10 Pins Tuesday- Inspirational

Sometimes pinterest can be so inspiring. I picked ten pins that really make me want to do or be or grow or sit and contemplate my existence.

1. This video makes me want to sing in a choir again. I miss those days! Seriously, just take the 8 minutes and watch it all. It's really well done.

2. This drawing makes me want to crochet. (a lot!) I've been crocheting again. I'm really pushing myself to get my spring/summer afghan done.

3. This pillow makes me want to embroider... but I'm too busy crocheting right now, lol.

 

 4.  This stencil makes me want to finish and paint my bathroom.

5. This makes me want to transform that ganky pallet in our garage into a herb garden.

6. This makes me want to pimp out an adult space in our back or front yard. Seriously, couldn't you just read and drink wine there for hours???

7. This makes me want to paint our coffee table bright yellow. (I'm kinda a chicken though... I sneak in my color in little bits. BUT I love this colorful coffee table)

8. This makes me want to be that artist I always wanted to be. I need some wealthy patrons to pay me to go walk in circles in the snow and make art. This is so cool... I die!

9. This makes me want to stand by the sea and soak in how small I am and how big God is.

10. This makes me want to paint. (I've tried a copy with water colors, but they were not the correct medium. I need to use acrylics the next time I try it.)

So there ya go! Be Inspired! Go, do, make, be, sit and contemplate!

two projects and a party

Last weekend, my husband had to work a 48 hour shift... right??? Can you even imagine it? He's a paramedic, and I'll tell you one thing, unless I'm unconscious, you will never see me on an ambulance! They work medics to the bone around here, and 48's and sometimes even 72's aren't all that uncommon, so you never know if you are getting a fresh medic or one who hasn't had any sleep. Poor guys.

But anyway, off that soap box. While he was gone, I had two goals, I wanted to get Journey's new bench made and my crochet/knitting chair recovered. My mom came over to help, thanks again mom!

This is what I started with. I think it was a coffee table, but it was pretty weird. I bought it for $3 at the thrift store by my work. The lady started a $10, but I made a "you've got to be kidding" face, and she said "ok, $5, but that's as low as I'm going". I said, "ok, do you have the glass pieces that slide in the sides?"... and I got it for $3. That's right people make faces and haggle.

 

 The laminate on this thing was rough! The corners were terrible. You could see the composite chipping in lots of places. It had weird holes in the middle section that maybe dowels or something went in? The sides had weird shelves with wide ridges on them. I have no clue what this things intended purpose was, lol. It says patent pending on the bottom. I wonder how that worked out for the inventor, lol.

 Friday, I removed the weird shelves, sanded and primed it. The fire you see in the background is the stumps from our ugo-dead Christmas trees that Justin finally cut down. We are planning some big stuff for our yard this year. I will try to remember to post some of our ideas soon. I can't wait!

 When I woke up Saturday, I decided that I hated this little quarter inch lip on the middle section.

 So I sanded, and sanded, and sanded the ba-jesus out of it. Then I decided, I could not live with the weirdo holes everywhere. (Even though I planned on buying baskets for all of Journey's stuff, anyway... I was going to do this right.) So I got out the wood filler, and I patched up all the holes, the corners, and the yucky spots.

 Meanwhile, my mama came outside to keep my company and sew my new chair covers.

 Journey just chilled. She LOVES to be outside, and she was obviously feeling no pain.

 Finally, the wood filler dried up, and I primed over the bad spots. Then I painted the whole thing "Brighton Beach" blue by ACE. It came down to two blues, but I went with Brighton because that's where Lydia Bennett ran off to, and I love me some Jane Austen :) Did you notice my patch work?

 No more weird shelves.

 Then I cut some MDF to fit the top, upholstered it, and wa-la! Doesn't it kinda look like it's smiling at you?

 Journey loves it already... but mostly she just loves having a soft place to lay around and look out her window. It's way more comfy and sturdy than the last coffee table bench I made.

 I got the baskets at Micheal's. They were having a 40% off sale on all their baskets, score! AND they fit perfectly. One has her toys, one has her meds and treats, and one has her harness and clothes. (Yeah, she's a fancy clothes wearing dog sometimes. My favorites are her footie pj's and her Valentine's tee shirt.)

 She's such a crazy good photo creeper model.

 While I was working on the bench, my mom was sewing, sewing, sewing. I needed to recover this chair, and the ottoman. (p.s. the ottoman turns into two little people chairs and a foot stool. My nieces love it. The bright starry red was a little much though, lol)

 I bought the fabric for the top of my bench and this fabric at Hancocks. I got this soft stone color on the remnant table, represent! It was only $5 a yard. The butterfly fabric was thrifted, and I think it made a good springy pillow cover.

So that was last weekend :) And even though we worked from dawn til dusk Saturday, it was really fun! This weekend was great too. It was my niece Emilia's birthday yesterday. I was painting faces, so I put mom in charge of taking pictures. (I think my camera was giving her some trouble, but here are some cute ones.)

 This is her opening the tutu I made her. (She lives in tutus!) Mom chopped off her head, but the stance is great!

 She put it on under the tutu she was already wearing. I also made her the sea horse necklace she's wearing.

She had a fairy/pirate party. My sister is dressed as Tinker Bell, and Mia is Rosetta.

Today I went over to my mother-in-law's for Easter brunch, and it was wonderful too. I hope you've had a great Easter weekend! Love, Clare

Pipe Dream

Justin and I worked all day, and my pipe dream (what Justin started calling it), is finally a reality. Our giant fire place wall is now adorned with pipe shelves! I know what you really want is to see pictures, so here ya go...

 

TA-DA!!! I'm so pleased with how they turned out! It was a little iffy for a second whether or not they would fit, but even my midnight math skills are pretty good apparently. I'm kinda in the middle of transitioning our fall/winter stuff into our spring/summer stuff. The big geese picture in the before photos is part of our winter stuff. The empty frame is on it's way to becoming something colorful and fabulous. (Spoilers)

Ok, if you are not a total nerd like me, you might want to stop reading there... but I took lots and lots more pictures, and I want to post them!

 This is what the sky looked like for us all day... Which is not a bonus when you need to spray paint, BUT it never did rain, and I made it through. (YAY!)

 

Like pretty much everyone else who has made pipe shelves, I cleaned them and spray painted them. Most people go for black, but I am not big on black, so I went with gray. I used Painter's Touch, my absolute favorite spray paint, and my spray paint gun attachment. This is the first time I've used the gun thingie, and I will never do another project without it! This is the first time I've spray painted without A. having a sore pointer finger and B. being covered in spray paint.

OK, more pictures of my shelves (quick and dirty) styled up. This is "my" side. The top shelf has some of my favorite things, owls, driftwood, and a funky puzzle box. It also has the Laura George print Goggles. It was one of my first art purchases, because it reminds me of me and all the different glasses I've worn since Kindergarten. I bought her print Mustachios at the same time because it reminded me of Justin. (It's on "his" side) My second shelf needs some help, but for now it has a cool ceramic piece I picked up at a thrift store, one of my favorite sets of teacups, and two canisters from Delft Holland. I am really excited to finally have a good place for the All You Need is Love set I made Justin for Valentine's. The bottle collection all along the mantle is Justin's... he's been collecting them forever, and that is another thing I'm glad finally has a place.

 This is Justin's side. The giant orange flame vase came free with our dining set forever and forever ago. On the top shelf you can see Mustachios. The ceramic cross piece is called Resurrection, and it was made for me by a friend in a ceramics class we took together. She made three Death, Burial, and Resurrection, and I was really honored when she gave me one. Justin's second shelf needs a little help too. (I had planned to put books on them, but now I'm not so sure.) The three bottles are from our wedding. The middle is our unity sand. (Try lighting a unity candle on the beach!) The other two are Jone's bottles with sand from the beaches where we were married and honeymooned. The piece next to them, I bought at a craft fair from a really sweet lady who actually went out and found the letters of the alphabet in her area. I really liked her eye, so I picked out RANEY. (Our last name for those of you just joining us.) Then more and more bottles... and this isn't even all of them.

 This is my favorite view... it's like pipe shelf porn.

Here's the break down of what we did

1. went to HD in the morning to buy everything
2. cleaned the pipes and fittings
3. put them together
4. spray painted (1 coat primer, 2 coats paint)
5. we left the shelves raw (poplar)
6. assembled
7. attached to the wall
8. cleaned the shelves
9. applied a wood cleaner 
10. styled them up

We used lots and lots of flanges, which are like $5 a piece, so this was kinda expensive to do. It has such a big impact though. I don't know how much it cost, and I don't want to. Justin knows I operate on a thrift store budget all the time, and I get terrible sticker shock. We decided just using a bunch of flanges was way easier than using a paddle bit and drilling a hole for the pipes to go through. Also it's true what everyone who's been making these have been saying, these are really sturdy. I can't really give you a tutorial because ours were specifically for our space and wouldn't work anywhere else, but there are a bunch of good ones out there I could direct you to if you're feeling the pipe shelf love. I'm so excited about mine, I think I'll go make myself some tea and just stare at them awhile :) ta-ta

midnight math, mama, tea, sleepy Journey

Justin gave me the thumbs up for a project I've been dying to do for a while- pipe shelves! Unless you've been living under a rock (or you don't have pinterest, read the cool blogs like Apartment Therapy and Design Sponge, or seek out new interesting home design stuff... which is kinda the same as living under a rock) you have probably been seeing some pipe shelf awesomeness slathered all over the internet. For example here are some I've been pinning...

 

I could go on and on and on, because I seriously LOVE pipe shelves! (I won't though, I promise.)

If you are a long time follower of my blog, you might remember my behemoth of a fire place... if not, I will refresh your memory.

Well, since we decided to buy this place I've been wanting to put some built-ins over all the brick(brick, brick, brick) to balance it out. The fireplace wall is at least 20 feet long, and while it's always cute at Christmas time, the rest of the year it's this big expanse that taunts me, lol. I've thrown lotf of ideas Justin's way, but he wasn't crazy about any of them, until pipe shelves, because seriously, there is a coolness factor that transcends gender, style, age, class, all of it. (Ok, maybe that's taking it too far, but my mama likes them too, and we are opposites.)

I've spent the last few hours plotting, planning, calculating, sketching, comparing materials and prices... AND (mostly because there aren't 24 hour hardware stores) tomorrow is go-time! I'm sooo pumped to finally be getting the shelving I've been dying for in the living room. I'm soooo stoked! Wish us luck, you know there will be pictures as soon as possible.

so retro

Justin and I have been super busy working on the house here lately. We've painted the exterior (mostly), worked on our garden, installed a dishwasher, a washer, and a drier, cleaned and rearranged things, and done a few small projects. I've got to show you one that we are both loving.

Remember all my wonderful finds from the New Athens town wide yardsale? Well, I got that amazing little record player, and I was trying to decide between fixing the record player and gutting it... we went with gutting it. Here's what we did :)

 This is the infamous before shot :)

 This is my wonderful husband getting those pesky screws out.

And this is the interior... Our Ipod and a little radio. We love it! It has a cool distortion from being in a box. We had a graduation party for Justin a few weeks ago, and everyone was like, "where's the music coming from... omg, is it coming from the record player? that's awesome." We are pretty proud of ourselves.



Now, the project that is driving my nuts at the moment is getting this last little bit of our kitchen done. When we moved in we had no appliances and a weird little desk thing in this spot. We tore out the little desk thing pretty early on because it served no purpose besides annoying me by taking up needed space.

I bought our dishwasher for $35 a few weeks ago. (Score!) My MIL's boyfriend Jim and Justin hooked it up, and it works great. TODAY, I bought this base cabinet from the St. Louis Habitat for Humanity Restore. I expected to pay around $20 for a base cabinet. I could not believe my eyes when I saw that the tag said $1! ONE DOLLAR PEOPLE! That made my day for sure.

 Now, it's door and handle do not match our cabinets, but I am working on that. I'm also working on getting a piece of counter top as close as possible to our existing counter top. Usually Home Depot comes through for me, but it looks like I'm going to have to go to a custom cabinets and counter tops place. This doesn't hurt my feelings too much since I got the cabinet for a dollar. SERIOUSLY A DOLLAR!

Since the cabinets were only a dollar, I also picked up this long skinny one. I've got some big ideas for it, but we will have to see. I'm thinking about hanging it horizontally  in my awkward little nook thing. Also, I think I want to put one of those lift up hydrolic frosted glass doors on it. I might use it to store my tea in. (I am already taking up a whole cabinet of just tea.)


I also went to the Goodwill outlet store. It's a giant Goodwill with bins that you have to sift through and everything in the bins is .79 a pound, books are .39 a pound, and none of the furniture or appliances is over $15. It was amazing! I got a bunch of cool stuff that I really want to show you, but I will have to save it for later. My poor pooch is very sleepy... and I am pretty tired too... sorting through all those bins tuckered me out, lol.

Good-night :)