Kitchen Chalk Board Wall

I am a project-aholic. 

I almost always have a few irons in the fire and if I don't have some sort of project going, I get anxious.

Today was one of those days where I was totally itching to do something. 

Change something. 

Create something.

So while the kids were taking a little nap, 

I whipped out a can of chalkboard paint that had been sitting in the garage and gave a wall in the kitchen a couple coats of black. 

I was in such a rush to 'do something' that I forgot to take a before picture.

The wall that I painted used to be cream, so it's a bit of a shock to walk in to the kitchen and see black!

But I think I'm liking it.

To break up some of the black, I hung a metal perpetual calendar (Joyworks), 

which I think happens to be pretty dang cute.

And I love that I now have a place to write the weekly dinner menu.

The kids are pretty crazy about getting to draw on a wall too :)

Oh, and just an FYI, chalk pens do not work well on chalk board paint on walls. 

It doesn't wipe off! I learn that lesson the hard way :(

Good old fashioned sticks of chalk seem to work best!

Linking up to:

Happy Hour Friday at Craftberry Bush

Drop Cloth Drapes Gone Bad and the Quest for Stripes

I was so excited when I jumped on the "Dropcloth Drapes" bandwagon a while back.

I mean, who wouldn't be excited about LONG drape panels for less than $20!?

And they were cute too.

But notice I said they were cute?

Nine months later, they are not so cute and I am not so excited about them.

These drop cloth drapes cover our sliding door that sits next to our kitchen table. 

The table where my toddlers eat all of their meals.

And throw all of their food on the floor.

Food that splatters onto the walls, the sliding door, and all over the drapes.

No biggie though, the drapes are washable.

Right??

Not such a good idea if you didn't pre-wash them before hemming them.

Why??

Because they SHRINK and you are left with high-water drapes!!!

I hate high-waters.

Total rookie mistake. Duh!

Also my wonderful hemming job turned into a knotted up mess of dangling strings.

So not cute.

So needless to say, we need new drapes now.

I could just replace them with new drop cloths (but pre-wash them this time!),

but after looking at those drapes for months now,

I've decided that they just look too blah against our tan walls.

Too much tan on tan action, if ya know what I mean.

We need something with a little more personality.

I am so in love with horizontally striped drapes that I've seen on a few blogs.

The Yellow Cape Cod

used plain ivory curtains and attached strips of black twill fabric with fusible webbing. 

The raw edges were covered with black grosgrain ribbon. 

Nesting Place 

found vertically striped fabric, and turned it into super cute horizontally striped drapes.

 Faith's Place 

used leftover paint from the walls and painted stripes on plain white curtains panels.

I haven't been able to find wide striped fabric that I like (or that's affordable) 

and so I thought I'd give the painted stripes method a try.

Using my old, shrunken drop cloth drapes for a trial run, 

I painted wide 8" stripes using leftover paint from our walls.

(Keep in mind this was a trial run, so I didn't do the best paint job)

While it looks really cute from far away, up close it's not so cute.

It is way crusty and stiff.

If you crease it, the paint cracks too.

And I'm pretty sure it wouldn't hold up in the washing machine.

Bummer.

While the painting trail wasn't so successful, 

it did show me that the stripes look really good in our kitchen/breakfast area, 

so I am definitely going to persevere in my quest for striped drapes!

I bought these puppies at Ikea (only $20 for a super long pair!) last weekend 

and I'm thinking I'll try attaching fabric stripes...

if I can find the right material...

Kitchen Canisters

About a year ago, I saw these wide-mouthed glass canisters at Pier 1. 

I really, really liked them, but I wasn't crazy about the jagged edges on the chalkboard bands.

Picky, picky, I know.

And I wasn't really in the mood to spend money on canisters that day anyways. 

So I filed them away in the back of my mind.

We've had these copper canisters in our kitchen since we received them a wedding present 7 years ago.

I loved them for quite a few years.

But as the years wore on and the canisters saw a lot of use, they got to look pretty gnarly.

They became tarnished, stained and showed every single fingerprint. 

In other words, they looked pretty beat up.

So finally I caved in and decided to replace them.

I remembered the ones I had seen at Pier 1 way back when. 

But I wanted to create my own version so that they were just my style.

I picked up three of these wide-mouthed glass canisters as Fred Meyer (Target and Walmart also carry them). 

I chose to buy two big ones and one medium sized one.

Then using my chalkboard contact paper (bought on ebay), 

I cut out 3 rectangles (with smooth edges!) and stuck them onto my new canisters.

I do a lot of baking and wanted big canisters to hold my sugar and flour.

I love that I can now see into the canisters and know when I am running low before its too late (I used to always run out of flour or sugar in the middle of making goodies! Arrrgghh - so frustrating!)

The small canister holds oatmeal, which I make the kids every morning for breakfast. So having it out and accessible makes things a little easier in the morning.

They look MUCH better than my old dirty looking copper ones. 

Super happy with my easy little project!

It really is the little things that make me smile.

 Linking up to:
The Stories of A to Z: Chalkboard Paint Party

E-A-T

One day while I was browsing online in Pottery Barn's clearance section, I came across this...

 

Super cute, right?

Those letters would look so good in my kitchen.

Well I didn't buy them. 

I knew I couldn't justify to my husband why I spent over $30 on some wood letters.

So I made my own.

I picked up some unfinished wood letters at our local craft store (Ben Franklin Crafts).

 

After I sanded them down to get rid of the rough patches, 

I slathered them with a coat of primer.

Then I painted on a layer of Benjamin Moore's Wedgewood Gray (my favorite color!).

I wanted the letters to be red with a hint of blue showing through.

This took some trial and error work.

I painted red right over the top and then tried to sand it to give it an aged look.

But the sander stripped it clear down to the original wood color and you couldn't even see the blue.

So I repainted it blue and then I read a great tip online...

If you want a paint color to show through after another color is applied, rub candle wax on the spots your want to show through.

So I found an old white candle in my cupboard and I rubbed it on the edges and sporadically on different parts of the letters.

Then I repainted the red over the top.

It worked so well that I didn't even have to use my sander. 

I was able to rub off some of the red with a paper towel!

I'm super happy with how they turned out. 

I like them even better than the Pottery Barn ones and they were about half the price (even on clearance)!

Linking up to:

Fingerprints on the Fridge Feature Yourself Friday

Funky Junk Interiors SNS #38

The Shabby Nest Frugal Friday

Chic on a Shoestring Flaunt it Friday

A Few of My Favorite Things - Favorite Things Friday

Drop Cloth Drapes

Every time it's sunny here in Washington (which actually isn't that often), the setting sun blasts us in the face through our sliding door as the five of us sit in our kitchen eating dinner. 

Don't get me wrong, I love when the sun is shining and we get beautiful sunsets, 

but we don't much appreciate the glare in our faces as we are trying to enjoy our dinner together. 

We really needed some kind of window treatment on our sliding door 

so that we could see each other while we ate dinner, 

but drapes can be quite costly, especially when you need extra tall ones! 

And with three wee ones running around, yanking on everything, 

I didn't want to put up anything that was too expensive and risk them ruining it.

I had read about people using painter's drop cloths as drapes, so I decided to give it a go. 

I mean, you can't beat a drape panel for $9.99! 

I went to Lowe's and picked up two canvas drop cloths that measured 6 feet wide by 9 feet tall. 

That is a killer price for drapes that long!

 Only the long edges were hemmed, so I put my new  sewing skills into practice and hemmed the two short ends. 

If you are going to attempt this, make sure you use a heavy duty needle on your sewing machine. 

I learned this the hard way after breaking 5 needles!

 I used some drape clips (also from Lowe's) so that the drapes can easily be taken down for cleaning.

 

If you clip the drape clips about an inch down on the back of the panel, it gives the drapes a  pleated look on the top.

Our drapes have a decorative hem line about 2/3 of the way down.

No, I didn't add that on myself. They actually came that way!

 

I love the texture and the flecks of brown and tan in them.

But I especially love the price!

Total cost of the project including the rod and the drape clips = $50.00