Bright Lights

I've been wanting to get new light fixtures in my home since I moved in. Two things stand in my way: 1) I am afraid of messing with the electrical work and 2) My living room has 15ft tall ceilings and I don't have a ladder tall enough to even get high enough to take down the ugly track lighting and dated white ceiling fan if I wasn't afraid of electrocuting myself!

I'd love to do something like this above my dining room table:

(via apartment therapy)

(via design sponge) ( Light kit found here)

I love the red! I think it would really pop and I know that I'd probably be able to find a chandelier at a thrift store for less than $15 - add some spray paint and voila!

(via design sponge)

This would be great for outdoors... too bad Oklahoma winds would probably destroy them in a matter of minutes:

(via casasugar)

P.S. Laying in bed sick for almost 2 days has left me looking at SO many design/DIY blogs, it's not even funny. I want to redecorate every room in my house now!

Up and Running!

I've spent a majority of today working on my new etsy shop. (For those of you who aren't familiar with etsy, it is an online marketplace for people to buy and sell handmade and vintage items.)

I've got the shop up and running. Take a look around!

Etsy: Your place to buy & sell all things handmade lot26vintage.etsy.com

Snow Day

Being snowed in for a few days has given me a lot of free time to do some much needed cleaning and organizing around the house. While cleaning, I found some lovely little handcrafted goodies that I decided to relist on my etsy site. I've put the link on my sidebar to the right.

Once I upload all my vintage finds to etsy, I'll post that store up there as well.

Something's in the works...

If you've been reading my blog for a while, you can probably tell that I enjoy antique shopping. I usually go once a week - and no, I would not consider myself addicted. I am, however, a bit quirky about how I shop.

Antique shopping is a bit different than any other type of shopping. When I shop for clothes, I like going with a girlfriend. You can ask for their opinion on something and if you shop at the same stores, you can make sure you aren't purchasing something they bought the week before. When I go antique/thrift shopping, I have to go alone. I have my regular stores that I go to and I have a weird system of shopping. If someone is shopping with me, it throws of my entire game plan because I'm concentrating more on the person than I am the merchandise. (Man, typing this all out makes me feel a lot more OCD about it than I am!) It's like when you host a party - You are so busy wondering if everyone is having a good time or if there's enough food and drinks for everyone or if everyone has a place to sit that you forget to just relax and have a good time. At the store, I am wondering if the other person has looked at everything they want to or if they are bored of the store and they are just wandering around waiting on me, so I just hurry up and end up not enjoying myself. I think I end up doing this because I'm the only one of my friends that is really into antiquing and having to dig around for the good stuff. If I was shopping with someone that was as into it as I am, it would probably be a different story.

I look at antique and thrift store shopping as a treasure hunt. Each of my regular stores has it's own "map" and I have a route set out for each one. For example, at The Rink Gallery, I always start on the south side of the building and work my way north. I know which booths to skip (the Western-themed one and the Dollhouse/Lace one) and which ones have great finds every time (the booth in the Northeast corner, next to the one with all the old oil cans and bookshelves). If I'm lucky, I leave with a fun little piece of the past. Even if I don't purchase anything, I'm still entertained by all the weird stuff people are trying to sell.

After being inspired by Three Potato Four and a conversation with my friends Beth and Brad, I have decided to take my hobby of antique shopping and work it into my List. I am working on creating an Etsy store to sell vintage goods that I find on my shopping excursions.

We'll see how it goes! I'm hoping for the best! I've already accumulated a handful of items that will be listed once the Etsy store is set up.

The only thing I am lacking right now is a name for the store... I've been trying to come up with one the past couple of days, but my mind is drawing a blank... grrrr!

I will definitely post a link once everything is set up!

Have a seat...

I found this Louis-style chair at The Rink a couple months ago. I bought it knowing it could be amazing after a little bit of work was put into it.

This project took me a lot longer than expected. The actual work was pretty uncomplicated, but since I had never worked with a chair like this, I psyched myself out every time I looked at it!

I removed the old ugly fabric within the first few days of bringing it home. That didn't take too long - just a lot of muscle. I made sure when I was removing the old fabric, that I was careful to keep all the pieces in tact and that I remembered how it was attached in the first place. This is probably the most important step in reupholstering furniture. The old fabric serves as a template for the new fabric.

I was super lucky that the batting was in great shape and that I didn't have to replace it. This was my first time working with a chair of this type - The only tutorial I could find online was this one at PoeticHome and just looking at the photos for replacing the stuffing made me want to vomit!

I had considered painting the wood a bright fun color like Jenny did over at Little Green Notebook, but I decided to go with my gut and stain it instead.

After having sat in my office for forever, naked (the chair, not me), I moved the it to the garage, where it sat. And sat. And who knows how much more time passed before I stopped procrastinating and actually started working on it again. My biggest issue was not so much procrastination, but the fact that I REALLY like the chair and I didn't want to screw it up!

Stripping the old paint took a few days... those little grooves are no fun to get paint out of!

I stained the wood and finished with a coat of polyurethane.

I finally found a print that I liked, so I cut pieces of fabric using the old fabric as templates, adding a couple inches around the edges so the print with line up the way I liked. Stapling the new fabric on was one of the easiest steps of the entire project. There was a little edge of wood where the wood trim met the batting - this is where the staples went. The staples were then hidden by hot glueing the piping around the edge.

I love how the chair turned out!

What do you think?

Have you had any projects that are WAY easier than you thought they would be?

#27 - Day 365 - Crossing it off my List!

Welp, a year has gone by and I've got a photo a day to show it!

Now that #27 is done, this means I've actually got to start writing on here... haha

#27 - Day 364

Brayden's baby dedication.