Weekend Project

In blog world, I'm led to believe that people knock out demolitions, renovations and furniture construction in one weekend.  I've come to believe that this is a lie.  Dave spearheads most of our projects and it can make me feel a little disconnected from the "fun" of our home improvements.  One fine Sunday about four weeks ago, Dave decided to take a nap in the basement.  This may be the first nap he's taken since we moved into the house.  I took it as my cue to pick up a powerdrill and demo our pantry, which happens to be located at the top of the basement staircase.  We can delve into my motivations to do so at a later date in time.  Here is the before of our pantry.  The previous homeowner had yellow doors with green flowers on it, which we removed within a few weeks of moving in.

 

It's a pretty sorry excuse for a pantry.  Here is mid-demo;

 

The former homeowner had a really sharp eye for color.  I think everyone loves the look of their food products set against lime green.  Mmm.

It's important to note that this took me all of 45 minutes.  After the demo was done, so was I.  The truth of the matter is that the only thing I know how to do is demo and paint.  I'm slowly learning, but the only way to really accomplish that is to take on a project all by myself....with the good and the bad.  But why (and the better question is how) can I do that when Dave can do everything?  So Dave was reluctantly drawn into the pantry project.  He had the genius idea of building boxes on casters for garbage and recycling that can be tucked away so that we don't have to see them.  

 

Here they are before being covered in wallpaper and trimmed out.  In the meantime, we'd each taken a crack at painting the pantry with chalkboard paint.  I've been wanting to paint a room black for awhile and the pantry is the only "room" that I was actually allowed to try it out on.  Here is the glorious after picture of the completed garbage/recycling bins and painted pantry;

 

So you may be wondering how the bins came to be covered in cow print wallpaper.  I'm obsessed with wallpaper...obsessed.  But it's very expensive and very intimidating.   I'm not even worried about the commitment of wallpaper and the nightmare that is removing wallpaper.  I'm afraid I couldn't hang the stuff correctly and that would be one, huge expensive mistake.  So I thought I'd buy a roll and try it out for the pantry project.   If you go to the website and take a look around, you'll notice all sorts of beautiful wallpapers.  I didn't want to pick anything with color because I thought it would clash with the food items on the shelves.  I do realize that choosing an animal print for a nook that houses things that we eat may have been in poor taste.  But I'm a carnivore and make no apologies :)  We went ahead and papered all of the shelves that I cut;

 

(I'm so serious when I'm sawing things.  Please take no notice of the fact that we're doing this in our basement.)

 

Right now you're probably thinking, whoaaaaa.  And not in a good way.  We had the same reaction.  So Dave decided to paint right over them and it's actually pretty cool.  You can see the cow print coming through, but it doesn't assault your sense of sight.  Here are the after shots;

 

 

Bruno is such a camera hog.  I prettied up the top shelf with some cake plates and I may take another picture because now these are really bothering me.  The moral of this story is that it didn't happen in a weekend, or even a month, but in blog world I could probably lie and get away with it. 

t-u-t-o-r

And a new Spelling Bee champ is crowned!  Bridget's triumphant rise to the throne marks the third Boland girl to get her name etched into the majestic St. Raphael School spelling bee plaque.  (I'm pretty sure my brothers dominated the geography bees, but they'll get their own moments in the sun.)   

Here is a quick pic that was snapped of Bridget and Mom enjoying the victory!

Go on girl and get that Regional title!

The British Invasion

This past weekend we got to meet our friend Liz's super fun, British boyfriend at the wedding.  In anticipation of meeting him, I had to have a serious chat with Dave.  Dave enjoys butchering all sorts of accents at any occasion.  He actually sat through my family's Thanksgiving brunch in an adult turkey costume while speaking in a Russian accent.  I was (secretly) impressed that he made it to cocktail hour before whipping out his British accent in front of Ben.  Also, the bride is Russian and her dad's accent was showcased during his Father of the Bride speech.  Dave's head almost exploded.  So in keeping with the recent British obsessions, both musical and personal, Foundations has been on repeat the entire week.  The lyrics are, I dare say, cheeky? (I couldn't help it.)

New York Bound

Dave and I are headed to a wedding in New Jersey this weekend and we get to stay at the brides pad on Friday night in New York!  It's Dave's first time to Manhattan since he was a kid and I don't know how I'm supposed to show him all of my favorite stuff in 24 hours.  I think we're going to start in Times Square and head south to SoHo, hitting landmarks along the way.  By landmarks I mean, "that's where we ate cheese fries served by alarmingly beautiful transvestites at 5 am".  The important kinds of landmarks. Not to mention the fact that we (I) get to hang out with the college girls on Saturday!  It's going to go so fast....

Photo Source

Florence + the Machine

One of my resolutions (I hate that word, but that's what it is) is to re-edumacate myself on music.  I spent more time in college hunting down new songs with friends than watching tv...and maybe going to class.  So it's time to get out there, read some good blogs and download new tunes.  I came across Florence + the Machine the other day and I dig it.



Check out her other songs; You've Got the Love, Drumming Song and Dog Days Are Over.

Homemade Headboard

There is one major eyesore in our house, despite all of the work that's been done. It's our bedroom. Serial killers wake up in nicer bedrooms than ours. It's the classic decision to leave the bedroom until last because no one else sees it. Yet, we live here. We should have the nicest room in the house. We've started making minor changes and hope it's complete in the next few months. So I saw this headboard at Urban Outfitters and I thought it was adorable. I love any furniture with nail head trim.

We took the measurements from their site and went to Home Depot to pick up a piece of MDF.  Just your typical Saturday afternoon... sawing a hunk of wood off the back of the pick up truck in your driveway.  Our neighbors think we're a bunch of rednecks and I like it.

 

 

 

We sprayed the wood with some adhesive and put down the batting.  I bought a curtain for $5 from the Crate & Barrel outlet without unfolding it entirely before purchasing.  There was major sun damage and it couldn't be used.  So I put the sunbleached fabric down first and then put down the final layer of gray suede fabric.  

We bought nail head trim that comes packaged as a roll so that every ten nail heads needs to be nailed in, as opposed to individually nailng them in.  It would've been impossible to keep them straight.  Even the roll was harder than I thought.

We did the single layer of trim around the outside and, voila, it was done!  We think it looks pretty good for our first project like this.

Another angle that includes the gorgeous, gold mirror that my sister got us for our wedding!

The Urban Outfitters headboard is selling for $280 and we probably spent $50 to make ours.  Now we need to work on the rest of the room that you can't see!  

I'm baaaack!

Well hello again.  It's been quite a while since I've posted and, like most resolutions, it took about 2 weeks to kick in.  The holidays were busy with lots of family fun, some house projects and the third annual Ugly Sweater Party!  Our friends made it ridiculously easy to have them over.  We got a keg and some prosecco...they brought wine, beer, booze and enough food for 50 people.  Oh and I did have to dress Bruno in his own ugly Christmas sweater.  I know - it's become a problem.  Here's a little family pic;

All the pretty girls and their homemade outfits.  Please note a pregnant O in adult bunny pj's with feet!  I'll spare you the visual of her husband in an identical get-up.

 

I think everyone had a good time.  Lots of drinking games, spilled beer everywhere and some grown men singing "flip, flip, flipadelphia!" 

 

And it wouldn't be an official theme party without prizes!  We had some newcomers place, as well as our first joint, married champions.  Dave took this opportunity to fulfill his dream of impersonating Miss America;

 

We also squeezed in Avatar.....which was unbelievable!  So good that we wanted to document ourselves looking like a bunch of Avatards. 

So the resolution is on and I plan on posting more often.  I should have some new house reno project pictures soon!