Final projects for the study

My dad stained 2 long shelves for me when I moved into my townhouse, way back when, and I've been moving them with me ever since.  The items displayed on the shelves have evolved since I was 19, from dolls to Amish souvenirs to sunflowers, and a few things in between...

 How was I ever this girly?

 or this cluttery?

...and now they display some of our favorite books in our updated study.  They just needed a quick update to be ready for their new home, nestled in this reading corner: 

I got to work this weekend staining them with Minwax's Red Mahogany 405.  Since the room is full of dark wood tones, I feel like the old version would look too juvenile for the space.  If the room was full of lighter tones, I would have hung them back as is.

The pics of the shelves above will have to serve as before pictures, because my camera had a temper tantrum and I lost the ones I took when I started the project.  I stained them both , waited 20 minutes or so, and then took a rag and wiped off any excess stain that didn't penetrate the wood.  I'm sure it's not professional looking, but it's my first staining project, and I'm just glad there aren't too many drip marks or blotches :)

After I let them dry for a few hours I went out to check on them and they were sticky.  According to the internets, this is either because it was humid and they needed to dry longer, or I didn't wipe enough of the excess stain off them.  I'm gonna assume it was the latter, so I gave it another pass with a dry rag to get more of the excess off.  They weren't sticky this morning, so we hung them up and adorned them with books and accessories!

Done!

The final project in the study was changing the light fixture - we took down the date gold fixture with gross mini-lampshades and replaced it with a rubbed bronze fixture with 3 frosted glass half-globes.  Much better!

I am so excited that this room is completely done!  It's been months in the making, and I'm sure we should have finished it sooner, but life got in the way...regardless, it's done now! :)

Strawberry Street is awesome!

After work today, I went downtown to check out a consignment shop my mom told me about - Blue Elephant.  Random that she found out about it before I did since she's in Florida...the girls at the shop agreed :)  It's so cute and full of unique items.  They have lots of vintage linens, kitchen tchotchkes, and a little bit of antique furniture.  The display in the front window was random and awesome, and the 2 girls working there were very friendly and I could tell they are having fun at this new place.

I picked up 2 vintage Fire King candle glow bowls that I can use for prep in the kitchen, sugar and creamer set from Pottery Barn (so cute!), and a heart-shaped candy dish for 12 bucks...

Then I walked next door to Strawberry Street Flowers and Gifts - wow, is this my kind of place.  The smell of fresh flowers fills up the shop, and they had garden accessories, quirky dish towels, candles, and paper goodness.  Love this place!  I bought a dish towel embroidered with an A that I'll use to make a pillow.

I picked up some wine at the Strawberry Street Vineyard and then headed home.  If Dave had been with me, I'm sure we would have eaten at the cafe for dinner, but I came home instead.  I'm happy with my purchases and I'll be going back for brunch and maybe pick up some of those fresh flowers I smelled today.  :)

Product spotlight: Swiffer Dust & Shine

This might sound like an exaggeration but it isn't.  Every time I dust I have an asthma attack.  Not a big one, or a life-threatening one, but an attack.  Every time.  So if you come to my house and it's dusty, that's why.  It's a bit of a catch-22:  if I dusted more often, there would be less stirred up when I do, and I might have less of a reaction; but asthma attacks are scary even when they're little, so dusting more and causing more attacks isn't appealing to me.

Please love me in spite of my dust.

The other week at the store I was looking at dusting products that might make this chore less dangerous for me, and I picked up Swiffer's Allergen Reducing Dust and Shine Furniture Spray.

I used this last weekend while dusting the living room and study and the dust particles didn't bother me at all!  It smells good, not like normal dusting spray, and I even think it gets better results than the other products I've tried like Pledge.

Just wanted to give it a plug - I'll be using this from now on to avoid asthma flare-ups, and maybe my house will be healthier along with me!

Fried green tomatoes

Every since I was like 13 and saw "Fried Green Tomatoes" I wanted to try this crunchy on the outside, soft on the inside treat.  Christie got me thinking about them a few weeks ago, and when I was at Berry's Produce on Friday I picked up 2 huge green tomatoes.  I decided this was finally the weekend I'd try to make them.

