Locks of Love

Maren desperately needed a summer haircut this year. Her hair had grown so long that it was hard to manage and got tangled so easily.

I told her that she needed a haircut for the summer, then mentioned that there is an organization that makes wigs for kids who are sick and lose their hair.

It took her a little while to think about it, but she decided that she wanted to help out another little and wanted to donate her hair to Locks of Love.

We went to Great Clips, where they will generously give you a free haircut if you choose to donate. They measured her hair to make sure it would meet the requirement of at least 10". Maren decided she was okay with the amount that would be cut, so the stylist snipped and OFF came that ponytail!

The stylist then evened up the ends and Maren has a fresh new haircut for the summer!

It took her (and us!) a few days to get used to the new short length--I was unprepared for how much older my sweet 6-year-old would look with short hair. We've already had one trip to the swimming pool and the new shorter hair is much better--it doesn't get in her eyes and it takes much less time to comb out in the mornings.

I'm proud of my girl for making a choice to help another child! And I think she's pretty no matter the length of her hair, because she's beautiful on the inside too!

Commenting problem

Apparently, Blogger is having some sort of a glitch right now regarding leaving comments and staying signed in. They say they're working on a fix, but the issue has been known for more than a week now so who knows how much longer it will take. I did change one of my comment settings so now the comment box is a pop-up, and they also suggest unclicking the "remember me" box on the comment form. I personally haven't been affected, so I'm not sure if this will work or not but it's worth a try!

Family Room re-do: decoupaged light switch cover

Things seem to have taken a turn for the worse in the painting department. Oy. After I wrote yesterday's post, I went out to have a look at how the paint had dried on my chair--not good. Brush marks and drips all over the place! In what was probably a rash decision, I decided to strip it and start all over using spray paint, but all that did was make a bigger mess. The flat surfaces aren't so bad but the grooved legs and round stretcher bars are giving me fits and now the chair is covered in sticky paint goo. I think I could remedy most of that with a good power washing, and as luck would have it we just purchased a brand-new power washer on Monday night. Problem is, it's still in the (big, heavy) box in our neighbor's garage two houses away, so before I can use it we have to get it over here, assembled and gassed up. I still love my little chair and I still believe it will be cute when this is all done, but I'm seriously ready for this DIY nightmare to be over!

So, after that ongoing DIY FAIL, let's have a little pick-me-up DIY success story. You remember the decoupaged letters I showed the other day?

On that same wall, there is a three-bay light switch cover that annoys me. I'm not even sure why there are three switches--I don't even know what one of them controls. One of them goes to the overhead light that we almost never use, and the other controls an outlet that is behind the couch and thereby wholly unsuited for a lamp. I've tried to hide the switch by propping a mirror on the table, but I want to do something different atop the table so the light switch is there, sticking out like a sore thumb on my aqua wall.

Once I saw Kimba's solution for a poorly-placed light switch, I knew what to do! I used some of the pale aqua houndstooth paper from the letter decoupage project and simply decoupaged it onto the light switch cover.

Now it blends right into the aqua wall! I can still see it, but it bugs me a whole lot less than if it were bright white. I do love that cute houndstooth paper--wish I remembered where I bought it so I could go pick up more!

If I knew this was a switch that was going to get a lot of daily use, I might have protected it further with a coat or two of spray sealant, but I don't have to worry about this one. And if I decide later I hate it, it's a quick trip to the hardware store and a few pennies to pick up a new, plain one.

Today while I wait for the power washer situation to improve, I think I'm ready to get started on painting the dresser. Wish me luck!

Painted furniture progress

Hello, friends! I hope you had a lovely weekend. The weather was finally dry here so we spent much of it outdoors. Yesterday afternoon we enjoyed the company of some good friends at a BBQ, and when I got home I took a quick trip to my favorite thrift store for their 50% off sale. As I pulled into the parking lot, I spotted a new cupcake truck, which is exciting enough--but then when I got to the door of the thrift, a girl from the truck was there giving out FREE cupcakes! I'm not kidding you, I thought I might actually be dreaming. I think I've just found out what Heaven will be like for me. :)

On Saturday, I spent quite literally FIVE hours sanding a chair. A chair, not a set of chairs--one small, wooden desk chair. Oh, and I used an electric sander. It was way past ridiculous and well into ludicrous territory. I'm still not totally sure why it took such a darn long time, but I know that was about five times longer than it should have taken. I wanted to paint my little chair on Saturday, but the old paint was chipped so I thought maybe I'd just give it a quick sand to smooth things out. I soon found that there were five, possibly six coats of paint on that little chair, and they were apparently some kind of iron-impregnated paint that is impossible to get off of wood.

