pinterest inspired: toys turned art

Posted on February 27, 2013 by Katie

As part of the Pinterest Challenge Young House Love and Bower Power do every season, I got geared up to make some bookends from toys to use in J’s future big boy room. And, I knew I wanted to use cars or trucks for the toys since he eats, sleeps, and breathes them. Pretty literally.

So, onto my Pinterest inspiration…

#1 from Bower Power - bookends made with dinosaurs from the dollar store

#2 from Nellie Bellie – bookends made with giraffes from the dollar store

#3 from Live Love DIY - inspirational non-DIY dog bookends from PB Teen

Then, it was like serendipity when I ran across these little unfinished boxes for $3 each at the Target Dollar Spot.

Using these boxes instead of just using bases for the cars would give me the option to have my project sit on a shelf as bookends or hang on the wall as art. Options. Woohoo.

I painted the outside of each of the boxes white (Ceramcoat Oyster White). Then, I painted the bottom inside of each of them dark blue (Martha Stewart Crafts Deep Sea) and set out to find some cars or trucks to fit in the boxes. J didn’t have any that would work in his toy bins, so I hit the dollar store but came up empty handed. I found this school bus and dump truck at Wal-Mart for $3 each.

Then, I went back and forth about whether to paint all of the remaining inside walls dark blue, whether to paint all of the other inside walls white, or whether to paint all of the other walls royal blue and the “ceiling” light blue for an ombre/gradient effect…

But before I decided on how to paint the last four surfaces on each box, I decided to paint the little cars I found at Wal-Mart dark blue. After I had a couple of coats of paint on the trucks, I did a quick test to see which direction to go next. The iPhone test. Took a picture of the truck with the light background (ala unfinished) and one with a dark background (ala scrap paper). I jumped on Team Blue because I thought the blue one felt more interesting to me (even though this crazy-dark blue doesn’t photograph well).

I painted the remaining sides of the interiors of each box dark blue and added a third coat of paint on the vehicles. And sat and watched the paint dry.

So, there you have it, my version of using toys to make bookends/art. Can’t wait to use these in our little one’s big boy room. Cars and trucks are his jam.

Check out the projects the hosts of the Pinterest Challenge have posted on each of their sites:
Sherry from Young House Love
Katie from Bower Power Blog
Megan from The Remodeled Life
Michelle from Decor & The Dog

Pssst – were you expecting a family room update post today? I’ll be posting about the fake fireplace brick facade on Friday. (If you want to catch up on our family room revamp, you can read about it here, here, here, here, and here.)

video killed the audio bar

Posted on February 25, 2013 by Katie

For me, the next steps at this point (with the mood board, planning, lighting, sectional, and built-ins complete) are to install the bricks on the face of the fireplace and to decorate the shelves, but for Michael, the next logical step is to hang the TV… So what do you think we did? Well, I did start decorating the shelves, but they look like a hot mess at this point, so I can’t bear to show you just yet. So, back to Michael’s precious TV. In typical fashion of the way things run around here, Michael waited until the cabinets had been installed to finalize his selection for the TV mounting bracket. (I was in charge of the infrared repeater, which arrived well before the last-minute. Just saying.) Luckily, Amazon got the mounting bracket to us in a jiffy, so we were ready to install it the next night.

Ok, time for the install. We originally thought we’d be able to use the same hole saw that we used to install a deadbolt a few years back. But, we soon realized neither of us would be able to get our arm in a hole that size to connect the wires, so we had to head to Home Depot to get a larger one. Then, it was time to saw a giant hole in the middle of my our pristine shelves. Ugh. I knew we had to do it to get the TV set up, but I hated the thought of it. And, what if we somehow caused the entire structure to crash with the vibrations from the drill? I couldn’t watch as Michael drilled through the built-in – literally, I had to look away (and only partly because of the sawdust.) Despite my fear that we would ruin the shelves, it turned out just fine.

I was too busy helping get the darn thing mounted that I didn’t get a chance to take any pictures. But that’s probably for the best anyway. Especially, if you read lips. Just kidding – all of the words were rated G. Ok, maybe not G… We may have had issues getting our drill to power the hole saw through the plywood in a timely manner… And, it may have started to seem like we were going to burn up our drill attempting it. But we powered though. Literally. And all turned out well.

Once we had the seemingly ginormous hole drilled, we attached the mounting bracket to the wall around it. Here is a mock-up of what the wall would have looked like at this point, had I actually taken a picture.

Then, it was time for the fun: to hook up the TV to the power and other components to get it working. I labeled all of the wires before we disconnected everything, so this was pretty straight forward. Adding the infrared repeater was pretty easy – the hardest part was locating the stealth infrared receiver on bluray player, but otherwise, it was easy enough.

