My Creative Blog [Search results for gray] 

If you missed all the amazing projects in the first three weeks of CWTS, be sure to check them out below!
Round 1 Projects & Winners Round 2 Projects & Winners Ro und 3 Projects & Winners

We've loved seeing all the projects that have been linked up to play along with CWTS each week! This week we were thrilled to be introduced to Meesh and her blog I.Meesh.U I spent a long time on her blog last night and I just kept reading because her stream of consciousness writing style had me hooked! We picked this project because we felt that everyone deserved to know the secret of how to get that super-cool, Restoration Hardware finish!
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oh Restoration Hardware… how i love thee…

Restoration Hardware's Kenwood Bed
Big A is currently in his converted crib. Problem is that he's getting too big for us to comfortably snuggle and read books in the glider. and sitting on the floor to read to him isn't fun. so mamma started searching for a new bed on craigslist… and look what i found. a glossy white Pottery Barn-looking bed. the very nice fireman who sold it to me even delivered it for free.

here's the headboard in our garage. the pix are a bit dark, but you get the idea. glossy white paint on a well-constructed piece. the beauty about Annie Sloan Chalk Paint is that you don't have to sand or strip any varnish before starting. you just paint. and the paint just sticks. and you're just happy. and yes, i've heard the complaints about how expensive ASCP is, but really, when you take into consideration the time you've saved sanding, stripping, and priming, it all works out. AND, with the 4 quarts i purchased almost two years ago, i've probably painted out 15-20 pieces of furniture. yes.

looks a little girly with the white glossy paint, huh? so here are my steps to achieve the ever elusive Restoration Hardware distressed and weathered wood furniture finish:

• using a 3" brush, paint out the pieces in Annie Sloan's Paris Grey. make sure you get in all the cracks and crevices. you'll note that this piece is similar to a bead board, so there are lots of nooks and crannies. let dry.

• using a mixture of MinWax water-based gray and dark Old English, brush on liberally on top of the Paris Gray. after a minute or so, wipe the mixture off with a rag, but don't wipe off 100% evenly. you want some of the pseudo-glaze to stick to the paint, creating some depth on the furniture. because this is a water-based stain, it's translucent and allows you to see the wood below it. the dark stain mixed in was intended to darken the color a bit.

in this experiment, i used about 1/4 cup MinWax, and 8 drops of the Old English. the above shot is taken without a flash and it looks more gray/brown. be sure you use the same mixture if you're remixing for additional pieces so that you achieve the same consistency and colors as you go.

in the above shot, i used the flash so that you could see that this glaze had more of a blue-ish gray hue.

• go over all the pieces using a 220 grit sandpaper…very lightly, with the grain. play around with the pressure. i was trying to achieve a pseudo wood grain look, so kept my pressure very light to accomplish the right look without removing too much of the chalk paint.

• then i brought out the Annie Sloan dark wax, my trusty gloves, and some soft rags. i generously applied the dark wax as i wanted a darker wood look.

what you'll notice about using the Annie Sloan dark wax is that you sometimes notice the brush marks. see in the above picture at the bottom center of the headboard? you see a dark area butted up against a lighter area. i've noticed this happens with AS wax… but never fear! the product is so malleable that you can buff it out and even out the look with some #0000 steel wool and elbow grease. that's right…get those arms in shape by buffing and making the wax more even across your piece.

see how i was able to get rid of the sharp contrast between the dark and light areas on the headboard? fancy.

i LOVE how this piece turned out.

thanks for reading!

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Thanks again Meesh! And make sure you check back tomorrow for the reveal of the Grand Prize Round Projects!! You're going to flip over them!!

Oooh, I so wish you could see my hallway bathroom right now. It is coming along exactly how I had envisioned. Mostly because I finally found the perfect piece of furniture for my new custom vanity. This vanity earned us a spot in Round 3 of Crafting with the Stars over at Sew Dang Cute, and although she's pretty darn cute in pictures, she's absolutely gorgeous in real life. So, here's the breakdown of the transformation this little table underwent:
Antiquated to Awesome Table Transformation While browsing one of our local antique stores, I stumbled across this table in an out-of-the-way-spot covered in loads of other stuff.

Now, she doesn't look like anything special, but I could see through her battered, yellowing self to see the potential in her simple lines and aged charm. My initial thought was to sand the yellowish tones off to hopefully reveal a distressed white/wood look. After what seemed like an eternity of sanding with two palm sanders, I realized that this piece probably really was an antique and that the paint had mostly likely been there forever. I hesitate to reveal this information for fear of the antique-lovers out there giving me a hard time about sanding such an old piece, but hey, a girls gotta do what a girls gotta do.

So anyway, the chippy paint look I was going for totally didn't happen because sanding it made the paint appear the color of a peach and that just was not at all the look I was going for.

So, on to plan B. Monica came over to help out and she brought the custom gray stain they used on their farmhouse table and also a mahogany stain she had. We had some walnut stain left over from when we originally stained our kitchen cabinets, so we tested all three on the top of the piece. We knew we could always sand out the stains we didn't like, but we made sure to place the sample stains in the middle where the vessel sink would go, anyway.

In the end, we decided on doing a custom mix of walnut and gray stains.

I brushed on the walnut stain first in long even strokes.

After about a minute, Monica wiped the stain off with a staining pad.

Even with just the walnut stain, it was absolutely beautiful, but I knew that the addition of the gray stain would make it match the colors in the bathroom even better, so again, I brushed the gray stain overtop of the walnut in long even strokes.

After wiping it off, we had this:

Note to self: Do not stain a piece of furniture in your kitchen. If you're not careful, stain will get everywhere leaving you in a slight panic and making lots of extra work for yourself.

Ahh! Let me stop here to point out how crazy our work environment was that evening:

How we got anything done is a mystery to me. Monica and I work very quickly and as a result, leave a trail of disaster in our wakes. We were simultaneously working on the table, painting a custom destination sign with coordinates for a customer, planning our posts for the next few weeks and drinking our favorite Pumpkin Spice Cappuccino from Wawa. Craziness, I tell you. But I digress… on with the project:

After the hours of sanding the top, I really REALLY didn't want to sand the legs, so we came up with the idea of doing a whitewash treatment. Basically, whitewashing is a combination of paint mixed with water that creates a translucent glaze of color.

You can see that adding the whitewash took away the yellow tones, but kept all that yummy aged character of the piece.

Finally, we broke out the power tools and got ready to make our holes for the new sink and faucet. This is a lot easier than you probably think it is. After measuring the center of the table where the sink would go, we used a drill with a 1 1/2" circle bit to make a hole for the pipes to run through.

This creates a lot of sawdust which for us was a problem. DESIGN BLOGGER FOUL! We should have drilled the holes FIRST before we stained!

Brushing off the saw dust on stain that hadn't dried yet gave us a minor heart attack, but we recovered after restained the parts that needed it. Phew! No big deal. (But if you attempt this project, drill first, stain second!)

We added the sink that we bought at Lowes so we could determine the placement of the hole for the faucet. We didn't use any scientific method here; we simply placed the faucet next to the sink and eyeballed where it should go. Remember folks, I don't claim to be a perfectionist.: )

In pictures, the faucet looks kind of goldish, but in reality it has a brushed nickel finish that adds just a touch of modern that is perfect.

We wanted to add some detailing to the piece to make it more unique, so I picked up some oil-rubbed bronze knobs from Lowe's. Monica pre-drilled a few holes, and then we screwed them right in. They look so cool and give the affect of a drawer on the front.

So, at the end of night one, this is how the table looked. Pretty sweet, huh? But the fun part was putting it all together the next day after I (and my mom who wanted to save me some time while I was coaching my tennis team) added 6-7 layers of a water-based polyurethane to the top to prevent water damage that may occur from my very messy wonderful family. We went with a water-based poly because it doesn't change the color of the wood tones. I'm not 100% sure this will be enough protection, and I'm paranoid about anything marring the surface of this beauty, so I'm going to be doing a bit more research on protecting the wood before we use it. Any suggestions?
So now that all is said and done, this is how my beautiful vanity looks:

I am so in love with this table, and am thrilled to death that it turned out just like I was hoping. It looks amazing in the bathroom, and pictures just don't do it justice. Next week, I'll be showing you the final reveal of our hallway bathroom after I add some finishing touches and I can't wait!
What do you think of my table-turned-vanity? Have you ever turned a thrift or antique store find into something fabulous?

Now, on to Round 3!

Linking up to: TT & J, Show & Tell Saturday, Tips & Tutorials Tip Me Tuesday, Sundae Scoop, Sunday Showcase

Elle Decor

Benjamin Moore's Chelsea Gray (HC 168)
On a recent tour of homes, I fell in love with a beautiful foyer painted Chelsea Gray. If you are considering a deep gray, give it a try...

