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

Inspiration Files: Printed Roman Shade

I was browsing around on Better Homes and Gardens online today, looking for inspiring ideas, and I came across this fun idea...

A No-Sew Printed Roman Shade for the Kitchen

By the way, I love everything about this kitchen too. 

The yellow, the white, the open shelving, the sink...

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BHG provides a tutorial for making the roman shade yourself:

"To widen a Roman shade, cut lengths of striped fabric twice as wide as the desired trim width (ours are 8 inches), press in half the long way, then press the raw edges under 1/8 inch. Glue the pressed edges to the shade, one to the front and one to the back, overlapping slightly. Print letters one per page in your favorite font. For the silverware, check the Internet or clip art books for an image and enlarge it on a photocopier. Put the patterns under the shade and trace in pencil, then outline with black fabric marker and shade as needed. Hang shade and tack the trim to the window."

I'm not quite clear on how you "hang the shade and tack trim to the window" though. 

What does that mean!?

Unique Home Decor - At West End

I LOVE getting home decor catalogs in the mail.

I always do the happy dance when I open up our mailbox and see one has arrived.

My neighbors must think I'm nuts.

Not that I usually buy anything from the catalogs, I just love browsing through them (over and over), gathering inspiration and daydreaming.

The other day, I received a new catalog that I had not seen before.

It was a small catalog, filled with unique and rustic home decor items. 

The catalog is called At West End  

and here is a sampling of some of their awesome stuff...

Captain's Lantern

Fish "Towels" Rack

Sea Horses

 

Glass Bird Feeder

 Vine Fish

Aqua Glass Bottles

Whitewashed Driftwood Star

Their prices are pretty good too!
I'm so impressed with their stuff that I might actually order some of their cute things.

Oh, and shipping is only $5 on any size order - sweet!

No, I am not getting compensated in any way for this post, I just thought they had super cute stuff and wanted to share it.

 

Old Glory - Vintage Style

The day before the fourth of July, Jacob and I were digging around in the garage trying to find our flag when I spied his big box of wood scraps. 

I inadvertently abandoned our flag hunt and started pulling scraps of wood out of the box. 

I get distracted so easily!

I started piecing them together like a puzzle on the floor. 

I was inspired by THIS post on Knock-Off Wood.

Jacob knew I had my creative juices flowing, so he just rolled his eyes at me and went about his flag search. 

I know he was thinking I don't want her giving me another project! 

But I knew this would be a project I could conquer myself.

After I pieced all of the scraps together to form a big rectangle resembling a flag, I asked Jacob to show me how to use his compound miter saw. 

Sorry, I didn't take any pictures of the process - I was too excited to get the project completed!

After a quick saw lesson, I cut all of my boards to fit perfectly together.  

Then I sanded and painted all of the boards. This process took me a full day because I had to wait for all of the paint to dry before I could sand the boards again to give it a distressed look. 

Note: I painted all of the boards BEFORE attaching them.

To paint the 13 stars in a perfect circle, I printed off a picture from the internet and traced it onto the boards. Then I used a white paint pen to color them in.

Jacob had to help me cut a big piece of plywood on the table saw for the backing. 

Then I used wood glue and little brad nails to attach the boards to the plywood.

Originally I had planned for this to decorate our front porch for Independence Day, but I liked how it turned out so much, that it now hangs in one of our hallways.

I smile every time I walk by it, knowing that I built it all by myself!

Linking up to:

Blue Cricket Design Show and Tell 

Trendy Treehouse Creative Share 

DIY Project Parade

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

Design Advice: Amy's Master Bedroom

My sister-in-law, Amy, moved (all the way from Florida!) into a beautiful house here in the Northwest last summer.

Her and her family have very tastefully decorated their new house.
Every room looks great....
except the master bedroom.

Why is it that the master bedroom is always the last room to get attention?

Amy and Frank's bedroom has great bones, it's just a little, well....plain.

They've got great blue/cream floral bedding that they purchased last summer.

And they painted the room a light tan to cover the hideous taupe-ish pinkish sponge paint job that covered all of the walls before they moved in.

Amy told me that she did not want to repaint the walls again (can't blame her!) and that she wanted to keep her bedding (it's super cute anyways!).

She also told me that she was thinking maybe a cream wrought iron headboard and black furniture.

So to help get the decorating ball rolling, I came up with some ideas to help her out...

1 The color palette is based on your existing blue and cream duvet cover (which, by the way, is beautiful) and your current wall color, beige. The black was added in for contrast and interest. If the black seems too harsh, you could always do a warm wood tone instead.

