Finally! Wall Art in the Master Bedroom.

First, before I get on to the fun stuff, I want to sincerely apologize to you guys - due to holiday drama, time crunches, vacation and time with family and friends, we didn't have a whole lot of extra minutes to get projects (much less posts) done. Aside from the dresser how-to and reveal (which were saved posts from the fall), you guys have been receiving a very high amount of "Inspiration" posts in your readers/inboxes, rather than the usual project, tutorial or progress posts you get from us.

So, I'm sorry. I feel like I haven't quite been living up to the usual happenings and posts around here.

But you understand, right?

I also want to thank you for reading this little ole' blog of ours, and for putting up with our posts as of late. Believe me when I say that every comment and visit really makes my day.

Because it's totally true.

Okay, enough of the mushy stuff! On to the latest and greatest house project, already!

So, it's no joke that the walls in our Master Bedroom needed some decor. They looked seriously nekked.

We didn't want to clutter the small room too much, but figured that it needed a little somethin'-somethin' on the big blank area to the left of the bed. After much thought and consideration as to what we should put there (okay, not really!) we I decided on an asymmetric photo wall.

I won't lie. It was mostly because we found a pack of brown/copperish frames on sale at Target one day, and BAM! It was perfect. Yeah, it would've had more character if we'd slowly put a bunch of frames together over time, but honestly that sounded like a heckuva lot more work. Maybe later we'll get around to that.

Maybe.

Anyways, I thought the brown frames would be perfect because it would tie in well with the brown wooden top of the dresser, the grass basket under the chair, and the bedside shelves.

Perfect? Totally.

And what better to put in those new wall frames than photos of the day we officially became "one"? (and that fact that those are the only professional photos we own might have something to do with it, too) .

So, several hours spent editing photos from our wedding (we're cheap and just bougtht raw camera shots from our photographer - being a graphic designer, I love it!), measuring, printing and cutting...

I just popped them into the frames. I love easy.

I arranged them on the floor while planning photos for each frame and also to find an arrangement that we liked. (Hint: I pretty much just copied the arrangement on the front of the box for ours, just reversing the two middle ones.)

Now, I could tell you that we meticously planned and plotted exactly where we wanted the frames, using painter's tape to get them perfect before nailing into the wall.

But I would be lying to you.

Nope, we did it the old-fashioned hold-it-up-and-take-your-best-guess approach. And yes, there are quite a few nail holes in the wall behind the frames that will have to be patched up. One day, that is.

But after a few mistakes (and more than a few nail holes), they are hung!

For this frame I cut up one of our wedding invitations that I designed to break up all the detail-rich photos and add a little variety (while keeping with the yellow theme).

This was a fun one. I printed out an 8.5 x 11" photo and carefully cut it into thirds to get this one. You can do this with any multiple-opening matted frame, too! It's easy and produces such a neat result - just remember to measure correctly...

We love the life that they add to the wall and the room, and make us smile every time we look at them. The colors also coordinate with the room really well, as (luck would have it) our wedding color was yellow (with red for accent). And the color plan for our bedroom? Blue and yellow. Love it.

What do you guys think? Do you like it as much as we do? Do you have any photo groupings/arrangements in your own home? Do you opt for the easy way out sometimes like we do (haha!)?

Next up - making a (mostly) no-sew pillow. I figured if I could make a curtain/headboard with that iron-on sewing tape and canvas, then I could make a pillow! Stay tuned to find out if it'll be a success or a failure...

Did you enjoy this post? Please subscribe for free updates in the future and to see what we're up to next!

Master Bedroom: Refinished Dresser Before and After {Full Reveal}

Are you guys ready?

Here she is before (or rather, middle):

And here she is now....

We refinished this old dresser in a two-tone style (click here for our tutorial), and it makes a huge difference!

Want to know the total cost? Since we had most of the supplies on-hand, the redo only cost us $5 for the woodstain, and then we spent $30 on knobs from Anthropologie. So the total comes to $35, which really isn't bad at all for a basically new dresser!

We love it!

Did you enjoy this post? Please subscribe for free updates in the future and to see what we're up to next!

Master Bedroom: How to Refinish Furniture in a Two-Tone Style

Remember this ole' dresser from our college days?

It used to be an old shiny-orangy-wood color, which was pretty outdated. So we attempted to refinish it in college.

Using 80 grit sandpaper and $1 black spray in 40mph Oklahoma winds.

Let's just say we have refined our techniques a bit since then, and while we still use spray paint we know how and when to apply it to furniture for an outstanding finish, and which grit sandpaper to use (aka, don't use 80 grit sandpaper to "smooth" it out).

You might remember that we remodeled our bedroom a while back, and went from this:

To this:

And after our little switcheroo our old dresser stuck out like a sore thumb.

Yikes.

We toyed with the idea of buying a new dresser, but what's the fun in that? We can get exactly what we want for about 10%-or less of the cost of a brand new dresser! Plus, they really don't make them nowadays like they used to, because this baby's 100% solid ole' fashioned wood.

Bring it on, baby.

How To Refinish Furniture in a Two-Tone Style

1) Gather supplies. We used:

Hand Orbital Sander (80 grit, 150 grit, 220 grit sandpaper)
Oil-Based Spray Paint Primer
Valspar's Satin Ultra-White Paint
Wood Stain
Polyurethane
New knobs (or reuse your old ones)

2) Drag said furniture outside. It's best to wait for a nice day that isn't too windy and the sun is shining. We happened to have beautiful weather for this part (you may notice another piece of furniture in the photo that we planned to redo but didn't quite get around to it).

3) Remove the old knobs with a screwdriver.

4) Starting with a low-grit sandpaper (rough, we used 80 grit) start sanding off any previous paint or varnish from the top of the dresser. Once you get down to the bare wood, switch out your sandpaper for smoother grit ones (we did a couple passes at 150, and then a few more at 220).

5) Use a slightly damp cloth to wipe down the piece and get any and all leftover wood shavings off it.

6) Make sure the piece is completely dry, and then decide which part of the two-tone finish you'll tackle first. We decided to prime the base first and then proceed with staining the top. Since we are in love with oil-based spray paint primer, we need to protect the newly-sanded wood top from getting any primer on it. We ended up using some trash bags and taping the sides down for a nice clean line.

7) Prime away! We only used one layer of primer, and we aimed for getting primer on all parts of the dresser base, not for even coverage (since primer just helps cover up any previous paint and also to help the new paint stick).

8) Take off the trashbag cover carefully, and get out a rag or cheap paintbrush to apply the woodstain. We used Minwax Wood Finish in Dark Walnut.

9) I applied the stain according to the directions (which I believe was to go against the woodgrain so it soaks in better).

10) After waiting 8 minutes for the stain to soak in, I took an old rag and wiped the rest off.

11) Then I decided to tape off the newly-stained wood top and give the rest of the piece a couple coats of white paint we had laying around (Valspar's Ultra White).

12) The next day we applied some Polyurethane to the dresser following the instructions on the can. We waited for that to dry and then used 220 grit sandpaper to lightly sand down the newly-Polyurethaned top, then applied another coat according to the directions.

13) Let it dry the suggested time, and then attach your new knobs and enjoy!

 

Did you enjoy this post? Please subscribe for free updates in the future and to see what we're up to next!

What Would You Do?

Another one, you ask?

Yes, well, I've come to realize that it's actually quite fun to ask you your opinion on various things, one because I love hearing your thoughts and ideas, two because you actually may know more about home decorating than I do, and three - well, I'm just plain curious.

As you may or may not know, the Master Bedroom Remodel is still coming along quite nicely. It's nearly there - I say nearly because there is one more piece of furniture in the room that needs a makeover. Bad.

Meet my I-found-this-at-a-garage-sale-during-college-and-made-my-first-attempt-at-refinishing-it dresser.

There is enough space to the right of the bed that the dresser fits perfectly. We debated about whether or not to just get rid of it (like Tom's dresser), but people - I need that dresser. There's just not enough closet space for all the um, necessities that that dresser stores - it stores everything from undergarments to workout clothes, not to mention the dresser itself also functions as a vanity. Hence the mirror. I grew up having to share a guest bathroom with my younger sibling, and so mastered the art of styling my hair and applying makeup in my bedroom, using my dresser as a vanity. And, funny enough, I still find myself in that same situation - sharing a (even smaller) guest bathroom with my husband.

All in all? I LOVE my dresser.

But what I don't love about my dresser?

This disastrous finish.

I suppose it might look decent from afar (and in these photos), but really, it's pretty bad. Here's how it went down: I bought the dresser and sanding off the shiny finish over the wood (by hand, which took hours - but hey, I was just a poor college kid and couldn't afford an orbital sander), in the process using different sandpaper grits and gouging deep into the wood in many places (I also didn't know to sand in one direction, sigh). Once that was done, I spray painted the whole thing with those 99 cent cans of black spray paint you find at the bottom of the spray paint section at the home improvement store, in a third story breezeway in the 20+ mph Oklahoma wind. Then I took some sandpaper and randomly sanded away areas of the black spray paint to reveal the wood underneath, distressing the edges - and also other completely unrealistic random areas. Then I purchased some spray paint sealer-type finish to protect my lovely *cough* paint job, and sprayed that in a third story breezeway in the 20+ mph Oklahoma wind. Then we moved - 4 times.

SO. Now you know the story of my dresser. It has a bit of a history with us. But more than that, it's built super-sturdy and is made of solid wood. It works great, and we couldn't be happier with it.

What I'm not happy with? The college-student-who-doesn't-know-what-she's-doing finish on it. Cringe.

So now it's time to refinish my earlier horrible paint job on this puppy.

And now I'm asking: what would you do with this dresser?

Did you enjoy this post? Please subscribe for free updates in the future and to see what we're up to next!