A Touch of Spring

I'm trying to bring a touch of spring into my house right now. My inspiration is a beautiful little bowl I found at Goodwill in an apple green or lemongrass color. Very pretty and very springy! I'm trying to take myself out of my comfort zone (aka, same old, same old!) and try some new things with my decor. Lemongrass definitely is a new color for me, but I'm really liking it a lot.

My inspiration for one of my recent projects is a faux flowerbox that Samster Mommy posted. I made the project my own, but she definitely planted the idea in my head.
I started with this empty tin pot I had out in the garage--it is leftover from some beautiful potted tulip bulbs I bought myself at the beginning of February.
I bought these ranunculus at JoAnn's where they were, of course, 40% off. They're a spring item and not part of the regular floral stock.
I bought floral foam at JoAnn's too and used a regular table knife to cut it into pieces that would fit into the bottom of my bucket. Then I used the wire snipping part on my husband's brand-new pliers to cut my flowers apart. I used only the blooms and skipped all the spiky and beaded things.
Voila! My new bucket of flowers! This vignette is sitting in my $5 Target tray from last year and the flower bucket is on the cake plate I made last March. My favorite things in this little display, however, are the books sitting under the glass hurricane.
Those books were my aunt's books when she was a girl--I love books with inscriptions! My grandma gave out all the old books years and years ago and eventually ended up giving out books only to the offspring of the original owners of the books, but she apparently slipped a few extra into my pile of vintage Nancy Drew and Dana Girls books. I love them and can't believe they were a gift 50 years ago!
This is another table in the same room. This arrangement still needs some tweaking--but that little bowl there is my inspiration for the room.
It is an ironstone bowl in the Emerald Isle color that I found at Goodwill--the only ironstone I have ever found there. Also on this table are some spring themed books that I pulled from around the house. I love pulling books for my children and putting them out on display--it seems to pique their curiosity a bit and entice them to revisit old favorites.
Speaking of inscriptions, this book was a gift to me on my 5th birthday by my preschool teachers. Love it!
And here is the whole room, ready for spring. On the right side of the armoire you can see the table with the chalkboard that I talked about yesterday. And yes, this room usually is quite clean as it is the first room you see when you open the front door. Our playroom (formally a dining room) is on the other side of the blue couch...which serves nicely to hide most of the mess on the floor back there!

Chalkboard Tray

I bought this silver tray at Goodwill for around $7 (it was the end of January...now I forget the exact price!) It is heavy enough to be real silver, but I suspect it is silverplate--not that it really matters. The cashier did comment on its heft though! It was a tarnished mess!
LOTS of tarnish, to say the least! It came off pretty easily though with silver polish and revealed some scratches on the surface of the tray. I would have been disappointed had I been buying this tray for something other than a craft project.
All sparkly! After cleaning it up, I painted it with some chalkboard paint that I had out in the garage. I didn't do a very good job though because I ended up with some tiny bubbles. I had big plans to hang this on the end of some of my cabinets, but it wasn't quite the right size...so it has been stuffed into a cupboard for a couple of months while I tried to figure out an alternate solution.
Today while at St. Vincent de Paul, I came across a really cute black plate holder--much cuter than the dollar store plate holders I had already tried. Better yet, it was only fifty cents! I've been updating my living room for spring and I think this fits in perfectly!

Entry Way Storage

image courtesy of Pottery Barn

Several years ago I fell in love with the Pottery Barn entryway storage systems. We have a teeny tiny coat closet (it has about 18 inches of hanging space) plus we are a "no shoes in the house" family which is pretty common in this area.

image courtesy of Pottery Barn

However I did not fall in love with the Pottery Barn pricetag! After eyeing the pieces some more, I realized that I could find VERY similar pieces at other stores--the other stores don't have pictures as nicely styled as PB, but the furniture pieces are similar in look. (The PB pieces above are not the exact same ones that I wanted, but they do happen to be the ones that exist as knockoffs now.) Rather than spending $500 plus shipping from Pottery Barn, I spent around $150 at JC Penney. I have been thrilled with the pieces...with one notable exception...
Here is the shelf portion of my entryway. See those cubbies? I could not find baskets ANYWHERE to fit them. Everything was either too big or way too small. Crazy! (By the way, JCP now sells their shelves with baskets.)
Finally, after looking for baskets for a few years, I had a brain flash. My husband and I had shoeboxes from our Merrells (ie the shoeboxes were larger than most shoeboxes) that would fit perfectly! I cut the tops off the boxes and then covered the boxes with wrapping paper from Target.
They're still a bit short for the openings, but they are a big improvement over what we had before...or rather, what we didn't have. The wrapping paper covered boxes aren't necessarily very sturdy, but I'm the only one who pulls stuff out of them, so it works.

