Lace Stencil Curtains

Our bedroom transformation has to be the slowest room makeover in the history of interior design. And for that I apologize. This weekend, we finally got around to making curtains for the room! And I'm going to show you just how we did it.

Fabric can be so expensive. Even when it's on sale, it still seems to add up when you're buying enough for something like curtains. It's one of those things where it's almost cheaper to just buy already-made curtain panels. But where's the fun in that?

I got to thinking about the cheapest possible way to acquire fabric... and it hit me: a drop cloth!!! (I learned yesterday that I wasn't the only one that had this idea... my girl Brooke at All Things Thrifty did the same exact thing! Great minds think alike! Check out her curtain transformation here!) So I bought a 9 foot by 12 foot drop cloth... for $12. This was the perfect amount of fabric for 4 curtain panels for our two windows in the bedroom. That's right, $3 per curtain panel!

After cutting the drop cloth into 4 equal panels, ironing and hemming the edges, I laid a strip of lace (I scored 3 yards on sale for a total of $7!) on top of the drop cloth like so:

Using the lace as a stencil, I spraypainted over top. The drop cloth was already light gray-ish in color, I wanted a very subtle yet elegant design (since our headboard has a busy damask print on it), so I used a simple white flat Rustoleum spraypaint. (As you well know, painting curtains and other unusual items is not foreign to me, if you remember the Skyline Curtains and my Stenciled Area Rug from back in the day!) I used 2 cans of spraypaint on each panel to make sure I had good coverage. It gave me just the right amount of contrast when I removed the "stencil".

After waiting a half hour or so, I just pealed off the lace to reveal a beautiful reverse lacey design! AND, I was able to reuse the lace for all 4 curtain panels!

Having finished my curtain panels, we put up our curtain rods (and by "we" I mean NICK) We went with oil rubbed bronze finish to complement the antique DIY swag lamps.

You might be wondering how we're going to handle the fact that our headboard is wall-mounted... directly over the window. Here's a little reminder:

Simple! Naturally, we just mounted it onto 2x4's to give a 4" clearance for the curtains to hang behind. Bingo.

I loooooooooove the way that curtains make such a huge difference in a room.

 They just make everything feel more soft and... finished  looking.

In certain lighting, the subtle lacy stencil really pops! And other times you can't see it at all. But that's ok with me.

Obviously we need to address the bedding situation. I'm keeping my eye out for the perfect comforter. Since we've gone bold with the walls, I think I'm going to look for something light and airy feeling. Here's a pic with no bedding... do you have any comforter suggestions?

I'm planning to DIY a bedskirt using inspiration from something I found on Pinterest. And some fun throw pillows will really make things feel more fluffy and inviting. And we still need to tackle the opposite side of the room. I'm looking for a low/long dresser, and a couple chairs for a little seating area! Our master bedroom is slowly coming together!

Tweet

It's about time!

I have great news... you no longer need to lose sleep over your overwhelming curiosity for what color our bedroom walls would end up. I've temporarily overcome my bout with indecisiveness and finally just chose a color. I'm definitely not feeling inspired with this bedroom transformation the same way I was in the nursery. It could be because that was a labor of love for my long-awaited darlings, and the ideas just naturally flowed into my head. But one way or another, our bedroom needs a facelift... cause I can't handle the beige any longer. I believe this is where we left off after the addition of the headboard, the nightstands, and the swag lamps.

I "tried out" about 100 different wall colors in my head, and nothing really jumped out at me and said PICK ME! So finally I had enough. While Nick, I and the girls were at Menards picking up some things, we stopped by the paint section and... just picked a color! I'm so proud of myself. I love how this color is not quite gray, but also not quite brown. I call it BRAY. It's that center one... Oswego Tea by Pittsburgh Paints.

And here's a totally random angle that I thought showed the integrity of the color very well.

I like that it's neutral, yet still unique and dramatic. In the pics, it kinda looks purple... but it's not. So this is what our bedroom looks like from out in the hallway.

And this is the new wall color looking towards the bed. I love how deep and rich it is! And because our bedroom is a southeast room, we get tons of daylight in our room pretty much all day long... so we were able to get away with going dark. Do yourself a favor, and ignore our bedding situation... namely the RED (ew).

Here she is at night.

What say you? Do you like it? Obviously we need to seriously consider the curtain and bedding situations, but we're working on that. Also, you may be wondering why we only show this one view of the room... this is why:

We've got some work to do with floor-planning. We've been batting around a few ideas, most of which include a seating area and quite possibly some shelving of some kind. And giving that dresser a new lease on life. But don't hold your breath.  We're pretty slow-moving lately, what with two babies moving into the separation-anxiety phase of babyhood.

Do you have any projects you're tackling over the holidays? Send me links to your blogs so I can feed off your creativity! I need some inspiration today, and Pinterest just isn't doing it.

Tweet

Bedroom Design Inspiration

As I've been considering the design development in our bedroom, I stumbled upon the following photo on Pinterest of this beautiful Greecian Port and fell in love. And I realized, the colors are sooo incredible... so this photo is now my color inspiration for the bedroom!! You can start to see hints of it with the turquoise headboard and burnt orange nightstands.  It's beautiful right?

Photo found here.

I can see it now! It's slowly coming together!

 

Tweet

She's Got Swag

A looooooooong time ago when we painted this backsplash, the homeowners Stan and Sue gave us a tour of their lovely home... and I comment on how I loved  their vintage swag lamps in their living room. It was meant to just be a compliment... but they proceeded to remark, "those old things? We just bought new lights to put in their place. Do ya want the old ones?"   ...ummmm, yes please? And so Stan whipped out his ladder and climbed up to their high vaulted ceiling, and removed the fixtures right in front of us. How incredibly generous and awesome?!

