Ikea hack and a winner

My husband was gone this week for Panama planning meetings. I can't believe he's deploying in a month. It seemed farther away before. Anyways, while he was gone some neighborhood cats decided that they were going to reproduce very loudly outside my bedroom window at 3 am. Laying in bed, wishing I had a rottweiler, thinking of everything I needed to do that day, I decided to repaint my Ikea bookcases.

Sorry for the crap picture, my nice camera is malfunctioning. 

My husband doesn't complain about much when it comes to how I decorate, but he does have one complaint. I hate the amount of books that we have and how they look on the shelves. He hates looking for books and doesn't want me to cover them or turn them around or anything that is visually appealing. So he won this fight.

I took off the backing and attached new plywood that I had cut into 4" pieces. Next time I think I'll do it myself because the guy at Home Depot made the cuts a little crookie. And my table saw cuts like butter. And then I painted it all Swiss Coffee. It is MUCH better than before...

Why did I wait so long to paint those suckers? Now all I need is to win a certain gift card and I can finish my master bedroom and bath ;) Go vote for me if you haven't already!

Also, Kim Skinner. You won my giveaway. Congrats, I'll get you the enamel bowl soon!

HELP! Vote for me!

I entered a contest for the best DIY of 2012 and the winner gets a $250 Home Depot gift card. The bunk beds I did made it in the top 10 and now I need your help! It's open for voting now and the winner gets the card! You can vote every day until the 29th and they'll announce the winner!

HERE is the link!

Here is a picture in case you haven't seen it.

This photo was taken by This Old House magazine. HERE is the link to my original bunk bed posting.

I have BIG plans for my $250 gift card. I plan to redecorate my master bedroom AND bath on only the $250. I'm super excited! Please vote for me! Again, you can vote EVERY day until the 29th. Please share, blog, facebook this so we can reach as many people this week as possible! Thanks in advance!

Dining room wall, Valentine mantle, and a giveaway

I was browsing pinterest yesterday and found a really fun painting project here. Jana wasn't the first one to do this project either, she was just the one that caught my eye. I decided to revamp my dining room wall with this same pattern on a larger scale.

I pulled the colors from the media wall and my kitchen to create this herringbone wall. It kind of looks black in this picture, but its actually navy. It has such a graphic punch and is one of the first things you see when walking around the corner from my front door. 

I also updated my mantle. Sorry I never took pictures of my Christmas mantle to show you. December just seemed to get away from me. I drew a picture on a paper of what I wanted this chalk board to look like and let my 7 year old help draw it. I love it that she's interested in art.

The rest of the mantle is really simple. I didn't want it very busy because of the herringbone. I reused some sheet music garland from Christmas in the giant mason jar and swiped the tulips from my guest bedroom.

I painted the baseboards on this wall so I can cross one of 15 walls of baseboards off my "to paint" list. Slow and steady.

And for the giveaway...

When I was in Alabama, I bought this white enamel bowl. I love the way it looks on my dining table with some fake hydrangeas. It also looks fantastic as a fruit bowl in the kitchen. Lucky for you, there were two of them and I bought the other one to give away to one of my readers!

All you have to do is make sure you're a follower and leave a comment for one entry. Facebook or blog for extra entries. Make sure there is an e-mail address or way to notify if you win! I'll let you know next week!

Fishie

Surprise! I'm still alive! I have been crazy busy (as I'm sure we all were) through the holidays. As soon as it started winding down, I went on a trip for a week to Alabama. I flew back to my old stomping grounds at Fort Rucker to visit my bestie. She recently purchased a home in Enterprise and didn't know quite where to start on her renovations. After many late nights, we came up with a plan for her that fit within her budget, and addressed every room in the house.

And I returned home to many happy surprises! After almost a week with the kids my husband kept the house from burning to the ground. I owe you 5 bucks Katie. On top of that, it was spotless. Oh how I love that man of mine. But the happiest surprise of all was this...

I had mentioned to my husband how I saw a pin (this usually never ends well for husbands) where they used a gumball machine as a fish bowl. Apparently, he took all 4 kids to get the machine, made them waterproof it, went to Petsmart and got the fish, and put it all together. What a  fun welcome home gift. My 3 year old named the fish Doctor Bacon.

I also changed up the bedding in my boys room in December. I bought the quilts from Urban Outfitters. They were clearing out the orange and mustard color and I scored 4 of them for less than $40 a piece. I made the pillows using the painted fabric method I talked about here.

The new fan is from a thrift store in Enterprise. I love the south. It's full of old brick buildings and ice cream shops and friendly people. Every time I go back there, I move retiring to the south a couple places up on my list of priorities.

I also brought home something I'm planning on giving away soon. I'm so excited to show you what it is!

Aqua Piano

My new friend Juliette just moved back into the neighborhood and hired me to refinish her piano as a Christmas present to herself. Isn't she thoughtful? How did she know that's exactly what she wanted?!?

Here's a crappy iphone before picture.

She wanted to paint it white but I talked her into doing this great aqua color. I'm so glad I did, it's so much more "her". She is very colorful when she talks and totally cracks me up. And with all of the neutral walls I thought a huge pop of color would make things interesting.

This next picture is actually a truer representation of the color. The stain I used over the top gave it a gorgeous green hue. 

Then I was Christmas shopping and spied these UH-mazing pillows at TJ Max. They had all the colors in her room which never happens. And I just happened upon it. Lucky.

We're going out of town for Christmas so I'm going to be MIA again for a while. Sorry, but Merry Christmas to everyone!!!

Front door holiday decor

I was so happy with my last front porch vignette that I decided to keep most of the elements and just update a few items. I bought some fake poinsettias from Goodwill for a couple dollars and added a little Christmas tree from Target to the metal stand. That's all! It's amazing how different something looks just by changing a few accessories.

Christmas party

I was asked a while ago to host a Christmas party for all of the women who I go to church with. I jumped at the opportunity to design something temporary, easy and fun. My husband was just glad that I might actually deep clean the house this year.

After finding some over sized, over ugly ornaments from Goodwill, brainstorming with my sister, and searching on Pinterest, here's what we came up with.

I needed enough seating for 40-50 people, have them all in the same room, and be able to see the t.v. My husband hung some branches from the ceiling. I'm not sure if you (or I) knew this, but my husband is apparently an expert angler. Which came in handy because if the fishing line didn't hold, I would ultimately be responsible for maiming someone. That's a lot of pressure.

After a quick can of heirloom white spray paint, the once gold ornaments were looking very festive. I tied them to the branches with red and white bakers twine from Hobby Lobby and called it a day.

It was really fun to host this years enrichment dinner for my church. I have to say, my tile floors took quite the beating from food and chairs and they are still looking fantastic. I really love how easy they are to clean. Here's one more of some of the awesome women who came.

Let's see how long my house stays clean. My money is on 9 hours. And mostly because my kids will be asleep for the next 8.

It's ok though. I kinda miss the semi-permanent blanket fort in the living room.