Extreme Makeover: Office Edition

So, I don't know if I've ever shown you our office? Nope, I just checked all of my old posts and while I've mentioned the office (in regards to the water leak we discovered after the hurricane last fall), I've never shown you the office. Probably Mostly because it was embarrassing. I am a neat freak and the office was anything but neat. It was more like a graveyard for crap (pardon my language). Our office was so bad that I actually would avoid using it. I would even use our archaic laptop to do work instead of our nice desktop, that I purchased, because I didn't want to go in the office.

Well, as I mentioned last week, I've been training for my summer teaching position and a majority of the training up until last week had been at home. The training required me to be at a computer watching videos, taking quizzes, participating in conference calls, reading materials, etc. a.k.a., I was actually going to have to use our office . . . which meant I was going to have to straighten that sucker up. (I'm one of those people that cannot work in an untidy room. I will seriously clean before I study/work.)

So, I spent a good two days clearing out the room, scrubbing it down, and putting things back in place. If you follow me on Instagram you probably saw this photo a few weeks back:

This was taken mid-clean, after I had taken everything out of the office and piled it all in the hallway. It was a dusty mess of books and random other stuff, like the cat drinking fountain box and a burgundy-colored crocodile-print briefcase . . . again, random stuff.

But, now it's time for the big reveal . . . and don't worry, I'm sharing the "before" and "after" shots so you can see how horrendous it looked before and how extreme of a makeover/cleaning job I did!



As you can see, not only did I remove the ladder and get a chair, but I organized our filing and the contents of all those boxes and bags.

Quick note on the chair. I have wanted an Ikea Poang chair for a few years now, but I could never muster up the courage to spend $100+ on the one I wanted. Now, if you've never sat in one, you need to find one and plunk your butt down because you'll understand why I've wanted one - they are coooooommfy. A few weeks ago though, I just happened to be searching craigslist for random stuff (like a retro metal bar cart) and realized that I should search for a Poang chair . . . A couple of days later I nabbed this beauty for $30! If you were to buy this chair straight from Ikea, it'd be about $150. Bar-gain!! And, it's in great condition! Anyway, back to our office makeover . . .

Then I had to tackle the bookshelves . . .

. . . oh, the books! Now they are finally all back in order on the shelves (by "type," author, chronology, etc.), the shelves are dusted, and the random piles of stuff have been contained (notice I didn't say removed!)!

Lastly, I conquered our desk, which pretty much meant organizing the piles of stuff on it. Easy stuff compared to the bookshelves.

Oh, and if you notice something different in the "after" shot, it's probably our diplomas that I finally hung up (because what office is complete without the diplomas?) and the teal-painted herringbone cork boards I made (thank you, Pinterest)! Here's a closer view of the cork boards if you're curious . . .

 They were super easy to make. I just bought four cork tiles from Target (the same ones I bought for my cork travel map that cost about $9), measured and taped off the herringbone design with painter's tape, took the tiles outside, and gave them a good three-ish coats of spray paint. I think this was one of the best projects I've done in a while - cheap, easy, and completely customizable. My mom mentioned that these tiles might be good for the side of a stainless refrigerator to hang invites or notes, that way you don't have to hang stuff on the front and potentially scratch the surface. Genius! Plus, you can do whatever design and color you want.

Also, if you noticed and like my uber-cute desktop background with the fun chevron pattern in the first photo, you should check out Atomicdust's blog (my sister, Danielle, works for them). Every month their designers take a break from client work to craft some seriously awesome desktops to download for FREE for your computer, iPad, and smartphones. LOVE them!

Anyway, that's our extreme makeover: office edition! It didn't require any painting or big furniture purchases, just some TLC, and a few days off work! Maybe someday we'll add a rug or a footstool for my Poang chair, but for now it's back to work in my clean and functional office . . .

THANK YOU Hand-Me-Down Dresser Gods

Back in April, I pleaded with the hand-me-down dresser gods for, well, a hand-me-down dresser! One that would be inexpensive and I could pretty-up and to put in our guest room. I definitely could've gone to Ikea or Target and bought a semi-inexpensive dresser for the room, but I wanted to get something that had a little more character, was even cheaper, and one I wouldn't feel bad about painting (especially if it didn't turn out well).

Well, the hand-me-down god of Craigslist answered my pleas and I scored this 9-drawer beauty for a cool $100.

For some reason I only took one "before" shot. With my phone...

Ok, so the $100 was a little more than I wanted to spend, but the dresser was perfect for what I was looking for and, honestly, I was already getting impatient with my search.

Of course I didn't want to keep the dresser as-is. While I'm sure it looked really nice back in the day, it definitely needed some TLC for my taste in the form of a fresh coat of paint and some new, updated (and matching) pulls. Now, I'm not going to give you a how-to on how to paint furniture because 1) this is the first real piece of furniture I've painted so I'm definitely no guru by any means, and 2) there are other great how-to's online by much more experienced DIYers like Young House Love and Centsational Girl that I would definitely recommend consulting over me (I pretty much followed their steps anyway)! But, I will tell you what I did. I painted the dresser Behr's Powdered Snow and added some 4-inch oil-rubbed bronze (even though they look black) cup pull handles. And, let me tell you, 4-inch pulls are hard to find! I ended up having to order ours online because there was a very limited selection of 4-inch pulls at our local hardware stores (I guess 4-inch pulls are a rarity?), and I definitely did not want to drill new holes and fill in the old ones (that's waaaay too much work for me!).

Anyway, instead of a how-to on painting furniture, I figured I'd show you some pictures of how this little hand-me-down dresser really helped (begin to) complete our guest bedroom. Here's a view of the room opposite the dresser . . .

. . . and here's the dresser!

Now, to "complete, complete" the room all I have to do is find a large mirror to go over the dresser, accessorize the space a little better, and the guest room will be pretty much done! I know it's been a long process to read about since we painted the chevrons on the wall waaaaay back in August, but thank you for being patient readers (and some of you, visitors) and know that it's almost done! (and we can move on to do projects and write about other areas of our house! Yay!)

Vertical Gardening

 One of our #1 requirements when we were house-hunting was to have some kind of a backyard, or whatever kind of a backyard we could get in the city. We knew it was a long-shot in finding a place with enough green space to warrant a real lawnmower, but Chris really just wanted a back "yard" to plant some herbs, relax on our adirondack chairs, and grill. That's really it. We eventually ended up putting a contract down on a short sale house that had absolutely no backyard. Imagine that. But, thankthegoodness we got tired of waiting on that short sale and fell in love with our current house, because it has a nice little backyard patio! No grass, but areas to plant some things, to sit in our chairs, and grill!

Last year, we worked on converting some of the greenery on the patio from bushes and flowers into a little herb garden of rosemary, chives, sage, parsley, dill, and oregano. It was our first time "gardening" and we definitely learned a lot. For example, did you know that dill grows out of control? Oops.

So, this year we decided to be a little more methodical in approaching our little herb garden, aka, not planting everything in the ground and giving them free reign to grow! I had been inspired by others' garden projects that I found on blogs and Pinterest and thought that something similar would be perfect for our little "yard"!

I figured that making some kind of vertical garden to hang on the brick wall at the back of our patio would not only hide the ugly, and boring, brick, but it would also make our herb plants inaccessible to the little herd of alley cats we got going on in our neighborhood. As you can guess, it wasn't hard to convince Chris to do a projects that required measurements and using tools either!

First, let me say that you can obviously literally do a vertical garden however you want, just look at those ideas that I found. They can be hung, stood, or leaned on a wall. It can be made of clay pots, mason jars, and even gutters. It'd be perfect for people who want a little planter garden in their huge yard, and even better for those of you with tiny apartment balconies. It's really what works best for you.

What we decided to do was hang ours on the brick wall at the back of our patio. We used clay pots we bought last year, some pine boards we picked up from Home Depot, "L" brackets to hold it all together, a little paint to make it pretty, and some thick rope to hang over the ledge of the brick wall, and voila!





 As you can guess, this project was really pretty simple, especially since it was completely customizable. Chris, being the "builder" of our relationship, drew out the plans, gathered the materials, and put it all together based on what we thought would work best for our yard (aka, cover up the brick wall). All he had to do was cut the pine board into the right lengths and screw it all together. He used the "L" brackets to reinforce the shelves to the back so that it could support the clay pots and plants. The shelves may not be that pretty from the inside, because of all of the brackets and whatnot, but the paint and plants cover them up just fine and at least it won't fall apart!

Chris also used some thick rope to hang it over the top of the brick wall. We figured this way it'd be easier to take down to store next fall.

If you want to build a vertical garden just like ours, Chris gave me some pretty detailed notes to share: Vertical Garden Assembly Instructions. The notes might even be too detailed, but that's Chris for ya!  ; )

 Oh, and if you are curious about what I did to contribute to this project, besides being inspired by Pinterest, I painted the darn thing! Behr's California Poppy to be exact. It's not the best paint job in the world, but I only used half the quart I bought for it so at least I can touch it up year to year.

And, you might think that I created the cute little plant labels on the shelves, but I didn't, Chris totally did. It was his "idea," so I gave him the supplies (white spray paint and a blue acrylic paint pen) and he went to town with some scrap wood. He even made little label stakes for our herbs in the ground.

Our back "yard" patio definitely looks complete now that we have something fun hanging up on that brick wall. And, in case you are in awe of our awesome Adirondack chairs, Chris definitely built those, from scratch, for us when we first moved out here to DC! (Oh, and those cute yellow and white pillows were from KMart. I'm super proud I found them!)

So, that's our vertical garden. Super simple, but perfect for a second try at our herb garden, even if we don't have a "yard" to plant anything in!

Oh, oh! And, look at these bad boys . . .

Do you see them in that little cluster in the center of the photo? Baby strawberries!! Cross your fingers that our alley cat friends (I'm talking to you Clipper/Homie Half Ear/Socks) don't snack on them before we can!

Dear Hand-Me-Down Dresser Gods

Dear Hand-Me-Down Dresser Gods,

I am searching for a lovingly-cared-for-but-no-longer-wanted dresser for our guest bedroom. I would love to have it in time for my parent's visit in mid-May so that I can progress in "finishing" our guest bedroom. See, it just looks so bare without some kind of a dresser to store linens, travel products, and other knick-knacks.

Said dresser would look fabulous with an equally wonderful mirror above it and those lovely aqua-spray-painted thrift-store sconces on either side of it, adorned with crisp white candles.

I am looking for something like these that I can "upcycle" with a nice coat of paint and some new hardware.

Can you please request that the DC area Craigslist, Goodwill, and other area thrift stores that I frequent make some available for me to purchase? Preferably in the $40-80 dollar range, with working drawers, solid construction, and maybe some detail work?

Also, I would love love to happen upon some kind of entry-way table, like these . . .

. . . and a metal bar cart, like this (since my lovely sister nabbed our grandma's!).

Sincerely, your project-starved patrons,

Kristin (and Chris)

History Nerds

Chris and I are big history nerds, if you haven't already figured that out from our map wall a few weeks ago. I am probably the biggest history nerd though, which I already hinted at here. (In summation, I love Little House on the Prairie.)

Any-who, if we didn't already stamp our nerdiness on our house with the map wall, we definitely did in our preparations for my brother and his girlfriend's visit last weekend for the Rock 'n' Roll Marathon.  Just like most of you probably do when you're expecting guests at your house, we spent the week before their arrival cleaning, grocery shopping, etc. But, while cleaning for most people is probably just the basic dusting and vacuuming, cleaning for me also means finally finishing long-awaited house projects. More specifically, long-awaited projects in the areas that guests will see, like the guest bedroom and its surrounding areas.

The first project was a 1,000-piece puzzle of the United States and the U.S. Presidents. Uber-nerdy, I know. It was an old puzzle I found in my parents' basement when we were visiting at Christmas and I decided that it was perfect for Chris and I. And, it only took us a couple of days to put it together (while we watched the first Presidential primary results of the year!).

Unfortunately, we realized that we were missing about 7 pieces of that puzzle. Bummer. So, I found an identical puzzle on Amazon for around $10 that promised to have all of its pieces. (I know you are probably thinking that I'm super nerdy for ordering the same puzzle online, but I had to have it!)

The new puzzle didn't have all its pieces though. It was missing 2-3 pieces. And, the worst part, besides that the missing pieces were part of Andrew Jackon's mugshot, er, portrait (which is one of Chris' favorite presidents) ,was that the puzzles were not identical. Sure, they were the same "scene" but the cuts of the pieces were different so it wasn't easy to swap a piece from one puzzle to the other. So, after carefully testing out pieces from both puzzles, we were able to find the right combination to make it look somewhat normal. For example, Andrew Jackson's portrait and description aren't quite right . . . (if you don't know who Andrew Jackson is, I guess that's ok. He's the one in the middle with the white hair, big forehead, and crazy receding hairline. But not the almost-bald dude on the bottom, that John Quincy Adams.)

If you can't tell, his nose and chin are kinda weird, at least weirder than they're already supposed to be, and the dates of his presidency and party are a jumbled mess. But I didn't care, at least the puzzle was together!

Then, I went out a bought some Modge Podge (because for some reason I didn't already own it) and a pricier-than-I-wanted-it-to-be frame from Michael's. Not only was it pricey, but the frame's corner was broken when I unwrapped it. That's what I get for being inpatient and buying when things aren't on sale. . . anyway, we hung it up in the hall in between the guest bedroom and the guest bathroom.

It fits in nicely with the Presidential and American History books that fill the bookshelf beneath it. (Yes, we have a bookshelf devoted to our Presidential history books. And don't worry, I have many more history books not pictured.) Plus, the AWESOME Abe Lincoln bobble head and vintage globe my sister gave me round out the nerdiness. (Thanks, Danielle!)

Well, I lied. The top two shelves are Presidential and American History books. The bottom shelf is clearly Harry Potter, Jane Austen, LOTR, some yearbooks, and other miscellaneous big books. Someday they will all be history books when I decide to organize them (unless I move them to my future classroom!).

The other project was hanging up some awesome sketches of our U.S. Presidents' homes that my mother-in-law gave us over Christmas. She had had them since Chris was younger, so I thought the perfect place to put them was in the guest bedroom where his parents will stay when they visit. As usual, Chris did the measurements, while I handled the sketches and the frames. . .

They line the wall across from the guest bed. So, if you stay with us, you will get to fall asleep, or wake up, to these beauties. Cool, huh? (only if you're a nerd, like us!)

And, just for your information, as a rule of thumb, I usually hang frames 3 inches a part (I did that here and here). I think it provides enough space between the frames, while also seeming "close." Especially because I use chunkier/bulkier frames.

Here are all of the prints up close . . .

First, there's George Washington's Mount Vernon (top) and William McKinley's home (bottom). . .

Then, it's Warren Harding's home (top) and Prospect, Princeton University's Presidents' home, and hence, Woodrow Wilson's home (bottom), since besides being our 28th President, he was also the 13th President of Princeton . . .

We also have Polk Place (top), the home of James K. Polk, and Andrew Jackson's Hermitage (bottom) . . .

Lastly, we have Harry Truman's Missouri home (top) and James Madison's Montpelier (bottom) . . .

I think we are the ultimate nerds, don't you think? Can't you just wait to come visit us and join us in all of our nerdy-glory? I like to think that we're all nerds at heart, I just like to show ours all over our house!

Anyway, in non-nerdy news, Chris and I will be spending the weekend tackling our yard since spring summer has decided to come early in DC. Remember all of that work we did last year? Well, it looks the same now, but substitute1-foot high weeds instead of ivy. We're in for some fun!

Winter Pinterest Challenge: More Map Love

Last summer, two of my favorite blogs, Young House Love and Bower Power, started a Pinterest Challenge where they took inspiration from stuff they had "pinned" and actually made it for themselves. As Sherry from YHL aptly puts, "It’s a welcome slap of stop-pinning-and-start-doing." I completely and totally agree. I've probably only done a handful of the projects that I've pinned on my Pinterest boards, even though I keep pinning away pretending that one day my house will be filled with projects of Pinterest-inspiration. This time though, instead of just looking at everyone else's cool projects (and pinning those!), I decided that I was going to participate in the Pinterest Challenge too, and make some pins a reality! So, here it goes . . .

As you might have guessed, I've been obsessing over map-related DIY projects. More specifically, some cork board travel maps . . .

This first one by Life Blessons initially caught me eye because of it's simplicity, and I adored the "our adventures together" banners across it! And then, I fell in love with this second one by C.R.A.F.T. because of the bold blue ribbon and the black outlining of the states. I can't imagine the amount of patience it took to do that detail, my goodness!

I've been contemplating doing my own version of this project for a couple of months, but couldn't really decide exactly what I wanted to do, that is, until I found a Cavallini U.S. map, similar to this one, in our attic a week ago!

I know it came from Paper Source, but I honestly don't remember ever buying it. I want to say it was leftover from Chris' old college apartment and that we've just been lugging it around all of these years. I'm so glad that neither of us threw it away! I guess it isn't a bad thing to be a pack-rat after all (right, Dad?!) - our trash has become our treasure!

So, this weekend while I was at Target I picked up some cork board. I had planned on just getting a regular framed cork board, but I saw a set of 4 square cork board pieces and decided I would glue them together to fit the map size instead. At a little over $7, compared to $15 for the framed board, I couldn't pass up this super easy, and cheaper, option.

So, I started by gluing all of the pieces together with my trusty hot glue gun . . .

And then trimmed off the excess cork board to fit the shape of the map . . .

Next, I pulled out some old spray adhesive and rubber cement to glue the paper onto my cork board. Now, when I say "old," I mean old. I think the rubber cement dates back to my high school art class. Again, it's okay to be a pack-rat! Just for your information too, I rubber cemented the corners and edges of the map and then glued the rest of it down with the adhesive spray, and I really only did that because there wasn't enough of both to do the whole thing (it's finally time to get some new rubber cement!).

Now, at this point I couldn't decide whether I wanted to keep the rectangular shape, or cut out the shape of America. Since I am the WORST at making decisions, I decided to keep it as is. I can always trim it later, but I can't add it back, you know?

Finally, I hot glued some ribbon onto the back, tied it in a bow, and hung it up!

Oh, and of course I added pins everywhere Chris and I have been together, which doesn't seem like that many now that I look at all of it! If you can tell, the black pins are places we've lived and the white pins are places we've visited.

Maybe one day I'll add little flag markers about each place like C.R.A.F.T., and maybe one day I'll trim it to the shape of North America. But, in the meantime, I'm going to enjoy this new map in my growing collection and I'm going to relish in a Pinterest project completed! (And, for the cost of the cork board, $7, at that!)

Well, that's my first official Pinterest Challenge project, hope you liked it and hopefully I'll start to do more! Here's the links to the four Pinterest Challenge leading ladies' projects too: Katie's (Bower Power), Cassie's (Hi Sugarplum!), Erin's (The Great Indoors), and Sherry's (Young House Love). Now, I  have some travel plans to make to fill up this map a little more!

Also, I tested out watermarking photos, what do you think??