2013 Year in Review

Happy 2014! I loved 2013 but am really looking forward to 2014 – my self-proclaimed “Year of Fun!” It’s always great to look back at the previous year and this blog helps keep some of those fun memories for me. Based upon your views and clicks, it is safe to say this year was the year of our master bedroom. We finally finished all of the big projects I wanted to complete and you all loved them with me! Below are the top five posts from 2013.

Conner’s favorite makeover in our house is this bar area, especially the stained wine cabinet from our 5th anniversary. When we moved in, we knew right away that the desk would have to come out (can you say junk collector?). New floors, new paint, an updated cabinet as well as two new beverage centers really make this spot more us!

I love that we finally have grown-up nightstands! Conner’s nightstand was tricky with that stupid floor vent but we worked it out and I love it.

Every girl’s dream – a full-length mirror to see her shoes! This DIY floor mirror took some time (mainly for drying, but really for silver-leafing) but it was so worth it for the end result and the space it takes up on this empty wall.

The second most favorite post/project of the year is our tufted headboard, inspired by West Elm and featured on BuzzFeed! (What a thrill and lesson learned…don’t read comments you can’t delete!) Mom and I worked all day on a Sunday to get this over-sized beauty finished and I love it so much.

And finally, your favorite project and mine…the DIY mirrored nightstand on my side of the bed. I had been dreaming of doing this for two years and am kicking myself for not doing it sooner. It is so easy and not as expensive as I feared!

Thanks for reading in 2013! I will be back soon with new projects. For more in between posts, follow me on Instagram and like the Facebook page!

Read Full Post »

DIY: Mirrored Nightstand, part 2

Almost four months ago, I showed you one of my top five favorite projects I’ve ever done – my DIY mirrored nightstand. I still love it! A week later, I was coveting a piece of furniture that I thought didn’t exist but thanks to the world wide web, a friendly reader and a town that I’m not too fond of (sorry Debbie, I’m an OSU gal!) I found exactly what I wanted and finally created a mirrored nightstand for the other side of our master bed.

Here he is! (I call mine a she, Conner’s side is a he. I feel its only appropriate.) I’m not totally happy with the styling and accessories but he’ll get there. At least he is finished and in place so my husband has a place to charge his phone and put down a water glass. Three months after I finished this nightstand, I’m finally showing you how it all came to be!

This was our humble beginning. Debbie from Norman was holding on to this piece to use outside. Luckily for me, it was still sitting in the garage and had yet to move so Debbie was willing to sell it to me. (I have plenty of those pieces!)

The bones were good but the back was too frilly for what I wanted. There were two small pieces of wood, held by small screws, that were holding the top scroll piece. It was super easy to take off the three pieces but then I was left with this hole. Crap.

After two trips to Home Depot (the first was just a thought process and the second I took Conner to make sure I measured right), I came home with two pieces of wood. The first piece of wood used was this small piece that fit perfectly in the new hole made from the missing top scroll piece.

The second piece of wood was actually a new layer to the top of the nightstand. When we set the nightstand next to the bed, it was just a smidge too short for what I wanted. I couldn’t find casters that fit the look for the price I wanted so I had a new piece of wood cut and used Gorilla Glue to attach it to the top of the old wood. After several coats of wood putty, some sanding and spray paint, it was just what I wanted! (I wasn’t looking for complete perfection since I knew you would be able to see the grain and knicks in the original wood)

I went through the same process of finishing this nightstand as I did on the first mirrored nightstand: the local glass shop cut the pieces of mirror to size, I used mirror adhesive to attach the pieces and glass knobs from Hobby Lobby finished it all off. I love it!

You can see the floor vent in this picture, aka my nightmare and the original reason why it took so long to find the perfect picture of furniture to fit this side of the bed. The floor vent deflector fits perfectly under here and our room has stayed nice and cool this summer.

The main wall of our bedroom looks perfect with the two mirrored nightstands and is exactly what I had pictured in my mind! Only a few more small details and I will show you a great before and after, complete with a picture of what this room looked like at our first showing!

Read Full Post »

Say what?!

So today was a fun day on the Internet for me! I was featured on BuzzFeed. Say what?!

Thanks to a girlfriend, I was alerted that my DIY tufted headboard was featured as one of their 24 West Elm Hacks. It was a pretty cool feeling to see my headboard and my room on a site like this. Thanks for the feature, BuzzFeed!

Side note: my family doesn’t really support the word ‘hack’ but I get it. I’m knocking off something that is really expensive so I get it. I do! But then I read some of the comments on the BuzzFeed article… ouch… maybe some day we’ll get to see the houses of the people who leave mean comments, yes? 😉

Read Full Post »