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I've been meaning to tell you, my mom is a genius. Of course I knew this already, but let me just share with you her latest example of genius-ness.


I am generally happy with my dining room and the church pew works like a charm to corral the girls during dinner but there was one small problem with the layout. When anyone over the age of 16 sat at the pew, they had a good chance of knocking their head against the mirror before dessert was served.


So often I would blather to my mom on the phone about wanting to put something behind the bench to create a bit of breathing room between guests and the big O (that would be the mirror, not Oprah). A console would be perfect, but I can't find a console that is as long as the bench and isn't thousands of dollars. Blah blah blah. It was probably around this point in the conversation that my mom would tell me she had to go so she didn't have to listen to this conversation...yet again.


Then we were downstairs (pre-family room makeover) and she said, "What about this console for behind the pew?" Uh, that's not long enough mom, duh. And it's too deep. To which the smarty pants said, "not if you cut it in half."

Mind blown.


I should clarify that this woman is a furniture lover of the first degree and doesn't normally condone furniture mutilation. But this particular piece was a random HomeGoods buy (we all have a few of those around the house) and is by no means precious.

So of course I took that sucker outside as quickly as I could, measured to find the exact middle of the table and asked the hubs to buzz that sucker in half. We kept the tape down as he cut to prevent any splitting and in no time flat I had myself one. long. console.

Although each side of the now super long console still had two legs to hold it up, it was a bit wobbly. To remedy this we just screwed each side of the console into the wall to hold it in place and we were done.


So nothing earth shattering but now all of my dinner guests can enjoy themselves without bonking their head in the middle of an animated story. (we host a lot of animated storytellers at our house). And really I'm a fan of little updates to a room. It feeds my constant appetite for change without chucking a room and starting over again every few months ($$$$$$)




The runner is a temporary one I made from fabric leftovers and extra ribbon. It will hang out until I find a more permanent replacement one day.





What about you? Do you make a lot of little changes around the house to pacify the 'itch'? Ever cut a piece of furniture in half? I'm willing to rent my mom out to anyone who needs her, although maybe I should ask her first.

I don't know about you, but I've got a long list of "someday I will have ___ piece of furniture." Classic pieces that I've wanted as long as I can remember and would be with me until I passed them on to the girls. True investment pieces.

And at the top of that list is for sure a chesterfield sofa. I often imagine finding an old one with fabulous worn leather while in a little antique shop on a fabulous vacation somewhere, while sipping ice tea and wearing a super cute dress and having a perfect hair day. Not to be too specific with my dreams or anything.  But in truth, I'm not picky. Bold color or neutral, leather, velvet, cotton or linen - they all look good.

Lonny

House Beautiful

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Country Living

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House Beautiful

Miles Redd

Elle

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What is your dream piece of furniture? Have you dreamed of finding just the right one, while wearing just the right thing? No one dreams like that but me? Probably.

One of the best parts about the ORC is hearing everyones comments. It is so interesting what people notice and what sparks their interest. I've had several source requests so I thought I'd lay it all out nice and neat, just like this room was - for about an hour. I am happy to report it is now perfectly trashed, and will probably stay that way for the foreseeable future. Also, the sun finally came out so I got some more true-to-life pictures.



The white stools were purchased several years ago at my favorite local antique store and have been in just about every room in the house and every color in the rainbow. I had just barely enough Les Touches to cover them and I love how they tie the red accents from the front of the house to the back of the room.

The console is an outdoor buffet table. It folds up, has a zinc top and weights practically nothing.

The blue and white is from my collection that has made its way around the house and the lovely brass hardware is from Rejuvenation.

The backs of the bookshelves are planked, just like the far wall. Tutorial to come soon.


The fabric for the slipcovers is plain white denim from housefabric.com (they are local for me). All the fabric was prewashed and the slipcovers were made without piping to prevent shrinkage when they are washed. And they will be washed. Frequently.

The red and white pillow is from Etsy, the white table used to be black, the mirror is from the side of the road (classy) and the toy under the table is probably Fisher-Price. (real life)


The plaid fabric, floral fabric and blue and white fabric are all from housefabric.com. They know me well there.


The color on the chairs is Rust-Oleum Lemongrass. The green pillow is from World Market (although I don't think it is available any more) and the ikat pillow is from Etsy. Rainbow Pom-pom garland from Furbish and sconce from IKEA.


I told you it was a sunny day. Can you believe all of this light came in from the door at the top of the stairs?!


I think that about covers it. Do you have furniture that you recycle from one room to the next? Ever dump something in storage for a while and all of a sudden it seems new and exciting? How excited do you think HouseFabric.com is going to be when they hear I'm actually sewing now?

Before I jump in on Week 4 progress, I want to thank everyone for your sweet comments on the HGTV Magazine feature. It wasn't totally real until I could share it with y'all and I'm still on cloud nine. Actually I'm kind of hoping that euphoria will carry me through the next few weeks because I feel like this project is growing. The list should be getting smaller at this point right? My design ADD is killing me. (catch up on previous weeks here.)

Now that the painting is done and I'm ready to get going on the meat and potatoes of the room I wanted to take this week to share some details on what will be sitting on those newly painted floors.

If you are new to LBD then I should let you know; I like a good bargain. And I love things that have a story to tell. (my furniture likes to talk almost as much as me) So when I can marry those two things and satisfy my 'thrill of the hunt' fix, then I am a happy girl.

For those that follow me on Instagram, these might look familiar but let's take a tour, shall we?


The couch. I found this beauty at Goodwill and loved it right away. Then the 'do I or don't I' debate started and I decided I would walk away and check back tomorrow. If it was still there it was meant to be. I thought about it all night and couldn't wait for the store to open the next morning. I rushed in and paid the $30. That's right. $30. I picked it up the next day in a surprise (and severe) snow storm with it hanging out of the back of my car for the 2 miles home. Zero visibility on the roads but 100% happy with my find.


The chairs. My friend and I go to an annual high school garage sale every spring and we usually come away with something great. The lines are long, we have to go super early and it is pure madness when we get in. We love it. This past spring we went and came up with a big fat nothing until we headed toward the exits. I saw these chairs and said to her that I had no more room for armchairs in my house (I have 4 extras in my basement), but don't they have great lines? And then she said the best thing a friend could say - "They are $8. Get them!" (thanks Becca). And so I did. They won't look like this the next time you see them, but they are again in excellent condition and I love their shape. And that's $8 for the PAIR by the way.


The lamps. Both were from Goodwill. Separate trips but equally ugly. :) Big plans for these. They were $8 for both.


The table. I knew I wanted something for the girls to draw and create on, but I didn't want to spend a lot since...they wold be drawing and creating on it. I saw this one at, wait for it, Goodwill, and emailed my lovely Linda to see what she thought. She assured me I could find some way to paint over that veneer and I pulled the trigger. $20. The dust was free.


The chairs. The green one was my dad's 'homework chair' growing up and the other chair has sat in my parents basement for 30 years. I come by my furniture hoarding honestly. Best part - FREE.


The coffee table. Snatched it up while at a retirement home sale with a client (they had great stuff). My monkeys girls' broke the glass top during an illegal dance party so it needs to be fixed and spruced up. She is the perfect length though and I love her height. $15.

So now the plan is take this motley crew and make them look cohesive and fresh. Less junky, more funky. Some of them have already been made over, some are still in process and some I still need to start (ugh!). Will I make it?!

- Rip up gross carpet (floor and stairs) and replace flooring
- Paint and plank walls and bookshelves
- Recover estate sale chairs - at the upholsterers 
- Create some sort of art station for the girls
- Paint chairs and table
- Repair and paint coffee table
- Create toy storage that doesn't involve the words 'pink' or 'plastic'
- Get some art on those walls
- Find rugs
- New Lighting

When will I learn?! That's rhetorical by the way, as I think I am beyond help.

Ever since I wrote about the glory that is unpainted wood furniture (here), I've had a hankering to add some, somewhere. And since I've got extra furniture three rows deep in the basement, I figured buying something wasn't the way to go.


Luckily I've been eyeing my church pew. I've been thinking of changing the red for some time, as I talked about here, so why not go with the color it was originally meant to be anyway.

In theory anyway.

Quick history on the pew, it came from the small country chapel that my great-great-grandfather founded long long ago. My mom acquired it back in the early 80's when they renovated the chapel and at that time it was painted brown. Why in the world would someone paint wood furniture brown? That's exactly what I was thinking too! Anyway, she promptly painted it red and it has been that way ever since. The point being no one that I know knew what type of wood this was or how it would look.

I love to solve a good mystery so I tested a little spot with my Citristrip just to see what I was getting into. If it looked bad I could paint that spot again or worse yet just put a pillow over it.


What a tease. It was worse than Ryan Seacrest before a commercial break. It was all, oh, I'm bubbling right away, I'll come up with no problem. And the first layer did.

That's right, I said first layer. But it was the layer, upon layer, upon layer of brown...paint/natural stain/mystery McGuyver substance that wouldn't. go. away.

I don't really have any pictures of this phase as its hard to take a picture while banging you head but basically each day started with 'I'm sure this will be the last layer of brown goop, I can do this' and ended with 'Who in lucifer's reach made this #%$^!!!'.

This went on for a week.

It was the worst as it looked as if there wasn't any paint there but when I scraped off the Cirtristrip there was more and more dark brown goo. I never did find out what it was but I got as much off as I could.


I used my last bit of energy to sand and then I stopped. The bench and I needed some time apart.

Have you ever underestimated a DIY project? Have you wanted to beat a piece of furniture? Do you have any idea what that brown goop could have been?

Come back next week when we see how the old girl looks now.

I'm in love with trim. I want it everywhere and I can't get enough of it. It might border on addiction, but since it is so awesome, I'm happy to call myself an addict.

We all know how amazing it looks on drapes, pillows and even walls, but how about your furniture? Particularly to finish off the bottom of furniture. I think it can be like a great pair of shoes - it 'makes' the piece.

Let's take a look shall we?

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Nick Olsen for Lee Jofa

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So what do you think? Amazing right? It's pretty major. Now I've got to go and trim something.


And don't forget, it's Friday which means another great week of the Simply Baby Nursery blog party. This week's party is hosted by the lovely Katherine of Rhymes with Smile. Check it out!