A post to find other posts

Burt says hello

• Awesome round-up of stylish dining chairs from Knight Moves.
• Neat Halloween decorations courtesy Brooklyn Limestone
• Lucite chiavari chairs at CopyCatChic (how cool would those be at a party/wedding?)
• Making a boring IKEA mirror much more interesting via KFD Designs.
• CentsationalGirl makes over her staircase in a pretty cool way.

Demolition

We ripped out our old bath vanity. It's the first *real* demo we've done in the house and it went well, despite Jake's protestations.

Time to take a hammer to it.  It ain't coming out in one piece.

Ta-dah!

 

Isn't that pretty?  There's no subfloor - just the floorboards covered by some black material and ancient metal grating.  High quality 1960s construction right there!  Thank goodness the cabinet builder was nonplussed and installed our new unit this morning.

I'll save the big reveal 'til we get the top installed.  It's not super exciting right now...

Alert

My fellow design cheapskates! Jonathan Adler's 2011 calendar could make fabulous cheap DIY art.

See my other posts on calendars as art.

Vanity

image: Edgewood Cabinetry

My vanity is coming tomorrow!  Eee! 

This means tonight is demo night.  We's going to take a sledgehammer to the place.  (Well, part of it at least.)

I'm considering these style pulls in chrome but I'm certain I'll change my mind.

image: Rejuvenation.com

Bath progress

Granite samples came into our life over the weekend. The imminent arrival of the new vanity means we need to figure out what kind of top make sense. The dark shade is nice but it has big old chunks of ambery/brown in it which don't really jive in this room.

 

Here's what we're working with. The blue/white tiles are dated, I know.  But they are in great shape so there's no sense in ripping them out.  I painted the gray stripes to give the room a little interest.  I may just go all the way with the gray one day.  There is a *lot* of white in this room.

 

So, of the three samples we brought home, the gray/white makes the most sense:

I like the brown and cream but it doesn't work in this room.  I wonder if I can find a similar look with gray instead of brown?

There's a different stone place near my work so I may run over at lunch and see what I can see.

Fabric Samples

I intend to recover my headboard in the guest room.  It's currently a mushroom-y shade in that microfiber/ultrasuede fabric that is just dreadful.  Be gone from the world microfiber!

My chosen samples from Premier Prints came yesterday after nearly 2 weeks (a bit of a long wait for  samples, IMHO).  They are a nice, heavy weight cotton and the samples are generous.

I love the yellow/white stripes but it's a too whimsical.  It would be really fun in a kids room.

The yellow/gray diamonds are nice, but not right for this project.   The animal-esque print photographs well and you can't go wrong with a little animal print.  Or pink.  And it will pop nicely against the taupe wall.

The green print is pretty but I'm not sure I *love* it.  It's a tad busy. What do you think?

Gah, Kate Spade sale got me.  Why am I buying clearly a summer bag in the fall?  Oh, because it was cheap as hell, that's why.

Painting Quarter Rounds

Our home was built in '64 and has pretty simple finishes - no fancy moldings or trims here. We have basic baseboards and some oak quarter round trim that was likely added after the shag carpeting was ripped out by prior owners. Why do I know there was shag carpet?  All the doors in our home have a generous gap at the bottom to accommodate the amber waves of polyester that used to cover lovely wood flooring. (New doors are in the plans)

Here's a corner of the living room to show you what I mean:

(Late night iPhone pix)

I noticed that in some rooms the quarter round was painted and in other rooms it was not. I decided to use our hallway as a test site and restore the banged up baseboards and try painting the quarter rounds. First, I sanded them down and scraped off layers of shoddily applied paint. Then, I wiped them down with a damp rag and taped off the wall and floor with green Frog tape. (I find this works better than blue painters tape.) I slapped a few layers of some leftover semi-gloss on the baseboards and trim, being careful to remove the green tape prior to the paint drying for smooth lines. 

Here are my results in the hall:

I think it looks better with the quarter rounds painted. It gives the baseboards more heft. Looking around the house, I now get to work on the trim in the living room, dining room and master bedroom so everything is uniform. Joy, projects!

Bath Vanity

Our mini bath makeover is on track.  The cabinet builder sent me this image last week.

Image: Edgewood Cabinetry

It's getting a coating of white lacquer and then it's making its way into the bathroom to replace the current atrocity there.  Sorry, can't be responsible for the burned eyeballs from the sadness that we've got going on.

I''m thinking of granite for the counter top, a very light gray or a white possibly as the tile is snow white.  I'll have to head out to the stone place this weekend and see what the options are.  Anyone want a nearly 50 year old vanity top stained with paint?  It's yours!!

Happy Weekend

If you need me, I'll be at Jordan Lake this weekend camping

Upholstery Fabric Resource

Have you seen Premier Prints Fabrics? Great prints at even better prices - most are 7.99 to 9.99 a yard! I've ordered some swatches for the re-upholstery job I want to do on my guest bedroom headboard.

Here are my favorites:

Tazo

Annie

Kimono

Lulu

Python

What's your favorite?

Spray Paint is Magic

This is a great and super useful post over at Centsational Girl on DIY spray paint projects. 

I recently rescued this ceramic ginger jar lamp from the Goodwill and gave it a coat of Krylon's Ivy Leaf.  For $6 + paint I had a whole new lamp! And rescued something from the garbahge. 

Finally - Guest BR Progress!

After painting, repainting and some not-to-be-discussed boneheaded moves - I've finished the wall color in the guest bedroom. I used Shenandoah Taupe by Benjamin Moore that I came across on the mistints rack.

I didn't intend to spend much on this project but you buy one thing, then another and then that doesn't work so you go another direction and probably $400 later I'm satisfied enough to slow down a bit.

• Paint: $11
• Tufted headboard: $100 on CL (I'm going to recover it)
• Chair: Already had it but I think I paid $30 at the thrift
• Mirror: $20
• Campaign dresser: $100 on CL (Will also be painted)
• Rug: Already had it, I think I paid $100 on eBay (West Elm)
• Drapes: $45 from West Elm
• Bedside tables: $80 both from local unfinished wood store
• Pillow: $17
• Bedding: Already had, duvet from IKEA a billion years ago
• Lamps: $14 for both at thrift, spray painted Krylon's Ivy Leaf
• Shades: $5/ea at Ollies, originally from Target
• Flower art: $80 for both (re-purposed from dining room)