We originally thought we might hang the TV angled down a little, but we didn’t like how this looked from the side.

So, we ended up hanging it flat on the wall. But, because of the 5-ish inch inset of the panel for the TV from the rest of the shelves, the logistics were a bit difficult. It turned out to be tricky to physically hang the TV up there mounted flat and to tighten that little screw to secure the whole thing at the very end. We ended up enlisting a makeup compact and a flashlight so that we could see what we were actually doing. Felt a little like MacGyver – if only I could have worked some duct tape in…

I hate that wire to the speaker bar. Michael wanted to drill an additional hole for that speaker bar wire, but I couldn’t stomach that, so we just ran that through the same place as the TV wires. I was thinking that I would just paint the cord white and that it would blend in. But Michael poo-poo’ed that idea.

Now, we have to figure out the plan for the ~~stupid~~ speaker bar. I vote to just use the internal TV speakers and ditch the bar. But my vote doesn’t count as much on this. Which is putting a bit of a kink in my plan to frame the TV like Remodelaholic or to hide it completely like Candace Olson always does… Boo.

Well, here is what is still remaining on the never-ending family room punch list:
- find small end tables
- decide if we want to re-cover the ottoman squares
- find white ceramic objects
- find/make wall art
- find curtains
- find throw pillows
- paint the walls (SW Silverplate)
- find baskets for toys
- install flat bricks on the face of the fireplace
- paint/install return covers
- install bricks in the fake fireplace
- figure out what to do about the speaker bar wire
- decorate the shelves
- frame/hide the TV

Anyone else wish they could just use the internal speakers from the TV instead of having to incorporate external speakers? Or think I should just go with my original white paint or white duct tape cord-hiding plan?

cabinets make the heart grow fonder

Posted on February 20, 2013 by Katie

So, we’re well on the way to the functional family room of ~~our~~ my dreams with the planning, additional lighting, and new sectional out of the way. (Michael’s dream family room contains a much, much larger TV, maybe even a wall of TVs, and no space for me to “clutter up”. O, and lots of speakers.) Now, it’s time to get all of the decisions for our soon-to-be-awesome built-in bookshelves to David at Custom Express & More, so they can get their cabinet-building on.

Decisions, decisions.

- decide on fireplace insert
We decided not to use a fireplace insert (because we’re cheap and thought we could always add it later if we needed it), but we based the opening on the dimensions of one we liked, in case we go that route later.

- decide on color to paint the back wall of the bookshelves
We picked Sherwin-Williams Stamped Concrete to paint the back of the bookcases – we wanted something as neutral as the soon-to-be-painted walls (SW Silverplate) so I can change the look of the room by changing out the accessories and something darker than the walls so my white menagerie would stand out.

- decide on color to stain the mantel beam
We picked a dark walnut stain with a distressed finish.

- decide on size of the mantel beam
We decided to go with a 6″ mantel beam.

- figure out where our TV components are going to sit
We were trying to decide between setting the components on a shelf (but didn’t want to have them in sight) or putting them in one of the cabinets (where we would have to put a child-lock to keep the spirited toddler out), but David came up with a better option. An awesome option. He said he could make the panel below the mantel and above the fireplace opening into a drop-face panel so we could put our components in there. And, since we were already hip to the idea of using an infrared repeater so the remotes could access components not sitting out in the open, we had found our solution. (If this doesn’t make sense yet, don’t worry, there are pictures of it below.)

Other details we had to finalize:
- For the cabinet color, we elected to color-match the white to our existing moulding throughout the house (which is roughly the color of what basic white non-tinted paint looks like after aging almost 50 years – we’ve repainted it all but had SW mix us something to match one of our old louver closet doors since we like the color).
- We decided to go with 12″ deep shelves on the top and 18″ deep cabinets in the base.
- We decided to use the same thin bricks (aptly named Thinbrick) for the face of the fireplace that we used on the exterior of the garage column a few months earlier.

All of ~~the~~ my decisions had been made. Shew! Meanwhile, Michael hemmed and hawed about how he wanted the panels in the TV-area since he is still pushing for a larger TV. (Never going to happen. Sorry, babe.) Once he finally came to terms with this TV being plenty big for the soon-to-be 12-foot wide room (the room was 21′ x 13′ to begin with, but would soon be under 12 feet once the cabinets were in), we sent everything to David and waited ~~patiently~~ for the installation day to arrive.

Here is what the soon-to-be-cabinet wall looked like from each side of the room before they started the install.

