MAD MAX AND THE REST OF THE WEEK

Meet Max. He’s the newest addition to our crew. -Or I should say Mad Max cuz he's an absolute adorable, but psycho kitty. Non stop running through the house, up the stairs, around the corner, back down the stairs and yes....right up your shoulder on to the top of your head. All in a split second before you have time to duck. :) But he is a doll. He is a rescue from a rescue group in town, as are all our little four legged family members. You can see the others here.

So there’s not much going on here around the old homestead other than... 

PAINT ME..PAINT ME.. PLEASE!!!

So this is a coffee table that I have had for.. oh about 12-13 years.
Not in the house, mind you, but it's been around. I haven't used it for at least 8 or 9 years. But it's still hanging out. I tried to give it to my son (He used it for a tv stand) and that lasted a while until it ended up back in my garage recently.  So here it is again. hmmm....I just can't get rid of it! So I think I might use it again. It's really not my style, especially the legs. But I might give it a try...only -not like it is of course. It's begging for a make over. I am thinking that this might be my next little project. Not a real "project" that takes an a considerable amount of time...just a Saturday afternoon kind of thing. But as easy as it is, I keep putting it off. So maybe this Saturday..... maybe. So I found a few painted ones online that give an idea of how it will look....

I AM DEFINITELY NOT A "PINK" GIRL!!!

I ABSOLUTELY LOVE THE MUSTARD COLOR BUT NOT FOR THIS PARTICULAR ROOM

AND I DO LOVE WHITE, BUT STILL, IT IS KINDA BORING......

   I think I want to paint it kind of a Citron color...like this.  

It will go in my living room which is a much smaller/cozier room than the family/great room and so it's size really works in there. My drapes in that room are from Pier 1 Imports and look like this...

so I want to get close to the color of them which is actually a citron kinda color even though this picture doesnt show that. What do you think?

Painted Interior Doors

So I was over checking out the most recent post of Kristi's, a fellow blogger that I follow. And can I just say that I just love her blog? (link below)

She is such an inspiration both in decorating and blogging itself! I am absorbing all the learning experience I can from her! But anyway.....she had a post about painting interior doors and was asking what others thought of it. I commented on it because I did just that. -I painted all my interior doors on the first level of my house about 2 months ago. And I LOVE them!

Kitchen "trash" door

I have always just had plain old white doors and never really thought much about it. But this time around I did. I first painted my front door (the exterior door) a beautiful turquoise and fell in love with it. You can see that beautiful door here. Then I painted all the rest of the doors inside the same color. Big mistake. What was beautiful in a small dose for the outside door, was way too much inside. So I repainted them a beautiful soft greyish blue called Yachtsman by Valspar. Check it out...do you like??? This color gives the whole downstairs a cohesive flow since I have used various greys, blacks, whites and yellows downstairs. 

Downstairs Powder Room door

view from standing in the kitchen to the hallway

So check out the link here if you'd like to see the original post that I was referring to of one of the blogs I follow! 

Heres a few more pics of the downstairs doors...

Pantry door with chalkboard

How to Make A Simple 5 minute Christmas Wreath!

This was the easiest wreath in the world to make! It literally took me 5 minutes. I was going through my decorations and I had a strand of wimpy garland left over and nowhere to use it. I said to the hubs...I wish I had one of those wire wreaths I could wrap this on. Light bulb idea!!! And before he could answer me I said, "Oh my gosh! A hanger!" Yep. Grab a hanger, shape it out, wrap the garland around it.

 
   Add a few little ornaments or wreath decorations, (I used bells) and......... Voila! Done deal and I love it! Seriously, c'mon...could a Christmas decoration be any easier? And it looks even better in person. Its green and gold glittery garland so it shimmers. And I love it on the door. Pretty proud of myself with this one. :)

YELLOW! -The new little black dress for decorating!

Isn't this little darling of a lamp gorgeous?? Don't you just love this yellow lamp??? Well, I do. I am doing my family room in black, white, charcoal grey and YELLOW! Who'd of thunk it? And because my family room is the great room that opens to the kitchen, my kitchen is following along. I remember reading a loonnnng time ago (before decorating blogs existed and I felt alone in my world obsessed with HGTV)) that every room should have a touch or whimsy (the owl) and/or a touch of yellow. It makes your room happy. Well, it does makes me smile. I walk into my living room or kitchen now and actually smile. I love the happy yellow. So I have always done that. A touch of whimsy or yellow. Mostly when it came to yellow though, I used flowers in the room.  Because I never really thought of yellow as a design color for accents until the past year. Now of course it's everywhere I look. I always ask myself why is it that when I choose a color for a room....it seems like everybody else jumps on board. (I did think of it first right? I didn't just jump on board myself did I?!! Oh my....)

Well, anyway..YELLOW it is. Mostly I am going with a "mustardy" color. That's a word, right? And thanks to the wonderful world of spray painting EVERYTHING it no longer matters what color something is when I buy it!
I bought this adorable little red lamp from Hobby Lobby just before last Christmas. (Sorry about the horrible "before" picture...(new camera is on it's way!)

I toyed with the idea of red as my accent color but could never quite get on board with it. And believe it not, red didn't "pop" in the room at all. I even bought some other items that day that were red. (Now yellow). I left them red during the holidays and then made the switch. I am horrible with "before" pics. Just as I am finishing up a paint job, it's always... "Ah geez, I forgot to take a picture!". So this is the best I can do for the before. It was cute -just not what I wanted.

So...don't let color hold you back when you see something you love in the wrong color. If it's a paintable surface -paint it! And believe me, this lamp does not look like it was "painted". Even up close in person, it looks like I bought it yellow. So thank you Lowes for a wonderful assortment of spray paint colors!!!!!!!!!!!

Double duty for all those Pumpkins laying around from Halloween???

Here's what you do  -Paint them! I simply took a spray can of primer and then sprayed them with a bright white paint. 2 coats for a really white look. While it's a little damp you can sprinkle it with gold or silver glitter if you want. They look festive with the glitter. I chose not to this year. I did last year and I am so done with glitter for a while. That's just me but so done... lol  A very fun and CHEAP decoration for Christmas and I really love the look of them white. 

WHAT A DIFFERENCE A DAY MAKES!!! ( And 30 bucks! )

YES!!! ONE DAY LATER... AND MY FIREPLACE LOOKS LIKE THIS....!!!

LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE....DID I SAY IT ENOUGH???????

INSTEAD OF THIS PLAIN JANE LOOK THAT IT HAD YESTERDAY !!!  

YAY! Love it!

AND IT COST JUST UNDER 30 BUCKS!!!  And let me tell ya...

Fireplace Mantel Surround

I can't wait! Tonight I am starting on my new fireplace "surround". My fireplace is very bland with just the wall above it. None of that beautiful white moulding. My daughter has an amazing white surround and crown moulding around hers and it looks beautiful. I always wanted mine to look like what I saw it pictures and then when she bought her house it definitely made me want it more! So, thanks to the internet and Pinterest ideas...... It starts tonight. :)

HERE'S THE BEFORE....

STAY TUNED FOR THE AFTERS TO BE PUT UP HOPEFULLY TOMORROW.... 

AND YOU CAN SEE THE AFTER HERE

Re- purposing. Just about anything can be made new again.

I re-purposed a bunch of items to show and of course I forgot to take some of the before pics. :(  Kinda ruins everything. But here are a few pics of some very easy cool things! See the lamp on top of the little buffet? Well that belonged to my mom and has been sitting in my garage, and the garage before that for about 20 years. It was brassy gold, and the lamp shades had broken. I brought it in one day and decided to fix it up. I searched online till I found white "milk glass" lamps shades that were very similar to the originals. They were actually fairly cheap too. I think they were like $35.00 each. When they came in I picked up some pewter spray paint and Voila! like new! Actually better, since they weren't brassy any more. :)
Here is the website where I found the globes in all different styles....  http://www.lampsplus.com/

And the speaking of the little buffet table. I found it in a second hand store for $60.00 buck I think and loved it. It was a bright neon blue and didn't work for me. So I painted it green and although I really liked the color I changed my mind on it. so............BEFORE. I love the green but I needed it to be neutral...so............

I WENT WHITE!!!

So how about those expensive small appliances that you see in magazines. They always have them to go with their decor and they cost a small fortune!!!! Again, PAINT your own!

I got these chairs from a neighbor who refinished chairs years ago. About 10 I think. I took the seats off (which is very easy to do) and recovered them with a textured material. Kind of like burlap feel, but softer on the bum. Sprayed them with scotchguard too. I have a huge family...so LOTS of scotchguard. And I painted the chairs with a spray paint. Just took them outside without the seats and sprayed them down. Very easy and it really gave them a new life. They go with my redone kitchen now! More of Cottage feel. Although I just took a test online at Better Homes and Gardens and it said my style was "Polished  Casual" hmmm... I like that. Find out yours.... http://www.bhg.com/decorating/decorating-style/quiz/

My "new" lamps!

So, I bought these lamps at Lowes. I loved them. Problem was...I didn't really "love" the decor in my formal (yeah, like anything in this house is formal..but that's what they call it I guess) living room. I have a family room that we really "live" in but this room is right at the entrance of the house and it is my favorite room to go to read in or just hang out for a little quiet time by myself. It had a lot of green so I thought these lamps would work but then when I switched out the green in the room, the lamps didn't work. So.....a little painters tape, some white gloss spray paint, and new shades and a totally different look! What do you think? The green pic on the left shows they had white shades which is a little hard to tell but .....the new shades (also from Lowe's) were on sale for $12.99! I love the new look.

and now the room fits!