Archive for 2009

Decorating!

Thursday, February 5th, 2009

l have a disease called decorator-itis. I’ve been futzing with my interior decor and can NEVER STOP or be happy. But I have made a few significant thrifty contributions.

Below are the dining and living rooms Before…this is what we call slow decorating…

And After…

Yes, it is the ubiquitous Ikea Stockholm Rand rug. Scored for $75 bucks in the as-is section. There are some small spots and I had to beat and vacumn the dirt out of it, but for its size (9 x 12′ !) and awesome graphic punch – it seemed like a great deal. It does kind of make your eyes go all wonky.

SHAZZAMMM! My new baby is this lovely vintage Danish expandable teak table. Found it at a thrift store and had to argue and LIE to get it. I may have used Christmas and dinner and FAMILY and the LORD to finagle this beautiful gem for $150.

Totally worth it for the surfboard shape and great condition. Oh yeah, and the tulip chairs are from the Long Beach Flea Market. I can have a real grown-up dinner party with matching chairs and actual room on the table for eating.

Get ready for some more of the After tour:

The Bertoia diamond chairs were a steal off of Craigslist. $40 a pop. A friend from Los Angeles picked them up and delivered these beautiful bad boys.

I’ve been installing new Ikea ENJE roller shades in the dining room and living room…and I’m still working on it. Eventually those horrible mini blinds will be GONE.

Here are the new roller shades in the dining room instead of the curtains.

Curtains:

Ikea ENJE roller shades:

These little windows are getting the Ikea ENJE roller shades as well. They had to be cut down to size to fit the 22″ width (which I will outline the fabulous: How to cut Enje shades!)

FILED UNDER: after, before, decorating, dining, fireplace, furniture, living, thrifting

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Exterior Door – Progress

Wednesday, January 28th, 2009

Making progress on the exterior doors. The entire back porch is a bit of a problem area. I’m still trying to figure out what to do with that awful water heater situation between the 2 doors. Maybe a tank less water heater is the way to go. Also, how do I cover up the stupid useless laundry room door? I’m stumped as to how to remedy all the weird structural issues.

In progress, it looks so ghetto.

After:

Benjamin Moore Toucan Black on the exterior and the Behr Ultra Pure White (semi-gloss) on the interior and molding.
I still need to add the screen and molding on the den door as well as finish scraping off extra paint on the glass panes. Still ghetto, but now the rest of the exterior is screaming for some paint.

Below is the interior of the kitchen door. So much nicer than the tobacco color and mysterious brown stained mess that we lived with for almost a year (we also lived with the foreclosure brass real estate doorknobs and a metal plate covering the deadbolt – how embarrassing).

We got a couple of sets of standard doorknobs from the Home Depot ages ago to replace the foreclosure knobs. They are not my number one choice, but sacrifices must be made for budgets…maybe one day something a little more mid century will replace them. We still have to drill out the holes for the deadbolt since the preexisting ones are about an inch to small.

The den door – before/after:

This door has been so gross and ugly for so long that the fresh paint immediately makes me happy every time I go in the room. We still need to replace the weatherstripping and clean the glass. To do, to do…it never ends.

I started working on the garage doors but it began raining and eventually snowing – in the motherf*ing Southern California desert! It was brief but so weird. Its been FREEZING lately, our heating bill is out of control.

Oh yeah, also the abandoned exterior lighting project. There are some weird things going on with the electrical wiring that may be a little above our skill level to problem solve. The lights all work when installed but won’t turn on and off – except for the one light still installed (but only when its installed alone). The Boy had a very rough time with that project and now refuses to look at it. I don’t blame him, I’m trying to ignore some things as well.

FILED UNDER: after, before, exterior

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Master Bedroom

Tuesday, January 27th, 2009

Finally! The master bedroom is starting to look kind of respectable.

I switched out almost all the furniture with things I had lying around the house. The black tallboy dresser is a bit of a departure from the mid century pieces scattered throughout the house. I love the distressed finish with bits of green poking out here and there and the bronze lion head handles. It was a thrift store find with a price tag of $25 that I was unsure at about at first but has really grown on me.

The painting above it was found at the same thrift store – the “Help Center” – and was snagged for $3. SCORE!
This is probably my favorite thrift store painting ever.

The two white faux bamboo Jordon Brown patio chairs are a thrifty find from way back in July that never really had a home. I like them in here, although The Boy tends to use them as a hamper. I’m not sure what it is, he just loves to pile clothes all over the house on all the chairs…maybe its a guy thing. The pillows were a score at the Crate and Barrel outlet at Cabazon. $5 each during the holiday sale – that store was working some awesome deals right before Christmas.

The blanket was a lovely score from 111 Antiques in Palm Springs. It is supposedly a vintage Danish wool throw – but for $32 I don’t care – call it mine.

The bed frame is the Vinstra from Ikea. Shiny, white, clean and very sturdy for…ummm…well at least the beds not just a box spring on the floor anymore. Its a real grown up bed kind of! This is my first bed frame – so I’m pretty stoked. The blue rug (the Hemmet) is also from Ikea. It was in the dining room for awhile but really didn’t work in that space. I think the peacock blue is a nice pop of color in a sea of white black and yellow.

The bed linens are still a bit of an issue. The duvet is the Malou (from Ikea again! I need to change it up a bit, but I’m just so very cheap.) in gray and black. I like them – its just the comforter insert is so bulgy and puffy and won’t lay flat which so bugs my minimalist soul. Plus I kind of hate the gray stripe at the top. The hunt continues for the perfect bed linens.