If you see a 5’3″ girl out there with brown curly hair and a goofy perma-grin it’s probably me. Why am I smiling? Because it is almost FALL! I love Autumn. My absolute favourite season of the year. As a westcoastie rain lover who is allergic to the sun (seriously – I get a major rash) I am so over summer by about June 22.

But alas – September is here! Yay! And with that, cooler weather, raindrops and time to decorate my mantel for FALL!

 Pulling back a bit…

After painting the mantel black last summer, decorating for Fall has had a fun new spin on it. I did a  slightly more rustic look last year so wanted something fresh and crisp this time ’round.

First I pulled out anything I thought may work and lined ‘er up on the couch.

Then I began by hanging the wreath that I made last year. I’ve never been a fan of the ‘traditional’ fake leaf and poppuri type fall wreaths so decided to make my own simpler version.

Then I focussed on the two ‘anchors’ – the white tree trunk vases which I filled with some funky things that looked like pussy willows on steroids who had gotten their hair dyed. I found them for $6 at Pier One! Score.

To make the steroid willows stand up straight (versus splaying out and flopping to the vase edges) I did a simple scotch tape grid – like I did here and here.

Then I layered in the other elements…

My large orange glass pumpkin (which has an opening in back for a candle)…

Serenity Now
The Life of Faith

Lil’ Mrs. Tori
Cherished Bliss
Centsational Girl

We had some people over for a BBQ recently and decided to take the opportunity to liven up the deck a bit. Make it a bit more cosy and pretty (Yipeeeee!).

After a particularly rainy westcoast Spring and start to Summer our deck wasn’t really in it’s finest form. A bit too grungy, a bit too dirty and way too drab.

It was like wood invited wood over and threw a wood party. And then mildew and moss showed up and crashed that party…

So after some fantastic deck scrubbing by Chef Kev and some decorating by yours truly we were ready to have some friends over to our ‘new’ cleaner, brighter deck.

The biggest impact was made from our new outdoor rug. (We got it at Canadian Tire for those interested).

Hanging right above that is the chandelier I refinished last summer. It ties in nicely.

Chef Kev and Mini Chef Kev have their own BBQ areas.

Here is the view as you step out onto the deck. You can see the planters I redid last summer along the right hand side. As well as the herb gardens I refinished last year hanging above them.

You can see how much cleaner the deck is above. And the storage bins below now shine. Ahhhh….

On the table are a few candles and hanging from the umbrella is my favourite funky orb tealight holder.

And what is a BBQ without tiki torches!? I got these from Candian Tire as well, and love the dark espresso finish and chevron inspired weave.

So that is it! A refreshed deck that is oh-so-refreshing to relax in. I love it out here so much that I might actually be sitting here right now writing this blog post. Yup. I am. 🙂

Have a great long weekend everyone! I hope the time off finds you on a deck with a nice cold beverage in hand.

Back last Fall when I painted our fireplace mantel black I was not thinking about how I would decorate it come Summer. Not that I regret for one second making the switch but sometimes solving one problem creates a new challenge.

Decorating for Autumn and Winter (Christmas) was easy but come Spring I realized I would have a harder time making it look festive then I did back when it was white.

I didn’t blog about how I decorated it for Spring (Easter) but basically it was a woodsey egg theme. Here are a few shots I took before I dismanteled the ‘ol mantel.

But what to do with a BLACK MANTEL in summer?

After some reflection (ha, get it? See that big mirror above the mantel) I decided I needed to keep it simple, graphic, punchy and bright. I needed some large vibrant elements that could compete with the heaviness of the black paint colour.

Well hello pink hydrangeas. Thank you for stopping by.

Here it is from a greater distance so that you can see the full effect.

Chef Kev bought a new (to us) beer to try a month or so ago and I loved the simplicity of the bottles so much that I washed and kept them. I thought they’d come in handy for something and this was their first task.

I simply filled five of my new ‘vases’ with water and added a single hydrangea bloom to each.

Hydrangea stems are very stalky (think tree branch) so to prolong the life of this type of bloom, cut a slit up the stem to allow for better water absorbtion.

Isn’t the refection from the mirror neat? It makes it look like there are twice as many bottles and blooms.

And a few close-ups for you…

And one last shot of the room from a distance. You can see the painting I did of Chace. Aren’t the bright colours in his painting fun with the pink hydrangeas?

What do you think? Ever changed something in your house for the better only to find yourself with a new dilema? Anyone else decorated their mantel for the summer? Turned any beer bottles into impromptu vases recently?

