House Tour – Master Bedroom
I use the term “Master” loosely. This room is pretty small, and I’m sure it doesn’t help that we own a King-sized bed. We try to make the most of the space we have though, and while it’s cramped cozy, I love this room.
Here’s an overview shot, looking in through the main doorway. I DIY’ed the capiz shell chandelier (I bought the shells on eBay), the upholstered headboard, and the burlap window treatments. The roman shades are from JC Penney. The paint color is Perfect Taupe by Behr, which I love.
The left side is Mister P’s side. That doorway leads to our (one) bathroom. Our bedframe is the Malm from IKEA. I covered the headboard with grey corduroy fabric. It’s also tufted, but you can’t tell in these pictures because the headboard is so low. The height actually works well in here though, because of the height of the windows. Our duvet cover is from Crate and Barrel – and it’s one of my most favorite things ever. The long white pillow is from Target, and the typographic shams in the back are EIVOR ORD, from IKEA.
Here’s a close-up of the wall on Mister P’s side. We have a couple of framed wedding photos (Rochelle Mort), and our ring bowl from Paloma’s Nest, is stamped with our wedding vows: “With all that I am, with all that I will become, with this ring I marry you,” our names, and wedding date. The Coney Island print on the left is from Etsy seller VisuaLingual.
The Boston Terrier print above the bed is from Brian Rubenacker, and looks exactly like our baby girl Abbey. The plastic T and copper P were found on Etsy. The (heavy) metal E was a gift. The lamps are vintage and were found on eBay and spray painted bright yellow. The closet doors used to be mirrored. We flipped them around and added the wood trim and fabric panels.
I found this lot of vintage keys on eBay and framed them in this shadow box from Marshall’s. The papercut art on the right is an excerpt from a poem by e.e. cummings, and was made by British paper artist Julene Harrison. It was a gift from me to Mister P on our first wedding anniversary.
Our dresser and nightstands are both Malm from IKEA. We added the brushed nickle bin pulls (purchased on eBay). The stool to the right of the dresser is the Benjamin (from IKEA…are you sensing a theme here?!), and I desperately want to give it some sort of fun, funky paint treatment.
The jewelry display was once an escort card holder for our wedding. I made it out of an old frame (spray painted), fabric, and twine. George the Terrier holds some of my bracelets.
Divas Half Marathon
This past Sunday, I completed one of the items on my Mighty List – running a half marathon. I’m incredibly proud of myself for accomplishing this goal. If you’d have asked me a year ago if I would ever run a half marathon, I would have looked at you like you were a crazy person.
I started running again (I ran track in high school) last February to lose weight. Little did I know that one year later I’d be running 5 days a week, 10 and 12 miles at a time! My cousin Meghan knew that I’d been running (due to my excessive running-related Facebook updates, no doubt), and around Christmas time, she asked if I wanted to run the Divas Half Marathon with her in San Francisco. I agreed, as did my sister in law, Jessica. We had 4 months to train, and this past Sunday, May 6th, was the big day. I was anxious, but confident.
I finished up with a chip time of 02:19:43. It would have been faster had I not stopped to pee (and wait in line at the port-a-potty!) around mile three. I’ve been cursed with a small bladder! I finished 185 out of 639 in my division, 899 out of 3,558 overall. Not too shabby for a first timer. When I crossed the finish line, I was elated. So much so that I (almost) started crying. It was such an amazing feeling. But this story wouldn’t be complete without talking about my weight loss journey.
Although it’s incredibly embarrassing and humbling, for the sake of honesty and transparency, here’s a photo of me from December 2010.
Some life altering events that I’d rather not disclose on my blog occurred shortly after this photo was taken. I went through a period of personal reflection and growth, thinking about everything from my career to my lifestyle choices. It was at this point I knew I had to make a change for my body and health once and for all.
My weight has fluctuated a lot over the past 10 years or so, but I was at my heaviest in the photo above, tipping the scales at 188 pounds. I’m only 5’3.” My goal was to lose 45 pounds, and hopefully fall within the ‘normal’ range of the Body Mass Index (BMI). When I started, my BMI was 33.3, which is considered obese. A normal BMI is anywhere from 18.5–24.9.
