Category Archives: our home

I Have a Dream… of a Fiddle Leaf Fig

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Here’s a riddle for you… what is alive (but doesn’t move on it’s own), has gorgeous green waxy leaves, is ridiculously expensive and favored by every contemporary interior designer who ever lived???

If you guessed the fiddle leaf fig, then you’d be correct!

I mean look how pretty they are!!

Enough with the inspiration photos you say??  You totally get how amazingly gorgeous these plants are???  And you understand why I am completely obsessed with them????  And you are wondering where I am going with this?????

Well, ok.  Let me tell you my little fiddle leaf fig story…

I’ve wanted one of these graphic, big-leafed beauties for going on three years now, but I have discovered that they are pricey.  REALLY pricey in fact.  A 5′ fiddle leaf fig can easily run four-hundred plus dollars… I know… I KNOW… that is ridiculously expensive!!  I have a notoriously brown thumb, so I was not about to shell out several hundred bucks for a plant that I would be likely to kill in record time.

I had heard rumors that Ikea was known to sell these plants, but I’d stalked the Ikea plant section for years without seeing so much as a bit of evidence to show that the fiddle leaf fig was ever actually sold there… I was convinced that this was a total urban myth… or was it???

Fast forward to this past weekend while I wandered the aisles of Ikea, dodging every idiot and their huge cart picking up shelves, brackets, and some of their lovely Ribba square frames… when lo and behold, what did I see??

You got it – a lovely, lonely, (smallish) fiddle leaf fig, nestled among the cheap-y palm fronds and money trees (not to hate on the money tree… I actually kind of like them).  As the Ikea patrons were examining the medium sized palm plants, I deserted my cart, and dashed over to the lone fiddle leaf fig, possibly trampling a few small children on my way.  Um, it was the holy grail – and for $12.99

HOLLAAAAAAAA!!!

Here she is –

Go on… just look at those lush pretty leaves…
 
And let’s not forget about the basket I found to house it!!  It does NOT look like it came from Ikea.  It’s big and sturdy, but it was still under $30!!  And that’s not it (I feel like an infomercial)… it also has a plastic insert to catch any water that leaks out from watering – keeping your floors dry, and preventing any rot in the pretty basket. It doesn’t get better than that folks.
Plus, look at the nice handles and black detail around the rim – House Beautiful has started to feature decorating advice from the experts in every issue, and last month one of them was “always be sure to include black in every room – it grounds the space”.  Thanks House Beautiful!  Don’t mind if I do!

And a final “beauty shot” of my little fiddle leaf fig… the mirror reflects the rest of the room, so you can kind of see how the rest of the space is evolving in this last photo…

Now I just need to figure out how to keep this little plant alive, and then I can call it a success!!

Dining Room Progress…

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Happy Monday all!  Last week, I’d talked about how I’d painted the trim in our dining room, and that from there my plans for this little space spiraled a bit out of control…

We’ll let’s take a look at a few before’s and afters from just the trim…

BEFORE:

AFTER:


Nothing earth shattering, but a DEFINITE improvement.  The trim and the ceiling had been the same color, so that really puts into context how much brighter the room felt once the trim got painted out.  Queue: sigh of relief.

This weekend, I made some SERIOUS headway on the other updates I’d wanted to make… remember this inspiration board I put together??

Well, I am VERY excited to say that the dining room is looking VERY close to this already – dare I say it, I will be finishing up our newly revamped space this week.  I’m going to hold out for a final room reveal, but I wanted to at least share a few sneak peeks at how it’s evolving…

Ooh la la… look at those pale grey walls staring back at me….  and with the white trim…  I die.

…. and what is this??  A nubby, natural, gloriously textured jute rug??  Love at first sight….

Yes.  Yes I did.  Please say hi to my new BFF – she is soft and a very pale blonde, and I absolutely adore her!
This is just the smallest glimpse of the changes this room is seeing… I cannot wait to show you all the rest of the progress later this week!
Have a happy Monday
xo

X Bench Makeover

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Say hello to my little friend(s)…

Last week I mentioned how I’d been lusting after a pair of x benches for our space, but had all but given up on the idea of them, since every bench I found cost hundreds of dollars.  I’d stopped looking for a while, and then found a pair of these guys from Target for ~$50 each.  It was a no brainer to buy them and make them over since the cost of spray paint and fabric is minimal.

I am SO happy with how these turned out…

Especially considering how they started out…

Not attractive…

The dark faux leather was so bad in person… and when I say “so bad” I mean “SOOO BAD”.  The leather was rock hard, super shiny, and had no give – it was like sitting on a slippery brick… but I saw past their sad exterior, and whipped them into shape quickly…. here’s how it went:

Step I: detach the cushions from the base.  Easy peasy…

Step II: Spray the bases the color of your choice (I went with Rustoleum’s trusty gold spray paint – never fails my friends) – while the paint dries on the bases, head upstairs to gleefully rip off the faux leather from the plywood using whatever tools at your disposal.

**This was actually the hardest step for me since the manufacturer really stapled the hell out of each bench.  I was left with lots of bits of leather and random staples I couldn’t get out, but it’s fine… no one cares about the underside…

Step III: Throw away horrible faux leather and breath a sigh of relief.

Step IV: Lay out beautiful new fabric that you will be covering the cushions with, and cut the fabric to size (leave ~3-4 inches around the sides of the plywood and foam)

Step V: Staple fabric securely to the cushion starting with the sides, and finishing with the corners

Step VI: Grab the fully dried bases from the garage, and re-attach the cushions to them (or in my case, get lazy on this step and vow to attach them tomorrow)

Step VII:  Stand back and admire your handiwork

What do you think??  Pretty good right?!

I fid that taking pictures of my projects is super helpful… it really allows me to see the imperfections that I want to go back and fix.  In this case, there is a bit of marred wood on the front side of one of the benches that I’ll want to patch, sand, and repaint for a smooth finish…

I also see now that I’ll want to trim down the extra fabric from the bottom of the cushions and that I really do need to reattach the cushions so they sit flush with the base – easy fixes, but you get the idea overall!

Big picture, these benches under-went a major overhaul!  I think it’s a huge change from dark-and-sad to light-and-bright.

So let’s recap costs and savings for a minute… the two benches cost ~$110, the fabric was marked down to $30 a yard, (I needed just 3/4 yards which came out to $22), and the two cans of spray paint were $14.

All together, this pair of benches cost me $146!

It’s not the least expensive project I’ve ever done, but considering I’d been seeing single benches for $200 each, it’s $146 compared to $400.

Pretty dang good if you ask me!

Living Room Re-design

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Do you ever have those moments when you turn around and completely hate everything in your space?? This happens to me most mornings when I try to get dressed – tons of clothes in the closet but nothing to wear…

Well, it’s started happening with decor now too – eek!

Our living room got a few updates earlier this year with a new rug, a gallery wall, and a dolled up wine hutch, but since then it has been at a complete standstill for many months.

I can’t stand the lack of change, so the time has come to switch things up.

I made a laundry list of the things I want to change, and came up with an inspiration board for how I want this space to feel – lighter colors, more natural wood elements, and overall a more organic feel…

Living Room Wishlist:
  – New sofa
  – “New” Area Rug
  – Cowhide rug (for layering)
  – Lighter colored side tables
  – Weathered wood coffee table
  – Additional Seating

I’m desperate for a new sofa (it’s about time!) and while I’ve been talking about getting rid of all the dark furniture (coffee table and side tables), it’s time!

The area rug is an easy fix – this creme colored trellis rug is the exact area rug that we have in our bedroom, and I think the rug currently in our living room would look fabulous in our bedroom with all the white bedding, and navy chevron curtains… so the easy solution is to swap rugs.  Bedroom rug moves to the living room, and living room rug moves to the bedroom.  The annoying part of this??  Moving the mattress, boxsprings, frame and headboard out of the way first…

Ok let’s not think about that… let’s talk about my plans for a cowhide rug… RugsUSA has a fab 75% off sale running over the 4th of July, making this cowhide rug just $245! I think I need to have it…..

Obviously, I can’t afford don’t plan to splurge on a new rug, new side tables, a new coffee table, a new chair (or pair of chairs) and a new sofa all at once, I’m thinking of making some temporary tweaks to what we already have in order to feel happier with this space overall… how will I do this??

PAINT.

Yep – that coffee table and side tables are getting a mini makeover in the meantime before I replace them.  They have no idea what is coming their way! I’m thinking a clean creamy white, or even a pretty light blue like the side table in the inspiration photo… although notice the card catalog drawers??? That side table is high up on my wish list….

I’m also contemplating changing up the layout of the room, but I’ll cross that bridge after making some of the initial changes to color palette…. stay tuned for more………..

Our new Upholstered Headboard

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I gave you all a sneak peek of our new headboard last week, but yesterday afternoon, it finally made it’s debut in our bedroom!

It took a lot of hard work, and a FULL weekend of sawing, sanding, measuring, drilling, screwing, gluing, upholstering, stapling, over-analyzing, band-aiding, nailing, un-nailing, re-nailing, and perhaps a little cursing somewhere in the middle, but it’s finished, and while it almost ended up face down in the middle of the freeway (another story for another day), it’s finally in our bedroom, safe and sound at last!

Literally blood, sweat (no tears), and a little stain remover went into this headboard, and I could not be more thrilled with how it turned out.  I am SO PROUD to say that with A LOT of help from my parents, I successfully made my own headboard!

We joked the entire time that the “A-Team” was working on it, and that the “A” stood for “type-A”.  It’s genetic I swear – we are all just as anal-retentive as one another… so that’s probably why it took us two full days instead of one.  It had to be JUST PERFECT – down to the stained (and lacquered) legs that no one will ever see behind the bed.

The full tutorial on what you need, and what we did is on it’s way, but in the meantime, here is a full photo dump of my pretty headboard in all it’s glory!

After living in this apartment for over a year and a half, this room is FINALLY a room that we want to spend time in.  Up until recently, it had been a catch-all for rejected furniture that didn’t belong in the rest of the house.  Slowly but surely, I’ve been making small updates to the room… making some chevron curtains, painting my furniture, replacing the dinky lamps that were there before, getting a new bed, new rug, new bedding… and the headboard is the final piece to tying this room together.

Do you even remember how this room started out??  Let me refresh your memory…

Scary!

I think I’ll also do a post on “the evolution of our bedroom” since it has gone through quite a few changes.  Anyway, getting back to our headboard…

The headboard really anchors the room, and makes the bed the focal point in the space.  While our bedroom gets less light than any other room in our house, I think we finally got it right with the light bedding and pretty blue accents.  Late morning is my favorite time of day in this room – it gets direct light, and feels bright and airy for a few hours before the sun moves beyond these windows.

The mirrors I hung behind the nightstands help reflect light for the rest of the day, and open up the space.

Let’s get a close-up of this fabric!

From a distance, you can’t see the texture, but it is one of my favorite things about the headboard.  I am usually a VERY indecisive person, but when choosing this fabric, it took me maybe 5 minutes to make up my mind on it.  The nubby texture is my favorite part… and I feel that it has the perfect mixture of tan and grey together, so wall color and bedding will never be an issue.

I started out comparing solid colored linen fabric swatches, but my concern was that if I ever picked out a bedding in a similar neutral tone that it would look like I tried (unsuccessfully) to match the fabrics, but with this texture, there is no risk of that.  I toyed with the idea of white or creme fabric, but if I ever wanted creme colored bedding and had a white headboard, or white bedding but had a creme colored headboard, it wouldn’t look right either.

So long story short, the fabric was an easy choice, and I am so in love with it!

I’ll also talk about this more in the DIY tutorial, but we went with a nailhead trim – it’s actually a strip of connected nail-heads  where you nail in every 5th nail or so.  This made it WAY easier to keep our lines straight, nail-heads evenly spaced, and after going through the process, I can’t even IMAGINE tacking in individual nail-heads.  What a nightmare that would have been!

This shot is facing the hallway that connects our bedroom (and bathroom) to the dining room, kitchen, and living room.  It’s a bit washed out due to the exposure (I swear, I am going to learn how to take better photos!) but you can KIND OF see the roman shade I made last year.

And as if the universe knew my headboard would be done, it’s peony season!  And is there anything better than a big bunch of ruffled pink peonies??

I think not!
I think that this is hands down, my best DIY to date!
What do you think?  Do you love it as much as I do?

Our Gallery Wall is up – TA-DAAAA!

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I finally installed a gallery wall in our living room after 6 months of talking about it.  
I had agonized over every little detail for way too long… the layout of our future gallery wall, frame size, frame color, and about what would go in the frames… finally I’d had enough of talking about it.  It was time for action.  
And so one evening about a month ago, I picked up my hammer and some nails, and went to town… about 15 minutes later, we had a gallery wall.

Almost none of the original frames I’d bought for this project even made it up on the wall.  I’d been thinking black frames across the board, but after buying a few non-black frames, decided to flip this gallery wall on it’s head, and spray them all gold.  Rustoleum spray paint to the rescue!

Once the frames were all sprayed and dry, I hung the large vintage print of the sailboat first.  With the largest piece of the puzzle complete it was easy to see where the other frames needed to go, and so I just started nailing up frames around it…

The gallery wall actually needs a few tweaks – in my preview post (the grainy cell phone shot of this wall after I finished it) I mentioned that the left side needed to be evened out.  I’ve started on that process slowly – replacing the illustrated Paris and London prints with brighter abstract prints that coordinate eerily well with the La Baule sailboat piece.  The left side still needs something else, to make it feel “even” but we’re getting there slowly.  Maybe a few more smaller frames will do the trick…

This was how it started…

Not bad by any means, but you can really see how the abstract prints bring some much needed life to the space, and help tie things together…

Kris’ least favorite game in the world is the “do you notice anything different” game when he comes home.  His first response is usually… your hair looks really good… is that it?  Did you get your hair done??

A well trained man… but this time, he noticed the gallery wall first.

This wall was VERY blah for a long time with three undersized black and white prints from Ikea – one in a broken frame.  Classy.  Remember how it looked before?

Don’t be fooled… this is actually a REALLY good picture of how it looked before.

Here’s a better “before”:

This makes me realize and really appreciate how far this room has come since we first moved in…

I like that this space has a lot more character, and that there is a lot of color going on.  As much as I admire Restoration Hardware’s style, I could never live in a room devoid of color and pattern that way.  I love pieces from their collections, but all tan and white and grey and greige (grey / beige) is not my jam.

Color makes me happy, and so this gallery wall is making me REAL happy.

Another thing I really want to point out here… the blue pillows with the white stitching.  These were a little DIY I did a few months ago.

Do you know where I got the fabric?

Target – the happiest place on earth (next to Disneyland)  The fabric was actually a shower curtain in another life.  That $19.99 shower curtain is now two throw pillow covers in our living room.  And I made them!  Holla!

A little stitch witchery (iron on bonding), and presto-chango.  We’ve got a pair of inexpensive, vibrant pillow cases, that are summery and fun… and match PERFECTLY with the water in the print (that was totally unintentional since the pillows happened way before the print was hung).

And so that’s that… slow changes over time, mean big changes in the end.  I am really happy about my little gallery wall!

Bedroom Updates

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Happy Monday!  Hope you all had a relaxing weekend!

I’ve been a busy bee, working on a few things for our bedroom.  There are some bedroom updates coming  soon enough, but in the meantime, here’s a little sneak peak of a) how I spent my weekend, and b) what is on it’s way into our bedroom this week…

It’s obvious enough to me, but are there any guesses??

Ahh, that fabric just makes my heart flutter…

Our New Aztec Rug

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Taaaa-daaaaaa!  Meet our new little Aztec print rug that came home with me from HomeGoods over the weekend… it’s now sprucing up our teeny tiny kitchen!
Like my leopard print pajama pants?  I’m just keeping things super stylish my friends….. 

Our kitchen is a room that I’ve never photographed or posted before – and for a good reason!  It’s small, it’s old, and as a renter, there is not a lot that we can do about the hideous tile, dated appliances, and miniscule size.  I hate this room.  Like REALLY hate.

Other spaces of our apartment, I’ve been able to doll up with paint, or large rugs, or furniture, and art, but attacking the cabinetry and walls in here with paint seems like a HUGE undertaking… especially since I’d have to remove cabinet doors, hardware, and paint around big appliances like the refrigerator and stove.  I’d really rather not go there, since there’s no telling how much longer we’ll be in this apartment.

Don’t get me wrong… we have a great place (which I DO love), and it’s in the best neighborhood of San Francisco, but this kitchen is pretty much the bane of my existence.

Fortunately, this little gem of a rug is bright and happy, and a good size!  It measures roughly 5’x3′ so it covers up quite a bit of our very old, very dinged up linoleum floor (is there anything worse than linoleum??)
Maybe it’s in my head, but I think the bright colors help distract from the ugliness of the rest of the kitchen, and the dark colors will also help camouflage spills (we had a white rug in here previously, and let’s just say that it ended disastrously).

Ok, prepare yourself for these next photos… there’s nothing cute about them…

Here is the view into the kitchen from our hallway… everything is painted in that dirty off-white paint that the rest of our apartment suffers from.  Looking at this photo, I’ve decided that the wall above our lovely $15 trash can needs some flair…

Will be on the hunt for some art ASAP.  And perhaps a nicer trash can…

And here’s the view from the entry hall, looking in towards the sink, and the glorious tile.  While there is something to be said for the kitchen still having it’s original tile from the 1930’s, I’d love to know what posessed the person who picked out the color combo…

The tile on the back-splash is like skin colored!  And the trim is maroon.

Seriously, WTF?

Ok, my rant is over… Let’s pretend the tile doesn’t exist, and focus on the good here… my new little rug.

Oh I love it!

New Bedding

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I had a very successful trip to HomeGoods yesterday.  VERY successful.  
I went in looking for a chair – something overstuffed and comfy – to replace the wicker chair in the living room.  While I didn’t come out with a chair, I came out with some new bedding, a few rugs, pillows, glass vases… oh the list goes on and on…
Since I’d been looking for bedding without much luck for the past several months, I’d even entertained the idea of making my own bedding.
With the navy and white bold stripe chevron curtains, I wanted something to coordinate, without necessarily “matching” and I’ve been obsessed with deep blues and indigos.  I can fully admit to my trellis pattern obsession, and with a trellis rug in the room, I knew any interlocking, repeating trellis print was out.  

I also wanted to stay away from stripes to avoid anything too matchy-matchy with the curtains.
       
I found it was incredibly hard to find bedding with blue and white – a true white.  There was lots of creme and blue, or tan and blue, so when I found a Queen size set of the blue and white Ralph Lauren paisley sheets in the bin at Homegoods yesterday, I was bound and determined to find them in a King size set.
Patiently I went through bin-by-bin, rummaging through every. single. set. of. sheets.  No luck.  If you’ve been to a Homegoods, you know how disorganized it all is.  I went through each bin and shelf a second time, just to be sure that I hadn’t missed it.  No luck again.  I accepted defeat, and moved on to the bath accessories section.
What did I find hiding behind a stack of sea-horse printed hand towels??  Well, it was the king size set of blue and white paisley Ralph Lauren Sheets that I’d spent the last 30 minutes hunting down!
JACKPOT.
They are great quality – 500 thread count, and the set included the fitted sheet, flat sheet, and two shams… for $50.  
$50 DOLLARS?!  I literally couldn’t believe it.  The set was cheaper than a single flat sheet I’d gotten a few months ago!
In the massive bin of throw pillows, I found a deep blue ikat roll pillow that coordinates with the sheets.  I wish it was down fill, but I can look for an insert later.  I’m still holding out for Euro Sham covers that I love, but so far, the addition of the sheets and roll pillow dramatically improve the bedding situation.
What do you think??

Also, you might also notice our lovely makeshift headboard…

Pretty huh?  Yeah… pretty awful.
It’s only temporary, I assure you.  We pieced it together to determine how high and wide we want the headboard to be.  You also can’t see from this far away, but we’re also trying to determine how large and at what angle we want the side cut-outs to be.
We’re planning on the belgrave headboard shape, like this DIY from Sarah M. Dorsey Designs:
Source
Can’t wait for more bedroom updates!
xo

Musical Curtains

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So this isn’t TOO exciting, but I wanted to share a few updated shots of our living room, after playing musical curtains the other weekend.

Since hanging the chevron curtains in our bedroom, the creme colored silk panels that had been in the bedroom, made themselves a new home in the living room with the other silk panels.

AT LAST we have four panels hanging along the row of windows in our living room!

For pretty much everyone except me, the change is nothing you’d even think twice about, but for the longest time, these windows just had a single curtain flanking each end.

These aren’t great photos, but they’re evidence that it was a bit bare:

See the empty space between windows?  It just sort of bugged me, and felt unfinished…

Here is a better picture to illustrate how “empty” it felt to me……

Obviously this snapshot is from a long time ago… before the new rug moved in with us.  Don’t you agree that there was something missing?  It just needed a little something extra…

And now it does…

I think it makes the room feel larger, and more complete, and since we get direct sunlight in here ALL DAY LONG, I think the curtains really help soften and filter the light.

Here are a few more pictures since I know you’re as excited as I am… NOT.

Side note… the room is really neutral as of now since I wanted to simplify and de-clutter after all the excess of Christmas.  Now that we are getting closer to spring, I’ve got my eye on some brighter colors and fun patterns for the pillows, so the room will feel a bit more awake after all the neutral colors of January and February.

And, that’s it!  Just wanted to share the little update with you all!  Happy Wednesday!