Lack Hack

My Favorite Teenage Girl was up north last weekend for her birthday.  (Usually I head down south since there are two Favorite Teenagers and only one Mom.)

She's crafty like Mom so we spent an afternoon getting down with an Ikea Lack side table (nightstand  in her room) and some Modge Podge.  She called the shots while I watched and cut out things on command.  Behold: the evolution of a teenage mind.

  

Most Important Home Improvement Tool: My Phone

Facetime is awesome. Here's proof. I bought two of these ceiling lights for the downstairs, one in the basement hallway and one above the stair landing.

I decided to be a badass and install these myself. Except for constant wishing for extra hands to sprout from my body, the first one was installed with no issues. I may have used my head to balance the light while one hand held screws and one held a screwdriver but it worked out with minimal profanity.

Things got ugly on the stair landing.

WHERE WAS THE METAL BOX THINGY THAT I SCREW THE NEW FIXTURE INTO? WHERE WAS THE GROUNDING WIRE? AM I GOING TO DIE?

Thankfully, Dad has an iPhone. Dad to the rescue. He calmed me down and talked me through it. I ended up screwing the new fixture into the beam, after he promised me I wouldn't electrocute myself and set the house on fire and it all worked out.

Basement Before & Not Quite After

Behold the basement back in November, emptied of furniture. (But not the heavy TV because it was too big and heavy for me to get it out. I'm pretty strong. This thing was ridiculous. I listed it on Freecycle and Craigslist and no one wanted it. I can't blame them. I eventually had to pay Arlington County $20 to recycle it. I can recycle paint for free but must pay for heavy annoying TVs. Ok. Fair enough, GOVERNMENT.)

I knew I was pulling up the carpet because it was destroyed by the Bad Cat. I had already ripped it out in the hallway leading to this room. So I used the carpet as a drop cloth for weeks, painting the shelves in the wall unit and  the seven closet doors.  I have no saw horses or a place to store saw horses, so I used cardboard boxes. It was SO NICE not worrying about drips. I also spray painted two thrift store lamps in Rustoleum's Key Lime, after cleaning them and giving them a rough sand. I sanded outside but painted inside because logic.

**Probably don't spray paint in your house. Especially in a room with only one very small window.

But again, it was nice getting spray paint all over the carpet like a gangster. PROTIP: Tape plastic bags around the cord.  Stuff the bit where the lightbulb goes with paper towels and tape over that. Tape around the off/on switch. And spray everything else, lots of light coats.

I did fashion cardboard box walls to protect my freshly painted actual walls. I'm not a savage.


This was the ugly builder-grade drop ceiling.

And now this is the ceiling after installing cool new tiles that fit right under the original ones.

It cost less than $300 to do the whole room, and Ceilume was great, both product and customer-service wise. I originally called for a sample because I wanted to feel the weight difference between the cheapest ones and the more expensive ones. I expected something the size of a paint chip, but they sent me actual 2' x 4' tiles as a free sample -- one of each. (You can see them in the 'ugly' version above.) I was able to install them and decide which I preferred. (I went with the cheaper version because I knew I was leaving the original foamy tiles up, but there is definitely a difference in quality.) They do have a 25 panel minimum for orders, but I only needed one of the translucent tiles where the light should shine through. I called and they sent that one along as a free sample, even though I offered to pay for it. Installation only took me a few hours, mainly because I had to cut so many of them. They look great, and completely updated the room. I cannot say enough good about this company. (They have no idea that I am typing this on the internet. I just really recommend them.)

Also, the bookcases got some paint, the window got some fabric, and here we are in April.

Still a huge mess, but coming together.

Wedding Decorations for Almost Free

For those of you playing along at home, the Great Sewing Machine Disaster was solved. A lovely lady from my office let me borrow her sewing machine to complete the wedding bunting in time and the day was saved and happily ever after was lived.

I finished the bunting the weekend before the wedding, which left me about five days to figure out centerpieces. I already knew I wanted to do candles and flowers in mason jars and tin cans. Very backyard wedding. And very cheap. I bought a bunch of candles at Ikea for under $20. Two hundred tea lights, and about thirty votives. I had some white ribbon left over and a random yard or two of burlap. I had pasta-sauce type jars and mason jars and on standby in Florida already, and just needed some cans.

My condo complex has a row of like twenty industrial trash can sized recycling bins (half paper, half 'commingled recyclables') that are always overflowing on Tuesdays because they are emptied on Wednesdays. I went out on Tuesday to gather my goods and learned that my neighbors are super fancy people that do not eat canned food. They drink wine, they drink fancy bottled beers, they drink un-fancy canned beer, and they eat food that comes in jars. But they clearly prefer Whole Foods and farmer's markets for their vegetables. And they have certainly never heard of Chef Boyardee. I found only four cans, all beans, all together, from someone clearly making a giant batch of chili. Even the tomato sauce I found next to them came in a jar. I actually had to go purchase the cheapest canned veggies I could find and throw them out. It felt terrible. I should have planned ahead. That cost just under $20 but could be free if you are smarter than me.

I used a hammer and nail to punch little starlight holes in half of the cans, to make twinkling tea light holders. And I glued burlap to the rest and tied ribbon around them to make vases. I put sand in half the jars with votives to make more candleholders, and used the other jars as more vases. For flowers, I sent my darling son and husband 80 miles away (one-way) to the nearest Trader Joe's with two 5-gallon buckets half full of water. They came back with SO MANY FLOWERS for about $85. I pulled all the bouquets apart and filled my little centerpiece vases and still had enough flowers left over to make a calla lily and tulip bouquet for the darling bride, smaller calla and lily bouquets for her ladies, flowers to pin on the gentlemen, and three more large bouquets for the cake table, the guest book table, and the bar. For $85, yo. I'm pretty sure I spent $85 for my bridal bouquet alone because I am an idiot. Newsflash: Wedding flowers don't have to be expensive. Trader Joe's ALL DAY.

It all turned out beautiful.

A Masochist's Guide to Sewing Bunting

Background: my darling cousin Jasmine decided to get married at my parent's house this March, as they have almost three acres and a gazebo for the ceremony and plenty of room for an outdoor reception. (Don't worry, it's Florida. Weather should be perfect but we're renting a tent just in case.) I volunteered to take on decorating the reception tent. On a budget. Oh by the way, this conversation went down in late January.

I decided the reception tent OBVIOUSLY needed bunting. I had a bin full of fabrics that I've had for years, waiting for that quilt I'll never make. What a perfect idea to sew bunting to hang in the tent! I can have it done in a week of evenings and then I'll work on centerpieces, I thought. HAHAHAHA. Please know that all of my sewing knowledge was imparted to me at age six by my grandmother when I used to make elastic skirts and sleeping bags for my Barbie dolls and at age twelve during a two week sewing lesson by my 7th grade Home Ec teacher. Everyone else in Home Ec made an apron, but I made a tote bag because I would only have to sew straight lines. So.

I made three cardboard triangle templates and began tracing with markers. Hours passed. Nights passed. To be fair, I did this while watching marathon TV shows, like Food Network Celebrity Cook-Off and Two Broke Girls. All the shows backed up on my DVR that didn't need a lot of attention to watch...

I stopped counting at 600 triangles. 
(I see triangles when I close my eyes. I dream of triangles. Triangles, triangles, triangles. I might be going crazy.)

But the triangles were pretty and vintage-y and I felt good about this. Three weeks in, and all. I decided that I wanted them different designs on each side, and I didn't want a wrong side to show. (MASOCHIST ALERT.) So I broke out the dusty sewing machine and randomly grabbed triangles, sewing them together on the long sides, wrong sides out. This took approximatley 65 hours and I wish I was kidding. (Lou Diamond Phillips won Celebrity Cook-Off if you were wondering, but I really though Coolio had it in the bag with his 'Ghetto Gourmet'.  Coolio, who knew you were such a great chef?)

I then turned all the triangles right side out and ironed them, creating millions of little flags. The internet told me that I should use bias tape to string them together but apparently the internet is a billionaire because that stuff was like $1/yard. I found some 2 inch thick indoor/outdoor ribbon selling for $6.99 for 100 yards instead. And bought three. 300 yards of ribbon. 900 feet of ribbon. What have I gotten myself into?

I cut a piece of ribbon about as long as the dining room table, fold it in half longways, and iron it. Then I pin my bunting flags inside, starting each flag every twelve inches. I don't know why I decided to measure THIS when I don't measure anything else; I guess it's because I love Jasmine so much and want her wedding to be beautiful. And evenly spaced. I then sew along the entire ribbon, attaching the flags and leaving a bit extra ribbon on the ends so I can go back and sew all the little ribbons together for one ginormous strand of bunting. I was in the groove tonight, almost finished with the first spool of ribbon (100 years!) but now I kind of want to cry. Ok, just kidding. I already cried.

My very old, very inexpensive sewing machine has broken.  The wedding is less than a month away.

Dear Universe,

Please help.

Love,

Darlene

Happy New Year!

This year's Spoonflower tea towel calendar comes from addilou, and it is an adorable tree of animals. However, the fat quarter is arranged oddly, so that there is no fabric at the top to create a loop for hanging it on the dowel. I McGyver'd it, as you can see below.

Happy Ending to the Infinite Closet Saga

After my just-built closet came crashing down, I briefly considered just leaving my clothes on the floor. It was MY clothes rack that broke (of course), not the husband's. And I had been working in that closet for 45,634 days. Or thereabouts. But then my favorite dress got wrinkly and I remembered that I despise things being on the floor. Even things that belong on the floor. Like shoes. Or carpet. (Especially carpet.) So off to the hardware store I went. 

Side note: big box hardware store employees look really confused when they ask you what they can help you find and you say, nothing, I'm just browsing. Who browses in the pipe aisle?

I came home with a few options. I got some industrial pipe with some corners and put it all together thinking I would build out a bar. It looked cool on the workbench but I got annoyed that it wouldn't match the rest of the shelves and scared that it would also fall. I picked out some wooden shelf thingys that were useless and not worth mentioning. And I also got some wooden 2x4s, the same ones that I used to make the bases for the shelves on the side. I ended up attaching the wood to the drywall, painting them the same color as the wall, and then screwing the original Ikea kitchen shelf/clothes hanging rod into the wood. It was higher than I liked, which meant I lost the shelf where I planned to keep a box of sweaters, but it matched the rest of the closet. And it hasn't fallen yet.

Ten points to Gryffindor!!