I didn’t take a miracle drug or have surgery. Instead, I lost the weight the old fashioned way – through diet and exercise. By July of 2011, I had lost 26 pounds. That’s my beautiful niece, Liza, by the way – 11 years old and almost as tall as me!
By October, I was down 33 pounds. Here I am at The Happiest Place on Earth!
Christmas Eve, 2011 – one year after the first photo was taken, down 39 pounds.
After the marathon, May 2012, down 45 pounds.
A little before & after side by side.
I still have a few pounds to go to fall within the normal BMI range. But if there’s one thing I’ve learned over the past year, it’s that I have the power, dedication, commitment and heart to achieve my goals!
Mother’s Day Planter Box DIY Project
Breaking news! In case you’ve been living under a rock, I thought I should let you know that Mother’s Day is this Sunday, May 13th. You still have a couple of days to get something together for that special lady. As for myself, I decided to go the DIY route this year for two reasons. One – nothing says I love you and care about you than the time and effort that goes into a handmade gift. And two – I’m currently out of work and trying to save some cash!
I wracked my brain for something simple, beautiful and cheap that I could make for the two most important moms in my life (my own, and Mister P’s). It was then that I remembered these wooden flower boxes I had laying around. These were originally purchased at IKEA 5 or so years ago. Yes, they’re that old. Here’s what they looked like after I gave them a good scrubbing on my workbench/outdoor kitchen:
You’ll notice there are three boxes and only two moms. Well, I decided to keep one for myself because I’m selfish like that!
These boxes have metal trays in the bottom, but no drainage. So I used my electric drill to create some!
The next step was sanding. I used my palm sander, but I’m sure regular old sandpaper would have done the trick.
At one point, I had attempted to spray paint these boxes white. It didn’t stick (probably because I neglected to clean them first). A lot of the old paint and grime was scrubbed off during the cleaning process, but I made sure to wear protective gear while sanding, just in case. Safety first!
Notice how red my eyes are? You can thank Mother Nature and the abundance of trees in my area for that!
I painted all of the boxes with two coats of white exterior acrylic paint that we had left over from another project. While they were drying and curing, I took to the computer to create a template. I used InDesign because I can, and the mere though of opening Microsoft Word makes me cringe, but I’m sure Word would work if you’re not a spoiled brat like I am 
After cutting and trimming my template (I used a craft knife, flat metal ruler and cutting mat), I taped it to one of the planters and got to painting. I used acrylic paints and a small foam roller.
I don’t have photos of the next couple of steps, but I can explain what I did just as well. After several coats of paint, I removed the template and did some touching-up using a small craft paintbrush. After the paint dried completely (overnight), I sanded the entire planter by hand to rough it up and make things look worn and chippy. Finally, I used a large dry brush to apply tiny amounts of grey paint, and then rubbed it in/wiped it off with a damp rag. There was no real science to it, I just painted and wiped until I was satisfied with the look.
After a trip to the garden center for some plants (the only thing I bought for this project), I had two gorgeous hand-painted flower boxes (I was too cheap to buy flowers for my own, the third one)! For this box, I chose Geraniums and Vinca.
The flowers I chose for the second box are Mexican Heather and Osteospermum (AKA African Daisy). And that, my friends, is how you make a thoughtful gift for the leading ladies in your life using limited resources.
April Instagram Photos
I didn’t do great at the photo a day challenge this past month, but I did manage to snap a few shots. I’m really going to try to stay on top of it for May, and I’m off to a good start so far! With that said, here are some of my favorite photos from April.
New Business Cards
I got new business cards today! They are very basic black and white, like my website – I wanted to keep things clean to show off the work in my portfolio. When developing my logo, I wrote my name a bunch of times on a clean sheet of paper until I had a few that I liked. This isn’t my actual signature – which is way, WAY messier! I scanned my handwriting, cleaned up any stray marks in Photoshop and then vectorized it in Illustrator. And don’t worry, I didn’t accidentally leave the last digit of my phone number off the card – I Photoshopped it out because I’m paranoid about internet weirdos calling me. Anyway, here’s the finished product:
What do you think?