Built-Ins Before Right Side

And once they got the base cabinets in…

And once they got the top unit on…

And added the shelves and crown moulding…

And here is the awesome super-secret (ok, so maybe not so secret anymore) component compartment…

How cool is that drop-front cabinet?? I’m in love with it. And the rest of our new built-ins. I was a little afraid the room would suddenly be dwarfed by a massive wall of cabinets, but it actually makes it feel bigger. Crazy, right?

Here’s what’s still on the old to-do list to wrap up this room:
- find small end tables
- decide if we want to re-cover the ottoman squares
- find white ceramic objects
- find/make wall art
- find curtains
- find throw pillows
- paint the walls (SW Silverplate)
- find baskets for toys
- buy/install flat bricks on the face of the fireplace
- buy TV mounting supplies
- paint/install return covers
- mount TV above the mantel
- hook up other components
- decorate the shelves

Anyone else ditching their formal living rooms for a more casual space? Or hiding their components and using an infrared repeater? Or are you googling it right now? :)

lights, camera, sectional

Posted on February 18, 2013 by Katie

It’s been a while since I gave you an update on the new family room. Oops. (If you haven’t read about the family room before, you can check out the mood board and first steps we’ve taken to get you all caught up.) When I left off, we were waiting for our new sectional to arrive from IKEA, finding an electrician to install recessed lighting, and contacting a cabinet builder about a 21-foot wall of built-in cabinets/shelves with a fake fireplace in the center… Out with the old formal living room, and in with the new casual family room.

The cabinet guy Michael’s builder friend recommended was David Strauss from Custom Express and More, so Michael gave him a call and scheduled for him to come out to our house to discuss what we wanted to do. I printed out the picture below from The Lettered Cottage (which was on our original mood board) as well as a few other inspiration pictures (and a picture of what the neighboring board and batten entry would eventually look like since it was not complete at that point), but the rest of it was really only in my head.

David was not only really nice, but he was able to decipher what we wanted looks-wise and what we needed function-wise. He didn’t act like we were crazy at all. (Did I mention we had the entry way under board and batten construction and almost no furniture in the future family room at this point except for a mis-matched nursing rocker, a few little square ottomans, and a tape outline of where our sectional will go…? It looked like a couch had died there. Or we’d just moved in. Except we hadn’t. Unless you count 9+ years ago as “just”. Right…) A couple of days later, David sent us a design of what he envisioned for our wall of cabinets/fireplace based on the information I’d printed and spewed verbally. He hit it spot on.

Awesome, right? It was so cool to see them coming to life! We had a few details to work out about paint colors and stain color for the mantel beam, as well as the exact sizing of everything above the mantel (where Michael’s precious TV would hang), but we were so close already. David’s company builds all the components for the cabinets and paints them off-site, so once we finalized the design, it would take about a month before they arrived to install them.

So, while we waited for that awesome day, our IKEA Karlstad sectional finally arrived. Woohoo. Woohoo. Woohoo. Lots of boxes to assemble. (Some people think boohoo here, but again woohoo from me — I love building things. Even IKEA furniture. Despite no words on the directions.)

When the little guy was napping that day, I unboxed and assembled the whole thing. And as soon as he woke up, he found his new playland. And decided it looked like a great place to park a car. (Yeah, I know. We are crazy for going with white.)

The new sectional is a little lower than the sofa we had in this room before, so he was overjoyed that he could pull himself up onto it. Uh-oh. It was hard to get a picture of it without him at this point. Little photobomber. It worked out that we were able to reuse the four old square ottomans we had from the den. I didn’t measure for that ahead of time, so we were just lucky that they fit perfectly. Er, I mean, it was totally part of my plan :)

A week or so later, the electrician came to install the six new recessed lights and new dimmer switches for them, as well as a few other outlets we’d identified as needing since he was already coming out. To give him the space he needed, we partially disassembled the sectional and moved it into the adjacent dining room — which is why that red room in the back is packed to the gills with furniture in this picture.

Yay new lights. Oops for cutting off the two closest ones to the camera in the picture…

Since the dimmer switches made to go with the LED lights can only control a certain number of LEDs, we ended up needing two switches, which was perfect so that we could have the option to control the front and back rows independently.

While the sectional was disassembled for the electrical work, I removed the legs and painted them so that they weren’t the IKEA basic birch. I went around a few times about what color to make them since the slipcover is white, and I ultimately landed on a weathered gray so that we had a few more options if we decided to switch it up later and go with a darker slipcover. I spray primed them with Rust-Oleum Painter’s Touch Wet or Dry Sandable Primer in Gray (with no sanding or anything ahead of time since it was primer), and once that was dry, I mixed some of our sample pot of SW Silverplate (the color already on the entry walls and soon to be on the family room walls) with water and whitewashed them with that. I repeated the whitewashing step a few times to get the exact color I was going for. The one on the right in the picture below has only been primed, and the one on the left has been primed and ~~white~~graywashed.

After meeting with David, we knew we were going to need some HVAC help to move the two return vents on the wall where the bookcases are going. We needed them to come out of the floor instead so that the returns fall in the cabinet kickplate instead of into the middle of the cabinet. Once the HVAC company came out and moved the returns, it looked a little strange for a bit until the cabinets arrived.

With all that complete, here is what is still left:
- find small end tables
- decide if we want to recover the ottoman squares
- find white ceramic objects
- find wall art
- find curtains
- find throw pillows
- figure out where our TV components are going to sit
- paint the walls
- find baskets for toys
- decide on fireplace insert
- buy more thin bricks for the face of the fireplace
- buy TV mounting supplies
- decide on color to paint the back wall of the cabinets
- decide on color to stain the mantel beam
- decide on size of the mantel beam

So, at this point, there are a few decisions to be made and communicated with David, a lot of sourcing to be done, and a little waiting. Doo tah doo….

Anyone else have a toddler, two dogs, and a white couch?? Have you added overhead lighting to a room with only lamps before? Or a fake fireplace?

valentines-a-palooza

Posted on February 14, 2013 by Katie

Last night, we had two last-minute (is there a more productive time?) Valentine’s projects at our house: 1) we needed to roll out enough kiddo-made Valentine’s for a certain toddler class (plus grandparents, aunts, and uncles) and 2) I needed to create some art to replace the Christmas printable that I’m ashamed to admit was still framed on our entry board and batten ledge. (I love being able to change out the art and pictures so easily with that ledge, but sometimes I just stop noticing what’s there until it’s just like “is that seriously still up there?”. Oops.)

Let’s just say I didn’t exactly prepare, per se, for either of these projects, but I always know I have my ~~hoarded~~ collected stash of crafting materials to fall back on. So, I scanned my craft reserves and formulated the plan – punch out lots of hearts and stick them on things… In the interest of efficiency (and making less of a mess), I decided the two projects should share their main supplies: leftover scraps of colored paper, some textured scrapbook paper, a heart-shaped craft paper punch (That’s Amore by Fiskars), and the sticker maker ~~machine~~ contraption (Xyron Create-a-Sticker).

I should go ahead and warn you that I am not a pink person. At all. So, we didn’t include much pink in our Valentine’s projects. And because I don’t love pink (and don’t always like to follow the rules), we used lots of other fun colors. We used red, pink (only for the cards), green, aqua, blue (only for the cards), and orange from my scrap pile. We only used the textured scrapbook paper for the art since it seemed thicker than I wanted for the cards. The scrapbook papers were by Coredinations and were a red overlayed with a darker red (called Ruby) and a pink overlayed with red (called Kisses).

Let’s start with the art, shall we?

I used a 9×12 canvas panel (yes, I realize it may be weird that I have these lying around in many sizes — what can I say, I like to make my own art), matte Mod Podge, and a brush to apply it with. I started by punching out a ton of little hearts from the leftover paper and the two sheets of scrapbook paper. Then, I laid some of the hearts out on the canvas panel to figure out the color pattern and general spacing and took a quick picture to help keep me from messing it up (5 across, 7 down).

Next, I ran the hearts through the sticker maker and attempted to put them back on the panel in the correct formation — luckily, I used the repositionable sticker cartridge because it took a few attempts to get the spacing right again. (In hindsight, I would make smaller batches of stickers next time so that some were still in position as a guide. I didn’t use a ruler or anything, so they are a little wonky since I just eyeballed it. But, I kinda like it that way since you can tell it was handmade.) Once they were all set, I spread a thin layer of matte Mod Podge all over them and left it to dry. Once it was dry, that project was complete and ready for the ledge. Woohoo. One down.

(No, I didn’t make that awesome Welcome print — I bought it from Anna Tovar on Etsy. So cute, right?)

Bring on the cards. O wait, don’t bring the toddler just yet.