 

You may recall in this post where I updated you on Chace’s ‘Big Boy Room’ progress, that I had another project in the works for this big blank space of wall…

link party

I thought it was high time I offered you all a ‘Big Boy Room’ update before my little guy outgrows it! Ha. Kidding. That won’t happen for some time (thankfully)!

For those of you following along, you may recall my grand master plan for turning Chace’s nursery into a room fit for a growing toddler that I shared back at the beginning of the year. I’ve been slowly picking away at it since, and now there are only minimal things left to do before it is complete. Luckily all the big items are done so time to share!

From the doorway, the room looks like this:

The cute owl bedding is what inspired the whole ‘scheme’ – that and trying to use as many things as I could from the nursery – dressers, shelves and curtains. The furniture was white and ‘birch’ toned so those few elements were my jumping off point. And of course I wanted to be able to do all of this on a pretty tight budget (enter Ikea).

I got the bed off of Craigslist but it is this one from Ikea. However, mine wasn’t $179 for just the frame, it was $60 for the frame AND slats!

I’d also like to add art above the bed but don’t want anything heavy that could fall down and hurt my little sleeping angel so would like to put up these sweet clouds from Umbra. I love how they play off the owl and trees and think they will look great on the blue wall.

I’d also like to add a little area rug for cute 3-year-old feet as they get out of bed and have found these two that fit the bill. Not sure which I will go with but will decide based on which one looks better with the bedding in person. I hope it’s the round one as that is my fave. Both are from Ikea.

Recently we got this little table and chair also from Ikea here and here for some hardcore colouring/crafting/block building/car playing sessions. Chace loves it and I do too. I really wanted his room to have ‘zones’ – and being a pretty basic/smallish room that was a bit of a task!

Behind that you can see a glimpse of the toy storage station that we brought in. Also from Ikea (are we seeing a theme here)? All of these are from the Trofast line that they carry. The nice thing about this product line is that it is so versatile. You can literally build to suit to fit your own specific needs.

Yes. I made labels. So what? Sue me… or make fun of me. Your choice. Chace likes ’em.

Above the toy storage are the two shelves that Chace had back in his nursery – moved over and refreshed with more toddler friendly things.

I already had this frame but loved how it tied together the ‘birch’ and ‘white’ furniture elements of the room into one thing. Plus these frames are free standing and chunky – light but still masculine.

Chace loves pointing to this and saying “Daddy and Chace with Elmo shirt!”

Looking at the room from over by the window, it looks like this.

You can see Chace’s growth chart which you may recall from here, and his closet nook which I blogged about here.

The only change I’ve made to the nook since I blogged about it is the addition of the soccer bean bag chair – before it had some pillows from our bed as a stand-in. My coworker gave me the bean bag chair as her sons had outgrown it – SCORE GOOOAAALLL! Daddy is a soccer goalie so very fitting.

There is one shelf at the very top of the closet which I’ve yet to add some storage bins too (not shown in the picture above but you can see it in the one before that).

Opposite to the books, the other corner of the closet has a little chalkboard which I shared here. (This picture is from that post which is why you see one of the ‘stand-in’  pillows in the foreground.)

And last but not least, the other wall looks like this – oh how we can’t WAIT to get rid of the change table… baby steps-breathe-baby steps (potty training isn’t going so well).

See that blank wall? Well I have an idea for that which I’m currently working on and will share very soon!

So that’s it. Only a few things left to do but almost there – and a loooong way from his nursery (you can see some old photos of that here if interested).

What do you think? Would love to hear your thoughts :).

UPDATE: the special project I was working on for that blank wall is now complete and can be found here!

link party

Okay, so I kind of love shoes… I mean who doesn’t right? I don’t think I quite qualify in the fetish mode category…  but I’d definitley be considered a connoiseur.

What I don’t love however, are ugly shoe racks. Or piles of shoes in the middle of the floor as you walk into the house. Or piles in the garage right in front of the door (ahem.cough.ChefKev.cough)… but that’s for another post.

As you enter our house from the garage you open into a small hallway that leads to our rec room. To the right are stairs that go to our main floor (where the main entrance is) but to the left is a (rather large) bathroom. Since the rec room is carpeted and I don’t want to track dirt on it, my shoes end up getting removed as I enter and side-kick-shuffled (patented move) into the tiled bathroom.

Exhibit A:

Obviously we needed a shoe storage solution here.

