Thrift store Frames turned into elegant artwork

Yesterday I shared with you guys my revamped collage wall.  I was determined to make my collage wall really special and was trolling the internet for some fresh ideas for art.  While browsing Pinterest recently, I stumbled upon some gorgeous images of gold leaf art that left me drooling.  Like this one:

Painting the back door black

The notion of painting a door black is not a revolutionary one.  The idea has been all over Pinterest and blogs for a while now.  I think it is a great idea and for many homes it can really make them feel classy and expensive.  

When I noticed our back door was really starting to look worn, I thought that painting it black would be a great solution. 

 Scratch marks from our dog.

 General dirt and grime build up.

I stopped by Lowe's to pick up the following:

 As far as the actually painting went, I didn't need to do anything special.  However, the prep work and the clean up work was pretty extensive for this project.

I started by cleaning the door very thoroughly using an all purpose cleaner.  Once I was satisfied that it was clean, I taped off the glass.  It took a while because there is so much glass on my door, and I wanted my lines to be as clean as possible.

Then I started painting!  I opened the door while I was painting and while it dried so that the edges wouldn't stick. (SIDE NOTE: Since this was an exterior project, I waited until we had some nice weather.  It's been really cold here lately, and I didn't think the paint would cure properly if I applied it in 40 degree weather.  The day I painted the door it was in the 60's and sunny.)

It took three coats to get a nice, even finish.  After the paint had dried, I used a razor blade to score the edges of the tape and make peeling it away easier.  Then I had to go back over the glass with q tips to get the edges as straight and clean as possible.  I had to do a few touch ups around the door knobs and edges of the glass where the paint peeled off with the tape.  So far it has held up very well, but in hindsight, it probably would not have hurt to sand the door first. 

 Here's the finished product: 

After I was done painting, I let the door stand open for about 2 hours before closing it.  It takes up to 30 days to fully cure, and since there was no way I could leave the door open that long, I just waited until I was sure it was dry.  The paint hasn't stuck at all, and I've opened and closed it countless times since then.

All in all, I think it was a success! It definitely looks cleaner, fresher and shinier :) I probably could have gotten away with a sample size of paint because my little quart is still nearly full.  Anybody have anything they need painted high gloss black?  If so, I got the hook up!

Thanks,

Jesse  

Custom Artwork

Lately I have found myself gravitating towards more modern and sophisticated design and wondering what the best way to incorporate these elements into my current home is.  I want to keep the majority of my home the same as it currently is because not only do I still like it, but I don't have the money to do a complete overhaul. While perusing Pinterest a few weeks back, I ran across this beauty from Ballard Designs.

I instantly fell in love with this art for its sophistication, and thought it would still go well with my existing decor.  The only downside, it cost $449.  Just a tad above my budget. So I decided to try to recreate it.

The supplies I used:
A 4 x 4 blank canvas (I received mine as a Christmas gift, but it was purchased at Michael's using a 60% off coupon, and only cost my mom $30).
Various foam and small bristle brushes ($7 at Lowe's)
Two small foam rollers (already owned from previous projects)
Acylic Paint ($12 at Michael's)
paper plates (used as pallets) 
tape measurer
pencil

Total cost: $49 (Although for me, it only cost $19 since the canvas was a gift)

Here are the colors I used: 

The Process:
Step 1: Lay out canvas on a work surface in a well lit area. 

 Probably not necessary to list this step, but it never hurts to be thorough.  

Anybody else think this is the perfect opportunity for a Big Lebowski reference? No? Just me?

Moving on.

Step 2:  Prime. I've been instructed that its best to prime with either a pale blue or a pale pink so that the end result isn't too bright.  Since I didn't have enough of either color to prime the entire canvas, I used a combo of both colors as my primer.  I didn't prime the edges of the canvas, but should have because it took several coats of paint to get the edges painted. 

Step 3: Find the center of your canvas.  This really comes in useful when doing Step 4, next.

Like so. 

Step 4:  Create a base coat with your basic colors to define the shape of your painting.  You'll be able to go back in and add dimension and texture later on. (SIDE NOTE: To be honest, from here on out it all became guess work and trial and error, so by all means, please deviate from my instructions as much as you want if you decide to do a similar project!)

 Also, sorry the pictures aren't great.  

We all know I'm a terrible photographer, and it was really hard to fit in one shot. 

Step 5: Begin playing with textures and dimension.  It became painfully obvious to me at this point that my painting would never look exactly like my inspiration that I found on Pinterest, so I decided to embrace that.  I'd used my inspiration as the basic form of my painting, but my shapes and colors were going to be different, and that is okay.  I was still determined that I'd end up with something sophisticated, which was the entire point of this project anyway.  Here's what mine looked like at this stage:

Doesn't it kinda look like the ocean meeting land from space?  Funny since the inspiration artwork kinda mimics the idea of clouds (to me, anyway).  Not exactly what I intended, but not a problem either. 

Step 6: Add your finishing touches.  For me, this meant blending the dark edges so they faded more gradually into the other colors, adding additional texture to the lighter blues, adding pops of metallic gold using small brushes, and using a foam roller to lightly coat the entire painting with a very light gold.  Last but not least,  I painted the outside edges of the canvas a dark blue to make the entire artwork look more polished. 

 

 Here is the final product:

 

 

 

I'm happy with the way it turned out, especially since this was my first time trying a project like this.  Originally, I was considering placing it above the mantel in my living room, but when I saw it in this space, I just knew this was its home.  It is over sized for this room, but it just looks so elegant! Nothing like massive artwork to trick people into thinking you've got money! ;) It really takes our formal dining room up a notch.

As I said earlier, by no means is mine an exact duplicate of the artwork I originally was inspired by, but I'm really okay with that.  So if you want to save $400 and have a one of a kind art piece, try making your own.  If you hate it, you can just paint over it and start again!  Good luck in your artistic adventures, and as always, thanks for stopping by.

Love,

Jesse

Picking the Perfect Grey Paint

NOTE:  This post is not endorsed by any company or brand, this is simply my opinion of a great product! 

I will be the first to admit, that picking out paint, particularly when it comes to neutral colors, is really hard.  More than once I've gone to the store for samples or swatches only to end up having to return multiple times because I was unhappy with my selection.  Those whites, greys, tans, taupes and greiges all looks so similar when you see them in photos on Pinterest, but in reality the colors are completely different depending on the house, the room, the lighting, the time of day, and about a million other factors.

So, when I fell in love with Tinman by Kwal while on a Southern Living home tour with my mom and sister, I was afraid that the beauty of the color wouldn't translate in my home.   The room in the house tour that was painted that color was bright and airy, with lots of white furniture, whereas the room I was eye balling it for in my home had really awful natural lighting, and was full of dark, bulky furniture.  Nevertheless, I was determined to try it out.

 The two pictures above are of the room in the showcase home with Tinman walls. Swoon!!!

My hubby's man cave was the same neutral tan color as most of my house, but the walls in there were super dingy and really needed a refresh.  (SIDE NOTE:  When the old owners of our home put it on the market, they painted the entire house a fresh, clean neutral.  Sounds great, right?  Well, for some odd reason, they chose a matte (flat) finish paint, and it is impossible to clean and shows every single bit of dust and dirt.  Do yourselves a favor, and paint interior walls with a satin finish paint.  It is so much more durable and much easier to clean.)  

Okay, back to the man cave.  I've never shared this room on the blog before because it is the one room in the house that Reid has complete creative control over, and I'm not allowed to "girl it up".  It's decorated with surfing posters and his snowboard hangs above a massive television.  Not very blog worthy, but it makes him happy so its a good room :)  When I found the tinman paint color, I knew if would look great in that room and after weeks of me asking him, he finally gave me the go ahead to paint it! He trusted me that a fresh grey color would still look manly.

Guys, I am head over heels in love with this paint color! It looks great in all types of lighting, and is the perfect blend between neutral and fresh.  It's not too dark, and not too light and it doesn't have any hints of blue or purple in it. I'm convinced that it would be the perfect choice in any room! I only had to do one coat and a few touch ups, and I don't think there is a single drip mark.  It is by far the easiest paint I've ever worked with.  


On an unrelated note, I am dying to replace that window with a big huge window. This room honestly gets the worst natural light.  It's a big room and that is the only (tiny) window.  Does anybody have any experience with a project like this?  I wonder how much it would cost. Hmm...
 
So anyway.... If you've been toying with the idea of painting a room in your home a lovely neutral gray but haven't taken the plunge because it is difficult to pick a color, then your search is over!  Tinman by Kwal in a satin finish was the right choice for me, and I think it could be the right choice for you too!

Thanks for stopping by,

Jesse

The Kitchen is Painted... Finally!

It's a new year and I am on a quest to do all the updates and fixes around the house that I didn't get around to in 2013. I'm slowly but surely working my way through this list, and I tackled another project over the weekend. We finally painted the walls in our kitchen!

We remodeled our kitchen in February of last year (you can read more about that here), and afterwards it looked like this:

We were really happy with the way the space turned out, but we decided the walls needed a fresh coat of paint too. This color was just too similar to the color of the back splash and we wanted a warmer feeling. (SIDE NOTE: I'm not sure how I managed to make the space look so bright in the above photo, seeing as I'm a less than talented photographer, but the walls actually weren't that pretty in real life. They were less yellow and more beige, and were starting to show some wear and tear). However we were pretty burnt out on painting (painting those cabinets took a long time!) and we procrastinated. I was convinced that painting this room would take a long time because of all the cutting in that was required around the cabinets, floors, ceiling, etc. However, over this past weekend we did it! It was a lot quicker than I thought it would be and we got the entire thing done in one day. Here's the outcome:

The change is pretty subtle, both my mom and sister had a hard time figuring out what was different about the space when I sent them pictures, but it makes the room much nicer. I think this color (called Oatmeal by Valspar) makes the space both warmer and fresher at the same time. Those walls were really starting to get dingy and I am very happy with the outcome.

How are your new years/home improvement resolutions coming along? I hope you are making progress as well!

Thanks!

Jesse

Half Bath Progress!

A few weeks ago I wrote this post about all the things I wanted to get done around our house. I'm happy to say I can cross one of those things off the list. 

I painted the cabinet in our half bathroom! Yay!!

Ok, let me start from the beginning.

When we first moved into the house, the floors in our half bath had already been updated with a nice grey-ish neutral tile that we really like, but otherwise the room was your standard 1980's builder grade bathroom. The cabinet was oak (I don't have a picture of it, but it was the exact same color that our kitchen cabinets were before we painted them, you can see pictures of that here). We also had one of those ugly light fixtures that you see often in homes built in the 1980's, one that looked a lot like this:

So several months ago we bought a new light fixture to replace the dated one. I'm really happy with the way the new one looks, but it turned out to be a bigger project than originally anticipated. When we went to swap out the old fixture for the new one we realized that because the base shape of the new fixture was different (it was oval whereas the old one was rectangular, like the one pictured above) it wouldn't fit properly. There wasn't enough space between the light fixture and the mirror and the base of the new fixture overlapped onto the top of the mirror. To compensate, we had to take down the mirror and get about 4 inches trimmed off of it. We took it to a windshield repair place and they trimmed it for us for $10. We also had to repaint the wall because the wall color behind the mirror was a dark green and four inches of that would have shown once we hung the mirror back up. I decided to just paint the one wall rather than the whole room for a couple of reasons. 1) I wanted to keep the room neutral and light because it is such a small space and 2) I was being cheap, and just wanted to reuse paint I already had rather than go buy more.

Here is a picture of the new fixture:

This room is really hard to photograph because it is tiny and has no natural light, but I did my best to make the colors in the photos true to life.

So that is what our bathroom looked like for months. An updated fixture and a blue accent wall, but otherwise, still a standard half bath. I did manage to buy some cute accessories, including that large framed bird art which I love in this space. I think the subtle blue and neutral colors and natural theme tie in nicely with the rest of our house. Here is another peek at some of the accessories we put into this space:

(SIDE NOTE: Look closely, and you'll notice the toilet paper dispenser from this post, and the DIY door knob from this one). 

I felt that the room was decent the way it looked at this stage, but I didn't want to settle for "decent". I wanted it to be "really pretty and welcoming". After all, practically every guest in our home will go into this room at some point, so why settle?

So.... I recently managed to carve out some time to paint the cabinet. Gone is the 1980's oak, and here is what it looks like now:

I think the grey is really fresh and ties in nicely with our flooring. I may even get brave and try installing hardware (read about why I vowed never to do cabinet hardware again after our last disastrous attempt here).

I really want to get the mirror framed BEFORE Thanksgiving, and if I do, I promise to share it with your guys! I've already got all the supplies, I just need to do it! I'm hoping that will be a small project that goes a long way towards making this room feel updated and pretty. Once the mirror is framed, I have even bigger plans for completing this space, but I'll keep those secret for now because it will likely be another two years before I get around to doing them! While this room is not yet complete, I'm happy with the progress we've made.

What about you? Have you taken any steps towards getting a room in your home up to date? Thanks for coming by!

-Jesse

Kitchen Remodel

Happy Tuesday! I promised you I'd give you the details of our kitchen remodel, so today is the day that I come through on that promise! My hubby and I had a very full January and February this year. We tied the knot, took a wonderful honeymoon and then came home and basically threw ourselves into a kitchen remodel. I'm not sure why we decided this was the time for major home renovations, but regardless, we took the plunge. First, for a basic breakdown:

Helpful blogs that I referred to when updating the kitchen:

allthingsthrifty

iheartorganizing

thekimsixfix

Supplies we purchased or used:

frog tape exacto knife

4 2 x4's

electric sander (100 grit, 150 grit and 60 grit paper) regular sand paper

2 saw horses

1 gallon Valspar semi gloss interior paint (color is called Papparazzi)

polycrylic- high gloss finish- water based

three sponge brushes

two cabinet rollers and paint trays

1 gallon of interior primer- Valspar brand

two regular bristle brushes

tons of paper towels

drop cloths

409 cleaner

shark vac money spent: granite: $1,200 granite installation: $1,200 plus $240 for removal of old laminate subway tiles: $110 subway tiles installation: $420 cabinet supplies (paint, primer, brushes, rollers, trays, drop cloths, tape, sand paper, polycrylic): $93 sink and installation: 175 plus 185 Grand total: $3,623.00

 Now, for some before photos:

Our first step was to hire a contractor for our back splash and counter tops. We did our research and shopped around. We didn't go with the lowest bid, we went with our instincts and chose the company who'd give us the best quality service. We also purchased our granite directly from a granite supplier, which has a couple of benefits: 1) it cuts out the middle man, which saves $$$ and 2) we got to keep the left over granite, so we have plenty left to re-do our master bathroom down the line, or sell it and get some money back!  Here's what the kitchen looked like at that point:

We are really happy with our granite choice. We think it has tons of variation and lots of interesting veins, lines and spots! The color is called "White Fantasy" but I am not sure that is a universal name for this stone. I wasn't able to find any other granite yards with anything called "White Fantasy" or with anything that looked similar at all.

At this stage, I was feeling a little skeptical of our back splash decision. I knew that subway tile was what I wanted, but we spent alot of time debating between a bright white tile, a soft ivory color and the darker neutral we ended up choosing. The color we chose is called Urban Putty 0161 by Rittenhouse. At this stage I was afraid the back splash color was very dull and too similar to our wall color, but I decided to just wait to see it all finished before making up my mind. Now that the professionals had finished their job, the real fun began! Here is the breakdown on how we refinished our kitchen cabinets:

Cabinet painting process:
Step 1:	select a paint color
Step 2:	remove hardware and put into labeled baggies
Step 3:	label doors using frog tape (this ended up being unnecessary)
Step 4:	lay doors out in garage in two rows
Step 5:	remove stuff from inside cabinets
Step 6:	sand everything using an electric sander
Step 7:	sand edges and crevices by hand
Step 8:	clean thoroughly using 409 and paper towels
Step 9:	prime using bristle brush
Step 10:	light sanding and cleaning
Step 11:	coat 1 using roller
Step 12:	light sanding and cleaning
Step 13:	coat 2 using roller
Step 14:	light sanding and cleaning
Step 15:	touch up coat/coat 3 (we didn't need a full third coat everywhere)
Step 16:	light sanding and cleaning
Step 17:	Allow for plenty of dry time between coats
Step 18:	apply clear polycrylic coat with sponge brush
Step 19:	put doors back up
Step 20:	put knobs back on
Step 21:	put rubber bumpers on inside corners of doors
Step 22:	touch up spots that got dinged while being put back together

  

It literally took us days to decide which paint color to choose. Can you even tell the difference in this picture?! (FYI- We ended up going with the one on the right door because we thought it would match our appliances better).

Once we'd taken down the doors we realized that we were going to have to empty out all the cabinets to keep everything from getting too dusty.

Here's a peek of our dining room table loaded down with stuff from inside our cabinets!

After the kitchen was all cleared out, it was time to sand:

And prime:

And paint:

You'll notice we did all the steps for the top cabinets first before we even started on the bottom ones. This made it a little easier to handle the mess, because it was done in sections. Finally after about 4 weeks of work (keep in mind we both have full time jobs, so most work was done in the evenings or on weekends), our kitchen was put back together. We decided to use the same knobs that we already had to save money, but we still plan to distress them to give them an aged feel. They are currently a solid black color and I really like the way they pop against the white cabinets. We're also still planning to paint the walls, but we're having a hard time deciding on a color. Here are the after photos:

What do you guys think? Was it worth all the work? We sure think it was. Let me know if you have any ideas on wall colors because were torn between a light blue and a coffee color. Of course, if you've got any questions, I'll do my best to answer them! Thanks!

-Jesse