For the Valentine’s cards, I went ahead and punched out all of the hearts and ran them through the sticker maker before the kiddo got involved. (I used the permanent adhesive on the hearts for this run to try to prevent him – or his classmates – from being able to easily remove the hearts and eat them. Yeah, the things I never thought I’d have to worry about…)

Once the hearts were all stickered up, I let him sit at the table and go to town peeling them off the backing paper and sticking them on the white cards (we used pre-cut flat 4 bar cards) I’d laid out for him. He was amazingly opinionated about exactly where each sticker would go – especially for someone who normally just wants to throw cars and trucks on the floor. He didn’t want any part of me trying to help and even tried to apply a few to our kitchen table. (Rethinking the permanent adhesive about now…) Eventually, we ran out of stickers and called it a night. For him, anyway. I then went back and just wrote Happy Valentine’s Day 2013 and signed his name on the bottom of each. Valentines complete. Woohoo.

Gotta say the stickers were a bigger hit with him than I expected. Especially since they don’t have wheels. And he was very specific about how he wanted to create each card which was just, well, entertaining. Think I may need to load up on some more sticker maker cartridges so we can make his upcoming birthday invitations in a similar way. Now, I just need a car/truck/boat paper punch…

Well, Happy Valentine’s Day — thanks for stopping by!

Is it weird that I can hardly bear to part with the cards he made? I may have taken an individual picture of each and every one… He has some ~~hoarding~~ collecting tendencies of his own. Hopefully, he’ll be able to give them to his little friends and not keep them all for himself. Wonder if he’d understand if I told him it was ok to give them away since I pictures of each of them for him… Ha.

book signings are the life for me

Posted on February 13, 2013 by Katie

Ok, maybe I am overselling my booking-signing-attendance skills again with that title a wee bit. But, the Green Acres theme song is still playing in my noggin, and well, I figured a corny piggy-back on the title from Monday’s post (book signings are the place for me), might just force it out of there once and for all. Or at least have us all singing it together. Hee hee.

I swear that I’m not usually chasing down famous people and trying to meet them — seriously, why would I do that just to have an awkward encounter?! It just happens that several different events were scheduled very close together lately that had me going to meet some of my favorite folks and unleashing my ~~awesomeness~~ awkwardness on them: first, Rhoda of Southern Hospitality (not once but twice), then, author Jen Lancaster, and now, Sherry and John Petersik of Young House Love for their Atlanta book signing.

As I explained when I went to meet Rhoda at her HomeGoods party, it’s a really weird feeling going to meet someone you feel like you already know. Especially, when they definitely don’t know you. At least, not as anything other than someone who makes ~~comments~~ bizarre comments on their blog. That is, if you’re lucky and they even remember your name at all. Considering YHL has over 5 million page views a month, the likelihood of them knowing my little name from a comment every day or two is highly unlikely. In fact, if there were odds on it in Vegas, I’d say that they would pay off extremely well.

I did feel a little comforted going in, considering John and Sherry have called themselves awkward before. So, I kinda figured with them ~~being awkward~~ supposedly being awkward and me being certifiably (is there a certification for this?) awkward, that this could go one of two ways: 1) it would be so awkward that we would literally hear crickets, then I’d panic and knock over their table and freak out more, and then just run out and forget my book and not get a picture and never be able to show my face again or 2) it would just be nominally awkward and nothing to write home about but at least I could still go out in public.

Think you know which way this goes??

First, let me give you the lay of the land. Word on the street (out in front of FLOR that night) was that they had 700 people who RSVP’d yes – how crazy is that?? Pretty sure all 700 (and at least another ~~handful~~ boatload) showed up! I got there about 30 minutes early thinking that would put me at the beginning of the line. Silly me. That put me at least 600 people deep in line. Uh, did I mention these guys are crazy-popular?? (Pssst - in case you just discovered the internet and don’t know of them yet, they are like the rockstars of the blog world. Blog royalty, if you will.)

The weather didn’t exactly cooperate. Though, at least the rain stopped before the line formed, and it was just cold and windy. (Translation: bad hair night. Too bad I didn’t have my trusty forkbrush on me.) I opted not to wear my nice warm boots because I was afraid the rain might ruin them, so instead, I made the unwise decision to wear ballet flats. So, uh, no nice warm socks… Just some almost-bare weather-exposed feet that I apparently flexed for this picture. (Nice, even my feet are awkward.)

Once, I made it into the store, I was no longer thinking about being that awkward weirdo that came a la carte and didn’t wear socks. Now, I’d started to obsess on something totally new. I noticed that everyone else with gifts for John and Sherry had actually wrapped them. Oops. Party foul? I had put mine in a lunch bag in my purse to keep them from getting purse-funk on them but they were definitely not wrapped, and I could definitely not deliver them in the now crumpled up lunch bag that surely had something unidentifiable on the outside of it by this point. (Worth mentioning here: one of the women about ten people in front of me in line made them each a throw pillow – that day – and they were nicely packaged up in gift sacks.)

