E-Reader Case

Made this e-book reader case for a prize on Pinstrosity. I LOVE this fabric. I've been eyeing it ever since I first saw it. I was excited for a reason to get some and make something out of it. 

Bedroom Makeover

Valentines Day kinda flopped as plans changed last minute with work schedules, family needs, etc. Cameron was going to come home to a nice home cooked meal, his favorite candy, a completely redone bedroom, and a movie night. Slowly he's gotten each thing, just not all in one go. Our bedroom has been in dire need of help since we moved here we got married. Here's what it looked like Friday morning when Cameron left for work:

Ew. 

Over-stuffed and unorganized bookshelves, makeshift side tables, our big and warm yet not so pretty winter bedding, the ever growing pile of clothes/shoes to give to the thrift store, the spot where the tv used to be (where the DDR mat still is..), a messy dresser top, and our dirty laundry pile. It always gets the least amount of attention because we're the only ones that ever see it. This is why I decided to redo the room. I'm not all the way done yet, but I've got a good start. 

Here's what the one side looks like so far:

Isn't that way way way better? I pulled the spring bedding out, hung stuff all over the wall, and traded out the bookshelf for a side table. It looks like a whole new room! 

Let me show you a few of the things I did. First the side tables. The one on my side of the bed was given to us a long time ago, but it was the only one. While cruising through my favorite Antique store I found this little beauty, which is similar to our already existing side-table:

Okay, so it's not really all that beautiful. But I knew it could be. I'd seen a ton of pins on sanding down old furniture and painting it and thought I'd give it a try. Em let me borrow their sander and I got to work. That finish did not want to come off...I'm not a sanding fan. But I do like how it turned out so it was worth it I guess. Once it was all sanded down I painted the body of it a tan and then threw in some accent colors for the drawer and back:

I put all of Cameron's trinkets and treasures in the drawer for him and left out his cup of pens/pencils, the 52 Reasons I Love You deck of cards I made him, his Duck Dynasty DVD, some of his special books, and his favorite picture of me. Then the poor guy gets a girly birdcage for now. Oh well.  

 I haven't sanded down my side-table yet, but it's slated to happen. So for now I just arranged the objects over it's not-so-prettiness. 

 Candles in the colors I tried to use for the wall hangings, then my current reading books, the glass I keep by the bed for the jewelry I forgot to take off before climbing in bed, and my various personal items. It'll look really nice when it's done, but for not it's not too bad. 

I wanted something above the bed and thought about making a headboard, but we don't have a frame for our bed yet (it just sits on the floor) and so I figured I should probably wait for that. Instead I decided to do a collage of pictures/objects for the wall space above the bed. 

I collected items for about 3 months for this. I frequented the antique shops and thrift stores around town looking for cheap frames. Finally I collected the perfect ones and took them home to paint. 

I wasn't a fan of that gold color, but I loved the frame shape...so I got it, painted it, and now it looks like this:

 

I'm still not quite sure where to hang it, as there wasn't really space above the bed for it...but I'll find somewhere for it. For now it's just on a random wall in the room. 

I also found this frame and painted it:

I started by painting it green, but then I decided I wanted it turquoise instead. Now it frames the bouquet I used in our 5th Anniversary Wedding Photos. 

Two other frames I got cheap and painted to match the colors are these two: 

 The one frames the first page of our song (The Lovers Waltz by Jay Ungar and Molly Mason), and the other holds a birds nest the blew out of our back porch rafters. 

It was fun to be able to paint the frames to get the color pops that I wanted. It would have taken forever to track down just the shapes and colors that I wanted if I hadn't. Don't be afraid to paint your frames! It was fun.

The Love Story Wall Hanging and Pastel Bird were both done for this project too. 

The rest of the items in the collage were trinkets, frames, pictures, and odds and ends that I picked up from various stores. 

I tried to get at least one photo from each portrait session we've had done since we got married. It's fun to have all those different stages of us up on the wall. 

Round frame: Pretty in Pink Photography
Top Photo: Treehouse Photography
Middle Photo: Lexi Moody Photography
Bottom Photo: Jacie Ames Photography

I love how this part of the project has turned out and it makes me motivated and excited to finish the rest of the room. I just need to get the pile of clothes to the thrift store, move the dressers around, get us a real hamper, and finish the quilt I started for the bed (all in the same colors as the wall hangings). I've got a ways to go, but it will look so fun when it's done! 

Love Story Wall Hanging

For Valentines Day I got everything I needed to redo our bedroom. We had no pictures or wall hangings. A big pile of clothes to go to the thrift store. A teetering old bookshelf. A battered night stand. And white everything. I decided to jazz the place up. I had big plans. Cameron was going to leave work with everything normal and come home to an awesome dinner and a completely redone room. Well...life got crazy and then I got called in to work on Valentines Day and the day just didn't happen like I planned it. I still don't have the room finished, but I have elements of it done. I spent a lot of time on Pinterest, at our antique shops, in the craft section at Walmart (because that's all we have here other than Family Dollar), and going through various shops downtown. I came up with a good handfull of ideas for what I wanted. One idea though came from this picture I found on Pinterest: 

I thought that was really a cute idea, but I wanted it to be a little more personal than that. So I tweaked the idea a little. I wrote up our story (how we met, how we became friends, our dating story, our engagement, etc) in third person. It was really fun to go back through details of our story. It took me a few days to write it. I wanted to make sure I got it just right. 

Once I finished the story, I then used Gimp to organize the text into columns so it would fill the entire page. I knew I wanted "Every Love Story is Beautiful but Ours is my Favorite" on the page, but I didn't want it to cover up any of the words beneath. I finally figured out how to do what I wanted with layers and ended up with this:

Here's a small section of the page zoomed in so you can see how the whole story is still readable through the large words:

I printed it out 16x20 and have it in a frame all ready to go on the wall when I get the room finished up. I wasn't sure how he'd react to this...it's more sentimental than some guys like I think. But he was so sweet and excited and he seemed touched by it, which made me feel good. I'm excited to get this on the wall!