This is the unedited view of our entryway this weekend--camcorder, swim goggles, outgrown ballet shoes, shipping box, and all! I love the bench and it is a nearly identical knockoff of the bench Pottery Barn used to sell. (Do you like all the backpacks? I promise I have just one child who goes to school...despite the four backpacks!)

It has turned out to be a very functional space for our family and it is one that I can "pretty up" very quickly when we have company. My JC Penney pieces have held up really well...although I am tempted to switch the bench out for one with storage underneath. I used to have a big basket for shoes under the bench, but didn't put it back after we refinished our hardwoods last spring.

Master Bedroom Closet Update

Our master bedroom closet was a disaster. I'm not exaggerating, either. The wire shelving was pulling out of the walls (or, in the case of one shelf, fell out five+ years ago), the closet had never been painted since the house was built in the mid 90s, and we had stuff EVERYWHERE. You see, we have a decent size house but we lack decent storage--no basement and very very limited attic space (basically enough room for our Christmas decorations.) Because of this, I tend to stuff everything I can into our closet.

It was bad--are you ready?

This is looking to the right after you go into the closet. I was gathering up stuff for a consignment sale, so I have even more bags and tubs of stuff than usual stuffed in here. The shelf with all the white hangers was falling out of the wall on the left side, so I could only put clothes on one side of the shelf. There used to be another shelf in here, but it fell down shortly after we moved into this house and we never fixed it because we knew we were going to redo the closet...we just didn't realize how long it would take us to get around to doing it!
See, here is that same side of the closet all emptied out of stuff. Not pretty! You can see where the anchors are for the shelf that fell down as well as the holes for the shelf that is halfway to falling down.

Last year we were at Costco and saw a beautiful wood closet system there--I think it was about $300 or so. At any rate, it was a great price for a quality system, so we bought it. We put it in the garage and left it there. For a year. Ooops. Finally enough was enough and I decided that we were going to do our closet and get it done with. And by "we" I mean my husband. I helped empty the closet and find stuff to donate and then I put everything back in the closet afterward, but he did the building and painting.
Ahhh, so much better! Compare that to the first picture on this post--what a difference! The closet system is SO sturdy and looks so nice! It is the John Louis Home Premier System in Red Mahoghany. I love it! You can configure it in all sorts of ways and all those shelves in the middle are adjustable. Gorgeous. I don't think Costco sells it anymore, but I did find it on Amazon. Unfortunately the Amazon price is at least $100 more than what we paid--but it still is worth it.
Love it!! It installed pretty well, too, according to my husband, and it is SO sturdy the way he installed it. We did have a couple of pieces (a camlock and a closet bar support) break while he was installing it. I called the customer service number and the telephone was answered by a real person (that shocked me!) who was so nice and polite. She shipped out the problem parts without any hesitation and we received them within just three days--and we do not live anywhere remotely near their corporate offices. Absolutely amazing customer service.
Remember that wall with the falling down shelves on the right side of my closet? Here it is now. No more shelves! We took everything out of the closet, filled in the holes from the old system, ripped off the baseboards (they're still MIA--we're slowly upgrading all the trim in the house to white millwork) and painted the whole closet white.)
I still have a lot of totes in here, but it isn't overwhelming any more...mostly because all the consignment sale stuff now is downstairs in what used to be the toy closet...the sale is next month and I'm looking forward to getting rid of this stuff!
Ahhh!
This is the left side of the closet. Love all this space. We can actually walk into our walk-in closet again! I'm thinking about moving a dresser into here to open up space in our bedroom. And yes, I know the "red mahogany" color doesn't match the oak of the doorframe, but remember, we're (eventually!) changing everything to white--including the trim and doors.
The bars are metal and the hangers can slide along the full length. I still have more organization and decorating to do in here. I want to get big flat boxes to put on the tippy top shelf and use those to collect gifts for my children. That will eliminate a few of the totes I have stored in here.

Definitely more projects to come in here--but for now we are so happy to have a closet that doesn't make us cringe every time we open it!

Giveaway Winner

The winner of the Marshall's giftcard is Trish! Please email me with your mailing address, Trish!

Glimpses of Home

Emily at Chatting at the Sky is having a "Glimpses of Home" link. I think this goes along so well with the latest blog fascination with "keeping it real." So often we share pictures like the one above--staged to look pretty and cropping out those pesky details of real life. (The picture above is of my not-so-formal living room decorated for Valentine's Day.)
If I had shifted over just a bit, you would have been able to see this--our playroom tucked behind that not-so-formal living room.
And if I had walked over behind that blue couch and into the playroom, this is what you would have seen. This is what my home really is like--Big Elmo headfirst in a shopping cart with finger puppet gloves on the floor and an abandoned Thomas the Tank Engine Oil Depot waiting for a little boy to come back and play some more.

This is real. This is home.

Remember to enter my 200th post giveaway--I'm giving away a Marshall's giftcard!

Tumblr

Do you Tumble? After having an out-of-control bookmark list in Firefox, I finally started a Tumblr account and I'm in love!

Tumblr has a "bookmarklet" (listed under "goodies" on your dashboard) that you can click and drag to your tool bar. Now when I read a blog article or magazine article that I like, I click on my "Share on Tumblr" button and post the article to my Tumblr account. It pops up a little window that lets me choose the type of link (I usually choose to post it as a photo) and put some tags on the link...and that's it! So easy!
Want to check out my tumblr page? It is http://frillsfluffandtrucks.tumblr.com/ and still needs some prettying up--but it is functioning really well for me.

Do you Tumble? Post your page--I'd love to check it out!

By the way--make sure to sign up for my 200th post giveaway!

200th Post Giveaway!

Happy 200th Post to Me, to Me! Happy 200th Post to Me!

THIS GIVEAWAY IS CLOSED

In celebration of this momentous occasion (ha, ha!), I'm giving away a $25 giftcard to Marshalls. Here are the ways you can enter this giveaway

1. Comment on this post
2. Subscribe to my blog (or let me know you subscribe already!)
   
3. Become a Google Follower (or let me know you're one already!)
4. Follow me on Twitter (or let me know you do this already!) AND tweet about this giveaway
5. Promote this giveaway on your blog (post your link in the comments!)
   

Please leave a separate comment for each entry--up to a maximum of five entries. That's it! Easy Peasy, Lemon Squeezy! The giveaway is open through Friday morning and I'll announce the winner on my blog over the weekend. Make sure you check back to see if you won!

THIS GIVEAWAY IS CLOSED

Wall Decor On a Budget

The "after" ... read on for an explanation!

When we did our house addition last year, we took advantage of having things ripped apart and we replaced our fireplace insert, had travertine tile installed around the fireplace, and a bigger mantel built. We really love our new fireplace, but I've struggled with how to decorate the wall space above it. I had a big Pottery Barn circular candleholder over our old fireplace but, after 5 1/2 years, I was tired of it!
We lived with the blank wall for about six months. Then, shortly before Christmas, I was fed up with the blank space, and put up an old (kind of lopsided) twig wreath that I had out in the garage. That lasted about two months before I just couldn't take it any more. It was bad! We went back to a naked wall for six weeks and then I finally remembered an inexpensive wall treatment I first saw on Nesting Place almost two years ago. Scrapbook paper to the rescue!
My husband cut some MDF (leftover from our Pottery Barn knockoff bookcase project!) to 12x12 for me. Then I painted the edges with brown craft paint and let them dry.
Like my fancy drying rack? Ha ha! My next step was to use spray adhesive and attach scrapbook paper to the fronts of the squares. Then I nailed sawtooth hangers on the back of each square (bought those at Target although they're also sold at hardware stores) and had my husband hang them on the wall. (Yes, I'm capable of hanging things on the wall, but he's an engineer and I like to put his multiple college degrees to work for me.)
Ooooh!
Ahhh!
Sooooo much better! Why on earth did it take me so long to remember that idea?! I love how this looks and I like knowing I didn't spend a fortune on it, so I won't feel guilty if I want to change it out in the future.

By the way, stay tuned for my 200th post giveaway!

Featured!

My oak kitchen makeover was featured today on Better After! Woohoo! We went from a 90s golden oaktastic kitchen to a crisp white beadboard kitchen--all for under $350!