New Kitchen Table

I bought a new farmhouse style table and two chairs for the kitchen. 

Both from Ikea, the table is the Stornas and the arm chairs are majby. The x-back chairs I already owned. 

I love it! 

Notice the paint samples on the walls? I wasn't happy with the grey looking so blue and cold. I wanted it warmer and more greige. LOL Gray + Beige = Greige.

I settled on Hazy Skies, (which has a green tint to it too) a Benjamin Moore color. But, I saved myself some money by having it mixed with Behr paint.

Here's the simple table-scape I came up with for Thanksgiving.

See that sample of fabric? I'm thinking of making curtains for the window. I think it coordinates nicely with the colors of the kitchen and with the existing fabric I used on the other windows and stools. Speaking of stools, I bought 4 of these to replace the old ones. I love how they look in Edie's amazing kitchen: 

They will arrive in about a week, probably right after Thanksgiving. Can't wait to see how they look! 

Suzy :0)

Ikea Ottava Hack

Hi there! I hope you had a great Halloween. I love it, but I'm glad to have the house look "normal" again and not like an abandoned haunted house of horrors! 

I've been busy on the kitchen again. This time I changed out the can light over my sink and installed the Ikea Ottava. It looks great with the modern cottage feel. Once again, I turned to a few of my favorite bloggers for guidance, The Lettered Cottage, Isabella and Max Rooms and The House Of Smiths. 

Since I had a can light above the sink, I used the Hampton Bay Recessed Light Adapter just like Janell and Shelley. It was somewhat hard trying to figure out how to attach the screws with the spring clip things to the inside of the can. After that, it was a snap. I didn't have to cut the cord to shorten it like Layla and Shelley did. I simply tucked it into the ceiling cap along with the capped wires. I used a 10 inch ceiling medallion to hide the adapter and give it a finished look.

It looked great. But, there was a problem. When the light was on, the bulb was too bright. I kept seeing spots every time I went into the kitchen. LOL So, I remembered reading what Layla did to soften the light. She sprayed the glass cover with a frosting effect. Brilliant! It was so easy and effective. Just a couple of coats and it dried fast too.

Ahh, much better! I was also playing around with the idea of spray painting it a dark bronze color for a little more contrast. What do you think? 

Ikea Malm dresser hack

Long time, no post! I finally ordered the pull rings I found at www.bellacor.com. I'm very proud of myself. I have NEVER used a power drill before and it was pretty intimidating. I was sure that I would, somehow, mess it up. After careful measuring TWICE, I marked a dot where the holes would be and drilled right in. It was so effortless! This may seem lame to experienced handy people, but when you don't know how a tool is going to feel or react when you push the button, it's kind of intimidating.

I changed out the knobs on the hemnes dresser to compliment the pull rings on the nightstands. Thanks again to Emily A. Clark for this great Ikea hack! 

Speaking of Ikea hacks, I found some other great examples of what can be done to Ikea furniture. 

Here's a great one from Jason @ retrograde: 

{source}

Look at how Morgan @ ikeahackers.net transformed this Edland dresser. 

{source}

Wow, this is gorgeous! Nancy @ MarcusDesign did a fabulous job of making these Rast dresssers look like Dorothy Draper Chests. I could see this working with the Malm too. 

{source}

{source}

I really want to try my hand at all of these. Just one of many, many things I have planned. *Sigh*

:0) Suzy

Update on My Master Bedroom

I've been busy re-tweaking my master bedroom and adding new furniture. Plus a new mattress set that we desperately needed. Our new bed is sooo comfortable!

 I got some incredible inspiration from Emily A, Clark. She used two ikea malm dressers, in her latest client project, and added pull rings to the drawers to dress them up. Absolutely beautiful and affordable! I headed to ikea and bought two malm dressers and the eight drawer hemnes dresser for under $500. I still need to buy pull rings and this is what I'm thinking of getting:

They are very similar, and may be the exact same ones she used.  You can find these at www.bellacor.com for $4.03/each. I love the poster bed she used and it looks very similar to the one I've been admiring from Zocalo Furniture's Madison Collection. 

It retails around $900-1,000 for a King. NOT in my price range. But, I found a similar poster bed at half the cost! 

I could easily paint it black-brown to match my other furniture. This is definitely on my list of future purchases! 

The beautiful, sleek beveled mirror used above the dresser looks just like this Z Gallerie mirror. 

But, at $270, I just can't stomach paying that much for a mirror. So I'll be on the look out for something similar at half the cost. For now, I like the current mirror I'm using. It used to have a rubbed silver/black finish and I spray painted it "heirloom white" by Rustoleum. More to come...

:0) Suzy

My Home Office Redo

Well, the day finally came when our cheap metal and wood laminate desk died.....and it's definitely the only time I've ever been happy about something dying! It gave me the opportunity to convince my hubby that we needed to finally get around to actually decorating our home office. A trip to ikea, goodwill and some homemade stenciling, made it into this:

I searched and searched my picture files for a before shot and apparently the room was so blah before that no one hardly ever took any pictures in there! Here's the only two I could find:

Before:

Here are some of my daughter's friends. It doesn't even look like an intentional shot!

I took this phot after completing the trellis wall. The desk on the left is the one that died. It was literally being propped up so that the legs would not collapse. Eww, look at all those yucky cords!

Basically the room was unfinished looking with unframed art and two mismatched desks with exposed wires underneath slapped side by side against the wall. Yeah, I know.

The first thing I tackled in the room was the walls. After seeing the beautiful and classy trellis wall that centsational girl painted in her master bedroom, I knew I had to try that. And so I did. :0)

I mostly followed her instructions. But, found it easier to skip the tracing step and just start painting directly on the wall. I started on the left side, working my way down until starting a new row.

I just love how the light reflects on it. 

After getting a heads up from Emily A. Clark on the great deal she got on these wedding signature frames at Ross, I was lucky enough to find them too at $8 each! I framed some of my sketches from a drawing class I took. 

I found these planters at Hobby Lobby for $3.50 each. The floral picture I found at Goodwill for $1.55!!

I already had the candelabra purchased at Pier One a few years ago and spray painted it silver. The lady statue was a gift from a friend who went to Spain. 

Instead of using a regular old mouse pad, I went with books. Dilbert fits right in with this office space. :0P

Chess pieces are from Hobby Lobby at a few dollars each. Boxes are from ikea. 

Gold vase was on clearance for $10 at Target, two ikea ribba white frames, "OH" letters were 50 cents at Goodwill. 

This monitor was shorter than the other. So, to give it some height, I used a shoe box I covered in wrapping paper. 

My old Target end table, painted white, is just right for the printer. 

Pretty paper wreath I made looks nice above the back door. 

Since this is such a small room, the expedit desk from ikea provided the right amount of space and just enough area for two people to work comfortably. 

And to break up the giant size of the fireplace, I used my Target coffee table, painted white, as a bench. Later on, I'd like to make a bench cushion for it. 

So there you have it. From a dead dud of a desk to a stylish and functional workspace. For very little $.