really been my thing. I remember the first time I went to mow my yard here. I had to call my dad and two of my guy friends to try to figure out how to start the push lawn mower. I swore sweet Dave to secrecy to never tell anyone that we had that conversation because I was embarrassed that I was so clueless when it came to yard work.

 Anyways, that brings me to present day. Ever since I got married (and even while dating) my husband has been talking about these great plans for our yard.

This is a pic of Philip using our new trimmer that we got for Christmas from his parents.

He came home last week telling me about this great AP on his phone where he can take weekly pictures and document the progress of our fertilizer. He is determined to have the greenest yard on the block. Philip came up to me last week and said that he has a secret competition with our neighbors to have a better looking yard. And would you not believe it, but almost every night since he said that our neighbors across the street have been doing yard work up until the wee hours of the night. We came home the other night around 10:30 and I started laughing because the crazy neighbors had taken the fluorescent light (it looked like the kind you find in a kitchen) and set it up on the front porch while they weeded and planted flowers. 

So what did we do...we planted our own garden.

It was so fun. We spent both days of our weekend going to the hardware store nursery, digging up an area, putting down the stones, and planting our plants. It was such a nice change to our backyard that has 0 landscaping. We high fived and patted each other on the back for a job well done. We still wanted to go buy some hydrangea bushes to finish of the flower bed but we had already started dreaming of our next step. We are going to buy a tree that will provide the dogs plenty of shade during the "dog days" of summer.

Wouldn't you know that not two days later our furry children (we are not for sure which one) dug up almost every single one of our flowers. Not only that, but they bit off the bloom of the flowers too. Philip and I came home from doing yard work for the church on Wednesday night. We were in such a good mood and decided to go in the back yard to admire our beautiful work that we had done earlier in the week. When I saw the sight I almost started crying. I know it is irrational but I felt emotional about the situation. All of our hard work was gone and I felt like the hope of ever having a beautiful yard went out the window too. After letting a few days go by so that I wasn't wanting to kill our dogs I joked with Philip that our dogs were moles...working for the neighbors. It was a sneaky ploy to keep us down in the garden wars. The Meadows will fight back. After all, gardening is almost in our name.

Have a blessed week everyone.