I'm sad that I don't have pictures of the lamps before our ADHD dog broke the globes (we shouldn't have had them in our garage I guess)... but we were left with just the ornate brass parts of the lamps, which is what I loved about them to begin with... so it was ok.

After occupying our garage for far too long, I finally decided what I could do to make them awesome again. Our bedroom's been in desperate need of some new matching bedside lamps, and we all know how hard it is to find two matching lamps at garage sales or thrift stores. Why is there always only one? So the swag lamps were the obvious and budget friendly choice for our bedroom... AND they have major character!

So here's what we did. The brass was very tarnished and icky, so everything got a good scrub-down with soapy water. Which didn't help AT ALL. So after googling some home remedies for shining up icky brass, I went at it with lemon juice and an old toothbrush. Also didn't help. So we broke down and bought some brass polish which worked like a charm. We'll know for next time, eh?

For $15, I ordered 36 yards of 6mm crafting beads from Amazon.com. I cut lengths of 18 inches.

While I was measuring and cutting strands of beads, Nick was wiring and soldering the fixtures so that they would work... and not be fire hazards.

Then I just used crafting wire and attached each strand of beads to the brass top and bottom thingys. I didn't take very many process pictures, because I got on a role and wasn't thinking to document my beading journey. But this is what it looks like now!

And here they are in the bedroom during the day.

 And at night.

We tried putting in some amber tinted bulbs, and it made for a fun vintagey-yellowy glow.

But I'm not lovin' how the amber bulbs look during the day. So maybe we'll just pull out those bulbs for "special occasion mood lighting."

Remember what our bedroom looked like just last week?

The addition of the headboard and nightstands and sweet swag lamps is making a world of difference! It's slowly starting to feel like a romantic paradise escape from our wild chaotic life!

I'm not saying that being a hoarder is a healthy lifestyle, but there's SOME merit to keeping things around "just in case I might use them someday." Such an improvement!!! Not sure what's next. Curtains p'haps?

Tweet

A Few Dilemma's Addressed

For some time now, I've been really itching to tackle another room in our home. The only rooms I feel are done are the nursery and the kitchen... (and the kitchen could really still use some new appliances, flooring, and the washer and dryer needs to be moved OUT of my pantry so I have room for our month's worth of food). And since we're on a serious budget, designing and updating our home has been put onto the back burner. And that... drives me CRAZY. I neeeeeed to keep crafty in order to feel alive and legitimate.

With all that being said... the living room and our master bedroom are the two rooms that are in the running for "needs to be next" on the list. And while we're not about to run out and buy a bunch of stuff (even from craigslist) I realized I could be using some of the things we already have to start making improvements... specifically to the bedroom in this case. Here's the view of the bed, as it's been (embarrassingly) for the last two years. Hate it.

Firstly, I'm SUPER happy to announce that we decided to keep our classy damask upholstered headboard that we crafted a few weeks ago (tutorial here). At first I wasn't a fan of having the same exact fabric displayed in the nursery AND our master bedroom... but then I decided: who cares? I like it a lot, and I want it on my bed. And if that's bad design, then call me an amateur. Cause technically, I have no qualifications whatsoever.

Additionally, my cousin Johnny and his wife Heather passed along this charming painted childrens desk/hutchy thing about a year ago, and gave us free reign to do whatever with it. They just wanted it out of their garage! And while I love this piece (what with it's great legs and whatnot) I just didn't know what to do with it! Should I save it for the girls room someday down the road when they're old enough to use and appreciate it? Should I fancy it up and sell it? Should I let it sit in our garage to accumulate sawdust and house our spraypaint collection? Yes! Let's do that!

BUT... about a week ago, it hit me. I knew exactly what the fate of that little tween desk would be. And, by fixing this dilemma, I would also be fixing another dilemma. That being our serious issue with our nightstands. They're really flimsy and without storage or style. And I hate them. Can you see where this is going at all??

 

So after convincing the man-boy of my unconventional plan, we started the demolition. Truthfully, I was excited about swinging a sledgehammer, but Nick got all logical and parental on me.

Which left us with two awesomely perfect matching nightstands... nightstands with great legs. Holla!

They got about 3 coats of burnt orange paint (that I brushed on, since we had a leftover can of paint from HERE in the color I wanted). This experience reminded me why spraypainting is SOOOOO much easier... and funner. And it gives you a better finish. And it's faster. I can safely say that if I had instead driven an hour round trip to town and purchased the color I wanted in spraypaint form, and come back home to spraypaint my bedside tables, it would have taken less time than using the can of already-owned paint. That's all yo. We glued together a couple planks of oak, and stained them in Minwax Ebony... for the tops of the nightstands. I loooooove how these turned out.   ...(yes, that's my husband sporting a tie-dyed T-shirt and classy froggy flannel PJ pants I sewed for him)

 Then these little gems got some glazing treatment, and they're ready to go!

Not only do we have matching adorable bedside tables with TONS of character... but we also have storage for all those bedside "items" that we won't discuss here... because this is a family blog. JK... I'm mostly speaking of my retainer.

I so love these new little additions to our bedroom! There are still many things to do in this room, but I think this is a pretty good start for now.

Here are some things I'm still planning to do in this room:

1) curtains
2) seating area (scouring craigslist)
3) new ceiling fan
4) painting treatment to the dresser (??)
5) paint the drab beige walls another color
6) bedding... DIY? perhaps

OK, so I know these plans aren't very specific, but I'm the design-as-I-go type, so I really don't have a picture in my head of how it will look in the end. That's annoying to you, I can tell.

Tweet