Entryway Command Center: Part 1 - Painting

Even though I'm not in school anymore, when I see all the kids heading back to class I feel the pressure to prepare.  I of course never liked going back to school, but I DID enjoy getting new school supplies.  Clean slate, fresh binders, ready to take on whatever challenge a teacher could dish.  So in that spirit, I thought it would be a great time to ramp up our "command center" - as they've come to be called.  A place to house everything you need - mail, keys, records, shoes...   Here's what we're starting with:

This area is technically a back-door entryway (the door on the right), but we seem to favor this door before leaving & when we come home.  I scored this library card catalog years ago, in the dumpster of a school, and it's been the handiest thing on the face of the earth! Plus it's easy to paint, so I think it's on paint job #3 (about to be 4, when we're done!).

Needless to say, this area was lacking. Boring. Ralph and I brainstormed over a glass of wine, and decided it needed to be a bold wall - since it's in a weird spot. A go to point. 

First step? Paint.

If you were standing in our home, in this area, the door on the left goes to the bathroom. I'm not crazy about that, but I also can't change it...so whatevs.  The door to the left of the fridge is the backdoor, and will someday be the type of door with a window in it.  The refrigerator is sadly in this area, but it's temporary. As it waits for a home in the actual kitchen, which is directly to the right.  We put in that light fixture, since it used to be one of those boob-lights, here's a close up:

Home Depot! Not bad, huh? I love the light it gives off.  Now, bloggers of the world will shun me for taking pictures in the evening, but I can't control the sun, and this was an after-work project. Which, if you find yourself with the energy to paint - never pass the opportunity up. Because you never know when you'll get that back!  Guess what color we went with...

Navy Blue!  (Benjamin Moore, Paint & Primer in one, "Old Navy" 2063-10 to be exact)Yea, frightening at first.  A dark house, a dark area, and we went with Navy Blue.  But in the end, I love it! It's only one wall, and we plan to put the library card catalog back, painted a bright white, with a big mirror & white frame.  So 80% of the blue will be covered.

Done. This was a quick paint job, and really satisfying.  By the way, we never use tape anymore (gasp!). We just use this Shur-Line paint edger that you can get at Home Depot, or on Amazon.  Once you get the hang of it you'll adore it. A couple daytime shots:

Light is a challenge in the mountains - a challenge I'm up for tackling.  Once this door has a giant window, light will pour in. And outside this door is a covered patio, begging for a skylight or two - bringing in even more - Just you wait...

 Let's take a step back into the kitchen...

 And a little farther back... you can see how this navy blue compliments the kitchen pretty well.

Part 1 done! My favorite part of a to-do list is crossing things off...no joke. Sometimes I add really remedial tasks that I'm going to do anyway just so I can cross them off.. (kinda crazy...)

1. Paint the command center wall Navy Blue
2. Paint the card catalog white...
3. Find & Paint a mirror
4. Bring in the accent colors & pieces  (gold? light blue?)
5. Trim the edges in something special. (Jute?)

Do you all have a command center? I've also heard them called "Take off & Landing Strips" which I think is really cute.  With the amount of drawers on our card catalog, it's the perfect spot to store everything we need to prepare ourselves for the day, or act as a catch-all place to dump out our pockets before settling in.

What do you think of the Navy Blue, too much?  Time will tell.  Up next I'll show you the card catalog paint job.... it's coming out great!  Also, update: we decided to trim the walls in something different.

-Jesse

Psst - If you are wondering about that spice rack, it's an oldy but a goody - see the post here. 

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How-To: Black and White Brushstroke Art

After we had whitewashed the fireplace, and painted the living room, it was time to add some visual interest to the fireplace wall.  I thought about doing fabric wall scrolls with a nice modern print, but worried it might be too busy. Perfect timing: I had seen this awesome black & white brushstroke art over at the Hunted Interior, and knew this was the project I was searching for:

Source

Aren't those lovely.. I'm a mega fan of abstract, and the black & white contrast is really clean & modern.  

Since we wanted to incorporate more modern elements into the house, I showed these to Ralph & he was totally on board.  Luckily, we had everything on hand (I always keep canvas around!) & were able to start. This project is so easy, and so fun!

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Painting the Living Room Green

Little by little Ralph and I have started working on the living room.  We spend so much of our time in here that's it's hard to leave it until later, even though we should be outside doing retaining wall projects.  These are just more fun.  After we whitewashed the fireplace we thought it would stand out more if there was a little color on the wall.  A little turned into a lot, and we chose Martha Stewart's "Rhododendron", take a look: (Ignore the towel on the floor, we were preppin' to paint)

Grr... that heater! Originally I wanted to take it off, take it outside and give it a high heat spray paint job, but it's wired in, due to a blower on the top. So that project is not as easy as I thought it would be... someday. I can't stand that spot!  Here's the after:

I love it! I've never gone with this type of a green before, but it makes for a very comfortable living room. It's weird too, in the daytime it's more of a soft green, and it night it has a hint of lime in it. It was a bold decision that made us a little nervous at first, but we figured we could always paint over it, right? I'm happy we finished... Here's the other side:

There are normally really ugly book shelves under that window, more on that soon.  I think the size of this room really helps with the green, we don't feel closed in at all. In fact, it's bringing the room together in a good way.

Because remember our couch is also green:

Which you might think, take it easy pilgrim - too much green, but the couch is kitty corner (is that the right saying?) the green, so they don't touch at all.  When you're sitting on the couch you see green across the room, and when your standing in front of the green wall, you see green couch opposite you. Make sense? I'll have a whole tour soon, we're doing all kinds of projects on this room.

So that's an update, we did this a while ago recently and I've meant to post, but so many other fun tutorials hopped in the way. Stay tuned for a how to on that TV stand in the right of that picture, we built that too.

Thanks for stopping by! Enjoy your day :)

-Jesse

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How To: White-Wash the Fireplace

Roughly 1 million  years ago I asked all of you for your opinion on whether or not we should whitewash the fireplace.  The results were pretty mixed but a lot of you leaned with us towards whitewashing - so one brave evening, we took to it. It was SO much easier than I expected!

So much brighter! We aren't completely done with our front deck yet, but it turns out both Ralph & I prefer to balance too many projects at once - and we started in on the living room.  The fireplace was the perfect kickstart we needed to get to work.   Here's a side by side so you can really see the difference:

If you think you can't do this, you're wrong. It was simple! I took a few process shots to share.

The process is simple. Take diluted paint, and one person brushes it on, while the other follows behind with a rag to remove the excess.  I thought we would have to be really fast about this, but to my surprise - the paint was really forgiving.  In fact, we had to let it soak a little longer on the brick to get the white we really wanted.

Pretty straightforward - dust & clean your fireplace as best you can.  If you want some more darker bricks to show through later, this is the time to paint some of them black, or brown, or deep red or whatever.

We skipped that step, as we already had some dirty bricks. Then, mix up your whitewash.  This is a simple half & half mix: 50% Water, 50% white latex paint.

 Yum!

Then you get to work! Brush a small area on, then wipe it off.  You can always repeat if it's not as white as you'd like. 

We started with the mantle first to get the hang of it, but I guess it would have been smarter to start somewhere LESS visible.  Luckily it came out fine, but you can see we wanted it a little lighter than this:

So we started leaving it on longer, and got this:

We found that wiping less vigorously helped too - gently removing the excess paint vs. scrubbing the bricks to death worked way better.

Stand back, take a look:

And just keep going. We did this in about an hour.

We chose not to tape because we figured we could be careful enough (and we were!) and we also had planned to paint the wall behind it another color someday (Update, we painted! Click here to see), to really make the fireplace pop. (again, click here to see!) And finished:

It dried so fast we were able to start playing decorator, and decided that our mantle needed a mirror, even if it's sliced in half by that chimney.  Can't really fix that, but I love the extra light the mirror brings!

So refreshing! We also have another crazy idea for this area, not sure if it will work... we want to get grey river stones, medium to large size, and cover the brick area around the stove.  We'll put a wood border, and just let the rocks be loose. I think it will bring a modern touch.  Have you ever seen anything like that before? I've been looking all over for tips (or warnings!) about doing that, but we might be on our own....**UPDATE** 10/3/13, we did it - we added river rock to the fireplace,  and it's great!

Well I guess it's Monday again, back to work, huh?  Have a great day & a productive week ahead!

-Jesse

P.S. Here's a sneak peak of the fireplace with our new wall, click here to go read more about it:

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DIY Security Sticks

There's been some robberies in our hood lately, which moved this DIY project to the top of the list.  Granted, I understand these sticks won't completely save the day, but they won't invite anyone in with open arms either.  But safety doesn't have to be boring, am I right? Break out the paints!

I don't know what these things are really called, so I'm gonna go ahead and name them Security Sticks, which is the best name ever.  This is an extremely easy DIY project that doesn't even warrant a tutorial.  You can look at them and already know what to do. So easy you can get the kids involved.  For the adults this project pairs nicely with beer, wine, and good music.

See? Simple.  We have the type of windows that those little screw locks BARELY hang onto, and ya know what? Those are a paint to screw and unscrew each day.  I like to have a little breathing room while we are gone at work, and these puppies fit the bill.  OK here's my super quick security stick project, that I think came out kinda cute.

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Curb Appeal: Wonderful White Paint

In my past, white has been the most under appreciated paint color in my book. We totally fought.  I used to think it was boring, and just avoided it as much as possible.  Maybe that's because I always lived in apartments where I wasn't allowed to paint, so everything was stark white.  I was surrounded by it during a time when I craved color, big time.  Then in our last house, the landlord gave us the all clear to paint whatever we wanted, and I about exploded. Color everywhere, which you can see an example of in this old post.  And you can see even then, with the white trim, that I was just starting to embrace and appreciate white. That was a beach house in Santa Cruz, so wild colors went over real well & matched the 'hood.

Then I started to try white a little more. Now don't get me wrong, I LOVE color (yea, seen the guest room? hehe..) but I've really come to appreciate the difference a little white paint can make.  When we painted the pergola we constructed out front, we bought a gallon of that white, figuring we would use it all over the yard.  In attempts to make the house a bit more welcoming from the street, we decided to tackle this crazy retaining wall along our driveway:

Come on white paint, save the day, please.

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Colorful Antique Crates

As soon as it started warming up, it seems like ALL the inside projects we had going on just dropped so we could get to the outdoor ones.  Can't help it, right? If it's gorgeous outside you don't want to be painting some closet or rebuilding a book shelf as the birds chirp by, you wanna be in the sun! So we've been working on our front deck big time.  I've built a few herb planters, we scored some furniture (CVS of all places!), and now it's time to cute-ify.  I saw these crates over at All Things Thrifty and knew they'd be perfect for the deck. Plus, versatile - they can hold stuff, or be a little end table, plant stand... I like that.
Take a look:

Looks great, right? But you may ask yourself, where will I find an assortment of antique crates in just my color scheme? Well, you'll make them of course.  I'm sure you've seen these bad boys 'round the craft store:

Mmhmm.  Mega easy tutorial over at All Things Thrifty, she did a great job of transforming an affordable lil crate into a piece that looks like it's been in the family a while. I need at least 6 of these, in assorted colors.  Scratch that, make it like 16, as I want to make a bookshelf out of crates someday. I love the wood look and the aged technique would totally match our "Modern Mountain" living room.... more on that later. We WERE going to do something like these OSB modular units inside, but I think they just got a run for their money...

What do you think? Is this your style? What colors would you do?  For our deck I'm leaning teals & yellows... we'll see.  Share what you're up to on Facebook, we all love to see projects!

Enjoy the day, it's another great one!

     -Jesse


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Mirror Makeover

Good day! Today I'm going to share a quick mirror make-over, this was a fast & fun little number.   I've done mirror projects before, (remember the teal mirror from way back when? or the Jade standing mirror/chalkboard?) but this one was hands down the easiest. Everything just went well, don't you love when that happens?

So fresh & so clean....  this project took, oh, a few hours? Majority of time was waiting for paint to dry.  Green is one of the major players in our living room, and I've always wanted to incorporate this one - it's "Meadow Green" by Rustoleum.  Yep - spray paint, you know I love it!

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Spotlight: Bird Murals by Tobias Hall

I'm so excited to share this artist with you today!  I was recently lucky enough to stumble across the website of the freelance illustrator & designer, Tobias Hall.  Oh man - I'm in love with these birds!  The colors are fantastic, and the geometric take on these cranes is so unique, and a style I'm really diggin' lately. I love how some of the angles suggest wings & other features of the bird, they almost remind me of Origami...Anyway, I'll let them speak for themselves; see more of his work here.

Tobias is the in-house designer for Zizzi Ristorante in London, and is responsible for this stunning mural.  I love the colors especially, and hey - check that table out there! The meadow green cane back chairs with the two shades of green against the wood....   totally speaking my language here.  Would you say those are a twist on a chevron pattern? I wonder if he did those too....regardless, look at how well the room comes together:

Head over to Tobias Hall's website to see more of his work.  I would love to have some of his artwork in our home!  Those patterns are so inspiring...I'm gonna marry these birds.

You can follow Tobias on Twitter by clicking: Tobias Hall 
Or on Facebook: Tobias Hall

What do you think?

     -Jesse

Up Next: Extremely easy & fast pickling recipe - sesame style....

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Radio Silence...

Oops! Sorry about the radio silence there, as luck would have it - Ralph and I managed to get 5 days off together, which means we went in overdrive on the home projects.  So much has changed, and we've done so much work, that today we are off to Monterey to relax.  We've been working 12 hour days on this house, and I can't wait to show you the results.  We fixed a major drainage issue in the yard, but that was so boring that I didn't bother with photos. Let's get to the good stuff!  Remember our porch dilemma? Here's a snapshot:

Yea... interesting little cave there. Behind that is a door, a brown oak door at that - I am pretty sure that this outhouse looking contraption is what helped us get the house over other people.  I'm sure people saw it, noticed the lack of curb appeal, and just left. I mean, where is the front door? We were going to chop it in half, make a cute patio, then on Sunday... we just.... kicked it down in a split second decision. Here's a sneak peak (warning - blurry phone pics!):

We painted the door red in a spur of the moment decision too, "Fire Cracker" by Behr.  All the names in the red category were really... interesting. My favorite was "Flirt a little" - who knew paint could flirt?  You can also see the wood 2x2's on top there that we set there to see how it looked...

There - we have a front of the house! I have a million more pictures, as we didn't stop there. We've been turning the frame into a little pergola... and repainted the whole thing (frame, not the house! I wish...).   We decided to just ditch the half banister and keep the whole thing open, and I like it. Of course a bench, some pots & planters will make an appearance later... baby steps.... (name that movie!)

More to come soon... just didn't want to leave you all in the dark! Have a great day - are you getting the itch to start working outside too? Spring is here!

     -Jesse

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How To: Hexagon Top Dresser

Hey everyone! Hey it's Friday, finally - this has been a long week! I'm so happy to share this tutorial today, Ralph and I bought a TV recently for our bedroom and started dreaming up what kind of dresser we wanted in there. It's not a huge room, so I imagined finding a long, low, old school dresser that we could do something fun to.  The very next day I was browsing craigslist and actually found it. FOR $25! After making sure I read that right, I rushed over & snagged it, and we got to work right away.   Check out this before & after:

This project took ONE day. Start to finish, with a lot of breaks and a lot of Radiolab.  We combined a few different techniques that I've talked about on the blog, and I love how it came out! We really wanted something in a bright color (red!) but still sort of subtle. We both love patterns so that was a pretty easy choice for the top, and ever since we did the Triangle Tabletop we've both been digging the wood grain showing through the paint look.

So, you want to make something similar? I show you how! Read on.......

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DIY Picnic Blanket

Spring has sprung! It's official, and though I can't speak for the rest of the country - out here in California, it's showing!  This weather get me into major planning mode and I start thinking up all the fun things we need to do this season.  Actually, once the time changes I spring into that mode - and start reserving camping spots and prepping for hikes ASAP.  All this talk reminded me of an awesome picnic blanket project I saw on Design*Sponge last fall, this is a total afternoon project:

The pattern is great, and this uses one of my favorite mediums: spray paint! And an old sheet. Perfect little picnic set up.  Stevie & Ashley provide a well written tutorial over on Design*Sponge - swing by and get the details.

Our house is starting to get a lot more sun now, and it's really exciting to see that the front deck right of the kitchen gets BLASTED for about 4 hours... I could totally see us deck-picnic-ing on a big blanket like this, soaking up the rays... here's a photo that was taken about noon...just the beginning:

Glorious sunshine, and a huge cat. Let's just say, she's "permanently pregnant", heh.. you can see that even though it's a big towel, a large blanket would be ideal.  I'll have to think of a way to make it padded..any ideas?

What projects & activities do you have planned now that spring has sprung?  An early start is a great way to make the most of it... Enjoy!

     -Jesse

 Up next: Learn how to give an old dresser an entirely new look:

  

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