Christmas is coming!

Easy fireplace makeover

Thanks to my friend Luanna! This project took more time in taping than painting, and was easy to do. Just a can of high-heat Rustoleum, and the fireplace insert looks better than new. Unless you are a fan of polished brass, then I guess you don't need to bother. A good cleaning never hurts either.

Before and after:

Feeling rather proud of my staple gunning skills

"Do you know how to re-upholster furniture?" my dh asked with a dubious expression. "Nope," I replied, carrying in the large roll of upholstery fabric I had special ordered.

I don't know what I was thinking 12 years ago when I spent good money on this chair with the diamond print fabric, but I've been loathing it for at least 5 years now. Just hating the fabric, there is nothing wrong with the chair itself. Which led me to think the best thing to do was re-upholstering. How hard could it be? The answer: not that hard at all! Thank the heavens above. Because once I started pulling it apart there was no going back. My friend Melissa showed me an adorable chair she had re-done while taking a class and suggested I take a class too. I'm too impatient for that, so I just started.

I've never let the fact that I am clueless prevent me from trying anyway. Hers is better though because she did piping. I don't think piping is all that necessary, is it? Just say no. I surmised, correctly, that if I just tore everything apart, then I could use the old pieces of fabric as a pattern. What surprised me the most was how little actual sewing was involved. Its almost all just tucked in and around and stapled to death. The hardest part (three days worth) was removing the 3,141,5926 staples some maniac had driven in. My best friends were a slender flat screwdriver, a pair of needle-nosed pliers, and an ice pack for my right hand.

My greatest stroke of genius during this project (other than all-day TV marathons for my children) was to leave one arm and wing intact while I put the new fabric on the other side so I would have a reference as to how they stapled that sucker. The kids were fascinated to see the guts of a chair, wood, springs, cardboard and foam. Ds kept asking me if I was going to have any leftover wood that he could have. He was quite disappointed that I didn't.

I love my dh for buying cool tools and occasionally letting me borrow them. A pneumatic staple gun rocks my world, though I jumped every single time the thing made that crazy loud noise. Notice the full face protection. Glamorous, no? After the accident, we are a bit fanatical about our eyeballs around here. Foot protection is obviously optional.

After 4 days of my living room looking like an upholstery factory had exploded, I drove my last staple, pounded in the wicked tack strips on the back and sewed up the cushion. There was also some sneaky use of a glue gun, since I was not about to go out and buy a second set of smaller staples for the detail work. Then I replaced the legs and voila! I amazed my dh.

If you are considering doing a project like this, you can do it! You will love it. I used 4 yards of fabric for this chair. I wish I had bought a little extra for a throw pillow or two for the couch. Christine, if you are reading this, I know the wall hangings are too high. I'm working on it.

Its kind of a shinier fabric than I thought it would be. Hopefully I will love it for several years. Its going to take that long for my staple-prying hand to recover. Ouch.

I have no idea why this picture/text formatting is all wacky. I've tried for an hour to fix it.

A corner of a room of one's own.

A corner is better than nothing. I must have a designated space. The dining room table works for cutting fabric and large drawing projects, but only on a temporary basis. I need a place for my stuff that is easily accessible and a place where I can leave a project out in the open for a while. This has been the biggest adjustment of moving to this house - I've lost "my" room. Gratefully, my sweet dd has allowed me to have a corner of her room. On the condition that I teach her to sew on the machine. Which I will do when she is a little older and stops losing her hand-sewing needles. Yeah, lost needles are always fun. I've tried hard to make my area fit in with the decor of her room, and we still struggle with the "I can leave piles of junk on my table but you, dd, keep your stuff off of it" concept, but I'll take what I can get for now. I'd like to make that cork board cuter. Any suggestions? I have my eye on upgrading my project space to the garage, but I'm going to have to fight dh for it. So show me your rooms, nooks, crannies, etc. where you create. I'd love to see your solutions to claiming your own project space. And after you take a pic, tell me what you love to create in your room of your own.

I almost feel famous

A friend of mine, well, okay a person I don't even know, is a real live interior designer. We were at college together, does that count? Anyway, she has a great blog where she gives decorating tips and will give you specific advice if you send her your questions. I recently sent her pics of my living room and she gave me some great advice! So check it out and tell me what YOU think I should do. Thanks, Christine!The diamond pattern fabric will be the first thing to go.

Project showoff, or The blue line is gone!

I did it! Almost completely. For a long time, I've wanted a family picture wall. I'd seen pics in magazines and such of mismatched yet coordinating frames displaying great family pics. I decided it was time to make one of my own. About three months ago. So I started collecting frames from everywhere I went; Target, Michaels, Big Lots, Aaron Bros, yard sales, JoAnns, my garage, and pulled out my stash of old family photos. I had the perfect wall in our dining area, but you know you can't just start banging holes in a wall to hang up a variety of mismatched yet coordinating photos. You must have a plan. There must be balance and composition and a unifying theme. So I designated our living room floor as the staging place. I measured the available space on the dining room wall and taped off the same amount of space on our living room carpet. Did you know that if you leave blue painter's tape on your carpet for three months that not all the sticky residue will actually come off? Now you do. Did you know that my dh is the most patient and supportive man on the planet? Now you do.

So I moved pictures around, gathered a few family photos I needed. Made scans and prints and did some research (who is this guy anyway?) Don't tell anyone, but I used a hot glue gun for mounting family heirloom shadowbox items. I endured jokes from visitors, "What happens if I cross the blue line?" Ha ha. I rip your head off because don't you dare step on my fam. And at last I was ready.

Again, my fabulous dh came to my aid. Very patiently and logically he hung every single picture in the exact relative position that I'd arranged on the floor in the next room. Even the ones that I changed my mind about at the last minute.

You may notice, if you are scrutinizing closely enough, that there is one fake pic, and one without a photo. I need glass for one frame, and the blank white box is the future spot for a shadowbox frame that I have to special order. In it will be displayed a beautiful crocheted doily made by dh's gma. Don't freak out, I promise not to use the hot glue gun on it.

Oh, and the black oval on the far right is a wooden warrior mask dh and I bought in Hawaii years ago. It is not an actual resemblance of any known family member. But if it were, I'm sure it would be from my side of the family. I hope to pick up a few more photos from my mom this summer and put them where the mask is. I'll probably still fit the mask in somewhere. BTW, this wall is adjacent to the wall with the pretty new curtains that I blogged about here.

And I admit I totally staged this photo. I kicked the full laundry baskets out of the pic and gathered up the tablecloth, papers, maps, catalogs and all and threw it on the floor. I snapped the pic then put it all back. On a more serious note, looking at all those pics made me ponder my ancestors, their families, their challenges and happinesses. What were their hopes and fears for their children? I almost envy that the worst thing they could probaby imagine for their children was death. That may seem morbid, but today's evils are so much more subtle and devious. I was warned by a friend recently about a song that would be playing during one of our family's favorite TV shows. I'm not going to advertise the song or the singer, but some of the lyrics included lines that said experimenting with homosexual behavior is "no big deal" and "innocent." Wouldn't it be easier just to worry that your kid would get kicked when milking the cows or fall out of the covered wagon? But those are not the times we live in. My church has recently asked us to support this effort to protect traditional marriage in CA: ProtectMarriage.com is a growing, broad-based coalition of organizations, churches, and individuals who believe that marriage’s foremost purpose is the raising of healthy children in a family with a mom and a dad. I have included their link in my sidebar too. Please take a look at their website and contribute even if you don't live in CA. This state has a large influence on the rest of the country, for good or evil. I look at the pictures of my ancestors who lived through wars, depressions and immigrating to an unknown country. They were all doing the best they could to provide a better life for their children and future posterity. I guess we are just trying to do the same thing.

I feel like a cheater but IDHTBPTBB.

I have a problem. I feel like I cheated on a project. A home decorating project. Let me start over. For three years, my family room windows have been bare except for the wood blinds that came with the house. Because I didn't know what I wanted. I have this dilemma often. I don't know what I want, so nothing gets done. Sometimes this lasts for years. But I'm really okay with that. I have these crazy windows. As you can see from the "before" pic, they are not the same size nor shape nor distance from the ceiling. A challenge, but not an overwhelming one. Eventually (about a year ago) I decided I wanted valances. Cool. First decision made. Then about six months ago I figured out that I just needed to place the curtain rods over each window at the same height, so the windows would appear the same height. The vertical window's rod would just be really high, and the valance would mostly cover wall instead of window. Second decision made! At this time I also decided on some type of white fabric for the valances. Then a month or so ago I stumbled across this very addicting blog. This woman has some great ideas, especially about window treatments, one of which was the "hang the curtain rod too high so your windows look taller" trick. I felt smug that I had figured that one out on my own. Then I noticed the theme and decorations on her blog. Birds! That's what my room needed! The family room had been looking too stark and needed a little charm. I was so excited! I searched for bird curtain rods, and found these adorable ones with little birds. I ordered two online. Then I went to another website and ordered some curtains that were just what I had been imagining. I pulled out my credit card, and in a few weeks the stuff showed up on my door and we put it up.

Whaddya think? Please ignore (or snicker at) the laundry to be folded and the spew from my kids' backpacks. Here's the cheating part. It was too easy and certainly not creative. I didn't sew the curtains. I didn't find the curtain rods at a discount store and repaint them. They weren't even on sale for Pete's sake! I feel guilty and not too proud of the final result. Its not my work, I just paid for it. Something is wrong with me. Oh, and the pillows on the couch? Didn't make those either. But, as I have learned from the above mentioned awesome blog, IDHTBPTBB. Meaning, it doesn't have to be perfect to be beautiful. The curtains are a little too sheer and show the wall above the window, the panels should be a little wider (and they would have been if I had sewn my own) and I'm not sure if the hanging strings of the bows are charming or messy. But thanks, Nester and cyberfriends for giving me the kick in the rear and the inspiration I needed to finish my three-year decision.