Tag Archives: furniture

Pinterest Musings: Water Cooler Disguises

May 27, 2014 Angelique 3 Comments

My current problem is an ugly water cooler. after several searches on Pinterest, I couldn’t find a solution….So I started an inspiration board after a simple Google search: “how to hide a water cooler”.

Here are a few things that I found. Clicking on the images will open a new tab to the image link.

Mod Boxes

Mod Boxes are simple covers that fit “90% of bottle-type coolers on the market” and is available in unfinished Birch or Oak. The cover has no backside, so changing the water bottle is simple.

Water Cabinet

Roundtree Furniture offers an interesting item called the Water Cabinet. The cabinet offers the same ease of use concept as the Mod Box, but features a cabinet style door to cover the water spigots (or is it spouts or faucets?).

Wood & Tique

Wood & Tique offers a cabinet for the water cooler as well, however their product is a full cabinet with a storage shelf.

The Water Bottle Cozy

Another option available is to do it old-school wiht a water bottle cozy…

My Solution:

Since I am not a fan of the Cozy and I do not have hundreds of dollars for the furniture style covers, I have decided to enlist the hubby’s help in building a custom water cooler cabinet of my own design.

But until then, I will just live with this…

Home Improvement

From Drab To Fab: Day 4–Floor Planning

August 13, 2013 Angelique Leave a comment

On Monday, I spent several hours moving furniture around–to no avail. Since our living room and dining room are in an open L shaped room with an off-center window and what I call a “hanging wall,” arranging furniture is not so easy. So finally I gave up and measured every single wall and every piece of furniture. I recorded all of my measurments on a notepad in my lovely chicken scratch writing that only I can read–or so says my kids.

Scribbled Measurments — Scribbled Measurements

After lunch I sat at my computer for at least an hour trying to create the floorplan on Urban Barn Icovia. Then I spent the next two hours arranging furniture on my new floorplan.

I came up with 3 options to choose from.

I'm really not liking this one--even though it is a mimic of one I saw on a designer's website — I’m really not liking this one–even though it is a mimic of one I saw on a designer’s website

I like this one a lot better, but not too keen on the end tables

I like this one the most, but am concerned about the flow into the dining area--and I have to take out my dining table extension for everyday dining. — I like this one the most, but am concerned about the flow into the dining area–and I have to take out my dining table extension for everyday dining.

I really am torn between Option 2 and Option 3. So like I usually do when I can’t make up my mind–I put it to a vote on facebook!

The Tally so far (just before bed 08/12)

Option One: 0

Option Two: 3

Option Three: 3

I’m “sleeping” on it until Friday.

Which one do you like? Vote here or on my Facebook page!

Home Decor Projects, Home Improvement, New Life for Furnishngs

Repurposed Vintage Plant Sconce

August 12, 2013 Angelique 3 Comments

I found these vintage plant sconces from the 1970’s at the thrift store for about $3 (for both) and just knew that they would look great in my modern glam living room.

After some cleaning, primer, and a coat of gloss black spray paint they looked like new.

At first I really didn’t know how I would use them. I guess these were really common in the 70’s as sconces for fake plants & flowers–eww.

It dawned on me a few days ago that I still had a sheet of plastic from the fluorescent light fixture that removed and that I could use that to turn these sconces into a shelf.

I used a large envelope to trace out a template–a file folder would work well too.

After cutting out the template (I called it my taco shell) I placed the plastic into the center of the template. I did it this way because it makes manipulating and cuing the plastic a lot easier.

Using my favorite glue in the whole world–E 600 glue–I simply glued the plastic onto the lip of the sconce.

Because I wanted to use the sconce as a shelf to hold a statuette, It need to be securely mounted to the wall. I would have used anchors and dry wall screws, but the heads of the screws would not fit into the mounting holes on the sconce.

I found two wood screws that fit into the sconce, but were too short to offer any support into the dry wall.

Enter the DIy mounting bracket.

I used an old scrap piece of wood to create two mounting brackets. I lined the top edge of the sconce with the edge of the wood, marked the length, and drilled holes where the screws should nestle into the holes of the sconce.

Using my handy dandy lightweight-yet-powerful cordless Ryobi 5″ circular saw, I cut the wood to the correct (measured twice) length.

I mounted the brackets to the wall with anchors and drywall screws. Use a level while mounting the bracket to ensure that your shelf or sconce is level after mounting.

I then inserted the wood screws into the pre-drilled holes. Make sure that the wood is painted the same color as the sconce.

Voila–a perfect Rococo shelf for my lovely ladies!

I think it’s a pretty close match to my Modern Glam Design Board.

No matter what color you choose, these will add glamour to any wall.

Linked To:

Tweak It Tuesday @ Cozy Little House

Tips & Tutorials Link Party @ Home Stories A to Z

New Life for Furnishngs, