Decorating my Coastal Bookcase

This was the fun part.  After my coastal bookcase makeover, I started working on filling it.  I had been using Pinterest to get ideas so I just went through and sifted through many pins.

First up was this amazing coastal wooden flag that I just HAD to make.   I still had some left over wood from when I disassembled 2 Adirondack ottomans.  Here is the where the wood came from.

I painted all the pieces first, lightly sanded the edges and parts of the front for a distressed look, then had the hubs cut the sides off where there were previous screw holes and attach them all together using 2 other scrap pieces of wood.  I'm really not sure why one of the boards didn't get paint on the back side, or even why I painted the back of any of them in the first place.  I blame it on painting at 2am!

I only needed 9 starfish, but I ordered a lot of 25 (1 inch) from North Florida Shells. Who can't use some extra little starfish around the house??  I stuck them on with super glue and there you have it! 

I need to get a larger easel to display it on though. It's a little wobbly.  I'll display this proudly for all the patriotic holidays.... or year round.  ;)

Next, I wanted to place books on it, but didn't like the mismatched nature of them. I saw that people had used maps to cover books with, so I found an old atlas I had collecting dust to cover the books.  I really liked the blues and greens in them.  I used mostly pages with places we have visited, and then a few other ones just because I liked the way the maps looked. 

The pictures, candle, coral and seashells were on the bookshelf prior to the makeover, so I just added them back on.  The letter was purchased from AC Moore some time ago, just didn't have a place to put it.  Now it has a home!

Decorating for Easter:

For Easter, I added some mini birdhouses that I purchased from Joann's last year from their dollar bin. I just gave them a few coats of white paint, then sanded the edges a bit. I found the bunny at a thrift store last year for .89.  The eggs are just those plastic Easter eggs wrapped in some twine using hot glue. 

I will add a few little accents for all the holidays!

China Cabinet Goes Coastal

I loved how the bookcase turned out so much I decided to give the china cabinet a similar makeover since new china cabinets are so expensive. My mom left the china cabinet here when she moved as it was way too large for her new home.  It is Asian-inspired so it was tricky turning it into something coastal. Here is what it looked like before.

First we scraped off the Asian pin striping on all the glass doors.  It came off really easily!

We took all the doors off and removed all the gold hardware.  Unfortunately, it left a ton of holes in the doors. 



I happened to have some dowel rods that fit perfectly in the large holes so we cut them to size and tapped them in.

We filled the rest in with putty and sanded them down.

Next, using the same wainscoting from the bookcase remodel, Hubs measured and cut them to fit into the door.

He used liquid nails to secure them and reinforced them with nails.  More holes to fill in with putty.  Yay. 

Primed the doors and cabinet with 2 coats of Zinsser's primer, then 2 coats of satin finish white.  

Taping the mirror was ridiculous!

Yes, I painted right in the dining room! These pieces were too heavy to move into the garage. 

After days of painting and sanding and painting, it was ready to be put back together again!

Almost complete!!  Just have to put the new hardware pulls on and fill it up!

Here is what it looks like today...

We absolutely love how it turned out!


Linking up to:

Country Bookcase Goes Coastal

The dining room is our next room overhaul.  Mom left her Asian-inspired dining room set and an old country style bookcase here when she moved since her new dining room was smaller.  The bookcase has been a good dumping ground for stuff that doesn't have a place because I could just close it up. 

I was getting tired of looking at it and was going to post it on Craigslist. Then I got to looking around on Pinterest, my new obsession place for ideas. I was inspired to transform this dated piece into something coastal.  It is laminate and wood and I wasn't sure about painting it so after some digging, I found a post by Centsational Girl on painting laminate furniture.  Well, that was that. I didn't like the hanging leaf trim at the top and I thought I could just unscrew it off but it was tacked and glued.

I took it off and asked Hubs if he could just cut it off.  Sure enough, that is what he did.



I liked the floral carving on the doors, but they weren't very beachy. 



I decided to buy some wainscoting to put over them.  Hubs cut 2 pieces out so that they fit right over the carved wood door.  We attached them with some brad nails and wood glue, filled in and sanded the nail holes, caulked around the edges and the wainscoting was ready to be primed and painted!



The door you see above the double doors used to be a pull down desk.  I had intended to put it back on but after taking it off to paint, I decided I liked it better without.  We had to fill in the hardware holes and sand it down. 

Rather than getting new hardware, I just primed and spray painted them with some Satin Nickel spray paint I had left over from another project.

I used 2 coats of Zinsser's primer, 2 coats of leftover paint from our kitchen/dining room for the back of the bookcase and 2 coats of leftover flat white ceiling paint for the rest of the bookcase, then followed it up with 2 coats of sealer. 







Here is what it looks like now. 

Quite the transformation, don't you think? 

         BEFORE                                 AFTER

Now the fun part.. decorating it!!  Stay tuned!!

Switch Flops - Best Thing Since Sliced Bread

Last year, I walked into a home and garden store and discovered Switch Flops.  If you haven't heard of these before, I insist you check them out!

WARNING:  You will want to buy these.  Many, many pairs of these.

It's basically a shoe with interchangeable straps or buttons.  Genius!  I started my new obsession around my birthday, so Hubs bought me 3 pairs (black Lulu, tan Lulu, and black Lily) with a few extra straps.  Then the store I got them from had a sale a few months later and I picked up the cork Emma and a few more straps. 

I'm not quite sure how I ended up with so many straps (ahem), but I got tired of sifting through them in a pile on my shoe shelf.   I decided I needed an organizer for them.  They sell them online, but I wanted something really pretty to display my collection.  I found a pattern for a wrapping paper organizer and modified it slightly to the size I needed and added strips of Velcro instead of pockets.  I think it turned out really well.  I have it hanging in my closet, but it also folds up easily for travel.

This is the front with a large pocket made out of coordinating scraps.

Here is the organizer opened up with some of my Switch Flop straps.

This is the back.

I love how it turned out!

Living Room Update

I decided a few weeks ago that I want to bring some beachy-ness to my living room.  It's currently decorated with tropical accents, which I love, but I want to brighten it up and go coastal. 

I started with the easy stuff like updating the pillows on the couch.  I went to Joann Fabrics and found some indoor/outdoor fabric for half off in a pretty turquoise with a subtle stripe pattern.  Then I found some fabric called Sportswear Twill, also half off, in an off white.  I measured my existing tropical pillows and got to work.  I made a total of 4 pillowcases, 2 in the turquoise fabric and 2 in the off white fabric with some accents and bling (rhinestones).  Oh, how I love bling!  ;) 

While browsing the Internet, I found some really pretty turquoise coral pillows, but all the ones I wanted were over $50!  So rather than spend that much on pillows, I made pillowcase covers to go over my existing pillows.  I Googled a coral outline that would not be too difficult to cut out, copied/pasted it into Paint, printed it, then cut it out.  I pinned it to a scrap piece of turquoise fabric and cut it out.  After I cut it out, I used Fray Check around the edges.  It needed a little something extra, so I added the rhinestones to some tips of the coral.  I then used Liquid Stitch to adhere it to one of the off white pillows I made.  I wanted to add a real starfish to the other pillow (something I saw in another blog), but Hubs said he didn't want to lay on a starfish.  After I explained to him that they were not to be used (blank stare), I went ahead and cut a starfish out of the off white fabric and added some bling to it as well.  I used Liquid Stitch to adhere it to my turquoise and off white pillow. 

Before:

After:

I really love the way they turned out. 

Next, Hubs and I worked on creating some wall art.  Back sometime this summer, while spending countless hours looking through blogs, I came across an awesome piece of artwork that Kari from The Sunset Lane created using pallet wood and paint.

We wanted to make 2 of them, with the seahorses facing each other, which would go on both sides of the mirror over the couch.

I spotted some pallet wood outside a warehouse a few weeks back, but after reading some warnings on them, I decided to pass and go for some cheap pine planks from Home Depot.  I bought 4 planks, 4x8 feet long each for a little over $16.  I had Hubs cut them down to 3 feet each, use the remaining pieces for the backing, and put them together for me.  I used black stain that I had left over from the porch furniture.  I only used 1 coat to give it a somewhat aged look.  I copied and cut out the seahorse image that was on Kari's blog, but it was too small so I basically traced an inch or so outside the pattern using chalk.  For the second one, I traced the seahorse from the first one with tissue paper, flipped it around and made it a tad bigger, one to symbolize Hubs and the other myself.  ;)  I used left over paint from the garage for the seahorses, which is a light turquoise.  Hubs added some hooks and wire to the back and up they went!

Here is what it looked like before with the tropical wall art. 

Here is what it looks like now.

If you look in the mirror, you will see the existing mantle.  I'll be working on updating that next.

Still Here!

Wow, it's been almost 5 months since my last post.  I'm such a slacker!  I had a wonderful summer off from house updating and sewing, but it's time to get back into the swing of things.  We still have a few things to finish up on the garage, but hopefully this month, we will be done and can move on to something else.  Hubs cut all the baseboards and shoe molding but still has to install them.  He is having an issue with the trim work around the doors and windows because nothing is ever as easy as it should be. We may have to get a carpenter friend of ours to come over and finish that up for us.  Most of the curtains are made and just have to be hemmed. 

I decided I want to turn the living room from tropical to beachy.  There is a lot of black furniture in there, but I figure if I can make a billiard room with dark furniture look beachy, I can do the same for the living room.  I will start another post on my progress soon.

Our Home - Exterior Transformations

I have lived in this house since 1989 when my mom and I moved here from Utica, NY.  In 1999, I bought this house from her and she bought one 4 houses down the street.  Since then, I have been turning the house into my own.  I'll take you through some of the transformations.

Here is the front of our house when Mom and I first moved in.

Here is the front of our house just after Mom moved out.

Mom had the large tree in the front cut down, replaced it with some perennials and planted 2 maple trees. I added the willow tree to the middle of the garden box (it was only about 4 feet tall in the picture above, but grew to be about 15 feet tall) I had gotten from a trade on GardenWeb.  She also replaced all the windows and shutters and had a concrete patio poured on the front porch where it used to be a mini garden.

After the willow tree in the front died for some unknown reason to me, I removed it and the surrounding garden box. 

We had our first daughter in 2007 and decided we needed more space.  Rather than moving, we decided to expand.  We thought about building up, but the cost was extremely high, so we decided to expand out.  We drew up a plan to add an additional 6 feet to our den, 2 bedrooms, a linen closet and a wiring closet.  When we got our addition done in 2008 (there will a post later on that), we also got a new roof, new siding, black shutters and replaced all the brown trim with white.   In 2009, we decided to expand our driveway to a double and replace the concrete porches and walkways with pavers.  We also replaced all the chain link fence with a wood fence. 

I wanted an additional walkway from the driveway to the front porch and a seat wall on the back patio, so we had the same company come out and do that in 2010. 

In the front of the house, after the new driveway and pavers were installed, I removed the existing garden wall (I installed them in 2002) that bordered the front garden and changed the shape.  I also created a new garden bed between the porch and new walkway.

Here is what the front looks like today.

Here is a picture of the back of the house when we first moved here from New York.  Plain Jane, right?

Here is a picture of the back yard a few years after Mom moved out. 

Mom planted 2 fig trees in the back and I added the mini patio.  When we got our addition, we had to remove the fig trees.  That was a very sad day, however, the contractor we hired lives out in the country and was able to save one of the trees for his property.  I sure miss those figs, but I don't miss the flies that constantly hung around them.

Here are some pictures of the back yard right before the addition went up.

Here is a picture of a fallen fig tree. (sniff sniff) 

Here are some pictures of the back yard today.  Much better, eh?

We added the play area for the girls last year.  Even though it is small, they love playing out there.

See the red barn looking shed in the back corner?  Total eye sore, isn't it??  Well, we are hoping to have a larger shed built that matches the exterior of our house sometime this year if we can ever finish up the garage.