Now, around about Hour 3, a smart person would have gone all Cee-Lo Green and said "Forget YOU!" and headed to Home Depot for a quart of paint stripper. My friends, I am not a smart person.

Anyway, after I wasted all Saturday on that silly project, I decided to start painting yesterday morning. In a total impulse buy, I purchased a quart of regular latex paint for this project instead of my normal spray paint. I primed the chair with some red-tinted primer leftover from when we painted our front room red several years ago, and then yesterday afternoon I got the first coat of red paint on and was reminded how much I detest painting furniture with a brush and regular paint. I'm having terrible trouble with drips, try as I might to be careful. It's difficult to get good coverage on the chair's s round stretcher bars so they look terrible. And now I have to let the paint cure for days so that it won't nick and scratch every time I sit in it. I really wish I'd gone with spray paint for this project.

Yesterday while I was waiting for red primer & paint to dry, I quickly sanded and spray-primed my yard sale dresser.

That sanding was much quicker, because the finish was in good shape and all I needed to do was rough it up a bit so the primer would stick. I had intended to use some latex paint in Behr River's Edge

that I have leftover from a cabinet I painted, but now I'm seriously thinking about going the spray paint route for that as well, although I did purchase small foam rollers to make all those wide flat surfaces easier to paint.

If I go with Krylon spray paint, my color options are pretty limited. I can go with Satin Catalina Mist

which I'm not sure I can find easily, or Blue Ocean Breeze

which I've used before and really is a much brighter turquoise than I'm looking for.

Any advice from those of you who have painted furniture before? I'd really like to take advantage of this good weather and my painting mojo and get started on the dresser ASAP so I can reclaim some space in my garage and get the project done. And those pillows I was hoping to sew this weekend? Yeah, that didn't happen.

The Family Room re-do: Decoupaged large chipboard letters

Even though the new aqua paint in my family room has been dry for a few weeks, I'm still working on putting the finishing touches on the room. This week I got things back up on the walls, and one of the projects I did was something I intended to do a long time ago, but now I'm glad I waited.

I purchased these large chipboard letters at Hobby Lobby over a year ago, and always intended to paint them or cover them with maps or old book pages or sheet music or some other type of ephemera. I never could decide exactly what I wanted, however, so I've left them raw all this time.

Inspiration finally struck in the form of a thrifted piece of fabric that I had purchased a long time ago and tucked away in a drawer. I rediscovered it last week and realized that it is perfect for my new family room! I had originally planned to use it in my front room but now that I have aqua walls instead of navy, I can use it in my family room. It's perfect for bringing in the brown and blue colors of my new rug, and brings in the red so I won't have to change my red window valances.

I picked four coordinating sheets of paper from my scrapbook stash and decoupaged the paper onto the chipboard letters--easy as pie! I used a sanding block on the edges to remove the excess paper and to give a nice little distressed edge. If I did letters like this again I'd do that part before putting on the top coat of decoupage medium--it would have required a lot less sanding!

I even had enough scraps left over that to make a little matching pennant banner to hang on the vintage chalkboard that hangs on another wall of the room. I simply cut out triangles and glued them to a piece of red and white baker's twine.

I'm happy with the way the letters look and for another way to bring the red & green into the rest of the room. I'm hoping to get started on sewing some new pillows this weekend. I think I have enough of that fabric to make two pillows if I use a coordinating color for the backs. I'm so close to being done--hopefully I can show you all a Before & After post next week!

Do you have any DIY plans for the long weekend?

