This would look so good on my new apartment wall....

In the spirit of the Spring Cleaning Move I'm making to my new place (stay tuned I took pictures and am going to post later this week), I found this hot little idea shared by Design*Sponge.

http://shopruche.blogspot.com/2010/02/diy-wall-decor-from-ruches-lookbook.html

Summer/Fall DIY projects

Okay, so it's almost fall, and I have not yet painted the picnic table, even though the asparagus paint is sitting there waiting to be used! What's wrong with me? Well, I've been enjoying the Seattle summer! Who can blame me? It's been a glorious summer here, spotted with the occasional rain shower, like today.

I don't mind, it keeps things here clean!

One of my new favorite things has lead to TWO new pieces in my life that I can't wait to make over. The new favorite thing? Seattle Freecycle! WHAT? It's the best thing ever. Imagine the free section on Craigslist, but they email you the items so you don't have to go looking and you can choose what to take based on your neighborhood. And, best of all, EVERYTHING IS FREE!

"Our mission is to build a worldwide gifting movement that reduces waste, saves precious resources & eases the burden on our landfills while enabling our members to benefit from the strength of a larger community."

Bring it on.

The first new item, I'm picking up tomorrow after work is this sad little chair with mucho potential, from a fellow in Mercer Island. This is going to get a high gloss white paint job, with a sturdy and washable cushion (made from outdoor material). This is going to be Paul's new desk chair at the condo. I really think he's going to love it! It'll have a manly touch, but with old school class. Use your imagination, and stay tuned!


The second new item, also from the Mercer Island man, is this funky little side table. It's going to get a make over too, but not sure what color yet. It's going in our entry way at the Yakima house. I'm thinking white for now, just because the space is small, and I want to have the storage/keys/mail etc. drop but without losing visual space.


Okay, so I'm picking those up after work tomorrow, and taking them to my house so they can sit in the carport with the picnic table while I wait for a free day where I can paint them (I'm thinking this Sunday!)

Bring the outdoors in, and bring it all together

Grace over at Design*Sponge just did a great DIY post on some homemade botanical prints, and I had to share it with you because I just really love them, and if you have empty frames laying around at home like I do, then it's time to GET CRACKIN' and put them to use.

Best thing of all? It's free if you have the frames already and it's so satisfying and very little actual work involved.

Enjoy!

Stop stalking me, Sunset Mag!

Sunset magazine seems to be stalking me and my summer ideas.

I just showed you my top faves of their out door dining rooms, and now they're showing lanterns you can make......um, anyone think that's a familiar concept they've seen here at Decorazzi this summer? yeah, thought so.

Whatever, I'm no hater, I love some of the takes they have on summer lanterns, so enjoy!

Cute cluster. Me likey!

Then you can mod podge some tissue paper on the outside and create stained glass versions, great embellishment idea for the advanced crafter (easy to do, hard to make look good).

Sunset's version of MY lanterns. :)

Chandelier of mason jars. I would like to see this at night to decide if I really like it.

EXTRA EXTRA! READ ALL ABOUT IT! Tablesetting competition!

(taken from Rosana's post on her blog about the contest)

Okay, I can barely even type this, I'm so excited. And I'll ellaborate more later, but I just found out that my favorite local (Seattle) based tablewares design firm, Rosana Inc., is putting on their 3rd annual Tablesetting design competition.

Here's the link to Rosana's blog (Which I just found today and am peeing my pants over), and the rules for the contest. I'll be submitting mine, but must take some careful consideration as to the theme and execution, and will most definitely be enlisting the help of my super secret decor mavens: my florist sister, Kate,

(seen here with the ever precious Riley)

and everyone's favorite gay, Adam, aka Poods.

(Which you remember from my recent project of redoing Paul's office...stay tuned for another update and post on that)

Remodel your bathroom recently? Live in Seattle? Wanna be on HGTV?

Great, then listen up: I just got this info from a list serve I'm on here in Seattle. If you live in the greater Seattle area, have recently remodeled your bathroom, and want to be on HGTV to show it off, read the following:

From: Brooke Schledewitz [mailto:bschledewitz@highnoonentertainment.com]
Sent: Tuesday, July 21, 2009 1:43 PM
To: gazette@georgetownneighborhood.com
Subject: HGTV Needs the Help of Your Neighborhood Association!

Good Afternoon!My name is Brooke Schledewitz and I work for the show, "Bang For Your Buck²on Home and Garden Television (HGTV). We are now in production of our 2ndseason and are looking to bring the show to the greater Seattle, WA area.I'm hoping for your help in locating homeowners who may be interested inhaving their recently remodeled master bathroom featured on our show!I am contacting you to see if you know of anyone in your neighborhood whohas completed this type of renovation and/or if you could pass thisinformation on to the people in your community.I have attached a press release for you to take a look at. If you have anyquestions or need any additional information please feel free to call ore-mail me. We are looking to select our homes within the next couple weeks,so time is of the essence.Thank you very much for your help!

Sincerely,

Brooke Schledewitz
HGTV's "Bang For Your Buck"
High Noon Entertainment
Phone: 303.712.3168
Fax: 303.486.3881
bschledewitz@highnoonentertainment.combschledewitz@gmail.com

Before and After: Carport/outdoor dining room Phase 1 complete

Hello, my faithful followers!

This weekend was Emily's (my roommate and best friend from childhood) 27th birthday, and she planned a girls night at our house to celebrate. We were very excited, and my end of the preparation was to get our carport to phase 1 completion of it's "outdoor dining room" endeavor.

To jog your memory, here's what we started with:



And after many days of prep work, building my vintage mason jar lanterns (which took so much arm strength, I think I got my upper body work out taken care of for the next two weeks), lots of de-cob-webbing, sweeping, nailing pilot holes and installing cup screws for said lanterns, our center piece lighting and privacy curtains, we finally ended up with this fabulous scene:

I haven't painted the picnic table yet, but hope to in the next month or so. For now, it's a great place to relax with friends. The roses are from our three rose bushes in the front yard, the picnic table as you recall was a recent estate sale find, and the table cloth is a scrap I picked up at the fabric outlet in SoDo.

I hope this before and after inspires you to take something old and make something fabulous!

Out door dining room

We're gonna have in, in our otherwise useless carport (which was SERIOUSLY made for a Model T, I'm not even kidding).

This weekend I'll be taking pictures and transforming our carport from BLAH, to FABULOUS!

Stay tuned for pictures. I'm going to take my estate sale picnic table find (a $22 investment, well worth it) and some estate sale bamboo rolling shades (a $3 gem if I do say so myself) and create some sweet lanterns (also estate sale goodies at $.25 each, and they're realy vintage).

You can see the Seattle skyline from our carport, and we're getting geared up for Emily's 27th birthday party (next weekend, girls only), so it's the perfect time to get it all set up! We're dividing the tasks and tackling the project. I'm in charge of sanding, cleaning and painting the table (might not paint just yet, depends on what's available to me), hanging the shades, making the lanterns, installing screws and hanging lanterns.

Em's in charge of sweeping out the carport, which is my death task, I hate it. With the passion of a thousand winds.

So, stay tuned for another great before and after!

Build-design off the grid

Hey there. So I wanted to bring a new topic to the table here at Decorazzi. I have been discussing home building with my dad, who's an architect by education and trade. I passed an article to him from the Willamette Weekly (a local Portland, OR paper).

The article was focusing on renewable energies and green building.

My dad's response was very thought-provoking, and I thought all of you savvy readers would find it interesting as well. Here's his response to the article about heating a home with a hair dryer:

"I had the chance to read that article called "Futurehaus" in the Willamette Weekly that Pat referenced me.

It's a good article, but the basic method that the young architects are promoting consists of a double-walled enclosure, with an energy efficient exterior shell insulating and weather-protecting a conventional inner shell of standard wood frame construction; double the shell and double the expenses as a result. Cost will soon put the damper on this method, in spite of any perceived or real government and/or industry incentives or tax breaks.These guys are working within standards and codes now prevailing and are apparently doing a good job of it.

The problem is, the standards and codes they have to deal with are based on conventional and long-standing construction techniques that building officials and engineers are accustomed to dealing with; there is no standard existing nor engineering method established for the use of alternative construction methods, used elsewhere all over the world, now for thousands of years...that method, among others is routinely referred to as "adobe".

Mother nature has provided for us very well; our problem is, we ignore her too much and do it our own way too often.

