Boy's Room Redecorating (manda)

After 3yrs. of living in our house I have finally gotten around to the last few rooms that I need to paint and decorate. (Of course the saying goes- once you finish painting you move and start all over) This includes my children's bedrooms. I wanted to redecorate my oldest son's room before purchasing bunkbeds and moving his little brother in with him. So in my efforts to redorate and create a room that two boys would eventually share this is what I came up with.

This is the before picture. My son was 5 at the time so the primary colors worked. The furniture is all a nice bedroom set that we inherited from my in-laws, minus the dresser which is from ikea. Now that everyone is older I needed something that my boys could grow into but would still be fun for young boys.

I started with painting the room. A friend of mine had done a similar wall color technique but with she painted the walls to chair rail height with two different colors of blue. I wanted something a little brighter, but still wanted a dark blue color. So I opted to go white on the ceiling to wainscoat height (1/3 of the way down the wall) and do blue from there down. I used my favorite white Home depot's Cotton Whisper by Behr and the blue is Valspar's Deluxe Eddie Bauer Home- Denim. The is a pretty easy process. I painted the white first and just went down far enough to ensure that it would be below where I wanted the blue. I then used a chalk line to mark the walls, taped the line, and painted the bottom -denim. The trim and windows were then also painted to match the ceiling.

It was definitely time for a bedding update. The old quilt was frayed and much too little boyish. Knowing that I would be making bedding for bunk beds I did everything x 2. I found 2 Ralph Lauren Down Alternative comforters at TjMaxx for $26 a piece. A great deal! Then I needed to cover them. My son wanted red so after much searching I finally found a set of red sheets by Woolrich on clearance at a local overstock store and bought two. I had two sets of knit sheets already. I sewed the red sheet to the blue- making the duvet cover reversible and whoola! I am hoping to mix and match the sheet sets on the bunk beds to make the spaces coordinated yet individual. The accent pillow was $5 and is a Waverly blue ticking stripe.

My window treatments including denim valances and red roman shades finish the look. My husband helped install shelves over the desk for my older son to keep things away from his brother and help clean up the clutter. I would like to find a night table to match the other furniture, that will have to be my next project. My clever sister also suggested adding dresser pulls to dress up the dresser. I will probably do that too. We are all very happy with the new room. My son is the most thrilled of all.

Window Changes (manda)

I had new windows installed to the front of my house about a month ago. I love them. They are great and really updated the front of the house, but what I have had the most fun with is updating and changing my window treatments. When we moved in everything was cheap aluminium mini-blinds. We changed a few out earlier for some shades but with the new windows everything had to come down.

This was my chance to get what I really wanted. While strolling through target a few weeks ago I came across a whole end cap of roman shades marked down 75% off. They were perfect. Mostly a nice cream color. I selected jute shades for 5 windows downstairs and thermal cloth shades for 5 windows upstairs. All of this only cost me $95! Yeah! My patient husband has been helping me get them all installed. We have practically no window sills, so the shades all had to mounted to the outside but with cute curtain panels it works great.



I picked up these curtain panels that I am in love with at Ikea. I had to hem them a little but the iron in hem strips made it a snap. They go from the ceiling to the floor and really add a great feature to the room. Now I am just saving up for my new couch.

Please tell me about your window challenges and solutions. I would love to hear all your clever ideas!



My new windows!

Boys room re-do (nat)

As soon as we found out we were having another boy I started planning out what I wanted to do to make the nursery into a cute boys room. So without major changes (wall treatments or re-painting etc.) I re-vamped the room to make it work for 2 boys. After about a million projects I think I am satisfied. Probably a few more things will be thrown in along the way but for now I'm happy. When we bought the house this room was painted a dark army green, it looks lighter than it was in the photo. So thanks to the help of my dad it has a totally new look!

Before...
After
Details of the different projects are below.
To the left- changing table, pics, diaper shelf etc. This changing table is just a dresser we begged off of my husband's grandma when we were snooping in the basement! It was painted white and mustard yellow. With our first, I just repainted it and painted the knobs- gotta love it when things are free!

To the right- rocking chair, shelf, reading/toy area
This rocking chair I picked up with our first too at DI (local consignment shop) i think it was like 20 bucks. I touched up the white paint and made new covers for the seat cushions that you can un-zip, remove, and wash. I still need to make a pillow for this chair and a pillow sham for the bed... hmm someday. Oh and I used to have these letters above the bed done in really cute scrap booking paper and ribbon but i can't find a picture of them anywhere. I haven't put up new letters yet, I'm waiting til we pick a name for baby #2!