As I got closer and closer to the front of the line, I started to get my normal meeting-people anxious stress. Plus, where do I set my purse/coat when I go up there? Is my phone charged up enough for them to take my picture? Then, what am I actually going to say?? Why didn’t I wrap these cards? Where was my forkbrush when I needed it?

Then, it was suddenly my turn, and well, I didn’t see what was waiting behind scenario door #3. At all. Um, they were sooooo nice and welcoming and non-awkward, that I hadn’t planned for this scenario and just shut down. (Not that I didn’t think they’d be nice, don’t get me wrong. I just didn’t plan on them not being awkward right back at me!) I went temporarily deaf to my own voice. No kidding. I could not hear a word I was saying. (Is this what happens to seriously crazy people?) I know I walked up and practically threw my book across the table at them and then tossed the note cards I’d made them down and said something like “I made these for y’all” and then trailed off with something like “they’re not pillows or anything…”. John asked if I had a shop, and when I said yes, he started looking for the tag in the cards. Oops. I didn’t include one. And, then I said something completely insane to that effect. Truth is, with their very public ‘no swag’ policy, I was afraid that including anything with even my little logo might get the cards thrown out, and since I wasn’t giving them the gift for the publicity but just because I appreciate their blog and am a huge fan, I didn’t think I should include it, anyway. (Hope that wasn’t weird — it really isn’t that it’s super-secret or anything. I promise. There is a link in my side bar…)

Then, luckily, they asked if I wanted a picture and that awkwardness I’d created melted away — I mean, I still couldn’t hear, but at least I wasn’t saying anything else crazy. At that moment anyway. After the picture, as I was clearing out to make room for the next fan, Sherry mentioned that she liked that the cards were printed in lowercase, and then I said “I’m a lowercase kinda gal” and tried my best to escape before I accidentally knocked over their table or said something totally insane. As I was wandering off, John said “you should totally make that your tagline: lowercase kinda gal”. Hmmm… he may be onto something – he was in advertising, right? #lowercasekindagal

Somehow, I just assumed the signing would be filled with a bunch of other fans like me and didn’t realize that any of those other fans would be real bloggers. Whose blogs I read. So, luckily for Sarah from Ugly Duckling House, I started talking to her in the line like she was just a regular ole fan like me – it was crazy because I didn’t recognize her without the paint on her face from her profile picture, so for once, I was only minimally (for me) awkward, and Sarah and her friend, Ellen, were super-nice and never once tried to run away. Of course, in true form, I didn’t ask to take a picture with them. Oh, well, next time. (You can read Sarah’s entertaining recap of the YHL book signing on her blog here.)

I also got to meet Katie Bower from Bower Power Blog, which was really cool. I knew there was a good chance of her making an appearance that night since the Bowers and the Petersiks are BFFs, and I had been thinking how cool it would be to see her. But, I was thinking, like, across the room. I didn’t imagine that I’d get to talk to her. Unfortunately for Katie and her husband, Jeremy, I was like a deer in headlights – I think I only said (and sadly more than one time) “I’m Katie, too”. Luckily for me, my new friends, Sarah and Ellen, went up there with me, so they did most of the socializing and I just smiled and looked ~~pretty~~ crazy. A special skill of mine.

Was anyone else at the YHL book signing? Who would you wait in that kind of line to meet? Do you think they could run a small ~~city~~ country on power harnessed from my awkwardness?

book signings are the place for me

Posted on February 11, 2013 by Katie

Ok, so maybe I don’t do my best work attending book signing events given my tendancy towards awkward (exhibits A and B), so saying they are “the place for me” may be a bit of an exaggeration. But, the Green Acres theme song was playing in my head, and I had to do what I had to do to get it out. If it’s now stuck in yours, you’re welcome :)

Some people credit Beverly Cleary or another author of kids’ books for helping them learn to love to read, but well, let’s just say I didn’t do a lot of intentional reading until well past the kids’ books stage when my friend, Stacy, introduced me to the genius that is Jen Lancaster. Not actually Jen Lancaster, obviously, but her books. (Though - spoiler alert - I am going to meet her before this post ends.) I then read up all of her memoirs as quickly as I could (which is probably not all that quickly given my previous aversion to intentional reading and therefore under-developed speedy reading skills). Side note: if they let me read Jen Lancaster in high school English class (assuming she had gone back in time to start writing them by then), I would have been a much better literature student.

