Hi. Blogging is a lot of work, and I no longer have a nice cozy (familiar) place to do it in my new house so I’m always finding myself avoiding it. It’s true. Blog, you have become a chore to me. I don’t want to feel like that, but I do. However, I’ve been busy prettifying my world and want to talk about it. I’m a fair-weather blogger. That’s true, too.
Some updates, first, on house in general:
- We had our first overnight guest in the new place, in the form of my vagabond friend literally passing through town and needing a place to crash. I hadn’t seen her in 13 years but it wasn’t even awkward! In fact, it was awesome. We were in the middle of painting a bathroom we’ve already since redone because I picked a totally wacktastic green paint the first go-round (oopsie), so she stayed in our guest room and used a bathroom that didn’t have a mirror. Or light. Ha. Hospitality, what? Snapped a shot of the horrid green for posterity- that’s my O-M-Green face.
- I am becoming a totally amazing vegetarian chef. I want to blog about it desperately but I can’t take pictures of food no matter how beautifully I can arrange it on a plate. But I try.
- I am still doing the photo-a-day challenge, it’s been 6 months, and I’ve missed one day. And that was like a week ago. And I was devastated for a few minutes. You can see them here. I’m a slacker about updating Flickr (shock!), but I eventually get around to it. I’m not a good photog. (sad face)
- We have grass, kinda. It’s growing. There are a lot of weeds mostly. GREEN weeds.
- I am a maniac with a few packets of fabric dye and some paint lately. You’ll see. …
I’m pretty pleased with the house progress! Of course painting the place was a HUGE improvement, but I love how it’s the little things that really tie something together and make it your own. For example, I was struggling with the open layout a bit, because I didn’t want to buy new furniture to fit the space (which is entirely different than the layout and style of our last home).The space was just feeling a little blah.
Luckily for me, working with what I have isn’t a bummer, it’s a challenge that I love to take on. I’ve been pinning and jotting ideas and moving things around, I took note of things I really liked, things that were feasible in my space, like a piece of accent furniture in a funky color or global prints, gallery walls and boho touches.
After painting our bedroom a bold teal, I was inspired to give the rest of the house at least some small doses of bold color. I found this gorgeous interior inspiration on Young House Love – that orange I love, and a very similar open living room/kitchen configuration. LOVE THIS!
That teal couch is to die for and probably out of reach for little ol’ me, but I was inspired by this palette because it incorporates teal and I’ve been wanting to paint something orange for fun! Paint, fabric dye, and a few new accessories did the trick to make the place a little more homey.
Here’s how the place is shaping up now:
Despite his reluctance, I convinced JB to paint our exterior doors black, and we LOVE how it looks, from inside and out. It just pops! And better balances the dark cabinets and counters on the other side as well. I painted our (formerly white) kitchen table grey.
I used a small piece of decorator fabric and some curtain clips to make a super simple (and cheap) valance on the kitchen window. I dyed my (formerly tan) rugs teal (along with the scarf that’s functioning as a table cloth on the kitchen table). I mixed one packet of blue iDye brand fabric dye and one half packet of green to create a teal hue, and followed the instructions for dying in a top-loading washing machine. Success! Happy dance! Woop woop! New shiz, for like 2 bucks.
And my favorite switch-up on the cheap is our lil’ TV stand upgrade (you can see the before up top…)
I really love how it turned out! The color is Tibetan Orange from Behr. I used a dark brown color mixed with Bahr Faux Glaze over the paint to give it a worn look. Here’s a close up:
Ahhhhh-yeah!… super cheap upgrade on an otherwise throwaway piece of furniture, but warning on painting fake wood – it takes forever. I sanded, primed once, painted three coats of paint, sanding between coats, and then glazed. It was a process. But I love how it turned out. I love re-vamping what I’ve already got. I always feel so clever. And new hardware really makes it snazzy.
I did pick up a few new things to tie it all together, like the large rug in front of the kitchen sink, blue IKAT pillows (outdoor pillows on clearance- shhh), little IKAT tray on the coffee table, terracotta-colored pot, etc, using birthday giftcards! So other than the paint and fabric dye, this was free (to me)!
By the way, the entryway looks super swanky with the black front door, too:
There are still lots of yet-to-dos. Like build a mantle above that fireplace, and fill in some blank wall spaces (above the fireplace, on the right-hand wall in the entryway, and above the stairway, but I have big plans for those…. All in good time.
That’s what I’ve been up to! Thanks for taking my little tour! Anyone else making any cheap but statement-making changes to their abodes? Did that veggie burger pic make you hungry, too?
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