Albert Hadley

Nate Berkus

via Rebecca June
I often receive e-mail requests for gray paint color recommendations; but, I'm just a gal who's out here searching, too... Maybe we can help each other out a little here. Have you found a gray that you love? Leave a comment telling us about your perfect gray.
You might want to include: the paint brand and name (or number if you have it) where you used the paint (living room walls? kitchen cabinets?) qualities you like about the color (cool/ warm, light/dark)
Maybe we can put together a piece like Paige at Tracery Interiors did recently on blues. That was awesome!
This is such a subjective area. But you may really help someone to narrow down their search for 'a perfect gray.' (And that someone could be me....)

New England Home magazine, Home of Design Duo Lee Bierly & Christopher Drake
Zinc, zinc, zinc, everywhere you look there's zinc! Don't you just love zinc? I know I do. I was just outside putting the finishing touches on a couple of boxwood shrubs that I planted up in my new Restoration Hardware planters. Which by the way are on sale now Here! It got me thinking about how wonderful the color is, that soft gray/blue.

Restoration Hardware zinc footed planters

It has become a design stable blending beautifully with today's neutral interiors.

New England Home magazine, Home of Design Duo Lee Bierly & Christopher Drake See the zinc table behind that stunning burlap and linen chair, love those pillows!
Gray is a true neutral color because of this, gray can be very restful and works with any palette.

This zinc nightstand comes open, one drawer and the bottom open or closed as pictured above from Restoration Hardware Here

French Zinc and Iron Table from Laurin Copen Antiques Here Love the zinc on the table legs! The pillows pick up the zinc color beautifully

Monumental Neoclassical style Zinc Bookcase from Sarlo Here Look at that fabulous cartouche, I'd love to have this in my home!

A Pair of Large Scaled Zinc Urn Lamps from G. Sergeant Antiques Here Now these make a statement!

Did you know Europeans even used zinc for their roofs? It's even being used here in the US for roofs'I did not know this. The zinc will last for 80 — 100years and can withstand harsh weather conditions. Zinc sheets are laid over wood and seamed.

The New Eighteenth Century Style, Zinc oeil-de-boeuf and zinc finial

Antique French Zinc Architectural Roof Finials from John J. Nelson Antiques Here
Zinc is the 23rd most abundant element in the earth's crust. We need zinc in our diets to help boost our immune systems, it also helps to cut a cold short. Best of all zinc's patina will constantly renew itself as it weathers and ages and will 'heal over' scratches and imperfection. So when zinc can be poured and molded to make such wonderful furniture, decorative items and put a roof over our heads, I ask you, what's not to love about zinc?

The New Eighteenth Century Style, zinc horse head above the door

Photo Simon Upton
Suddenly I've got this thing for black furniture and it's all Darryl Carter's fault, once I saw this picture I was intrigued. I love how the black pops against all the white really making the furniture a statement and brings out the clean lines. Less seems to be more!

voila!
Then I saw this beautiful black bench on 1st Dibs and kept thinking how stunning it would look in an entryway. Before I knew it everything kept coming up black, so I'm now wondering is black the new gray?

Cote de Texas
It wasn't just furniture I was seeing in black but doors as in Joni Webb's home from Cote de Texas. Kitchens and whole rooms were taking on a whole new meaning of sophistication and seductiveness.

House Beautiful

House Beautiful
I love how all the white ironstone pops in this beautiful cupboard, it looks so elegant.

House Beautiful
Black and white can look very classic, timeless, the walls almost seem to float.

Tate Gunnerson

Design Sponge
A splash of bright bold color can keep a room from feeling to stark and adds a touch of playfulness.

Design Sponge

lonny mag

http://www.melanieacevedo.com/
So my questions are to you, is black becoming the new gray? Could you make a bold statement such as this and paint a room black? I don't think I could paint a whole room black but I'm certainly going to try it out on an interior door this weekend thanks to Joni at Cote de Texas. Baby steps for me, how about you?

Emily Henderson of HGTV's Secrets From a Stylist used Benjamin Moore's Smoke Embers (No. 1466) in Ian Brennan's living room,

Benjamin Moore's Gray Owl (2137-60) in the guest room,

via HGTV and Emily's blog The Brass Petal
and a charcoal gray grasscloth in Ian's den/office.
Emily is funny, fresh, and terrific at putting together an 'undecorated' looking space. But all that pales next to the fact that:
her loves some gray!

....well, not literally. but I have always said that this image is 'me' translated into a room. Nate, are you out there? What is that 'perfect' gray you use on your walls....? love you, man. mean it.
katie lee joel's living room by nate
thanks, Moggit gals for setting up our Nate Day...
Update! This gray is BM Pale Smoke (1584) Thanks to Vanessa at Decor Happy for the tip off!

