Fall Decor: Dinner Party

Candles, Vase, Candle Sticks & Fall Vines | Michael's

Table & Chair Rental | Art Pancakes, Nashville, TN

Pumkins | Old Time Pottery

Runner Fabric, Napkins & Chargers | Hobby Lobby

Halloween Decor

Black Fabric | Ely's Fabrics, Mobile, AL

Pumkpins, Candles and Candle Sticks | TJ Maxx Homegoods

Mirror | Southeastern Salvage

The Green Room: New Meeting Space for A Little Something Detailed

I'll admit it. I only get the paper to read through the yard sale listings for Saturday morning. I stumbled upon an estate sale, thanks to an early morning call from my mother-in-law, and found some great deals.

This is my new meeting space for A Little Something Detailed clients!

Couch - $50
Wing Backed Chair - $20 + $125 to slipcover
Coffee Table - $19.99 at Ikea
End Tables - $7.99 each at Ikea
Black Throw Pillows - $20 at Homegoods
Recovered Couch Pillows - $12 each
Vinyl Shelving - $15 at Home Depot
Black and White Mirror - $17 at Homegoods
Total: $294.00

The couch is in great condition. I really think it was only used in a granny's formal living room for opening presents on Christmas Day. It's vintage style is a great pairing with the rest of the modern elements. I had the wing backed chair slip-covered here in Nashville - let me know if you want his contact number. He is a little creepy, but his work is awesome and affordable.

We already had this Nashville picture, taken by friend, co-worker's husband and former roommate of my husband, Warne Riker. You may recognize his pictures from the cover of the Nashville Scene with the flood picture. That was a real picture folks. He uses HDR for some of his pictures. Uber talented photographer. You can find all of his pictures here for purchase.

ModerNash is a company in town that drives to Ikea every week and brings back goodies to Nashville residents. It is SO much less expensive to have them pick it up than it is to pay Ikea's shipping charges.  And the shelving idea came from a fav blog of mine, Young House Love. Overall, I am very pleased with the outcome of this room, since my hubby thought it was a waste of space and money to furnish - shame on him! Glad I could prove him wrong.

New House. New Office and Workspace.

We are FINALLY settled in to the new house which means I am FINALLY settled in to my new office. My old space was a small antique library desk – the size of a postage stamp. I was really hoping for a new house with enough bedrooms to use one as a true office and workspace. 

So, without further adieu, here is the new workspace for ALSD. I still have a lot to do, but I am super proud of my handy work. I built this all by myself! You can see where I got the idea... from one of my favorite blogs, Young House Love who also got this idea from another fav blog of mine, Tart House.

The square bookcases are from Target - actually listed online for more than they are in the store. The table tops are flat panel doors which I painted white. I secured everything with 2x4's in the wall (which you can see a bit of on the far right of the desk). Chair is from Ikea. I am still working on cable management and the best layout, but so far I am very pleased with the set up. This paint is Behr's Pale Lemon - the perfect and perky shade for an office.

I also have some fun coming your way for the meeting room downstairs - yard sale furniture - and it's awesome. All I need is for my chair cover to be ready, and I can do the big reveal!

Harvest Gold Freezer Goes White.

We inherited this little beauty for *free* approximately 8 months ago. We hauled it all the way to our little garage only to plug it in and find out that the plug in garage was not strong enough to power our ancient new (oxymoron?) freezer. 

This is from JC Penney, people. Do they even sell appliances anymore? It also reminds me of the harvest gold kitchen in the house I grew up in - and the avocado green one at my Nana's house. Classic 70's.

When we bought our new house, we had a place for this gem in the laundry/mud room. With a door that opened right to the kitchen. Harvest gold works for the garage, but not for my kitchen, so I went to The Home Depot for a solution.

Solution: Rust-oleum Appliance Epoxy in a spray paint can. Success!

With a few other items in my cart...I went home with a plan.

Step 1: start sanding. I grabbed fine sandpaper on a block - just to knock off the sheen and give the paint something to adhere to.