If you aren’t familar with Jen, I can only tell you that she is seriously the funniest person in the entire universe. Hands down. I read all of her early books while travelling for business, and her books had entire planefuls of people thinking I was completely insane. I could not help but to laugh out loud as I read, and well, sitting by yourself and just bursting out into laughter every few minutes tends towards the insanity assumptions. I get that. I’m ok with it. It was totally worth it. Plus, it set the bar low for whatever insanity/awkwardness that actually came out of my mouth as I encountered my fellow passengers.

Fast forward a few years, to when Jen is scheduled for a book signing event in Atlanta for her newest novel, Here I Go Again. (Did I mention I live in Atlanta?!) That book signing took place just over a week ago, and thankfully, my favorite sister (previously seen here) planned a trip into town to go with me — seeing that I introduced her to Ms. Lancaster’s hilarity and all. In my well-thought-out plan, it never occurred to me (until we were on our way there) that she might have been as excited/nervous/soon-to-be-awkward as me about meeting Jen. Uh oh. I feel a train wreck coming. And yet, I couldn’t stop it.

O, and in the interest of full disclosure, I believe I have to mention here that I didn’t have a brush in my car on the way down to the signing and had a case of what my husband calls “crazy mom-hair” so I had to resort to using a fork from my glove box as a brush. Love me some fork brush. It does a suprisingly good job on thin hair like mine. You should try it – you’ll thank me. Anyway, I felt I should mention this here before my loving sister told on me in the comments :) #owningit #forkbrushrules

Jen gave a reading and answered questions before she signed books, and she was just as hysterical as we expected. And then some. Seriously, she did not dissapoint. Except for not asking us to be her new best friends. Yet.

So, here we are sitting in our seats ~~patiently~~ anxiously waiting for our group to get called for the book signing.

When it was our turn to go up to the table, I just handed over my book and stood there like a crazy holding my gift for her. Luckily, Jen asked what else I was buying to which I just said, “I made you these” as I handed over the letterpress note cards I had made for her. At that point, I was pretty done. I didn’t get any other words out. Luckily, my sister was there to explain that they were letterpress and so on. But, then at some point she went numb, too, and started saying crazy things that didn’t even sound like English to me. I seriously had no idea what they were talking about but was ok with that. [According to my sister, we were both just nervously laughing at whatever Jen said. And, the reason I didn't think she was speaking English was that she wasn't speaking. At all. Apparently, we were like Beavis and Butthead. Or Dumb and Dumber. Or Tweedledee and Tweedledum. I stake claim on Tweedledee, for obvious reasons.] I considered it a victory that I hadn’t stroked out on the signing table or spit on Jen when I tried to speak or jokingly used the word “stalker” and been escorted out. So, yeah, I guess I can’t blame Jen for not asking us to be her new best friends. Yet.

Luckily, I couldn’t forget to ask for a picture this time since book signings are kinda setup for that.

Thanks, Jen, for not acting like my sister and I were completely off our rockers. At least, not to our faces. Should you need to vent about our insanity, I understand. It would be an honor for you to call us @sshats. Or anything, really. Can’t wait for The Tao of Martha this summer – I already have it on pre-order :)

Is it weird that I bought the book in print just to have her sign it and put it on my shelf but bought another copy to actually read on my Kindle? Anyone else an avid reader of Jen’s books or Jennsylvania blog?

awkward is as awkward does

Posted on February 10, 2013 by Katie

So… we all remember my awkward (on my end) encounter with Rhoda from Southern Hospitality at her HomeGoods party a few weeks ago, yes? Well, sadly, that is just the tip of the iceberg. I went to her open house a couple of weekends ago – in hopes that this time I would be able to string together at least 10 words and seem a little less, well, insane. I’m guessing you know how this one turns out, but I wouldn’t want to spare you the awkward details — so that maybe just for a few seconds you can feel my pain…

I arrived at the open house with my mother-in-law and her friend (both of whom had gone to one of Rhoda’s thrifting outings last summer and had met her there), so I was excited that I was armed with a “posse” (ok, fine, they weren’t exactly my posse, but they did give me a ride so I didn’t have to go alone) that already knew her so that maybe I would feel a little less nervous. Well, I think I at least introduced myself this time, so that is something, but I’m pretty sure it didn’t take 10 words… While my mother-in-law and her friend were speaking to Rhoda, I was trying to think of something semi-intelligent to say and was coming up blank. Then, Rhoda asked if we were all related, and I answered the question with as few words as humanly possible and stopped speaking. The cat got my tongue. Again. I may have reached my arbitrary 10-word goal, but I’m guessing I should aim a bit higher next time… I even forgot to ask to get a picture with her — that should have at least given me a few more words in my conversation word count and a picture for this post, but yeah, this awkward newbie blogger failed on both counts there.

