Kitchen Valance and Other Details

Last weekend I revealed our freshly painted white kitchen cabinets.  Since then, I’ve been sprucing up the kitchen a bit more.  Those white cabinets made the room feel stark and cold, so a bit of colorful accessorizing was called for.  My specialty!

I showed you this fabric (Braemore Gazebo in Cloud) that I loved for a curtain, and lamented how it was wrong, all wrong.  Well, after some more consideration, I decided to go back to the fabric store and buy a half yard just to see if would work after all.  (I also saw a kitchen window shade over at Young House Love that they had made with the same fabric!  So, I figured it might work in my kitchen, too.)

After a bit of measuring and some sewing I whipped up this little valance:

My original concern was that the print was too large.  Yeah, it is kind of big, but I think it’s okay.  And my second concern was that the green color wouldn’t look good with our yellow walls.  But it coordinates with all the other green accents in the room, yay!  And I managed to get a strip that had some aqua in it, which was important!  I cut the valance so the aqua sections were front and center, while still squeezing in as much green as possible. :)  The gray also works well in here with our stainless sink and gray/black countertops.  I love it!

I trimmed it with a little piece of aqua grosgrain ribbon that I had.  I wanted to highlight the edge of the swag as well as bring in more blue.  Then I put a little tuck on each side to make the bottom swag up in a curved shape.  I just hung the shade up and then pinned them in place until they were doing what I wanted.  Then I stitched them in place from the back.  The tucks make the bottom corners kind of flip out, but oh well, no one will notice that unless they are looking at the following view. :)

I hung it using a tension rod so it would fit securely inside the frame.  Then I put the tripod on the ledge of the sink to get this shot for you. :)  While we’re up on the counters, here’s another look at my new kitty cat towel hook.  The tail is the hook part:

Speaking of new things, I also updated a few things on the other side of the room, too!  The first is an unlikely item from a cattle sale of all places!  My mother dragged me to the local cattle sale the other day.  I had never been to a cattle sale (didn’t have much need for livestock) and I was totally shocked to see rows and rows of vendors selling dry goods, produce, toys, clothes, old tools, tires, hubcaps, junk, parakeets, hens, and rabbits, too!  It was just a little much for a Monday morning!  But after the initial shock wore off,  I managed to find a cool vintage soda crate for my kitchen.  (We also bought a few crystal vases, a blouse, and had our watch batteries replaced... haha!)

I put it in that nice empty spot on top of the fridge (Sorry Michael) and stacked a little daisy arrangement on top.  I think the peeling paint and rusty spots are cool.  Plus it has dividers (for the soda bottles back in the day) so I could eventually repurpose it for craft storage or to organize my acrylic paint collection.  For now, I’m enjoying it as kitchen decor.  :) 

I have also been looking for a chalkboard to fit next to the fridge, and I finally found one!  This one is an 11 x 14 frame from Target.  I spray painted the glass insert with chalkboard paint and wrote out my weekly menu on it:

I am only responsible for advance planning of six meals a week.  That other day we can fill in as necessary with leftovers, takeout, or spontaneously whip up something!  :)  This little chalkboard keeps me accountable since I am bad to neglect my meal planning duties, which results in random things for dinner and multiple trips to the grocery store. :) 

Sometimes, it’s the little things that make a difference.  Like a new curtain… or a vintage soda crate! :)

What do you think?  You like the new kitchen accessories?

Pretty Summer Pillows

I have been busy in the sewing room making some pretty new pillows to share!  The first one is a butterfly hand-painted on cream linen.  I first saw this pillow two years ago on etsy.  As soon as I saw it, I put it on my wish list because I knew it would be perfect for the den.  Eventually I realized I was never going to pay $40 for a pillow and then it became unavailable so I was forced to take action.  Fortunately I had saved a picture of the pillow, so I decided to make my own!  Here’s the inspiration:

Gorgeous, no?  I scaled up the image to fit my pillow size and printed out just the butterfly part.  I bought some cream linen and traced the design on to the fabric.  I used acrylic paint even though fabric paint would be have been better, but I didn’t have any.  I don’t intend to wash it, so the acrylic should be fine for my purposes.  It only took me a couple of hours to paint it and then another half hour to sew it into a pillow!

It looks just like the picture, right?  Except for all that postmark-y stuff in the background.

It’s currently living it up on the den couch with all its pillow pals. :)  Yay!  And all it cost me was the price of the linen which was around $6 or so.  :)  Score!

In other pillow making news, I made a couple of doily covered pillows for my sister-in-law, Laura last week.  While they were waiting to be gift-wrapped, I had to sneak a photo op of them in the cream wingback chairs. :)  They looked right at home next to the turquoise dresser:

This was another easy pillow project.  The doilies were passed down to Laura from her grandmother so we decided to reuse them on a pillow.  I just arranged them on a square of turquoise cotton and stitched them on.  I used a machine stitch in the center down the straight lines and then hand stitched all the way around the scalloped edge to keep them from lifting.  Then I sewed an envelope closure in the back and stuck a pillow form inside. 

There you have it:  a couple of do-it-yourself pillows that look like you bought them on etsy!  :) 

A New Antique Chair

Yesterday we said goodbye to our beloved denim chair and now that we have dried our eyes, we are able to welcome the new fabulous antique chair!

This chair, as I said yesterday, came from my grandfather; he was saving it for someone who would love it and show it the attention it deserved.  Mama and I love it!  She brought it home and lived with it for a while before we decided that it would look perfect in my office if it was recovered in a nice gray velvet.  I admit, I am velvet obsessed!  Is it obvious that I don’t have children?!  Anyway this is my last velvet project until my retirement.  Haha!  No, I’m serious!  I told Mama there was a moratorium on velvet!  :)

We finally found some affordable velvet in the perfect color gray (to coordinate with my wall color and general black/gray-ness of the office decor.  Haha!  Can you decorate around computer equipment?  Why sure!  Once we got the fabric, I gave Mama a head start on the chair.  She got a lot accomplished before she needed my help.  :)

In its former life it was brownish-orange corduroy… please stop following my blog if I ever upholster anything in corduroy.  Yuck.

Once Mama started tearing it down, she discovered that before it was orange it was cream floral!

After tearing it down and restaining all the exposed woodwork Bombay Mahogany (the only color as far as I’m concerned) she began adding new batting to the seat and new webbing to the back.  Old chairs are never comfortable so we built this one up with new materials so it would be extra plush!

Next, she used the old fabric pieces to cut new ones and re-stapled them in the appropriate spot.  My Mama knows her way around an upholstery project.  Me = clueless.  But I help pull out staples and pull on the fabric when it needs to be tight and generally tell her when things are crooked or lumpy and need to be redone.  :)  Slave driver.

The back had all new batting rolled into shape and stuffed tightly into each section of the tufted back.  Then I stitched down the seam of each section through the upholstery layers into the back webbing so everything was nice and tight. 

At the top of the back, the fabric had to be gathered in and stapled just so.  The edges around the “wings” also had to be gathered in around the plump stuffing.  It was touchy… more reasons not to use velvet.  Sorry Mama! :)

All the exposed edges on the front and wings were finished off with double welt cording. 

And voila!  We’re finished:

I wrapped it up and carefully loaded it into the back of my car and brought it home with me that evening! 

Here it is in its new home.  The dark stain on the chair matches the desk perfectly.  The wood is really a rich, dark brown, but it looks black in this picture.

I love all its curves and the shiny finish!  Ahh, it’s gorgeous!

And of course, it wasn’t in the house five minutes before Bandit had climbed up to test it out.

It is Bandit-approved. :)

I will miss the denim chair, but this one is so perfectly suited for the office! Love it!  I’m still deciding if it needs a little pillow friend or perhaps a tiny side table?  We’ll see…

A Baby Boy Bambi Nursery

Back in July I shared the owl baby shower that we had for my sister, Hannah.  Her little one has finally arrived and I am back to share the details of her nursery with you.

Hannah and her husband love the outdoors so they decided to do a Bambi themed nursery.  It was nearly impossible to find cute Bambi bedding so we decided to make our own.  The cotton prints for the bedding were the jumping off point for the room.

I designed the bumper pads and the quilt with random sized patchwork pieces.  Since we couldn’t find Bambi fabric, I appliqued three of the characters on the quilt to bring in the theme.

Here’s a full view of the quilt.  I pieced it and Mama hand quilted it for Hannah and her baby.

The bumper pads are all different with random patchwork designs in orange, brown, blue, and green prints.

Here’s the owl pillow that I made for the shower.

A Bambi painting hangs over the crib.

The picture is from a Bambi children’s book and I just enlarged it and transferred the design to canvas before painting it. 

Across the room in the little nook is a custom cabinet and bookcase that my Papa built for his grandson.  The cabinet opens to reveal six pull out drawers for clothes or toys or whatever.

Hannah was kind enough to let me style it for her when I went to visit last weekend. :) 

She had so many cute accessories and frames.  They are still displaying the stock photos they came with, but we’ll pop in some cute pictures of the new guy really soon!

These vintage deer bookends are so adorable!

This little tree stump planter with baby deer came from a local thrift store.  I just cleaned it up and stuck a little fern in it.  Love!

Here’s the other baby deer bookend with a bunch of tiny books.  Cute!

And on the last wall is the changing table and dresser. The wall shelf was built by my brother for us when we were in high school.  I have a larger matching one in our guest room.

Mama made the curtains for the room and Hannah topped them with a banner that I made for the shower.

I also gave her a framed print with a cute quote.  I think it is very appropriate for little boys, “All good things are wild and free.”  I’m sure if I actually had little boys I would think, “All good things are calm and neat.”  :)  The frame is from Michael’s and I love this collection that looks like rustic barn wood.

So that’s the tour!  I am so excited with how this nursery came together.  I hope Hannah’s little man enjoys it as much as me!