Let me show you where my shoes live NOW (hint: it’s the big yellow dresser).

Allow me to back up and fill you in on how this ray of sunshine entered my life.

As I mentioned earlier, this bathroom is quite large. It’s actually outfitted with plumbing for a bath to go along that back wall but as the fourth bathroom in our house, and being located off the rec room, it just didn’t make sense to have a tub there.

I had always wanted to get something to go in that space (wasn’t quite sure what) but the project just never made it to the top of the priority list.

Enter Craigslist and their FREE Classified section.

I saw this and (believe it or not) I had a vision…

Yes, it was straight from the 80’s (hello, Mrs. Max Headroom is calling and she wants her dresser back), had chawesome pulls and knobs and was wearing 25 years of scuffs, dings, dirt and dog chewing, oh, and the front of one drawer had fallen off… but I could see it… SHOE STORAGE THAT I COULD TURN INTO SOMETHING PRETTY!

And so it was mine. For zero dollars.

What a pretty flower.

Funny side note – my mom called me the other day and said when I got my first desk for doing homework the first thing I said was “I’m going to change those knobs!” Ha. I guess somethings never change… but taste sure does. Apparently my dad was highly unimpressed with the cost of the ones I chose as a replacement. And yes, they had painted flowers on them.

But back to this.

I did a lot of research in deciding how to make over this piece. I’ll explain my process below.

First up was to patch the dog chewed corner. To do this use some wood filler. Start by applying a layer,  letting it dry and then applying another layer and so on until it builds up to the level of the surface you are working with. Then you sand and contour the filler to match your existing drawer. My dad did this part (thanks Dad) as he had taken the drawer to fix the broken front (he had the clamps and wood glue needed). So no pictures of these last two steps but here is one of the rebuilt corner before priming.

Next up I sanded the whole dresser. The key here is to LIGHTLY sand with the lowest grit paper you can. Since the dresser has a veneer finish you want to take off the sheen without sanding down to the particle board. This step is uber-important. Of if you are italian, uber-importantico.

Next was the priming step. I chose Kilz from Home Depot. You can see it here on the left.

Apply both your primer and paint with a mohair mini roller. I didn’t use a brush at all for this project. The mohair roller is key – do not use foam. A mini mohair roller holds and distributes your paint evenly and really gets it into your lighty sanded surface. It’s basically a small version of a good quality wall roller. Anyone who has used a foam roller for a project like this will know what I’m talking about. A foam roller will just push your paint around on your surface. Slicky McSlickerson.

Now the fun part – paint! The colour I chose is Benjamin Moore “Sun Kissed Yellow”. I had seen other dressers done in yellow during my blogland and Pinterest travels and loved the graphic punch they add to a space. For my small and windowless room I thought this colour would look great.

The paint I chose was Benjamin Moore Advance paint in a high gloss finish (seen above next to the primer). My research said this was the product for the job so I took note. It lived up to expectations and dries to a strong finish, is self levelling, easy to work with and very durable, but one thing that surprised me was how thin it was. You absolutely need to use a primer with before this product and may even want to tint it.

After some drying time and knob installation we were done. I may or may not have bought the wrong amount of knobs and had to back and get more. Seriously. It’s only 12. Not a high number to count to. Ridiculous.

Ta da!

You can see how the damaged corner turned out below. For reference it is the bottom left corner of the bottom left drawer in the photo above.

The thing that really drew me to this dresser was that the top two drawers were divided in to six quadrants with bevel detail between each section.

For the knobs and pulls I chose some that I thought would look good (found at Home Depot here and here). I chose this style because I like that it was a nod to the traditional but was going to be used on a piece that had been given a modern glossy yellow twist.

Since these were the front runner after my searching, I actually had a photo of them on my phone for a few months (shows how long this took me to do). One day while in the bathroom I noticed something about the existing taps. Ummm… match much?

It was knob fate.

Here is a different view of the room where you can see how the dresser fits into the space.

See the towel reflection? I picked those for my birthday back in March. Obviously I was planning on getting to this… just took awhile.

I love the layering of the charcoal and white chevron inspired towel paired with the bright yellow and crisp white.

One of my favourite parts of this project is that now I have a drop zone for my jewellery when I come home from work.

And of course, a new home for my shoes!

So there we have it!

What about you? Refinish any Craigslist finds recently? Did it take you months or is that just me? Hopefully you weren’t carrying around photos of knobs on your phone like I was. Um, dresser knobs people. That came out really wrong.