The open house was great — Rhoda has done some amazing things with her house in a short time! I am in love with the paint treatment she did on her bedroom focal wall, the curtains she stenciled for her bedroom, the chandelier in her living room, the runners she installed on her stairs, the bright cheery color she painted the back of her entry door, the updates in her hall bath that look amazing, the way her beautiful new kitchen turned out, the stenciling in her office, the 3 cute little bird prints hung in her basement – I could go on for a while here… And, yet, I didn’t mention any of that when I got my second chance to talk to her in person. O well, next time. (You can read Rhoda’s recap from her open house here. I didn’t want to post my pictures of all of my favorite things from her house since it is her house, but you can take a virtual tour of her house on her blog here.)

Once again, Rhoda was very gracious and lovely, and I was an awkward dufus. Hoping the third time is, in fact, the charm, and that the next time I meet Rhoda that I can act like a ~~normal~~ normal-for-me person. I mean, once you meet someone three times, you are friends, right?? So, I shouldn’t be nervous about talking to my friend, yes?

Anyone else out there that takes a few meetings before you can act like yourself? Can’t get enough of my awkward-ness? Don’t worry — I’ll be posting recaps of my recent adventures at the book signings of Jen Lancaster and Young House Love in a jiff.

thrifting with my favorite sis

Posted on February 5, 2013 by Katie

Last week, as part of Young House Love’s 100% Totally Unofficial Macklemore Thrift Shop Challenge, my ~~only~~ favorite sister (Kim) and I went thrifting. She was in town helping me with some technical deets for the blog (woohoo!), and once I played Macklemore’s Thrift Shop song for her, I knew I had her as an accomplice. Well, that and I may have played Thrift Shop on repeat on my iPhone while we got our ~~only~~ favorite brother moved into his new place — then, she was hooked. What, what… what, what…

(image from Young House Love)

Ok, so onto the challenge.

Step #1. Go to a thrift shop with – just as the chorus of the song says – “$20 in your pocket” and take a picture. Check, check.

Step #2. Spend your $20 any way you’d like and photograph your spoils. Check.

I bought a square frame (that I totally plan to paint and replace what’s inside it), a bent up little metal tray (that I also plan to paint and to straighten back out), a Little Tikes wheelbarrow that my little boo is going to love putting rocks/acorns in (once I get it all cleaned up), and a Mega Blocks castle for the boo to knock down repeatedly (once I get it cleaned up).

And, I came in decently under my $20 budget. Woohoo! Here is the breakdown –
Square Frame: 1.91
Bent Tray: 1.91
Little Tikes wheelbarrow: 1.91
Mega Blocks castle: 6.96
Tax: 0.34
Total: 13.03

Step #3. Find one item (or more) referenced in the song and snap a pic.

This task proved much harder. We went to a couple of different thrift stores but didn’t find anything super-awesome. Cue the game show wrong-answer noise: bwah-bwah-bwahahah….

I was totally hoping to find some awesomely-bad grandpa-y clothes. But, it seems either there are no grandpas in our area (not likely), that there are so many grandpas (or other Thrift Shop Challengers?) in our area that they had already bought up all the grandpa styles (not likely?), that the grandpas in our area aren’t donating their clothes to thrift stores (possible?), or that the grandpas in our area dress better than the young folks so their clothes wouldn’t exactly be to Macklemore’s standards (that’s what I’d bet my leftover 6.97 on!)…

Anyway, here’s what we did find…

Excuse the blurriness (and crazy eyes!) in the photo of me with the crazy-striped pants — I think I was so excited to find something that remotely resembled anyone’s grandpa’s style, that I was probably shaking like an lunatic (that, and we were using a camera phone). Note: that suit Kim has on the right is short sleeved. Rockin.

Step #4. Blog about it. Check…

Have you found anything good thrifting lately? Anyone else in Atlanta going to see John and Sherry from YHL at FLOR on Thursday night? What are the chances I will be able to act completely normal and not at all star-struck? (Which reminds me — went to Jen Lancaster’s book signing on Friday night and will post pics and the 411 this week!)

deranchification

turning our old drab ranch house into a fun updated home

Monthly Archives: February 2013

pinterest inspired: toys turned art

video killed the audio bar

cabinets make the heart grow fonder

lights, camera, sectional

valentines-a-palooza

book signings are the life for me

book signings are the place for me

awkward is as awkward does

thrifting with my favorite sis

You may also like:

You may also like:

You may also like:

You may also like:

You may also like:

You may also like:

You may also like:

You may also like:

You may also like: