New Shed!

So I've posted before about the workshop shed, but I never showed the storage shed! We set up a 10 x 10 "garage" to store furniture in before we work on it, so the moisture here in Santa Cruz would stop killing them! I've lost quite a few pieces to moisture, and it's really annoying - especially when you are in the middle of a project! It's mostly the mist from the ocean that does it. 

Anyway - up until now, it was on the ground. But thanks to my step-dad Mark, we were able to raise it! Take a look first and I'll explain after:

 Using free pallets from craigslist, we stacked 18 pallets on top of eachother, in opposite directions. Then purchased roof plywood ($8 a sheet) and secured them to the pallets.  $26 dollars and about 2 hours later, we have a raised platform to keep the furniture off the groung this winter! This came out so much better than I thought, that I am really excited to do the workshop with this method and a few other areas in the yard, but use nicer wood on the top for a pseudo "deck".  I rent so I don't want to spend money on installing a full on deck without permission (and compensation, ha!). Mark had tons of tips and tricks about this procedure he came up with, e-mail him here if you want more information.

Have a great day, keep an eye out for our new flickr album as I'm going to start posting all the inventory "as - is" to be available for reservation. Thanks!

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Long Break!

Hi everyone! I apologize for such a long break, we have been working really hard getting our new workshop set up. Here is a picture:

There you have it. That table was a crazy find, we went to a "free" sale which turned out to not be free (long story) and scored this table.  It's HUGE! We don't have a big enough truck at our disposal, so we paid extra to have it delivered. Well, we got a call that night around ten p.m. saying they dropped it off at the liquor store NEAR our house... and that's it! SO Ross and I, at ten p.m., were carrying an enormous table down the middle of the street.  It was very awkward, but very worth it! We can each work from a side with plenty of space. 

I've started in on a few projects.  The first is one of the chandeliers. I decided to break all the glass out, and I will paint it bright red with oversized light bulbs.

Breaking the glass was a fun stress relief!

 The other project is a set of four chairs from my Grandma.

It's so cool to be working on these chairs after growing up around them. It's neat to think all this time I never knew I'd be redoing them one day!

Set of four, all matching. Here they are primed:

Like our make-shift paint booth? There is one chair missing from the photo. I think I am going to paint them a light blue, and use this fabric for the seats and the back:

I haven't finalized any of the plans though, so it is still open if anyone wants to reserve them to buy and choose the colors and fabrics.  Anyone have suggestions of chair color, after seeing this print?

Ross is working on a few things right now too, but I only have a picture of one. This mirror:

It's pretty big - It's been primed now too, and is about to receive a coat of color. This is also up for reservation if anyone is interested. 

Thanks for checking in, I'll post progress pictures soon! Have a great one.

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New Projects!

Here is a few things we are starting on - if you would like to reserve anything, let me know, and you can choose the colors - etc.

We are also now on Facebook under "Nine Red" or you can click here to become a fan!  For you twitter lovers, we are there too under NineRedDecor. Nine Red was taken! Oh well. Thanks for stopping by!

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Forgiveness please!

Wow! What a break! Well, sorry everyone for not posting in so long, things went a little crazy with work and home life at the end of the school year there. Parties to be thrown and kitchens to be painted. Oh that's right, I didn't mention that... well here are some shots of the kitchen before and after, I'll take better ones soon. Sorry about the messes, it's a rough job to paint a kitchen!

We chose to go with bright colors. Since we rent, we couldnt' replace the cabinets, so we just gave them a quick makover. The bottom ones need another couple coats, but I'd say for just adding paint and new handles this is pretty good!

I promise to post soon about the chalkboard pig adventure, as I got an order for 28 in... it's like a litle blackboard piggy bank army....  have a great day!

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Ciabatta Bread

I found this great tutorial on line for making ciabatta bread.  It's extremely easy! First let's give credit where credit is due; Ciabatta tutorial.
Basically to make this bread, you take 2 cups of warm water, and stir in 1/4 tsp of yeast. Add 1 teaspoon of salt, stir it up, then drop in 4 cups of flour.  The hardest part is over! Stir it into a dough, then cover it and leave it on the counter for 8-12 hours. Plastic wrap or a towel is fine. Afterwards, the dough will have doubled, and you just dump it out onto a floured (well, flour and cornmeal in my case) cookie sheet.  Literally, just dump it out, give it a little shape if it needs it.  Here's mine before the oven:

I sprinkled on some fresh oregano, red chili flakes, pepper, whatever was around and smelled good.Throw it in a 400 degree oven for 25 minutes, or until it looks done. In retrospect, mine could have used 5 more minutes, but i'm not complaining because I like when bread is moist on the inside.  Enjoy this super easy bread!

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Teal Candle Holder, 1 of 4

Remember the post about the four candle holders makeover? Well the first of the four teal candle holders is done and up for sale. Here's the before picture:

This was a fun project. I really like this color. My sister Denise gave it to me when she went with a slightly different teal in her kitchen (which looks amazing! check it out at the end of the post).  So, in the "reuse spirit" I applied this paint to a few other projects of mine. Here's the finished holder:

I LOVE the picture with the red candle on it.  Again, that inspiration came from Denise and Joey's kitchen, and I think the red and teal combo looks amazing.  The past few years I've really started to like all the different red and blue combinations. There was a time when I worried about certain reds & blues looking too "captain america", but I think with the right shades it doesn't even come to mind.  I think the use of teal with the strong red is by far the most impressive! Thanks again Denise! So the candle holder is for sale in my etsy shop, here.

Now for a little inspiration for those of you wondering, here is Denise and Joey's awesome kitchen done in teal with red accents, and a beautiful dark countertop. These colors work great!

The back splash is clear glass subway tile backed in white that they installed themselves. Not shown here is how in the cabinet above is all red dishware, on glass shelves, with spotlights.

Have a great day!

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New Door Glass

So yesterday we had a project we didn't intend to do, and it turned out to be a good thing. The glass in our door (probably 40 years old) finally gave in, and sent a huge crack up the middle. We are having a party saturday so we thought, we'd better fix it so it doesn't come crashing down during the party.  Instead of getting a plain clear glass, we decided to pay just a little extra for something neat.

We chose "Raindrop glass". I wanted to do a color but we decided to keep it clear since we still have to paint the kitchen, and the door is red on the outside.

Installing it was surprisingly easy: Remove the molding, put the glass in, replace the molding. Done! Now we just have to repaint the door red, but it looks nice and "old" right now as is. Then someday......the kitchen! I love this new glass though - we get a little bit more privacy but still all the light!

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Corned Beef und Cabbage

Oh man! The house smells so good right and i'm starving, I forgot to include this earlier - Happy St. Patrick's Day! I'm wearing green and making Corned beef and cabbage. It's been cooking for about 3 hours and I'm STARVING.  The whole house smells amazing and my stomach is trying to claw it's way out  & run to the kitchen.  A few more minutes and it's time to eat!

I used this recipe, but I think they are all the same. I added a bottle of guiness though for extra flavor. I saw that somewhere, or I made it up. Hey - one for me, one for the stew! One last thing, if you would like to receive e-mail updates to blog, click here and enter your info.  RSS feeds are also available on the lower right of this page. 

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