Step 2: wipe off the grit that the sanding left behind with a wet cloth or wipes- get it good. Let dry.

Step 3: use a tack cloth to get the stuff you thought you got - it will be much more than you think.

Step 4: Tape. Tape off everything that you don't want painted...this stuff gets everywhere. Since I did this in our garage - I moved the cars down the street (taking no chances with 2 black cars) and put drop cloth on everything. Everything - this stuff goes everywhere.

Step 5: Start painting! Your first coat will look awful. It's ok. Just aim straight, 10 inches from the surface and use even, sweeping motions across the surface.

Step 6: continue layering until it looks covered. It took me 4 cans and a couple of days to completely cover the gold shining through. And wah-lah...a new freezer in our new house in our new laundry/mud room.

I am thrilled with the result! Now we just need a trip to Costco to fill it up with frozen goodies.

New House. The Second Thing I Love.

The second thing I love about our new house is that I got rid of this Texas orange paint in the dining room. Now is it back to normal!

After fighting with painters tape, Frog Tape to be exact, I figured out that the molding in here is some sort of composite material that NOTHING will adhere to. I had such high expectations for Frog Tape and was discouraged until I used it in the casual eating area and it worked wonders. I ended up cutting in by hand (yikes!) in the dining room and on all the floor boards. A little trick to get it nice and even: Drop a little bead of paint along the top of the baseboard when you are cutting in. It's a little trick I learned from a professional painter as a great way to cut in by hand and not have to worry about the shakes.

See...looks like home! This is Behr Brown Teepee. It's a great - warm - taupe.

And more fresh flowers from the garden - day lilies - I hope I can keep them alive!

New House. The First Thing I Love.

 

The first thing that I love about our new house is that it actually has landscaping! At least until we (I) kill it. These are some of the beautiful hydrangea's I cut this weekend for our bar in the kitchen.

Spring Door Decor.

Around this time last year, I had a beautiful spring pastel Easter wreath on my front door. Two little baby finches called it home for about a month. It was cute. Mom and dad got mad every time we opened the door, stood on our railing and screamed at us until we closed it. When I went to switch out wreaths, they had left quite a mess on the door with all their nest glue and poop. So, this year, I took my Easter wreath down - pronto - after waking up one night and remembering having to power wash my door last year. 

This year, I decided, I was not going to have a nest on my door. Especially since our house was on the market. From Fall and Christmas, I had painted a metal "F" to accent my holiday wreaths. You can see the Fall one here and the Christmas one here.

I got a little too crafty and decided to paint red glitter polka dots on the Christmas wreath. Word to the wise - it makes it hard to spray paint it again. So, I grabbed some paint remover. I went with a water based gel stripper. It was pretty easy. I was able to do a little paint job on my toes in the back yard while waiting on it to work.

Once, I scrapped off all of the paint with a putty knife, we were good to go again. I went with a super bright shade of green and a teal bow.  Super cute for the spring and no room for the little birdies.

I'll be putting my yellow wreath back up once the birds and the bees stop messing around.

Wine Bottle Candle.

Thought this was pretty cool, plus we love wine. It's a wick, like what you would use in your grandmother's old oil lamps, except for wine bottles. I just scraped off the label of a clear wine bottle, poured in the oil fluid and dropped in the wick. It should soak for around 30 minutes before lighting and it works best if the oil is more than 3/4 of the way full.

Home Improvement Tips - Painting Around Your Toilet.

Painting is no fun. But the result of it is! We painted a lot of things recently in our totally white house. Actually, there was no "we" in that. It was just me. Sorry hunny.


So, I got every room done except for the toilet room. It's tiny. And Skittle yellow. I'm 6 feet tall, but had some problems getting a ladder in there to cut in around the ceiling. Enter 6'6" tall husband. He was able to get in there with just a step stool.

Now, being an extremely messy painter, I decided to give our little bathroom some defenses.


So, I wanted to pass along this little tip: plastic wrap and painters tape. There was no way a drop of paint was going to get on that toilet. Plus, you don't even need to be careful painting behind the tank. Happy painting.

Upholstered Headboards.

Want to get a custom, upholstered headboard for around $50? It is so easy. Head out to your favorite hardware store and fabric store. A few hours later, you'll have a great (inexpensive) looking place to rest your head.

First, you have some decisions to make. Do you want your headboard to be one big piece or look like it is tufted? Fabric or leather? Solid, stripes or pattern?

Basically, you will build a frame using boards and cover that with thin plywood to give it some sturdiness and a place for your fabric to lay. I went with 2 pieces, so I could get it all in my car.


The tricky part was determining the length of the pieces I needed to cut at the hardware store. You can have them cut the pieces for you at their saw. I suggest you take a pen or pencil with you to mark the length as they are being cut. I knew that I wanted to use 1"x 3" boards. Drawing it out helps get the right measurements. Also, since I used 1" thick boards, I needed to make sure that I used nails short enough to not go through the other side. That is pretty important, since your head is so close to this thing.

My total length was 76" wide. Divided by 2 is 38" wide for my two frames. It's a lot easier to illustrate the measurements, so a diagram is here:
Your hardware store list:

• 1" x 3" boards cut to size (33" and 32" lengths)
  
• 1/8" MDF or plywood cut to size (33" x 38")
  
• 1/2" - 3/4" long Galvanized Grip-Rite Fas'ners (in layman's terms - u-shaped nails or staples)
• Staple Gun
  
• Staples for you gun - 3/4" - 1" long
• 1/2" flat topped nails to attach your plywood to the frame
• Hammer
  

Assembly is pretty straight forward. Layout your pieces on a sturdy surface and use the u-shaped nails to attach your pieces together making the frame. Then lay the plywood on top of your frame and attach using nails.



Next comes the padding and fabric part. I used 1" think foam and faux leather to cover this one, finding that foam is a little more dense than batting. It just feels softer. The leather was about $5 a yard, and you can find it next to the red and white checked picnic table fabric. Fabric comes in 36", 45" and 60" widths, so just make sure you choose a fabric that is wide enough for your project. Same for the foam. My local store didn't carry foam wide enough, so I actually needed to buy 4 pieces. You can't tell once the fabric is on that there is a seam.

Since the piece I am covering here is 38" wide, I need to allow enough fabric and foam to go around the 1" board and around to the back. I am allowing 4" on all sides to make sure I have enough to hold on to and staple into the frame. I ended up needing 2.5 yards, but decided to get 2.75 to be on the safe side. Go ahead and have your fabric store cut these pieces in half, so it is more manageable at home.

Your Fabric Store List:

• 2.75 yards of fabric (check the width! I needed a 45" wide fabric)
• 2.75 yards 1" thick foam padding (again check the width!)

Steps for fastening the foam and fabric:

• Layout your fabric flat the floor.
• Lay the the foam on top of that.
• Center the previously assembled frame on top of that with the plywood side facing down.
• Start at the center of one side, pull both the foam and the fabric taught, and put in a staple, so that you have 4 staples in the center of each side.
• Then work from that center staple out to the corners, stopping on each side about 3" from the corner.
• Once you have all the sides stapled, (and believe me you will be happy to be close to finished, because your hand will be on fire if you are using a manually powered staple gun), start folding in the corners like you are wrapping a present. It helps to trim some excess fabric, if needed, to make the fold less bulky. See close up image above.
  

Your finished product will look something like this.


Now you are ready to hang it on the wall. Using anchors and some pretty sturdy screws, we placed 4 screws evenly along the wall so that the frame would just hang on the screws. Make sure you leave at least 1" of your screw out of the wall, so the frame fits snugly and won't fall on your head around midnight.


Finished Product:


So, there you have it. A few thoughts:

• Measure, measure, measure. It's really important.
  
• Using stripes or a pattern needs additional attention to detail and concentration. You must be very careful when pulling your fabric taught, or you will end up with a crooked pattern. You also should take into consideration the repeat of the pattern - will you have enough fabric to line up the pattern?
  
• You can get pretty crafty if you have a man with a miter saw and knowledge of mitering. Think hexagon.
  
• Thinking about borrowing or renting a powered staple gun. Your hands will be pretty sore!

Christmas Tree Oh! Christmas Tree.

Need a little inspiration this weekend while putting up your tree? Many of us get our decorations out with excitement and then realize that we need more ornaments or things aren't as pretty as they seemed last year. For those of us who will be doing adding a few touches or those completely starting over, here are a few tips for your trees.



1. Pick a theme. It's easy to go with a color theme - red, bright green and gold is mine. Everything from the ornaments, to wrapping paper and bows are all in that color scheme. You can also go for shabby chic, traditional, country, or even a candy colored theme that doesn't even use traditional Christmas colors.

2. Once you have the tree up, fluffed and the lights on, start with your base layer or decoration. If you are adding ribbon some sort of garland, this is the time to do it. Start at the top and work your way around, making sure to keep an even distance as you swirl around your tree. Don't have too much wine, or you'll get dizzy!



3. Make things odd. Groups of 3, 5 or 7 work best when placing things on your tree. Find balance in the colors and the groupings and the size of your ornaments. Get all of your ornaments out where you can see them at once. If you have a lot of the same ornament style, pick up 3 or 5 at a time and place them around the tree - starting at the top, then down a section on opposite of the first one, making a zig zag all the way around. Repeat with all of your decorations, making sure to take a step back every once in a while to see what you've missed or what needs to be moved to create balance.



4. Now is the time to add any type of spray or sticks or whatever to your tree. Place beautiful glittered poinsettia's around the tree using the same technique as above. Or use glittered sprays, branches or even feathers! You can place them around the tree or gather them at the top like a burst of glitteriness at the top.

5. No tree is complete without tons of gifts underneath! Find wrapping paper to go with your theme and wrap everything to coordinate. Use the same garland or ribbon you used on your tree or find the same colors. The possibilities are endless here.

In my opinion, a tree can never be too overly decorated. Seems to be the trend over the past few years to take the theme over board. It's always a work in progress. Enjoy your decorating.

StyleScope from HomeGoods.

Loving this. My love for HomeGoods is proved again... they have put together a style horoscope for their buyers.



The Results.


Although I didn't think the title matched my style personality, the description seemed spot on. Comfort. Warmth. Bold color. Balanced neutrals.



I love organizing, yet it is also a challenge in such a small home with little time. My bed is my happy place. We love entertaining, and it has become easy now that our pantry keeps things that are easy to whip up at the last minute.



Don't be afraid of bold color in small spaces! I have a dark chocolate bathroom, a huge red wall in the main living space and a bright green bedroom and it looks great - but somehow all cohesive. Think things through and take a look through different magazines for inspiration. A few of my favs... Pottery Barn, West Elm, Ikea, Crate & Barrel. Take the quiz here!

Fall Tablescape.

Love setting the table by the season.

Placemats: Pier 1 clearance table
Michael's: candles, berry ring, vase sand filler
Old Time Pottery: ceramic pumpkins, tall vase, vase rocks filler
Hobby Lobby: yellow spray (50% coupon)
Publix's: mini white pumpkins

Spice Up That Fall Wreath.

This cute wreath is from Joann's (it was buy one get one free!) I decided to spice it up a little. Christmas Village this past weekend gave me a great idea - using a monogram. So, with a trip to craft store for spray paint and ribbon...this is how it started.


And this is how it turned out.



For those who are intimidated by making your own bows - here's a little How To. It is VERY simple.


1. Start by making a figure 8 with your ribbon.
2. Continue to stack the ribbon on top of itself, making multiple figure 8's. (On the last one, leave a tail.
3. Pitch it in the middle
4. Secure with a bread tie.
5. Wrap a piece around the center to cover up your tie (and make your second tail).
6. Cut the ends to have a clean finish.

Stay tuned...I'll show you how it will transform again at Christmas.