2 These striped curtains add pattern to the room and also help tie in the blues and tans from throughout the room. The fabric I found is and upholstery fabric called Pintado Stripe from http://www.fabricsandpapers.com/, but I have also seen similar fabric at Joann’s Fabrics. The black wrought iron rod and the curtain clips help tie in the black color.

3 A distressed antique white (it looks white in the picture, but is actually more cream) wrought iron bed flows nicely with the cream in your bedding. This particular one is the Savannah bed from Pottery Barn, but I’m sure you can probably find one elsewhere for cheaper.

4 An antique looking picture, like this one of an old bicycle would go well with the style of furniture and accessories in the room. This picture also has blues and tans as seen in other parts of the room. The frame is distressed antique white. Both the frame and picture were found at art.com.

5 A long antique black dresser would be optimal for more storage, for mounting a flat screen TV above it, and for displaying accessories. Look for something that has curved details and slender feet. These can be a bit pricey if bought new, so a cheaper alternative (and more unique) idea would be to find one on craigslist.com and paint & distress it.

6 These blue ceramic lamps bring in more color & interest to the room and are a more substantial size to help fill up the large wall behind your bed. A cream colored drum shade would be ideal for this lamp, found at Pottery Barn.

7 The large wall behind your bed dominates the room, so you need nightstands that fit the scale of the room. These black nightstands are actually small chests of drawers found at http://www.ikea.com/us/en/catalog/products/50162858 The slender, curved legs look a little more feminine to flow with the lines of your bed frame.

8 Three tall mirrors would look good above your bed since the wall is so tall. The cream frames on the mirrors would tie in nicely with the cream of the bed frame. I found these at Ballard Designs, but I also saw very similar black ones at Target (you could always spray paint them cream!).

9 This tan settee is from JCPenney and the style of it would definitely fit in with French Country style; however, I think it may be too big to fit in the corner where the little stool is. You may want to consider a chair with similar colors and style instead. The cream and blue pillows help bring color into yet another area of the room.

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After receiving her feedback, I placed some of the items in the pictures of her room so that she could get a feel for how things would actually look in her room.

Option 1:

Option 2:

I also found some pictures of other rooms for her to use as inspiration.

Images from Houzz.com

Images from Coastal Living

Images from Pottery Barn

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I can't wait to see what the finished room looks like!

Romantic Master Bedroom Getaway - Mood Board

Sarah over at Pewter+Sage occasionally hosts a blog party called...

Her blog parties are  all about seeing how different people are inspired differently by the same things. 

This week's challenge was to design a bedroom around one of four beautiful bedding options.

I was immediately drawn to the Barbara Barry "Poetical" Bedding Collection from Macy's

 

 and used it as my inspiration for the romantic master bedroom getaway that I designed...

1 - I was drawn to the soothing grey that provides the undertone for this elegant bedding. The soft white vinework gives the bedding a romantic appeal.

2 - I chose a soft grey/blue paint for the walls from Benjamin Moore called Whirlpool 1436. This color is just a few shades lighter than the grey in the bedding, giving the room a monochromatic look.

3 - The Rhonda Headboard from JCPENNEY is button tufted and upholstered in white twill.

4 - The tufted bench at the end of the bed is from Restoration Hardware and is covered in white Belgian Linen.

5 -The Plain Tin Slate Wool Hooked Rug is from Dash & Albert.The soft grey of the rug compliments the grey in the bedding while the brown and white vintage geometric pattern compliments the white vinework in the duvet cover.

6 - The Rustic Pedestal Accent Table is from Pottery Barn.

7 - The Triple Gourd Clear Glass Table Lamp is from Lamps Plus.

8 - The Caroline Dresser from Pottery Barn has a charmingly timeworn appeal.

9 - The drapes are layered with white sheer panels underneath and Opaque Linen Pole-Pocket Window Panels in Platinum Grey on top from West Elm. The dark grey panels play into the monochromatic grey color scheme of the room.

10 - The white ceramic garden stool is from Ballard Designs and is to be used as a decorative accent in the room. The decorative details on the stool compliment the white design on the bedding.

11 - The Raindrops Mirror from Home Decorators brings interest to the wall with its unique eye-catching design. The warm metallic color of the rays warms up the cool-colored walls.

12 - The Duet Papillon and the Filigree Papillon butterfly prints are from art.com and bring warmth to the room while adding a feminine touch.

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I hope my design came across as a romantic room inspired by classic prints and vintage looking pieces.

This was SO much fun to do! 

Thanks for hosting the fab party, Sarah! 

 Also linking up to: