They're back! (A Tutorial)

Remember the picture shelves from the old house? I loved them so much that i brought 'em back! Only this time, i used door moulding from an actual door that we bought since we had to replace the door to the walk-up in the basement because of some water damage.

So, free shelves. I measured where i wanted them, which happened to be the side of the stairwell. It was the only space that made sense out of all the walls in this window-filled house (not complaining). So they couldn't be even like they were in the last house, and i had to make a lightswitch work for me, but i think i did an OK job planning this out. After Chris made the cuts and screwed them into the wall for me, i taped them off so i could begin work on them.

Since this moulding was removed from a door instead of just buying it on the shelves, it's a little bit bent and bowed and had a noticeable gap when screwed flat against the wall:

Nothing that some caulk can't fix. Am i right, ladies? Notice that when i taped, i made sure it was about 1/8" up the wall so that there would be room for the caulking to blend the shelf to the wall.

 Enter paintable caulk!

 The first step in caulking is to do a line, using enough to fill the space.

Then, immediately go back over it with your finger and help it to fill any of the seams and to make it look nice and smooth. This needs to be done in small increments so that the caulk doesn't dry out. I completed one shelf at a time since it didn't take me long as the areas are fairly small.

 This is what it looks like when it's all smoothed out:

 And this is what it looks like when you remove the tape (again, when the caulk is still wet):

 When i was done, the shelves went from looking like this:

 To looking like this:

After it dried, i taped them off again and painted them with Valspar's ultra white semi-gloss, just like the rest of the trim in the house, and was able to get away with two coats (gasp!). This is what they look like now...loaded up with pictures of my kids because what the hell else did you expect?

Now i'm able to overcrowd them just like i did before. On to the next project!

Kid Room Updates

The last time we checked in on the kids' rooms, the windows had sort of a...situation.

I'm not proud of it, though living in permadark has its advantagezzzzz. <-- See that? I did that on purpose. But it was also like nails on a chalkboard to have blankets nailed to the wall and really kind of depressing to never have sunlight in their rooms. So we fixed it! With real live curtains!

But not just any curtains...

HOMEMADE curtains! I drank copious amounts of booze and sat in front of my sewing machine until i passed out. It was just like my 8th birthday all over again.

And we got the fabric at none other than Ikea and i loved that they had nice, modern prints at cheap prices. My daughter chose hers ($0.99/yard! Awesome deal!) and i chose my son's ($7/yard) because he's luckily too young to care. The expensive part came from JoAnn, where i bought blackout liner (because i'm not giving up on sleep), which was normally $7/yard, but i got it for $3.50/yard with a coupon. The sucky part of all of this is that i needed 12 yards (6 yards of each fabric per room). So, it adds up. But i think i won in the end, because 108" lined blackout panels are expensive, especially in a design that i liked if i could find one. This way, i spent relatively less for prints i love.

Moving on, i cut each panel then double-hemmed it on all sides, making sure to crease the top for a curtain rod.

One i had everything hemmed, i cut the blackout liner, which fit snuggly right underneath the side hems, and sewed it all in. Then, they were hung to the ceiling...

The greatest thing about curtains is that you can open them. Write that down.

Lets take a look again at how far we've come with these rooms. My son's room first since he's never first at anything...

Ok, so not much has changed between the last two pics, except that in the last one the curtains are open and we're letting the day in. And yes, there is a pink rocking horse. I get a lot of comments about that, but he loves it, and i can assure you that the pink one works just as well as any other color.

And yes, we're still in nursery mode because i can't bring myself to take that step. I'm gearing up to sell his rocking chair and put a big tub of toys in its place. This means that, one day, i'll have to accept the fact that he'll keep getting older despite my efforts to keep him this way. One day, he'll replace the cute little designs in his room for posters of ....who do boys have posters of these days? Liam Neesons? Moving on...

Daughter's room:

Don't forget that i gave my three-year-old daughter creative control over this room and i kind of love that it looks like a rainbow threw up in here. And what a difference that some daylight makes...

See? No light...

With light...

And the blackout works well...

As for over her bed, i asked her what she wanted and she said "butterflies." I should have known that, because "butterflies" is the answer to almost any question i ask. What do you want for breakfast? "Butterflies." Who's souls do you eat every time you throw a tantrum? "Butterflies."  

I'd originally though i'd paint something on a canvas like i did for my son, but then i thought i'd just get literal with it and cut a bunch of butterflies out of a stiff interfacing (which i already had on hand). Instead of having them all white, i ironed some fabric from my stash onto a small handful of them.

So there you have it. No need to call CPS since i'm no longer making my kids sleep in caves. They have curtains now like real people, which unfortunately i don't even have in my room yet. Priorities, i guess.

Now for the total$:

Boy's room: $21 blackout liner, $42 fabric = $63 for two 108" blackout curtain panels.

Girl's room: $21 blackout liner, $6 (total!) fabric = $27 for two 108" blackout curtain panels.

It's Painted so it Stays.

How hard have y'all been craving an update on the wall saga?? Pretty hard? Well then, prepare to change your underoos. Here's where i left you all those years ago:

The wall itself still in need of trim, paint, and hardware. The inside of the office needed a lot of love as well and i was just the person to deliver. After i removed all the curtain hardware and patched up the holes, i began painting. Ceilings are the debil.

If you look closely at the picture above, you can see my brain.

Chris picked out the color (Behr's Cloud Burst*), and i slapped it on the walls. And i'm trying a new trick with the windows in this house and painting the border (is that what it's called?) in a semi-gloss white (Valspar's Ultra White**) as opposed to the wall color. I think this opens up the windows and makes them look more like windows and less like "holes to the outside." Does that make sense? The whole process sucks and is totally time consuming, but the result is worth it.

After the office was finished, i did the entire dining room (pictures later). Then after that, i painted the entire hallway (Behr's Chocolate Froth*) - ceiling, upstairs & downstairs walls, trim, and all doors. I do things. So here's where this leaves us:

Aaaannnd there's the dining room. Chris chose the color (Behr's Bayside) and i painted it. I don't love it, but i'm going to wait until we refinish the floors (we're going dark) before i recommend a change. Plus, i'm tired.

Let me remind you real quick where we started when we bought the place...

After we moved in:

And where we are now:

Same with the dining room:

We still have a LOT of work to do in both rooms, for starters getting a light fixture for the dining room that i don't want to set on fire and getting new bookcases for the office that aren't bowed in the middle.

*The type of Behr paint that we used was the superior ultra with the paint & primer in one and let me tell you that it made all the difference. I was able to change the blood red walls to the grandmotherly blue you see above in just ONE coat. I'm never getting the standard paint again.

**Valspar is the most terrible paint i've ever used. I've used their top-of-the-line in the bedrooms upstairs and had to do two coats in eggshell, still with touchup. And i cannot say enough horrible things about their semi-gloss paint in which we're forced to use on all our trim and doors. Three coats!? Why don't they just come on by and punch me in the face every hour?