So Fresh and So Clean, Clean

When we moved into our humble abode (I can't believe it has already been four months now!), something irked David and I... a lot. Every square inch of paintable surface (besides the walls) was painted a creamy beige color: all of the trim, all of the wood plantation blinds, all windows and windowsills, doors, crown moulding, cabinets... you get the picture. While it was super annoying to attempt to match the paint (for touch ups) to the premium custom Porter paint (ie. a $50 can of paint-- which is SO not up my alley!), we honestly just don't really like it. Then I wrote this post about how much I love painting to develop a high contrast look and we just knew that we had to do something about the beige. Step by step, we have pledged to rid our sweet little home of all of the beige!

First stop? Our bedroom.

Creamy beige trim:

Pretty white trim: (Please excuse the AWFUL picture quality and the fact that our duvet cover is not on the bed- hey, we were just being lazy it was laundry day! We were just super excited to get these up.)

Creamy beige trim:

Pretty white trim:

Creamy beige trim:

Pretty white trim:

Yes, we can all say ahhhh together! Mad props to David who layered on the white while I partied it up at my cousin's baby shower last Saturday! He's the bomb! (Yes, I realize I am the only person who has said this phrase since the year 2001!) Painted anything fun lately?

DIY Picture Frame

One of the main reasons that David and I headed down to south Georgia last weekend was to move my youngest sister, Callie, into her dorm at Georgia Southern University. Whether I'm ready to believe it or not, my baby sister is a freshman in college! We loaded up her dorm room gear (which includes anything black, white or hot pink), packed her some Ramen noodles and Easy Mac, and drug along our will to move her into a fourth floor dorm room in sweltering south Georgia heat.

And of course I was super excited about the opportunity to help decorate a blank slate of a room! And in thinking about how I could help add to the room, I realized that I felt a DIY project coming on.... I wanted to give Callie something sentimental but fun, so I settled on a photo collage. The only thing I knew in starting this little project was that everything just HAD to be black, white, or hot pink. I have to admit, working with these colors was kind of fun considering there's not an ounce of hot pink in my house!

Back to the project. I picked up a 50% off basic black frame (no backing or glass) at Hobby Lobby. I drilled several holes in the side of the frame (ok, you caught me again, David drilled the holes) to place several screws. I (ahem, David) then wrapped picture framing wire around the screws across the length of the frame. Like so:

Here's a close up for the curious:

Then comes the fun part. I went to a few different craft stores and picked out some fun scrapbook paper.

And let me tell you, these funky, girly patterns are RIGHT up my sweet little sister's alley! And, duh... black, white and hot pink!

Then I got the pleasure of sorting through a bunch of our old pictures. I wanted some recent shots, some old shots, and a few non-photograph items. Callie loves anything with her initials on them and anything girly. So I pulled a random assortment, including some of the following.

A shot of our family cocker spaniel, Charlie (otherwise known as Chuckles, Chud, St. Charles Sebastian, or sometimes just Dog):

And while Callie obviously knows the recipe, I thought I'd throw in a handwritten copy of a family favorite- Saturday morning french toast:

And a picture of me and my wee little sisters with my dad, many years ago (and yes, that is me rocking the "all denim" outfit, you can be jealous):

With that said, I had to get the pictures, etc. to attach to the frame, so I decided to paint some basic tiny clothespins that I picked up from Walmart for $1.88. Before the paint, the clothespins looked kind of like this:

But, obviously, the natural wood is not black, white or hot pink, so I spray painted them a glossy black. Needless to say, here's the final product:

You can see I added the pictures, her initials (the CFG is chipboard from the scrapbook department and I picked up the "C" button from the fabric department at Michaels), a sweet little satin fabric hot pink flower, and all of the fun scrapbook paper (how cool is that black glitter paper!). I also wrote some special, personal messages on the back of the frame with a paint pen (a Bible verse, a favorite quote, and a few words about how PROUD I am of my little sis!) which added even more personalization to the gift. And yes, the picture of Callie with a Burger King paper bag on her head is definitely a silly inside joke that has lasted about ten years now!!

The presentation to her was certainly filled with a lot of tears and laughter-- I sure did get my sentimental moment! My family was there when I gave it to her, so it was very special to share the entire project with everyone! Here are me and my beautiful sister with the frame once we got it hanging in her dorm room (please ignore the fact that we are slightly very sweaty!):

Don't worry, I've got another version going (which is slightly less black, white and hot pink and more neutral and earthy toned!) for our living room as well! I'll share that next week! Have you guys made any fun DIY wall art lately?!

PS. I posted an update on the frame I made for our house today (September 1, 2010). Here's a sneak peek, but check out the Update Post!

 

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Linked to: House of Hepworths

Savannah

No, I haven't given up on blogging yet... I'm on vacation! We're relaxing this week in the beautiful, historic, stylish Savannah, Georgia. Remember all of those lowcountry inspirations I mentioned last week? Here, they are realities! It is seriously beautiful here! So far we've hiked the cobblestone streets, dined on oysters on the half shell at a rooftop restaurant along the river, and of course hit up the design and antique boutiques. :) Needless to say, there will be lots to come on the blog about our lovely little Southern expedition. Off to Tybee Island for the day... have a great week!

Inspiration from the Lowcountry

Having spent my college years in the oh-so-fabulous Charleston, South Carolina, I will be the first to say that there is a little bit of lowcountry in this Georgia girl. I'm pretty sure I've been forever permeated with a passion for anything made out of woven sweetgrass, a love for the smell of the salty marsh water, and an obsession with shrimp and grits.

While we're certainly not living in an adorable cottage surrounded by palmettos and tiny little blue crabs scurrying about, I do try to bring a little lowcountry to our house. And what, you may ask, does that mean? Well, it means...

...live oaks older than anyone you know...

...blue painted porch ceilings...

...anything white, clean, and crisp...

...(only a touch of) a little something funky...

...a worn-in and welcoming vibe...

...finding a way to make even a narrow row house look spacy...

...clapboard walls and nautical stripes...

...a cozy porch for reading the Post & Courier...

...and, above all, a view...

All pictures are images of Charleston Magazine.

Before & After- Master Bedroom

When we were house shopping, David and I were never too impressed by gigantic "master suites." I know, call me crazy, but closets as big as a room and triple vanity sinks just weren't really on our wish list. Just give me a place for a few of my lawyer suits and our favorite jeans and flip flops, and we're good to go! Boy did I get what I asked for....

Meet our master bedroom.

And by master bedroom, what I really mean is a twelve-year-old boy's room. Complete with navy blue walls, smelly laundry, and BB gun holes in the walls. Yes, I said BB gun holes in the walls. Don't believe me?

Each one of those Spackle marks? A BB gun hole. And that's just one wall. (Yes, we can all cringe together!) Oh! And don't forget the fifty years of wallpaper found underneath the navy blue. Oh! And that was only found once we ripped what felt like billions of feet of impossible to pull off chair rail. Those poor walls got so beat up!

Yes, ouch. Like I said, that took lots of Spackle. And one rockin husband who stayed up till 2 am several nights in a row to get this done. Well, I think he had some incentive, as we were sleeping on an air mattress in the guest room.

That would be said air mattress. Okay, so on to the "later!"

First of all, I just want to say that I'm completely aware that we have a really, really small master bedroom. Even still, we are honestly loving it! In order to be comfortable, we just had to pare it down to the basics. Actually, Goodwill is loving us because we weeded out and donated our old bedroom TV and a bunch of unnecessary old clothes. It feels good to keep it simple! There are actually other bedrooms in the house that are larger than our bedroom, but this room is in the back of the house with a bit more privacy and is the only room in the house that has a bathroom attached (check out our before/after page for the gruesome pre-renovation bathroom pictures).

Anyways, after repairing the oh-so-sad walls, our next big step (of course) was paint. We added several coats of Benjamin Moore's Pale Smoke, which gave us the relaxed, soothing color we were looking for. 

We went back and forth about what colors to use as accents in the room (we attempted a raspberry red, a dark gray, and even a golden yellow) and ended up with royal blue-- against neutrals of course! I decided to pull in the royal blue in some funky ways: curtains, our night stands, throw pillows, and picture frames. I love me some royal blue! Ok so lets be honest... I might have gone a little overboard on the blue spray paint. Lets just say David likes to call it attack of the Smurf.

Smurf got the Hobby Lobby nightstands.

The white Walmart frames (complete with some of our favorite wedding pictures) also got Smurfed.

And of course we had to pull in the blue treatment with some fun Target pillows. This is actually the bedding from our old house- we haven't found anything new we like, so we've yet to move on. And yes, that is our favorite, favorite wedding picture above our bed, courtesy of the a-maz-ing Lindsey Turner of Lindsey Turner Photography.

There was a big question about what to do with the cluster mess of doors otherwise known as the closet and bedroom doors.

There just wasn't much flow once you opened all of the doors in that tiny space. So we pulled each door out and added some flow... with curtains!

 I bought several yards of (royal blue accented) fabric from Jo-Anns and simply cleaned up the edges with some no-sew hem tape. You thought I would sew?! I may be crafty, but I'm not that good! :) When I "sew," I use extra strength Heat 'n Bond!

Then I just slipped the top of the curtain onto a tension curtain rod. Voila! Curtains! Oh, and speaking of, I pulled an even easier Heat 'n Bond curtain trick on our window treatments. Instead of the tension curtain rod, we just bought curtain clips and hung the fabric from the curtain rod like so.

Add in a neutral rug from the one and only Target and our matching hand-me-down dresser (thanks Aunt Christy!), and we've got our perfect master bedroom!

Well, let's be honest. Not incredibly perfect. And no, I'm not talking about the yellow tiled adjoining bathroom. A little something has been irking us since we finished our master bedroom redo. In fact, we're currently undergoing a mini-makeover in this room as we speak. Already?! Yes. :) Stay tuned! **Note: Pictures have been updated to show the trim paint makeover shown here. Yay fresh white paint!