Pretty toes in Iceberg Lotus

Someday, it will actually be sandal-wearing season around here--I'm sure of it! And when it is, I can go get a pedicure without bemoaning the fact that wearing closed-toe shoes just rubs off the pretty nail polish I'm paying to have put on my toes. Normally I go for bright red or sparkly pink on my piggies, but I've found a new color for this summer:

It's called Iceberg Lotus from Nicole by OPI I purchased mine at Target with a coupon. I first saw this color on Jen way back in March--her version was called Mermaid Green and I think it is Wet n' Wild brand. The Iceberg Lotus is a beautiful blue-green with iridescent sparkles. It goes on a bit thinner than I prefer, so you definitely need two coats. I think it will be a fun color for summer.

Even though the colors is pretty, I'll grant you that the name is kind of stupid--Iceberg Lotus? Those are two words that have absolutely nothing to do with one another. My high school best friend Emily and I used to say that when we grew up, we wanted to be the ones who got to choose the names for cosmetics so that we could spend our time making up ridiculous combinations of words. Looks like someone at Nicole by OPI got my dream job!

Mother's Day at the Horseshoe Market

My gift for Mother's Day was exactly what I wanted--I got to spend the whole day prior doing whatever my little heart desired while The Mister took care of the kids! Of course, my heart's desires usually include junking. I'd heard of a new craft/vintage market where one of my favorite antique sellers would be a vendor, so I decided to check it out. It was a bit of a drive and took me to a neighborhood of Denver I've never before visited, but the weather was gorgeous and I'm so glad I made the effort because it was such fun!

The market was just the right size, with around 100 vendors, all who sold either vintage/antique goods or handmade items. There was a really good variety of items--kind of like searching Etsy, only in person! Everyone had decorated their booths and created cute banners and things and it was so fun to soak up all of the creativity, eye candy and sheer prettiness all around me.

I picked up this darling pair of cherry earrings not long after I got to the fair. I've already gotten several compliments on them and they're fun to wear!

The seller has an Etsy shop called Sweet & Precious. She makes really pretty beaded necklaces and earrings using bright colored glass beads in a vintage fruit salad-style.

At one booth, I spied a pair of sweet vintage dresses that looked to be close to my size. Because we were outside in a parking lot there was no fitting room, so the booth owner suggested that I could try to slip them on over my clothes. Both dresses had side zippers which are always trickier to get on anyway, let alone over shorts and a t-shirt and I was nervous about straining the old fabric and stitches too much. One dress (actually my favorite of the two) was immediately a no-go, but the second actually went on and fit nicely, though it was a little snug in the bodice because of my shirt underneath. The booth owners were delighted, and even took a picture of me wearing it and joked that I should just wear it out!

I just about ended up having to do exactly that, because when I tried to get it off, the darn old metal zipper got stuck! I and two very nervous booth owners struggled for a good 10 minutes trying to get it to budge, before one of the girls finally produced a pair of scissors and was able to free the zipper with one well-placed snip. They say sometimes the dress chooses you, and I guess this must have been one of those occasions!

The dress is really fun--I'd guess it is 1940s vintage, but I could be wrong. It's ankle-length, which seems really long to me for that era for a dress that isn't a formal gown. In fact, I'm tempted to take it to the tailor and have it hemmed to just below my knee. With all that fabric in the skirt, it's really kind of hot for summer wear and I think a shorter hemline would make it a little less costume-y. I do love the skirt--it has a light blue panel in the front and then alternating triangles of light blue and royal blue all around the back.

The skirt is seriously voluminous--it feels like about six yards of fabric in that thing! I wore it with bright red shoes:

my new vintage petticoat:

and one of my favorite vintage brooches on the collar:

Fun outfit, and the best Mother's Day gift!

Good Junk: feedsack quilt squares

On Monday I popped into Goodwill looking for...well, I'm not sure what I was looking for, but while I was there I spied a bag full of old feedsack quilt squares in the locked glass case. This particular Goodwill is usually pretty lousy, although I have found a few treasures now and again. I've seen antique quilts in the glass case on more than one occasion, but they're always marked at some ridiculous amount for a thrift store ($70+) and have been in poor condition. The price on the quilt squares was also too high, so I didn't even ask to look at them.

Yesterday afternoon we were on the way to get Porter's hair cut and I knew that the 50% off color tag at that Goodwill changes on Thursdays, so I thought we'd do a quick stop and see if, just by some lucky chance, the color of tag on the quilt squares was the color on sale. It was and I was surprised to see that the quilt squares were still in the case, so I wasted no time in snapping them up!

I finally had a chance last night to go through them and I'm so happy I bought them! They definitely qualify for the title of Good Junk:

There are 61 squares total. Nine of them have been sewn together in a line, and some of the other squares must have been sewn together at some point because they have pressed seam allowances and needle holes down two sides. Most of the squares (50 to be exact) have nine little feedsack strips at the top of the pink wedge.

One square has 10 strips, one has 14, and the remaining squares have 15 strips.

I have no idea why there is a difference, unless the quilter started out doing the 15-strip squares and decided it was just taking WAY too long and dropped six strips for a total of nine.

The squares themselves are made of what looks like unbleached muslin.

Some of the muslin has yellowish spots on it, and I don't know if that is damage or just part of the unbleached-ness.

The feedsack fabrics are just darling and I know it must have been an awful lot of work to piece all those tiny strips together. Here is a sampling of some of the squares:

I'm not totally sure what I'm going to do with these squares. I don't sew so it's way beyond my abilities to make them into a quilt myself. I know that there are quilters out there that will take old squares like these and make them into a quilt for you, but I imagine that's a pretty expensive service due to the time involved. The sewing is not as precise (notice how most of the wedges are different sizes?) so I'm not sure it would be worth the great expense. They're too small to be made into pillows, and there are too many to frame and put on the wall. Any suggestions?

I figure each square cost me just over 25¢, which was some consolation after Porter's disaster of a haircut. He has portraits scheduled for tomorrow morning and his hair ended up way shorter than I wanted it to be, and I could just cry about it! I don't know what possessed me to get his hair cut right before pictures, but it really was looking shaggy and needed a trim--just not that much of a trim! He's not bald by any means, but all of his long curls are gone and I'm just sick about it. Maybe I'll feel better if I go look at my new quilt squares again.

Where the birds sing words and the flowers croon...

Maybe it's the dreary weather we've been having for nearly two weeks (including SNOW on more than one occasion), but right now I'm kind of obsessed with the idea of having a Tiki Party this summer. I can trace the germination of the idea back to two sources:

First, the posts Danielle Thompson wrote about the Tiki Party she threw recently (I don't want to use any of Danielle's photos so pop over there and check them out yourself). I just love the bright colors and retro vibe of her decor and invitations!

Second, I went to a craft/vintage market on Mother's Day weekend and came across what I think is such a clever business idea: Hula Moon, which is basically a mobile Tiki bar that you can hire to cater your events. I love this idea, and think it's a great niche to fill and hope that the girls who run it find much success. At the market, they were selling delicious freshly-made mocktails and mocktinis and ice pops and judging from the line at their booth, they were doing a smashing business! I had a mojito, which was delicious and refreshing.

Ever since then, I've been pinning and dreaming about how I could turn our deck and (tiny) back yard into a Tiki lounge. The whole idea is kind of ironic because we don't drink alcohol and neither do any of our friends, so I'll be hitting the Google for some fun tropical mocktails that I can serve. I've even started shopping--I picked up these little dudes at a yard sale on Saturday:

They're vintage, made by Steve Crane and Associates. I sold a vintage Steve Crane tiki mug a few months ago on eBay for around $60 so maybe I can even resell these guys after I'm finished. Because for pete's sake, I do NOT need another collection, and I can see myself getting sucked into the Tiki thing if I'm not careful!

Sooo...ya have any good mocktail recipes?

Hello from the Turkish bazaar and future projects

In the past five days, I've purchased no fewer than FIVE 5'x7' rugs (whew, that's a lot of fives!). My front room is starting to look like a Turkish bazaar. Yesterday alone I purchased three of the rugs, two from my new favorite store--Lowe's! I bought a clearanced jute boucle rug for $10--seriously! Regular price was $60. Actually, I got it for $9 because of the 10% discount they generously give to military folks. It has actually crossed my mind that maybe I should go back and get the other two $9 rugs and throw them up on Craigslist and see if I can't make a little profit.