It's also the weekend I'd use my Pampered Chef coating trays.  I bought these months ago and hadn't even taken them out of the box until this tomato adventure.  They are awesome and perfect for any layered coating recipe.  Here's what you'll need:

I sliced the tomatoes into about 1/2 inch thick slices and coated them using flour, egg/milk, and breadcrumb/cornmeal mixtures listed below:

• First bowl/tray - 1 cup flour
• Second bowl/tray - 1/2 cup milk and 2 eggs, whisked together
• Third bowl/tray - combine 1/2 cup bread crumbs, 1/2 cup cornmeal, 2 tsp. salt, and 1/2 tsp. black pepper
• Skillet on medium heat - enough vegetable oil to create 1/2 inch deep bath for the tomatoes

I put the coated tomatoes into the vegetable oil to cook.  I had my splash screen ready to go just in case, but turns out I didn't need it. 

I let them cook until they were golden brown and then flipped them....once they were finished on both sides I let them cool on a wire rack.  They turned out like this:

They were tasty - my only complaint is that I may have cooked them a little too long because some of the thinner slices were a little mushy.  But it was good for my first try and Dave loved them.  I don't think there are any left, including the scraps I left on my plate.

Half-fail

Today's project is to hide the contents of my pantry.  I keep serving bowls, platters, and extra dishes in there and I hate that anyone walking through the kitchen can see all of it.  Even when it's neat and organized (which is not the case in the picture below), it looks messy.

At Lowe's the other night, I picked up some Valspar glass frosting spray paint to make the doors translucent instead of clear glass.  This morning, I took the glass off the pantry doors and took them outside for their makeover.

Once I cleaned them I sprayed several coats of the spray paint on them to create the frosted look.  By several I mean 7 or 8 - I kept spraying because I wasn't get the look I wanted.  After the 3rd or 4th coat it stopped working and I sould have stopped spraying, but I was convinced I could make it look even more frosted.

I left them outside in full sun to dry for about an hour...

...and brought them inside to put them back on the pantry doors:

I'm calling it a half-fail because you can still see what's behind the doors.  But it is camouflaged enough that you can't tell what it is or how messy it is.

Putting my Pampered Chef loot to work

Bonnie dropped off my Pampered Chef order from her party today and I couldn't wait to use some of the tools and spices I got!

Here's what I ordered:

• Grill pan for Dave - he said he needed something to lay on top of the grill grates when he cooks kabobs or chicken wings to make it easier to flip them without losing pieces in the fire
• Garlic slicer - diced garlic is very pungent and can be overwhelming to me and this tool creates slices that have a more toned-down flavor
• Salad chopper - these things are awesome!  They can slice a whole tomato, chicken breast, peppers, etc. into small enough pieces for fajitas, chicken salad, or salsa; if I had better knife skills I wouldn't need this but my hand tends to cramp up when I'm slicing stuff...
• Corer - nuff said
• Chipotle rub
• Thai peanut sauce - this was a freebie with a purchase over a certain amount
• 'Sweeten it up' set - this contains 3 sweet mix jars:  cinnamon, caramel, and mocha hazelnut; you can use them in coffee or baking projects for added sweet flavor; this is the item I used immediately and I found a new purpose for the muslin bag they came in

While I was at Bonnie's party, I was smelling all the sweet sprinkle mixes and the demonstrator, Rachel, told us some ways to use them.  I used one of those ideas tonight to make a sweet treat with some crescent rolls I had in the fridge.  I rolled out the dough without separating it into the individual rolls and pinched the seams to make it all one piece.  I melted some unsalted butter and brushed a thin layer on the dough, then sprinkled on the caramel mix.

I rolled up the dough and sliced it up into about 12 pieces, making little cinnamon rolls. 

I baked it on my stone using the directions on the crescent roll package and ended up with golden brown goodness:

While they were baking I put the 3 sprinkle mixes in the pantry with the rest of the spices and rubs and got to work repurposing the muslin bag the set came in.  In my baking cabinet I have some shoebox-sized totes containing various accessories like cupcake liners, cookie cutters, sugar sprinkles, and cake decorating tools.  The cake decorating one has gotten a little out of hand with the number of piping tips I've purchased, and it needed a good amount of organization.  Here's the before - blech:

And after...I put all the piping tips and pastry wheels in the bag and it looks much nicer!

Beautiful lyrics and a beautiful song

God loves a lullaby
In a mothers tears in the dead of night
Better than a Hallelujah sometimes.
God loves a drunkards cry,
The soldiers plea not to let him die
Better than a Hallelujah sometimes.

We pour out our miseries
God just hears a melody
Beautiful the mess we are
The honest cries of breaking hearts
Are better than a Hallelujah

The woman holding on for life,
The dying man giving up the fight
Are better than a Hallelujah sometimes
The tears of shame for what's been done,
The silence when the words won't come
Are better than a Hallelujah sometimes.

We pour out our miseries
God just hears a melody
Beautiful the mess we are
The honest cries of breaking hearts
Are better than a Hallelujah

Better than a church bell ringing,
Better than a choir singing out,singing out.

We pour out our miseries
God just hears a melody
Beautiful the mess we are
The honest cries of breaking hearts
Are better than a Hallelujah

Witty title

So, about that dish towel from earlier.  I got so excited about making a pillow out of it, I decided I needed to do it now.

So I went up to my craft room, dug through all my fabric scraps, and found nothing that was both fun-and-funky and complementary to the navy/white towel.  I did, however, find a very modest navy fabric with musliny cream stars that I used for a patriotic quilt I made for Nate's dad as a host gift.

I whipped up a pillow using the star fabric as the back, making sure to leave room for the little white tassels to be visible on the other side of the seam.  It took longer than I expected and longer than it should have, but it's so worth it!  How cute is this?!?

From mission to Kristen

I love my laptop desk, but I've never been a fan of the drawer pull.  Even when I was looking at it in the store before the purchase, I was thinking about what look I would choose to update the piece a bit.  The pull that came with it makes it mission style, and I always associate mission with southwest designs.  Not a fan.  Here's how the desk looked earlier tonight:

I wanted to go one of two ways.  The first option was fun and funky, playing off the new green color on the walls.  The other was a classic Victorian style glass pull.  Here are my 3 options:

I got the 2 bigger pulls from Anthropologie - they have the hugest selection of knobs and pulls I've ever seen outside Lowe's and Home Depot.  Every style and color you could imagine.  Love that place!  I picked up the smaller glass one at Through the Garden Gate, along with 2 purchases for my yet-to-be-fully-thought-out beachy chic master bath.  More on those later in the post.

The green one lost the contest immediately.  While it does meet the fun and funky requirement, it's the wrong green and fun and funky is not how I would describe our living room.   It's going back.  Next I tried the smaller glass one - because it fits the scale of the piece better.  Too bad the screw that came with it was too short to make it all the way through the hole and actually attach to the knob.  Wop-wop.

So that leaves the large glass knob, which fit perfectly and is growing on me.  It is a little large for the scale of the drawer it is attached to, but it's really cute and I feel the whole thing fits in more with the other furniture pieces in the living room.

 this picture really makes me want to take a vacation :)

It's a subtle change, but I feel like it gives the desk a whole new look.

See those paint chips in the background?  That's the color palette I'm thinking about for our bathroom.  I'm leaving towards Homestead Resort Spa Aqua from Valspar's Historical Preservation line - funny since we picked this out before visiting the Homestead Resort on our recent trip to the mountains.

It's a very soothing color - I need to tape it to the wall in the bathroom and look at it at all times of the day and levels of sunlight to see if it is in fact my color.

I'm working on an inspiration board for the bathroom, using the existing double-sink vanity and brushed nickel shelving we already have in there.  We need to keep this as cheap as possible so we're going to work with the big pieces we have, and allow paint, crisp white linens, and beachy accessories to make the impact in the room.  I'll share it once it is complete - I'm still looking for mirror and lighting options.

Two items that are on the inspiration board have already been purchased.  I visited my favorite crafty store in Richmond - technically it's the only crafty store, because I haven't located any more of them.  It is msotly garden and beachy accessories and decorating items, and most of the merchandise is shabby chic - very casual and homey.  Love it.

This huge starfish was only $3 so I knew I needed to buy it!  And the Mason jar full of shells was $6 - most antique places wouldn't even sell the jar for that cheap, much less full of shells.  I might actually get rid of the shells and collect my own...or I can add my own and mix them in.  Jury's still out on that....

One last purchase I want to share for tonight is this awesome dish towel I bought - you guessed it, at Anthropologie.  It was on clearance for cheaper than a Walmart price, so I didn't even feel a little guilty breaking my no-more-dish-towel rule.  Cool facts about this dish towel:

1. It's not just a dish towel.  It's a geography lesson.  I didn't realize it at the time, but instead of being a real or even fictional place with labels to indicate the specific name of the country, mountain range, ocean, etc., it is labeled by the names of the geographical features it represents.  It.  Is.  Awesome.  Click it to enlarge and see the awesomeness.
2. I'm not going to use it as a dish towel.  I'm going to find some fun and funky fabric, sew it to the back of the towel, stuff it, and put it on the guest bed in my craft room.  :)

Couldn't resist

I am the proud new owner of a quilted 'k":

It's so cute I couldn't leave it at the store.  It now has a new home in my craft room, among the brads and Sharpies and stamps: