Category: Decorating

It’s been quite awhile since I posted anything about the progress of our house transformation. I was very gung-ho when we moved in to get it done, but life has been crazy and projects have been abandoned. The last time I shared pictures was just a week after moving in and there was such a big difference already! But sadly, not too much has changed since then. My hope is that if I put all my plans out there on the blog, I might be more apt to hold myself to doing something about them. So, without further ado, my 2013 DIY list.

I did finish the tile floors in the kitchen and breakfast room and even got them done in the laundry room! I also got the bookcases painted, put the doors back on with new hardware, and started painting the fireplace. The TV is mounted, too, but none of it is cleaned up and nice looking yet. The fireplace needs another coat of paint and the bookshelves need to be organized and decorated.

Before:

1 week after moving in:

Today (the rest of the room isn’t picture worthy, not that this corner is, either, but you get the idea):

I also need to paint all the trim in the room still. The windows and molding have been primed but will soon become a beautiful white…and I can’t wait! I bought the fabric to make curtains months and months ago and we’ve been staring at it wound in the corner since then. The curtains will be my reward for the rest of the painting.

Not all areas are still a disaster, though! I’ve been working in the dining room. It’s far from being finished, but it’s looking so much better! I hung one set of curtains and got a mirror on the wall. Hey, it’s progress and anything counts! But I do still need to hem the curtains and I have big plans to paint them. Stay tuned for that, it’s going to be dramatic!

But, the other half of the room leaves a lot to be desired! I didn’t get the other set of curtains up because the battery died on my drill so I stopped to charge it and just haven’t gotten back in there. I need some great art for this huge blank wall and I’m thinking something that goes with my dramatic curtain color.

Before:

Currently:

It’s amazing what an enormous difference just hanging a rod and some curtains can make!

And what this room looked like before:

Then there’s the pesky chandelier. Brass, yuck. And I stole the shades for the light in the breakfast room since we mainly use that table and they had dark hunter green shades on it. I love love love the medallion but haven’t decided what to do with it yet. I’m going to try to paint the chandelier before giving up and replacing it entirely.

I also want to paint the chandelier in the breakfast room, but I’m not sure about the ceramic parts on it. And though the shades are better, they’re still not great!

Our house is totally full of painting projects. One of the most immediate is Chloe’s room. We started painting it before we moved in and lost daylight and had to stop. Since then, there just hasn’t been a good time to go back in there! I can’t paint while she’s sleeping, there’s not much time for it to dry before she needs to sleep again, and I can’t paint with all of them up! So poor Chloe’s lived with these sad walls for 9 months (it’s going from brown to blue).

It doesn’t stop her from playing in there, though!

The next project to be tackled is quarter round molding. The entire house, including the kitchen, was carpeted when we moved in so the molding everywhere looks like this. My Dad is going to come up one weekend and help me get as much of it down as possible and I can’t wait! It’ll be the kick I need to paint the rest of the trim in the rooms.

Did you suffer through all that? If you made it this far, there’s a reward in it for you! This post isn’t just about my horrific house, but it’s a giveaway for one of you lucky readers! Up for grabs is a RYOBI ONE+ combo kit, supplied by The Home Depot!

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I’m starting to think I should rename my blog “Sew Like My Mom Intended to Make” because things just haven’t been going my way the last 6 weeks! Ella’s an amazing baby, but she’s got some horrible reflux that’s been hard on us both. Sofie and Chloe had it too, but Ella’s has been harder to get under control. We’re finally getting into a good routine and getting good sleep at night. I love getting past the zombie stage!

So life with a 3 year old, a 19 month old and 6 week old is rough. The Hubs has been working 16+ hour days for the last few months so I’ve been doing my best to just keep everyone alive! Sewing and blogging has had to take a back seat to my family and though it’s made me sad, it was necessary.

But since things are finally starting to go smoothly around here, I feel like I can get us all into a good routine and get back to regular sewing. I spent all weekend giving the house a cleaning overhaul and it’s refreshing to have everything orderly again! I also finally got around to getting my birthday gift together, which leads me to this post.

I reorganized my whole sewing area…again. I started my blog not long after Chloe was born and my sewing area had become a disaster. I did a good job keeping it clean until my orders and sewing got out of control and I jumped from one project to another. The last 6 months or so I’ve just completely outgrown it. And while I was pregnant with Ella, my sacroiliac joint was misaligned. It was causing me lots of pain, especially while sitting in my sewing chair. I was sewing at our kitchen table while sitting on a medicine ball and fabric and notions were literally spread throughout the entire first floor of the house.

So for my birthday I decided I REALLY wanted a good storage system to help make life easier. The Hubs insisted that wasn’t a gift, just something necessary, but it was the only thing I wanted. We got them at Target on my birthday, but the shelves sat in the boxes for a few weeks until I had the time to not only assemble them, but get everything put together. Turns out last Sunday was the magical day and I’m SO excited with how it all came together!

                          

Earlier this year I was using my serger and my sewing machine regularly, but my sewing table wasn’t big enough to accommodate them both. I did some research and found this GREAT table at Ikea for only $20!! It doesn’t rock or move at all and holds both machines perfectly! It’s so wonderful to have them next to each other while I’m working on a project.

And I got my fabric all back in order. I like just looking at it!

                          

I’m also so glad that I finally get to use my table! It was hidden in the corner under a ton of other stuff and I was never able to open it up. I’ve been cutting fabric on the kitchen floor for a year and a half! So this has been great for my knees and my back, and it’s awesome to be able to leave a project there at any point and not worry about little hands getting to it.

I still share the room with the girls which makes it easy to sew and parent at the same time.

I’ve already made two things since getting it all cleaned up and put together and I’ve got a list a mile long of things to get done in the next few weeks. It feels good to be getting back to “me.”

Finally, a tutorial!!

To make Chloe’s nursery canvases, I used a mixture of paint, paper, and fabric to create completely unique art for her wall.

I started with the fully painted canvases.

I found an image from one of the fabric prints that I liked, then I blew it up on my computer to the size of my canvas, and traced it on computer paper.

Then, channeling my elementary school art days, I flipped it over and filled in the back using a regular lead pencil tilted at an angle.

Then I flipped it back over, taped it to my canvas in a few places, and made little reference points on the canvas to make sure I returned it to the exact same spot each time. I started with the green pieces, so I traced them first.

Then painted.

Once it was dry, I moved on to the next color, in the order that made the most sense.

Then I washed off the reference points and it was finished!! I followed the same steps for this canvas, also from one of the fabric prints, except it was much simpler to do. I painted all the pink, then went back and added the red on top.

                          

And for the “C” I simply painted the whole canvas pink, went back and taped off 1″ spaces with 1″ painters tape and added the green stripes. Once it was dry I used the same tracing method to draw the C on top of the lines, and filled it in with brown paint.

                          

The apple and pear are painted backgrounds, with paper pieces glued on top.

I enlisted some help with the painting for these while I cut the paper.

                          

Then starting with the bottom shapes, I glued (using Mod Podge because I couldn’t find my Aleene’s) the pieces on.

                          

                          

                          

(I forgot to take a picture of the step where I added the stem and the leaf)

                          

Then to let them dry without rippling, I turned them over and placed a heavy book on the back of the canvas so it would be perfectly flat.

Then for the owl, I used only fabric (other than the painted background).

                          

I traced the shapes on regular (red) Heat n Bond and ironed them on at the same time.

                          

I covered the whole canvas with a scrap piece of fabric and ironed lightly, until all the pieces stuck.

                          

Then turn the whole thing over and iron from the back side to get a good seal on the Heat n Bond.

                          

And lastly, the birds. I used a mix of all the previous techniques to make my birds.

First I freehanded the branch with brown paint. While it dried, I cut the leaf shapes from scrapbook paper and glued them on. I cut the birds from scrap fabric on Heat n Bond and ironed them on, then painted their beaks and feet.

And that’s it!! I already had all the fabric, paper, and some of the paint, so I just bought the canvases (50% off at Michael’s) and a few bottles of paint! It cost me less than $20 and a few afternoons of crafting to create this adorable wall art!