The other rug from Lowe's is for the newly-painted aqua room, and was on clearance for $78 (I also bought a clearance floor lamp for $23--see why Lowe's is my new fave?).

I'm going to return the HomeGoods rug I asked you about in the last post. Design- and color-wise, it's actually my favorite, but even with a rug pad I'm just worried that it won't ever lay nice and flat and will drive me crazy forever. So it's headed back to HomeGoods, along with the other jute rug I purchased for the front room, as is the $50 outdoor rug I bought at Target yesterday morning, also purchased for the front room. Whew!

I finally finished the painting yesterday, exactly one week after I started. That'll teach me to be impatient! I am still proud that I did it myself and love how it turned out, and have several more painting projects in mind for the summer. One of them is this cute dresser,

which I bought at a yard sale on Saturday morning. I like the scalloped piece on the back and the turned front legs (which I think would be made even cuter by the addition of some vintage-style casters). It's not the finest piece of furniture, but I think it will work once it's been repainted and had fun new knobs added. I have it in mind to replace this dresser

which I still love, but have finally come to grips with the fact that it is simply too small for the space. I'm not going to get rid of Short Stack here--it needs a trip to rehab and then it will find another place in my house. I need to scrape off the existing (lead, I'm sure) paint, fix the drawers, and rip off the too-large and warped top and replace it with something nice and solid. I think I'll paint the dresser a creamy white and stain the top dark, a la Miss Mustard Seed.

I also purchased a can of bright red paint to paint my little wooden desk chair, another yard sale find that I don't seem to have a picture of. I bought it from a guy who said he meant to refinish it but never got around to it. For several years I've been fine with the shabby white paint that has hints of blue peeking through, but on one of my many trips to Home Depot last week, was seized with the desire to paint it a pretty red to match the remade vintage curtains from my office re-do:

I'm anxious to get started on all of these projects! Now all I need is for the stupid weather to cooperate so I can get going before I lose my painting mojo.

Need advice on an area rug

The painting is *almost* done--today I have to touch up the corners where the aqua paint meets the Rice Grain on two walls. I also need to get a small pot of gloss white paint to touch up the door frames, and then I can finally put away the painting supplies that have been taking up space on my kitchen counter for a week and get the furniture moved out of my front room and back where it belongs! I'm anxious to get it all done, because I'm tired of the mess. I LOVE the color, though!

 I bought a new area rug on Friday at HomeGoods and put it down last night, but now I'm having second thoughts. I like the colors, but it's quite a bit thinner and lighter than the rug I had previously, and I'm noticing that doesn't want to lay flat and gets all bunched up when we walk on it. Will a rug pad help with that, or am I doomed to have a scrunchy rug? It was $99 for a 5'x7' which I know is a super price, and I was thrilled to find it because I just don't want to shell out $200+ for a rug when the last one I had was purchased for $20 at a yard sale! Any advice for me? Do you get what you pay for in the rug department?

Vintage hankie cuff bracelet

How weird..I know that yesterday's post about the vintage tablecloth & glass beads posted at one point, because Rebecca commented on it--but then it disappeared and went back to being scheduled! I know Blogger was acting up for many people yesterday and I suppose I must be one of them.

I had high hopes to finally FINISH my painting project during today's naptime, but my hopes were dashed when the paint roller left hundreds of tiny pieces of fuzz in my wet paint. Grrr! I've been washing and reusing the same roller all week and apparently the limit on number of times you can successfully do that is three. The baby is asleep so I couldn't just run out and get another roller cover, so I'll have to pick one up after school and finish during tomorrow's naptime. I just want this darn project to be over!

I did go through the entire gallon of Sherwin-Williams Super Paint just doing the first coat, and purchased another gallon of custom-matched Behr to act as the top coat. The color match is pretty spot-on, but I'm really surprised at how thin the Behr paint is compared to the S-W Super Paint. It's like the difference between chocolate milk and a chocolate milkshake. And now I really want a chocolate milkshake! Yum. Also, the Behr paint is much stinkier than the Sherwin-Williams was, even though the Super Paint is not marketed as low-odor or low-VOC.

I found some old project photos I never shared, so I thought I'd throw those up today so you have something pretty to look at. I don't know how I got the idea, but I wanted to turn a vintage printed hankie into a cuff bracelet.

I used a hankie with a pretty floral design and ironed it onto a piece of stiffener to give it some body. Then I cut out along the edges of the flowers and leaves and used prong-set rhinestones to add some sparkle to the flower centers. (sidenote--I had no idea how difficult it would be to find glass, prong-set rhinestones anymore. I could only find them at Michael's and only in one or two sizes, and only in clear.)

For the cuff I used a wide piece of vintage lace and sewed a straight line down each side of the flower piece to tack it down. I hand-sewed a pair of large snaps to keep it closed, and it was finished! It's a fun little piece (although I don't think I've ever worn it!) and a fun way to repurpose a vintage hankie.

What are your plans this weekend? I think you know what mine involve...

So THAT'S what was yelling so loud

I could hear something calling me from the thrift store, so I was obedient.

Glad I listened! I only bought two things, but they were worth the drive:

A bag of seven (!) strands of various-sized vintage gold mercury glass beads (this from a thrift that only recently started putting out Christmas items year-round)

A vintage Cactus Cloth printed California souvenir tablecloth, unused and sporting the original paper tag.

 Sometimes it pays to listen!

Out of the navy, into the swimming pool

If you have the May 2011 issue of Country Living magazine, you may have seen this photo in the antiques appraisal article:

I've been kind of obsessed with it--I love the combination of the aqua walls and the red, and I love the bold graphic quality of the doily stretcher and the ticking stripe pillows. I've just kept thinking about the photo and how much I loved it and how I wanted that same feeling in my own house, but I didn't think I could get it because I don't have any aqua walls.

And then it hit me--duh, I can make aqua walls! My family room is connected on one long wall with my kitchen. Last year we repainted that portion of the walls and the kitchen in good-old Sherwin-Williams Rice Grain.

The other two walls of the family room are painted navy blue.

Here's The Mister painting in his sexy short shorts. ;) We painted the navy walls right after we moved into this house in 2004, before we even had any furniture. I was shocked that it was so easy to convince him to paint the walls such a dark, bold color--he's usually pretty conservative on those types of things.

Here's how our living room looked yesterday.

Nice that I cleaned up to take this photo, right? I don't dislike the navy, but once I got a bee in my bonnet about painting the walls aqua like that Country Living photo, that was it for me. I went immediately to Sherwin-Williams and picked out this gorgeous color

which is appropriately named "Swimming" and today I got started painting.

The Mister is out of town this week so I'm on my own for this project. Oh sure, I could wait until next week when I have his help and could probably get it done in half the time, but I want it done NOW so I'm willing to go it alone. I'm pretty sure The Mister is thrilled that he gets out of painting! Today I had two hours to paint during the time that Maren is at school and Porter naps.

I knew I wouldn't get very far and unfortunately, I was right. If you look at the photo of my room, I painted the short wall with the HOME letters and the tiny hallway right next to it. That was maybe 1/3 of the total area, and it took me two solid hours! Sheesh. I did have to do a lot of tricky cutting in, because that little "hallway" has two doors right next to one another at a right angle, and painting the tiny sliver of wall between the door frames is challenging. The rest of the wall from here on out is nice and flat so it should go much faster.

Once again, my proclivity for underestimating the amount of paint needed for a room has shown itself. I knew that going over a dark paint with a much lighter shade would require some kind of priming. I bought the Sherwin-Williams Super Paint that's supposed to be self-priming, although the salesman told me I'd need two coats because of how dark the navy is. He was right, it will. And although I've only done 1/3 of the area, I've used nearly 1/2 the paint, and then I still need to do that second coat.

The Super Paint is regularly priced at $43/gallon and I specifically bought it last week because it was 25% off. I'll be darned if I'm going to go fork over another 45 bucks (sale is over, of course) so I think tomorrow I'll make a visit to Home Depot or Lowe's and see if they can match the color in Behr or Valspar. I'll get as far as I can with the remaining S-W paint, and then use the new gallon as the top coat so it will all match. I do really love how the new aqua color is looking and I can't wait to see the final result!

Any advice on Behr vs. Valspar?