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Monday, July 21, 2014

Home Office Built-In Bookshelves

We installed all of the crown molding in the study this weekend, and the built-in bookshelves are about 97% complete!  For the crown molding, we used an upside down piece of baseboard combined with a pretty thick piece of crown molding to give it a little bit chunkier look.  I don't have any great photos, but I couldn't wait to share it with you so here’s what we have so far:


All we have left to do is pick out and put up the vertical trim pieces and fill up the shelves of course.  I also bought a light fixture, which was on sale for $60 at Lamps Plus!  I was looking for a couple of natural material pieces to balance out all of the painted finishes in this room and I love how the bamboo fixture looks.  And since the only switched outlet in the room was located inside the built-in desk, on the opposite wall of where I wanted my switched light fixture (of course), we had to do some electrical work to make the other outlet switched.  My awesome dad was able to do this by switching out some wires in the basement.  I’m still not exactly sure how he did it, but the outlet I wanted switched is now switched, so I am a happy camper.



We have a couple of projects left in this room and then we will be finished with one more room.  (If you're counting, that's four rooms out of thirteen that will be done... and we've been in the house for almost two years.  Slow and steady wins the race??  I'll go with that :)).  Anywho, here’s the updated to-do list for the study:

  • Install hardwood floors
  • Build built-in desk and bookshelves
  • Install crown molding
  • Buy area rug
  • Buy/hang light fixture
  • Install outlet in built-in - 0% complete
  • Paint free-standing desk
  • Paint file cabinet - 1% complete
  • Reupholster wingback chair - 0% complete
  • Decorate - 50% complete

Saturday, July 5, 2014

DIY Industrial Jewelry Holder

Lately I have been on a kick of giving people home made things for gifts.  Two of my friends recently moved into new houses, so I wanted to make them something special for a house warming gift.  I saw this DIY jewelry organizer on Making Home Base and I thought it would be perfect!  I had already worked with this type of pipe for my curtain rods in the family room and I love the industrial look they create.



I knew I wanted the color to be a sort of distressed oil rubbed bronze so I bought the black steel pipes from home depot.  They actually have all different short sizes already cut (they are called "nippes"... hehe) so I didn't even have to ask someone to cut them down for me.  Everything you need (besides the wood base) can be found in the plumbing isle.  I bought the following pipes and fittings (they are all 1/2"):
  • 1 - 8" pipe (for the top vertical piece)
  • 2 - 5" pipes (for the bottom vertical piece and the bottom horizontal piece)
  • 2- 6" pipes (for the top horizontal pieces)
  • 2 - tees
  • 1 - floor flange
I assembled all of the pipes and screwed the whole thing to a piece of scrap wood.  Then I gave it a coat of gold spray paint, let that dry for a day, then followed up with a coat of ORB spray paint.  Then after the second coat dried, I lightly sanded it in random places to make the gold come through.  For the base I just cut a piece of scrap pine to an 8"x"8 square, sanded down the edges a bit, and stained it dark walnut.  Then I spray painted the tops of 4 3/4" screws and attached my pipes to the base.  And there you have it!

The great thing about this is you can easily customize it for the sizes/colors you want.  Spray paint is a wonderful thing!

Linking up at these great parties... go check them out!

Thursday, July 3, 2014

Greg's Veggie Garden

Yeesh, it’s really hard to settle into a completely new schedule!  I think about blogging all of the time and just can’t seem to find the time to sit down and write!

Our home office progress is moving along slowly but surely.  We got all of the bookshelf units up and I got all of the adjustable shelves cut and painted, but then found out that the middle ones are too short for the opening L.  Note to self: measure shelf width AFTER installing the base units.  So now I’ll just have to cut/paint new shelves.  I also have all of the crown molding painted and ready to go!  Hopefully we can get that up this weekend.

Greg has been busy in the veggie garden lately!  I am so glad he is consistent with taking care of it because everything would be dead in a week if it were left up to me.  Greg must have gotten his mother’s green thumb because he is a growing machine!  Some of our squash are coming in already, as well as the spinach and lettuce!  We had grilled chicken lettuce wraps the other night and they were delicious!  We are trying a couple of new things from last year… here’s everything we are growing this year and some pictures of the garden so far:

  • Cherry tomatoes
  • Roma tomatoes
  • Pink tomatoes (so fun!)
  • Potatoes
  • Zucchini
  • Cucumbers (new)
  • Yellow squash
  • Spaghetti squash
  • Peas (new)
  • Carrots
  • Eggplant (new)
  • Bell peppers
  • Strawberries (new)
  • Blueberries (new)
  • Corn (new)
  • Spinach (new)
  • Romaine lettuce (new)
  • Basil
  • Oregano
  • Mint
  • Cilantro
  • Dill