I have done more than my fair share of decorative wall treatments in my day.  I was queen of sponge painting back in the day.  When Ralph Lauren came out with the denim wall treatment I had to try that out on my kids’ bedroom walls.  I have also stenciled, painted stripes, squares, circles, polka dots and free-handed tree branches with  blossoms.  I love paint and I am always excited to try something new.  Today, I wanted to try a linen/grasscloth look on the wall behind the bed in my bedroom (this is where the good idea goes bad).  I figured the linen look wasn’t that far off the denim look (which I was successful at even as a complete novice).  I have a linen brush that I purchased at Home Depot years back when they still carried Ralph Lauren products.  I had the glaze mixed and ready to go.  I followed the instructions, but my project didn’t turn out right.  I think maybe I used too many different tints of glaze and didn’t let each coat dry completely between coats.  Anyway, I ended up with cock-eyed stripes instead of beautiful linen or grasscloth look wallpaper.  So, what am I going to do now?  I don’t know.  I will paint over the faux linen mess with some of the leftover wall color for now.  Maybe it will stay that way until I can afford the original plan for the wall, brick.  Guess I’ll have to chalk this one up to “lessons learned the hard way”.  Thank goodness it’s easy to get a do-over with paint!  Hope you are heaving a better weekend than me

 

     I thought it would make the most sense to show one corner of my family room at a time.  Above is the before.  I loved the green (Sherwin William’s Lemon Verbena), black and white, but I was ready for a change .  Besides, I chose the wrong wall to make an accent wall (more on that soon). 

 

     Here is the after.  The living room, family room, kitchen and family room are all open to each other so I decided that it would make sense to carry the beige all throughout these areas.  Now it feels right and I am happy.  This has been a tough room to decorate.  I have painted this wall seven times. It has been three different shades of green, yellow, blue, khaki, and now biege .  I wish I had taken Design 101 before I tried tackling this room.  In that class, I was taught that a warm, light color on the walls is the easiest to live with.  I won’t be painting in here again (barring any unforseen ceiling collapses ) partly because I am just plain sick of painting, partly because I don’t want to chance getting paint on my new floors (when they are in) and partly because it is easier to change out my pillows, rug, and art when I am sick of a particular color scheme.  So, that is why I am starting my reveal now and not waiting until my new floors are in.  I will of course keep you posted when and how the floors go in.  Thanks for visiting!

     Above are pictures of the room my two year old and six year old sons share.  Well, this is what it did look like.  Below are pictures of what it looks like now (so far).

     I figured if they wanted to write on the walls, then by golly I’d let them write on the walls.  I wanted to give them a chalkboard, dry erase board and a magnetic board.  I kept trying to figure out how to put these all together in their room without it looking just as messy as before.  I finally came up with the idea of integrating them all by painting vertical stripes around the room.  The chalkboard, dry erase board, and the magnetic board will be extra wide stripes.  The smaller stripes are blue, grey, green, black and white.  I am trying to use up extra paint leftover from other projects and stick with the inspiration piece they gave me to copy.  I’ll post soon about that inspiration piece.  I will also be updating you as I progress with this room.  I can’t wait to start the magnetic stripe.  I am going to have the boys help me with some art projects inspired from their inspiration piece.  I have an extra storage up-cycling project and of course I need to make some cute magnets for the magnetic board.  Hope you’ll stick it out with me.  This looks to be a summer-long project, especially now that we are spending our days swimming, going on walks to the park, hiking, picnicking and just lazin’ around.

    

  This week I’ve been putting some finishing touches on a big project.  Here’s a little sneak peek.  I needed some black and white fabric to make new pillow covers.  I just had plain black and plain white fabric on hand, but as you probably know by now, I love black and white patterned fabric.  What’s a girl to do?  Paint the fabric of course.  I first measured my pillow form (bought at Ikea a few years ago).  Then I cut a piece from the white fabric for the back and a piece from the black fabric for the front.   Below is a picture of  the supplies you will need.  In addition to fabric paint, you will need a brush, something to protect your work surface, a stencil or stamp, painter’s tape, and an iron.

     I had to run down to Hobby Lobby to get some more fabric paint.  I didn’t have enough from my silk screened pillows (here).  I painted two pillows for this project.  I used about a bottle and a half of the paint for both.  I really love this paint because it doesn’t smudge (much) or bleed.  I had this brush on hand so I used it.  I haven’t experimented much with painting fabric so I am not sure if there is a better way to do this, but it worked for me.  I didn’t have a paper plate on hand to squirt the paint onto so I just used a corner of the garbage bag.  You will need to protect the surface you are working on (below) because while this paint doesn’t bleed under the stencil, it does bleed through to the back of the fabric.

     You don’t have to worry about ironing your fabric just yet.  Just put your stencil on top.  I centered my stencil on my fabric but if you have a stamp or a more random type of stencil you can just start where you want.

     I used painter’s tape to secure the stencil in place.  I lightly loaded my brush and then “pounced” the paint along the stencil lines.  I had to go back and do a few spots.  It was a little time consuming but I wanted to make sure there was an even coating of paint. 

     After I was done painting, I carefully peeled the stencil off.  I had a few little mistakes but I used the corner of a wet sponge to wipe them off.  Then I let the paint dry.  The package instructions states that you need to let the paint air dry for 24 hours.  To set the paint, use a dry iron.  I had mine set on medium.  I was supposed to use a pressing cloth but I forgot.  You need to wait at least 72 hours to wash your painted fabric after that.  Hand wash in cold water. 

     When my fabric was ready I pinned right sides together and sewed.  Here is the first one.  I’m still working on the second one.  Painting the material is a bit time consuming but I am really happy with how this one turned out.   I am even more happy that two new pillows only cost me a bit over $2.00.    As always, thanks for stopping by.  I always enjoy swapping ideas with people that don’t  roll their eyes when I start talking about decorating.

 

 

    I put the finishing touches on our guest/kids bathroom today.  You may remember from my Free Art post that I needed a new rug (see here for that story) for this room.  I decided that I didn’t want another blue, cream and brown rug.  It would have been easy to just search for on, throw it in there and call it quits, but I am changing things up around here.  I want the house to flow better so I decided to do black, white plus a color in each room. 

 

 I started this project by painting the walls.  I wanted to change the paint from blue (Ralph Lauren’s Shoreline Blue) to yellow because there is absolutely no natural light in this room.  I found the most beautiful shade of yellow.  It’s Ralph Lauren’s Ginger.  I wish these pictures did the color justice.  It is a sunny, sophisticated color that just makes me happy whenever I look at it.   That being said, a little goes a long way.  The first coat of yellow paint went from floor to ceiling.  It was too much for this little room.  I decided that it needed to be broken up.  I went over a couple of different looks in my mind.  Board and batten, bead board, or chair rail would have all been beautiful but I have no patience.  Doing one of those mean a trip to the store and power tools.  I wanted something quick and easy.  I had white paint leftover so I painted the bottom third of the wall white.  I had some ribbon for some pillow covers I was planning to make.  I thought the ribbon would be cute to use in place of the chair rail.   I drew a level line and lined the ribbon up so it was straight.  I secured it to the wall with doubled-sided tape.  It looked good and stayed in place well, but I started to think about it and decided to tap in a few upholstery tacks just to make sure my two year old didn’t pull it off the wall.   Here is a close-up.

 

 I liked the ribbon so much, I decided to put some around my mirror to trim it out. 

 

    The next thing I did was paint the vanity.  I have lived with that golden oak and the mismatched doors for longer than I’d care to admit. The doors are mismatched because I experimented with them (see here for that story).   I kept putting off painting because I want a new vanity, one with twin vessel sinks, granite counter tops, and definitely something not oak.  But life has a way of sidelining my plans (someone needs dental work, the oven needs fixing, etc., etc.).   I am hoping that one of these days I will get my dream bathroom but for now I am loving the grey.

  

    The rest of the room came together pretty easily.  I bought a black and white rug and shower curtain.  I pulled all of my black and white towels out of the linen closet.  I pulled a few things out of storage that were waiting for me to find them a special place.  Here is a picture of a couple of new things I picked up.  The wire-mesh star is a thrift store find.  The chalk board is from Hobby Lobby.  It has really come in handy in the bathroom. 

 

      I just wanted to take a minute and show how the black and white trim/doors is working.  I have mentioned before that I am only painting the the trim/doors of the public areas black.  All of the private rooms are keeping their white trim/doors. Now I like the way the room looks with the door open or closed. 

 

 Well, that’s about it.  I put just under $100.00 into this makeover and just over two weeks.  I could probably have done the whole thing in a week.  Nothing was difficult.  There was just a lot of drying time and I only put in a few minutes here and there last week because my kids were home for Spring Break.  Hope everyone had a happy Easter.