This day seems like a long time coming. It's the first time I've completed a nursery AFTER the baby was born. Ha! (If you missed my baby announcement, you can see it here) Doing this reveal today- October 1st- is sort of ironic, since this is the day I was due! I'm so happy I took my time to finish it because I'm really happy with it! It's not perfect- is any room ever really perfect??-, but it makes me smile and will be a great space for Bennett… when I can part from him.; ) I hope you're ready for a whole slew of pictures. Sit back and enjoy!

Come on in!

This room is nothing like I originally envisioned, but one thing that stuck is the color scheme: orange, mint and gray. It's so fresh, bright and a little quirky.

Isn't that little Bennett burp cloth adorable? My friend Karen from Thread Blossoms made it and I never want to actually use it- it's too cute!

Free printables are a great way to dress the walls in a nursery- (you can see my round up of fun printables here.) I added the printable on the far left from The Handmade Home, and I love it! The rocking chair has been in my family for years, but I just recently decided to make it work in the space by painting it in Annie Sloan's Graphite chalk paint. The abstract art was custom-made by my cute kids (more on that later!)

These cube shelves are from Ikea- Monica actually hung them during our first Nate's Crate challenge on The Nate Berkus Show. They totally look like built-ins and fit that little nook perfectly.

This room doesn't have a closet that we can use, so we purchased an armoire from Ikea to hang some of Bennett's clothes. When you sit in the rocking chair, you kind of stare right at the side of the armoire, so I hung an old print that was in my nursery as a baby, after painting the wood frame in the same graphite as the chair.

I've had the coffee sign for several years, but I moved it in the nursery because I thought it was kind of funny…if you've ever had a newborn, you know how much caffeine you need!: )

Oh, the dresser. This dresser is fabulous, isn't it? It was my grandparents and I totally wasn't sold on it at first, but we were trying to do this room on a budget and it was free. Done deal, folks. Now, I am in love with it! I'll share the details in another post, but with some paint and wax and a pop of orange paint on the legs, it was turned into the best part of the room!

I thought the"Oh Boy" was so appropriate for two reasons: 1) we were having a boy (duh!) and 2) we were taken so by surprise with this pregnancy. It makes such a statement and adds a whole lot of personality to the room!

I added some washi tape to the plain black lamp shade to add a little interest. Man, I love washi- is there no end to it's many uses?

Bennett isn't spending too much time in this room yet, but I'm pretty sure he's excited about it!

I hope you love it as much as I do! Tell me…what's your favorite part?

Sources Sheets: Target Rug: Ikea Changing Pad Cover: Babys R Us Dresser Paint: Annie Sloan Graphite & Paris Gray, Dark Wax Giant Letters: Hobby Lobby Dresser light: Target Color-blocked baskets: Target Copper Light on bookshelf: Local antique shop Armoire: Ikea Bookshelf cubes: Ikea Rocking Chair: Hand-me-down Mirror: Walmart Coffee sign: Vintage sign store in OCNJ

Tia Zoldan's awesome kitchen in High Gloss
I am so doing this — painting my kitchen door gray. Doesn't it just make this kitchen? try to imagine it white....just not the same.
I'll be getting a new french door in my kitchen soon. I'm thinking:

chelsea gray?

Well, this isn't really a project we had planned on doing right now. Especially since we're still trying to finish the baby's nursery, put the finishing touches on Charlie's room and mentally prepare ourselves for another baby. But, sometimes (ok, lots of times, in my case) we get distracted and something else begs for our attention. Back in May, I posted this picture on instagram saying I didn't know what to do with our deck…

It was a hot mess. Then the arbor thingy you see above broke in a storm, which led us to begin our deck transformation. I'm not kidding when I say I really wanted to tear this deck down because I didn't think it could be redeemed. I mean, we had done some cute projects to spruce it up, like these DIY shutters and window box, but even that couldn't hide the fact that this deck was ugly.

We decided to go ahead and try power-washing it before burning it down (haha-kidding…sort of) to see if that would help at all. It was really beat up, graying, splintery and just plain ugly. Oh wait, I mentioned that already, didn't I? Just take a look:

In the picture below, you can see that the top of the arbor had been removed, but the posts were still there. Plus, there was that one giant bush that was all up in the deck's business too. The first thing we did was cut the posts down and cut back the bush. You wouldn't believe how much that opened things up on the deck.

We borrowed a power-washer from Kevin's grandpop (who owns a painting business) and went to town. Immediately we began to see a major difference!

Ewwww…that gray grime is just disgusting. But the wood underneath was in beautiful shape- I seriously was beyond shocked. Who knew that was under there?

Again I went to instagram to post the progress. Why did we wait six stinkin' years to do this?? And if you don't follow us on Instagram, you totally should. I mean, two posts about a deck should have you banging down our IG doors, we're just that exciting. Follow us at Jess_ec2blog and eastcoastcreative for lots of fun, juicy stuff like deck cleaning.

Anyhow, look at our gorgeous deck now! It's like she was just built yesterday!

Without that big bush and the trellis/arbor thingy (what WAS that thing?) the other side of the deck is wide open…just one big open slate!

(Pssst…did you notice how well my flowers fared in my window box? Ha. They didn't stand a chance.)

Ahhh…I'm in love. With a deck. It's just not right. But it's the truth. The next step is decided what to do with the deck now that it's so fresh and so clean, clean. I'm leaning towards staining the deck a nice gray to go with our gray shutters and painting the railings white. Sort of like this:

Source

Source
Pretty, right? Kevin's grandpa swears by Sherwin Williams Deckscapes, so we'll probably go that route just because we know it's good stuff. I really like the idea of a semi-transparent stain so that some of the wood grain shows through.

What color would you choose? Have you ever used Deckscapes? Has a power-washer ever changed your life?
I'm hoping to finish this bad boy up this week…that is, unless I get distracted by something else.; )

It's a week early! I'm both excited and nervous all at the same time! Why you ask is it still covered in plastic? Well, the delivery guys just left for one, and for two, we have an issue with our floor finish that the floor guy has to deal with tomorrow (hopefully) and although no dust will be created, I don't want to unwrap them until he's done.
So pictures are a bit premature but I thought I'd give you a sneek peek as to what we've been up to the past few weeks. We never did break into a waltz like I described in my fantasy BUT we did accomplish something equally as romantic and painted all the windows! I'm kidding, although I do find it very attractive when Hubby is working on the house — why is that? (wink, wink Hubby)

I also painted the fireplace bricks white!
After priming the bricks to cover up the glue stains, I had a panic attack and questioned what I had done. Joan at For the Love of a House (my dear friend) calmed me down (I love her!).
I wish I didn't have to paint them but when I spoke to a local mason, he told me that the blond bricks weren't original to the house. Meaning, that at some point probably in the 60's, the fireplace surround was rebuilt and that's why they didn't match the gray bricks on the exterior chimney....which has made me contemplate painting the bricks gray as I'm not completely sold on the white. Thoughts? Do you like the white?
Once again, Joan came to my rescue (she does that a lot) and sent me some Sherwin Williams colors to try and upon doing so, I discovered this amazing digital tool they offer on their web site where you can upload your personal photo and try different paint colors (I'll post them soon). It's been so helpful in determining what shade of grey may work as I wouldn't want it to look too flat, too dark or like concrete!

My other update is the new mirror over the fireplace. I absolutely love the botanical detail on the frame. I was in an antique shop in Portland, one of my favorites, when I stumbled across it- on sale. Was I looking for a new mirror for over the fireplace, not really, but my Great-Great Grandparent's mirror never looked quite proportionate to the size of the mantle (I've relocated it to the guest room for now).
When I saw the mirror, I put a hold on it and then went to another favorite antique store to see what other similar items were out there. I discovered that compared to other mirrors of similar size and style, the one I had on hold was a really great deal so I went back and bought it. It was $120, normally priced at $195.
I hope that we'll be able to unwrap our furniture by tomorrow — although I'm sure we'll take a few peeks before then! I normally don't get very nervous about new purchases but typically that's because I don't spend as much money and they're also not purchased sight unseen (we didn't get to actually see our chosen fabrics on the pieces).
So again, excited and nervous all at the same time! Hubby is more calm and Lucy just wants to know what all the fuss is about.

I was wandering about in the woods and found some bittersweet. It's an invasive vine that will strangle trees but the berries and their covers are still pretty and you only find them in the fall. I arranged a few branches in our kitchen for a little autumn color.

My husband walked in and saw the shadows the berries and branches were casting on the wall from the overhead light. While the pictures didn't capture it very well the shadows are dark gray in color. He thought it might be fun to paint the shadows onto the wall.

What do you think, should I paint the shadows in the gray they're casting or not?

Ok, are you ready for our last guest post for the Summer? We are thrilled with all of the projects our bloggy friends have shared with us, and this one from Christina of Christina's Adventures, is no exception! Christina is a local girl and has a sweet heart and some serious DIY skills. And oh my goodness, this nautical summer wreath of hers made my heart skip a beat. A.dor.a.ble.

She's a regular commenter on our posts, for which we are eternally grateful! Welcome, Christina!

Hey East Coast Creative readers! I’m super excited to be here! I live just a short drive away from Jess & Monica – and I share so many of their DIY passions! I have a blog (Christina’s Adventures) where I share my stories about thrifty decorating, DIY upcycling, and creative living.

I am a former Autism Support teacher (just resigned from my job in June!) who lives with my husband & “dog baby” in an apartment attached to my parent’s house while we save money to buy our own house (so we can have real babies)! This summer has been filled with all things wedding! I am a bridesmaid in one wedding, attending a great friend’s wedding next weekend, and my brother is getting married in a few days! We hosted a shower for my brother and his fiancée, and I had a lot of fun decorating for the shower. One of the guest’s favorite DIY items was this trough:

And YOU can easily make your own! Seriously! Added bonus – no power tools are required. Here’s how I made mine: I have been dying to make a trough for flowers for ages, and then I saw this one from Thrifty Décor Chick and I fell in love! I just needed the occasion/space to put the trough. When we were looking for something to fill the space at the kitchen table for the bridal shower, I knew this was my opportunity! I first planned out how big I wanted to make it. Our table was just about 6 feet long, so I decided to make this trough 4 feet long. I went to Lowe’s, and found some cedar wood in their lumber section. What I love about Lowes, is they will cut your wood for you! Just give them the measurements, and they’ll cut it. Seriously – best thing ever.

Here were the measurements I used:

• 2 planks: 3/4” x 7 1/2” – 4 feet long
• 1 plank: 1 1/2” x 5 1/2” – 4 feet long
• 2 squares (cut from the thicker piece): 1 1/2” x 5 1/2” – 5 1/2” long

In the morning, I hammered in some nails at the seams, just to make sure it was secure. I then roughly filled in some of the bigger cracks with wood filler, and sanded it down. I didn’t want this to look perfect – I knew I was going to paint and distress it, so I wanted imperfections.

I picked out a blue color I had in my stash (originally an “oops” can for $3). I didn’t prime the surface since I painted right onto the bare wood.

I let that dry, and then I painted with a very light gray over top (the same gray I used on this desk). I did not do this meticulously – I tried to leave some spots where you could see some of the blue coming through:

I then had some fun with glaze and sandpaper. There’s no science to this – I sanded down in certain spots, glazed over areas, and wiped down with a damp cloth. I like to use this glaze, which can be found at Lowe’s or Home Depot. Finally – I let it dry, and it was ready to be filled! I would have *loved* to fill it with fresh flowers, but it just wasn’t practical. We knew we wanted to keep the decoration in my mother’s living room after the shower, so she bought fake flowers from Michaels. I usually hate fake flowers, but these look surprisingly pretty!

What I love about this project is that it wasn’t just a “shower decoration”, but we are now able to use it in my mother’s living room (come follow my blog to see the full make-over of her room – coming soon!)

A few more glamour shots:

What are your thoughts? Have I convinced you that you can easily make yourself one of these as well? If you want to see more projects like this, come follow my blog! We have so much fun over there, and I’d love to get to know you better!

Andrew Raquet in House Beautiful, September, 2010
Being a mirror gal, I love the antiqued mirror fireplace surround with the starburst layered on top.

Ryan Korban in Lonny, September, 2010
Besides mirrors and gray, nude art pieces have my heart, so I love this image. The vintage tea pot is just the touch alongside the modern lamps. A stunning 'silver' gray effect.

Ryan Korban in Lonny, September 2010
Awesome art piece in charcoal tones.

via design darling
modern. antique. gray.
good.

I can't help myself I simply love ORANGE! It doesn't matter if it's bright orange, burnt orange or anything in-between, I simply love orange. So when I opened the October issue of Elle D'cor, I'm always running a month behind, and saw the home of hairstylist Fr'd'ric Fekkai and his wife Shirin von Wulffen I drooled.

Orange is a power color and it also stimulates creativity so it isn't surprising that someone as creative as Fr'd'ric Fekkai is drawn to orange. I love how the burnt orange of the dining chairs play off the bronze chandelier.

They even have orange carpets that I think looks fabulous with that gray sofa. My husband reads my blog so''honey what do you think of orange and gray for our new living room scheme?' Loving it!

Fr'd'ric Fekkai and his wife Shirin also own a country home in Millbrook, New York. This picture was taken in their living room and as you can see they continued the orange theme.

Seems like a lot of people in the hair and makeup business like orange, this orange framed mirror belongs to Est'e Lauder executive John Demsey.

Hair guru John Barrett is no different and used pops of orange in his living room too. I personally think orange works better then red for that bit of pop, orange isn't as explosive. So what's your take, do you like orange or not?
images via Elle Decor

We're super excited (and honored) to be a part of Knocktoberfest 2013, the brainchild of the incredible Lindsay from Makely. Knocktoberfest is basically a blog event that features 25 awesome bloggers"knocking off" some of their favorite products. You know we love knock offs- duh, it's the name of our TV show!: ) If you're stopping over from Funky Junk Interiors, welcome! We're thrilled you're here. Donna is so cool, isn't she? And such a hard act to follow, but we're going to give it our best shot!

My entryway was in desperate need of a stylish, but functional table. Here's what I came up with!

It was inspired by this Pottery Barn Griffin Console Table that is…wait for it…$1099!! It's made of steel and a reclaimed wood slab, which is why it's mucho moolah, but I got the same look using wood I had on hand from other projects! I'm really happy with the way it turned out.

I used (4) 1x2 pieces of pine, (1) 2x12x12, dark walnut stain, gray paint and Rustoleum Oil Rubbed Bronze spray paint. Pottery Barn is generous enough to share the measurements for their table (thanks PB!), so we just tweaked them to fit the wood we had.

I started by measuring the lengths of wood that I needed.

We ended up cutting (4) pieces at 36 inches for the vertical legs, (4) at 48 inches for the horizontal pieces and (6) at 6 inches for the cross pieces. Side note: I love the chop saw. That's all.

Once we had all of our pieces cut, we made two boxes by attaching the vertical pieces to the horizontal pieces with the drill.

Then we attached the boxes with the 6 inch cross pieces at the bottom, in the middle (we measured halfway up the vertical pieces) and the top.

Then, using my trusty oil-rubbed bronze spray paint, I sprayed the legs of the table. The wood really sucked up the paint, so I had to do several light coats before I got the coverage I wanted.

After I attached the wood plank to the top of my base (we screwed up from the underside), I stained it with Rustoleum Dark Walnut stain. It wasn't exactly the color I was looking for so I watered down some gray paint and brushed that on and then wiped it off to get what I wanted.

I put it in it's place of honor by the front door and dressed it up a bit. Doesn't it look cute- and by cute, I mean super stylish?

Even though I didn't use real steel- sadly I don't have much time for welding- I think the legs look a lot like real metal!

And ok, I'll share one last picture since you've begged me.

Man, I just love knocking off cool stuff for way less money! If you love knock offs like we do, check out our TV Show"Knock It Off" You can watch full episodes online!

And, make sure you check out all of the awesome projects on the Knocktoberfest page, but before you do that, head over to visit Jackie from Teal and Lime to see what she came up with. And a huge thanks to Lindsay for including us!!

Come on, you knew that all those old cabinets and cabinet doors would someday be put to use in my house, didn't you? (Remember my cabinet turned planter box?) Well, my most recent transformation was super easy, and pushed me a little bit out of my norm because I used DecoArt Frost Gloss Enamel paints, which I had never tried before. The result is this adorable cabinet door turned hat rack for my baseball -and baseball hat- obsessed little boy.

We consider ourselves to be very fortunate girls. So blessed in so many ways, but one of the ways we are so lucky is that we get to work with some amazing companies! DecoArt was generous enough to send us all this awesome stuff to try out. It seriously was like Christmas morning opening up that box!

After thinking about what I had laying around the house that I could attack with glass paint, I remembered my stash of cabinet doors leftover from our kitchen remodel. I chose one long, rectangular door that had glass inset in it. I washed the glass with soap and water and then cleaned the side I was going to paint on with rubbing alcohol which allows for better adhesion for the paint.


I taped up the glass and spraypainted it my favorite white spraypaint from Rustoleum.


I chose my color scheme based on the colors in my son's room. I ended up not using the green paint, but I'll go into that more later. DecoArt recommends using a makeup sponge to apply the paint, and luckily I had a bunch of them on hand.


One of the main colors in Charlie's room is gray, so I mixed a little bit of the black frost paint in with the white until I was satisfied with the color.


I taped off stripes so that I would have two gray stripes and one white stripe and then gently dabbed the paint on the glass using the makeup sponge. I did this 3 times total to get the color I was going for, allowing the paint to dry a bit in between each coat.


The paint goes on sort of opaque but dries to a really cool etched glass appearance. The colors are much more subtle and translucent once they dry. It really is such a cool affect that you couldn't get using other paints.


While the paint dried, I had my hubs drill four holes for the hat hooks on the bottom of the the cabinet,

and then I spraypainted these knobs from my kitchen cabinets in a hammered bronze medal spraypaint.


After letting the paint dry overnight, I pulled back the tape to reveal the stripes. WRONG METHOD! DecoArt recommends that you let the paint dry for 4 days, which I totally should have done because my paint pulled up a bit when I pulled the tape off. Do like I say, not like I did.; ) To add a little more detail, I used the stick-on stencils they sent us, which were awesome. You just place them on the surface, smooth out the air bubbles, and then rinse them when you're done. You can use them over and over again! Love that.

Using a small dauber, I applied the paint to the knobs.

Ta-da! The look is so simple and classic looking and I love it! The paint is so subtle but adds a lot of interest to the glass.

Remember I mentioned the green paint before? Well, I was going to stencil Charlie's name on the glass over the stripes, but I'm a simple kind of girl, and the plain stripes really appealed to me. But just for fun, here's what it would kind of look like if I did paint his name, thanks to the wonders of PicMonkey:


I may eventually want to add some color, but for now, I'm enjoying the nice, subtle, neutral tones of this hat rack.

I wish I could really capture how cool the glass looks, but trust me, it's awesome.

There are loads of ideas and how-to videos on the DecoArt website, if you're interested in giving glass paint a go (which you totally should!) You can find DecoArt's glass paint line at Michaels. I'm planning on using all those other paints with my senior ladies in the craft group I lead once a month. Holiday mugs, here we come!: )
*This post was sponsored by DecoArt, but all ideas and opinions are my own.: )Linking up to: Tutorials & Tips

Well, well, look what I found:

Remember my post about the game plan for my bathroom? I really wanted a ladder for the space to as a stylish way to hang a few hand towels and other little things we might need in the bathroom. I found one this weekend while visiting my sister in Lancaster. There is a house that we pass on the way to my sister's that has hundreds (no exaggeration) of old windows and other random junk in their yard. Of course, that's like the jackpot for a cheap DIYer like me, so we stopped by. Lucky for me, they had a few ladders like this one and I was able to buy it for $15! (Talked her down from $20. Oh yeah, I drive a hard bargain.) Out of all the things I've bought for my house, besides my statement piece, this one is my favorite. It captures the feel I'm going for in my home (and no, that feel is not old paint shop in case you were wondering.) This really tall little beauty needs some loving, as in, a good sanding and maybe a few coats of a water-based polyurethane to bring out the wood tones. There's just one too many different colors of paint on her for my liking, so once they're sanded out, she'll be perfect.

In other news, we bought a mirror at Lowes for the bathroom. Originally, I planned on thrifting a cheap, unique mirror, but we came across this one marked way down on clearance at Lowes, and I'm totally loving the shape of it.

(Yes, that is my garage filled with lots of old barnwood for my various projects. Yes, my husband gives me the stink eye because of it.)

And how do I like the color of this mirror? Umm, not so much. Black with red undertones? I don't think so.

I'm planning on painting the mirror frame and then doing an antique glazing treatment on it to make it look weathered and well, antique. Something like this:

I've finally chosen my paint colors, Olympic Whispering Wind and Quill, which I'll have color-matched in Valspar paint (that covers better with less coats). You can't tell in this picture, but they are very neutral beiges that are almost gray. LOVE them.

And finally, the lighting. Thanks to some suggestions by our awesome readers (who knew to look at outdoor lighting??!!), I've narrowed down my choices to this large bronze wall-mounted light fixture that is actually meant to be outside. It's from Lowes and costs $39.98. I really adore everything about it, but I'm not sure the color is exactly the feel I'm going for.

Lowes

My second choice is this Raw Steel outdoor wall sconce from Lowes. It costs a little bit less than the other light $24.95, but is smaller. The color is definitely in the cooler tones.

Lowes

So, now, will you help me? The finish of the light will really direct the direction of the other decorative items in the room (bronze= browns & creams, silver = gray, white and black). It's your chance to tell me what you think would work best in my bathroom redesign.

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Thanks so much! My husband tried to sneak his own decorative touch into the bathroom, hoping I wouldn't notice.

Sorry, babe, the Phillies hand towel is oooooutta here! Nice try.

Happy Monday!