Now here are some of the projects close up- I had a lot of fun with these pictures. I love the look of pictures stretched on canvas but it is soooo expensive. So I got creative and bought 3 canvases at joann's (at 40% off) and then had pictures printed out on computer paper at kinkos (like 1.50) then I used good ole' mod podge to wrap the pics onto the canvas, just kind of like you are wrapping a present. Not perfect but definitely worth the price tag. I think it turned out pretty cute. These pictures are what inspired a lot of the room. Add some cheap square frames from the dollar bins at target, scrap booking paper, and vinyl lettering- voila

I tried to do the mod podge streaky to make it have more of that canvas/rustic effect. Hard to tell in a picture but you get the idea.

Onto the sewing projects- I made the duvet cover. Couldn't find anything I liked in the stores at the price I like to pay so I made one. Just used an inexpensive sheet on the back, and two coordinating fabrics for the front, added some buttons to close it all up. The great thing is since I change my mind so much now all I have to do is make a new cover instead of buy a whole new set when I get sick of this one. Oh yeah and if you look back at the first couple pics I made the window treatment too. It keeps the heat in and the light out perfectly at nap/nightime and is just rolled up during the day. Here's a tutorial if you are interested in making a similar window treatment for yourself!

I re-did this shelf awhile ago but it had like stars and moons cut out on the back which I got sick of so I took some cardboard, covered it in fabric, and put it on the 3 back sections. Perfect size for housing diapers

Finally, stuff on the shelf. Found these boxes super cheap at Michaels, covered them in scrap booking paper etc. Not the greatest close up but whatever.

The great vintage car my mom bought me for my birthday and a cute pottery barn plane I got at the after christmas sale since it's actually an ornament.

Make a simple window treatment (nat)

I've had this dilemma with the big window in our kitchen for quite some time now. It was a weird space for drapes, too big for pre-made valances, etc. I made a few things that did not turn out well, shopped at a million stores, and finally I found the solution and love it. I have a good friend (thanks josey!) that is quite the seamstress so she told me an easy way to make a valance without a pattern (since i HATE patterns). So I tried it out and here is the result....a little funky but I like it!

WINDOW TREATMENT TUTORIAL

1. Pick out 2 types of fabric that coordinate. I used drapery fabric but it does tend to be a bit more expensive. Get both fabrics cut long enough to cover about 3/4th of your window and wide enough to cover your window plus about 4 inches or more. get an addition half yard or so of the fabric you want for your ties. I used the fabric on the backside.

2. Buy Velcro. I found it cheapest at walmart. You want it to be sticky back on each side so you don't have to mess with sewing or ironing etc.

3. Start measuring! Measuring everything so that it hangs just where you want it to on the window was the trickiest part. So once you have that figured out, then you can start everything else.

4. Cut the two fabric pieces so they are exactly the same size.

5. Use the excess fabric to make your ties. The ties should be long enough so that after you tie them, they fall where you want them to on the window. You need 4 ties so cut out 8 strips of fabric. Take 2 strips, pin them together- back sides out. Sew around 3 edges, leaving the 4th short edge un-sewn. Inside out the tie- set aside, make other 3 the same way.

6. Lay back fabric down face up.

7. Lay all 4 ties on top of that with the un-sewn edge in line with the top edge of the back fabric. Make sure the ties lay where you will want them to hang on the window. Lay two on one spot and the other 2 on the other spot.

8. Lay the top fabric ontop of everything else face down.

9. Pin everything together.

10. Sew everything together leaving part of the bottom edge un-sewn so you can turn it right side out.

11. Turn it all right side out, finish the bottom edge

12. Stick velcro on the top backside of the valance, and then velcro on the top of the window.

13. Hang, roll towards you, tie, and admire your beautiful, easy, new creation!

Nat's kitchen remodel

Here's the kitchen when we first came to look at the place. Basically- I fell in love with this house purely because of this kitchen. I LOVED the white bead board, the tile floor, and the huge vaulted ceilings. What I didn't love so much was the cream colored cabinets, the mauve paint, and the country decor- but I knew all of that could change. This was the first room in the house to go- basically it was my jumping off point for every other room in the house. I must say, I LOVE my kitchen!

Before...

After! The mauve paint was painted over bright red so I knew it would be way too much work to pick a lighter color so I went with chocolate brown, and its a great contrast with the bright white. I love it. We sanded down, primed, and painted all the cubboards and the side door. But like I've said... I love lots of white with punches of color and pattern.

We changed all the hinges and splurged on putting on hardware. But I love that we didn't have to spend much money at all to tranform the entire space. I would love to add molding to the top of the cabinets, better decide how long we really want to stay here first!
Adding a window treatment made such a difference and I was so happy with how it turned out!