The use of adobe was the first and still remains the most common way of providing housing all over the world. However, the U.S. Testing agencies, like the ASTM (American Society of Testing Materials), have never commissioned the analysis or testing of adobe buildings to determine their values for providing for compression and tension resistance using these simple construction methods and for this reason, adobe consruction is not recognized as an acceptable building system in the codes; the why of it is probably immersed in the politics and lobbyists protecting the staus quo of American industry for profitability reasons, pure and simple. The result of this is that local building departments will not accept it since they have no way of monitoring it to standards that don't exist.

Here's why that is a bad idea:

Adobe is an all natural, locally available (as in, on your building site) material that is unsurpassed in providing insulation for warmth in the winter and cooling in the summer...no material does this better, and I mean by a long, long ways adobe is self-finishing on the exterior (with an additive commonly found in the country, cow pies!) with a final finish coat that is impervious to weather; reapplication is a snap and is done no more often than one repaints a wood-sided house
adobe is self-finishing on the interior (with a modification of the standard adobe mix, no cow pies!) with a final finish coat that provides a hard interior finish similar to painted plaster or sheetrock adobe is naturally resistive to compressive forces, meaning it can bear substantial weight; tension is another story and it is here where we need tested standards adobe can be constructed with all power, lighting, HVAC and other utilities located within the walls, per standard construction methods there's nothing cheaper than dirt, especially when you already own it, assuming you already own your lot; constituencies in the soil are easily tested on site and any deficiencies in the existing soil can be augmented and brought to the site for achieving the proper mix adobe flooring is among one of the best floor systems available; yes, dirt floors can be made hard and shiny and will take wax finishes and patterns and colors may be incorporated as well. This means that the floors are also insulative.

Adobe is perhaps the easiest of all materials to maintain; if a gouge in a wall or floor should occur, the adobe is simply re-hydrated and patched with...more adobe! Patches done correctly are also invisible, therefore, no waste is incurred due to replacement activities. This applies to either interior or exterior damage/replacement I am sure I am leaving some points out, but for the sake of brevity...So what does all this mean?

It means that adobe is super cheap to build with; the exterior and interior finishes are already included in the material...there's no sheetrock, wallpaper, siding, insulation, structure, framing, building wrap or membranes...the only thing it has in common with current systems is the incorporation of windows and doors. Interior trim and built-ins can be formed with adobe during the wall construction...things like benches, mantles, chair rails, picture rails, shelving, countertops...the list is endless. Adobe can also accommodate standard light fixtures, cabinetwork, appliances and washroom fixtures...in short, anything a standard frame house can accommodate, abdobe can too.

I believe adobe will be U.S. standard in the years to come; the way things are going with cost, it will soon be the only available, affordable option for most Americans. Now you know why I want to build my off-the-grid retirement abode out of adobe...hey, that makes it an adobe-abode!"

**If you have any questions about the ideas or opinions above, please feel free to list them in the comments, directed towards my dad, and I'll pass them along. When I get his responses, I'll create a follow up post, or send them back directly to you.

Another great idea.

Hello, Sampson! Anyone home?! Apparantly not, because I have totally been thinking "I really need a bag for my yoga mat, something that I can attach to my gym bag or that has a pocket or something...." but I am toooooo cheap to buy anything.

Enter the obvious: a knit sack, basically a really long hat. Add draw string to the bottom (where you would start the long hat, it would be open, so you could thread the draw string through that first row of stitches). then either add a knit strap, or a couple of caribeaners (sp?) to either end and clip that bad boy to the strap of my gym bag.

DONE!

and that's why they pay me the big bucks, Ladies and Gents.

I'll be signing autographs for the next 10 minutes, and they're $20 a piece. Now no pushing and don't talk to Ms. Sampson.

Thank you and good night!

THIS is what I'm going to do!

Okay, so I'm bummin' around on the blogs today, and hit up one of my local faves, Shelterrific, and they linked to this great idea, called a Puff, over at this hyper-cute blog called "Pickles," (why didn't I think of that cute name?)


Here's what it looks like:

I have a TON (literally, it's so heavy I have two bankers boxes full) of inherited yarn from various sources. And I have been thinking about what to do with it all. I love to knit but I don't want 20 million scarves, and let's be honest, although I'm sure I can knit lots of patterns, I'm never going to finish anything that is more complex than knit 2, pearl 1, so this is a perf project for me!

I am so excited to get started, because this is a project that would yield a product useful in all seasons! I can see these as extra seating in the house, and if Emily and I ever get our crap together and actually create our Morrocan lounge, these would be a great addition, in various colors. Also, if we do outdoor movie night at my place, we can bring these out on the big Mexico blankets and they'll be the perfect pillow/seat!

But, I'm getting ahead of myself, as I don't know how long this will take to actually knit. And I have to source the duvets to go inside, so that's an additional expense, although maybe I can find some at a thirft store and wash them. They can be ugly as sin, afterall, they'll be covered up!

Here's the directions:

What we used:

Eskimo, 18 balls (Or yarn suitable for US #13 needles)Acrylic yarn would probably be a really good alternative, as it´s a piece of furnitureUS #19 circular needles2 cheap duves (feather and down)


How we did it:

Cast on 35 stitches using three threads.Knit the garter stitch until you´ve knitted all the balls, and there is just enough yarn left to asseble the stool.


You now have ONE rectangular piece.Cast off loosely. Assemble the short sides (35 stitch side) as neatly as you can.Assemble the first long side. This is supposed to be the top or the bottom of the stool. Put the needle through the end stitch of every second row and tighten, tighten, tighten! Repeat on the rows in between and tighten until there is no whole in the middle. Stuff the duves into the stool. We tried to make a ball of the duves before we stuffed it.Assemble the other end in the same manner as the first.And there you go! Your first knitted furniture perhaps?

Oh, the joys of home ownership

While I don't technically own my own home right now, my wonderful boyf, Paul, does. He owns this sweet little condo right at the cusp of downtown Seattle. He just passed the two year mark on the purchase, and on the whole, things have gone pretty well at the condo.

There have been the occassional issue, like the dishwasher overflowing the kitchen with soap suds (apparently you have to pre-wash the dishes and make sure there's no liquid soap left on any dish, because the dishwasher has an attitude problem), or like when we realized that the wiring for the lights and fans in the bathroom was not only messed up, but the jerks cut major corners by wiring the fan and heat lamp together, but accidently wired the fan to the regular lights (idiots).

So this past weekend I was in Bellingham helping my sister, Kate, with a wedding she had. We delivered all the beautiful flowers on Sunday morning/afternoon. As we got back into the car, I called Paul to check in, only to find out that there was some major plumbing leak under the kitchen sink.

Paul sent me some pictures/videos of the situation. Lucky for us, the leak only existed when you turned the sink on, and was coming from the drain pipe. It could have been MUCH worse, really.

So I drove back down to Seattle, checked it out, and sure enough we could tell the mess was coming from the drain (if the smell didn't give it away. GOD! talk about wrank)

This what Paul discovered when he went to take the trash out. The trash can was sopping wet, and stinky (he said "Babe, it's got to bad if even I think it stinks.")

Here's some of the nastyness coming down the wall, see that odd, rubbery looking white compound? Yeah, that's what the subcontrators called a "joint." I think they were smoking a joint when they put this together.

So basically, what happened is this: The subcontractor that did the kitchen build out cut some major corners. This is not even REMOTELY close to being up to code. The drain pipe coming out of the wall (concrete walls and floors) is metal. It's an 1.5" round. The drain coming out of the sink/disposal is made of PVC pipe. It's also 1.5" round. The metal pipe has threadings on it, and a metal nut at the end, which you would use to secure the drain pipe to the wall pipe, if you were using all metal. They butted the PVC pipe up against the wall drain pipe, and squished the rubber putty around the two pipes.

I swear, that's really what they did. The pipes are the same size, so it's not like one fits into the other one, creating a seal or anything. They just put the two pipes up against each other and covered it with some goo.

What really pissed me off is that after all was said and done, I fixed it for $6.43, two trips to Home Depot (where I met my new best friend, Larry, their plumbing expert), and 3 hours of diagnosis, labor and running around. That's all it took, and I know very little about plumbing (although clearly more than the clowns that did the job in the first place).

Of course, this was not exactly an entry level project, but I was not the least bit scared of ruining anything, afterall, their cockamamey set up lasted the last two years, so honestly I couldn't do worse!

Since I know how to measure and cut out the dry wall, shut off the water main, and employ common sense, I was good to go! I feel really accomplished, Paul is super relieved (and who wouldn't be? That's a huge bullet we dodged by catching it early and fixing it ourselves), and we're using the fan to dry out the soggy MDF and drywall back there (at least the portion we can see....but under the sub floor is concrete, so no worries of passing it on to the floor below us).

Here's a video of the final result:

And another thing!

So in my house and at the condo, we have doors that sometimes need stopping! Like when we come back from Costco with arm loads of stuff, and we're running between the car and the lobby, then the lobby and the elevator, then the elevator and the hallway, and finally the hallway and the front door of the unit. (Phew! I'm out of breath just thinking about it!) These "Tube" door stops would be great for that, because they'll hold any door, they're small so I can put them in my car, purse or pocket, when needed, and they're COLORFUL so you wouldn't forget you put it there (unlike those ulgy old doorstops you remember from Sunday School, libraries or hospitals).

Then, for the screen door at the house, and other party like situations, I'd want something more design oriented, that is a bit whimsicle (sp? sorry), and old school, to fit with my eccletic style:

Like this hot little number, from Design Within Reach (or without reach, God, who's paying $100 for a doorstop again? remind me of where they live, so I can go steal this from their rich front porch).

I'm making that knot myself, and I'm doing it this weekend, with the help of my Eagle Scout boyfriend, and handyman brother in law. (Sorry guys, you're knot off the hook this weekend! ha Ha, get it? know? hook? yeah....................)

This would do nicely.

I just saw this fab French industrial book case that I could SO easily repro on my own.
I was reviewing the extensive and wonderful "book storage roundup" which is offered by Design*Sponge, but I was referred by Jamie over at i suwanee.

This could be a cool alternative to Paul's condo book storage, and it could go behind the chair I want to put there (for additional company seating). And since it has massive casters, it would build consistency with the desk I'm going to build (that drafting table I have, but I'm going to replace the saw horses with HON 2-drawer filing cabinets with commercial casters on the bottom for height and mobility, and of course a bit of manliness.

Follow Up: I think I can, I think I can

Hey there,

So, I have a couple of pictures, but........................they're not the best. One is fuzzy, and neither really shows the hat. So sorry, but maybe there'll be another opportunity to wear it, or maybe I'll get annoyed enough and retake the pictures later.

Either way, here's how it sat on my head (PS: my hair didn't go so well, but them's the breaks)

I think I can, I think I can!

So, this weekend I'm going to a wedding shower for a friend of Paul's (she's Polish also, a couple years younger than Paul, but their families have known each other since before the kids were born), and I got the invitation a couple of weeks ago. It said that it's a hat party. Well, that should be fun, right? I have a few cute dresses to choose from.......but no hats to go with any of them. I LOVE hats, and have a TON of them, but none of them are "fancy" hats that would go with a dress.

Before I realized it, it was Thursday night and the shower is in two days! YIKES (at least I already have the gift! thankyouverymuch Macy's online!). So I decided rather than hunt various thirft stores for an overpriced hat that may or may not match one of my dresses (not to mention sometimes they're just a little musty smelling and "don't-touch-me-or-I'll-break-into-a-million-pieces" delicate, I'd make my own custom hat! Hat Couture (sorry, I know that was lame - 'hat'/'haute', you get it)

So off I went to JoAnns. Since I didn't have my dress with me, and wasn't even sure which one I'd wear (Depending on how fat or skinny I am, and the weather/temperature, and my mood), I got supplies for the hat in three different colors: forest green, navy, and dark taupe/beige.

I spent $20.75 on all the supplies. Here's what I used to create the hat:

-a kids sized foam visor: $1
-1 sheet of craft felt (eco-fi, made from recycled plastic bottles): $.72
-1/2 yard of shiny tulle (of which I used about 1/4 of): $.65
-a high temp glue gun (I only had a low temp one): $2.50
-a bag of mini glue sticks (I used 4): $2.50
-a fake Magnolia bloom (was 50% off): $2.50
-a fake cherry blossom bloom (or something like that, also 50% off): $1.99

Total price: $9.36 + tax (per hat, except of course the glue gun stuff you only buy once)

First I made a duplicate of the visor on some scratch card stock, so I could cut it up and play with how to make the actual hat form from the foam (say that 5 times fast).

Once I had figured out how I wanted the hat form to look, I used my template card stock to cut the foam, then glued it in place with my glue gun.

Then, I flipped it upside down and traced it on the wrong side of the felt, so I had a 1" boarder. I cut the felt out and used the glue gun to stretch, wrap, glue and repeat all the way around (of course doing the opposite ends first to avoid pulling and weird gathering). so then I had the basic hat form. (Save that scrap of left over felt for later, so you can cover the bottom side of the hat. you want it to look professional, right?)

Next, I cut out my tulle shapes. I wanted to do something a bit off center, with some body and volume, so I cut three different sized ovals, and gathered each one separately, (using the glue gun to "sew" at the gather. once the glue was dry, I had little veils). Then I sat in the mirror and played with positioning. After deciding on each one's position, I carefully glued it in place on the top side of the hat.

Once all three were complete, I grabbed my mag bloom, pulled it off the stem, cut the plastic part beneath it as short as possible, and then went back to the mirror to see where I wanted to position it. But FIRST, I pulled the big leaf off the stem and put that in place, so the flower had a base, and the hat had some contrasting color (otherwise it would be all white, cream and tan. blah!)

So, once you've got the mag (or other flower bloom) and leaf glued down, you can use your filler flower to fill in (duh) spots that either show a bit of glue, or show the base of your work. This way you add a pop of color, and some nice detailing that does double duty to cover your tracks!

Now, you're almost done. Take that left over felt, cover the bottom side of your, gluing it ALL OVER so that it really stays put. This is important because later you might need to use this as a base for bobby pins or a comb, to secure into your hair.

I however, took the stem from my filler flower, curved it into a headband, fit it to my head and cut it to the right length. It's already covered in floral tape, so it's a little sticky-ish, and it blends into most hair color (people are looking at the hat anyway, right?!) Then I sat in front of the mirror, AGAIN, and played with the position of the finished hat, atop the head band.

Once that was in place, I carefully took the hat with headband off, ran to the table. and traced the headband on the under side of the hat, so I can glue it later, if I decide to use the head band rather than bobby pins or a comb.

If you use bobby pins, then either get some that are going to blend in with your hat (you've done all this work, don't ruin the illusion with ugly bobby pins showing on the top of the hat) or you'll want to create little loops for the bobby pins to slide through using scraps of your felt on the bottom side of the hat.

Okay, without further ado, her are the pictures of the finished product (I promise to take more pictures when I'm wearing it, so you get the full effect):

This is the top view of the hat (above).

This is the back side of the hat....where most of the work would show, so I used my filler to cover it and act as a garnish to the major bloom (above).

This is the front/side of the hat (above). The tulle will sit over my left ear and side of my face. there are three layers of tulle, all in different positions and different sizes, you'll see when I post pics of me wearing it.

Okay, go and build!

Pear cozy

I was just checking in over at SeeSaw Designs, and they were highlighting the ubercute apple jacket.

I decided I must have its cousin, the Pear Jacket (although I'm calling it the Pear Cozy) from Handamade, this superpresh Etsy designer.

Here it is in all its glory:

Although I might ask them to join Reveal and put up the pattern...doubtful they would since this is one of only a handful of items they make.....and it's a steal at only $8.00, considering how many pears I eat a week....

And now back to your previously scheduled programming. work.

Headboard? What headboard?

Sometimes I'm pretty sure I'm still in my freshman year of college, because I have this piece of crap bed frame that I think we found out back near the dumpsters of the apartment building I used to live in....classy, I know.

I'm hell bent on finding a cheap bed frame that is also beautiful, but I'm having this internal dilemma between making the frame myself, or holding out to find one on Craigslist. So far, the holding out hasn't worked so well. My thought was to create something neat from materials at the local salvage yard, SecondUse, that way it'd be custom and if I ruined it, I wouldn't be out a lot of cash, just a lot of my time.

But then I saw this article (also on Sunset.com): http://www.sunset.com/home/decorating/great-ideas-for-headboards-00400000039992/page17.html



This one is great, it's an old pocket door that they reclaimed, super dramatic. just like me. (at least I admit it)

I like this wooden one, for many reasons, it's so masculine, but they still have that woman's touch with the nook.

Does anyone have any great beds to show off? What about sources for frames or materials?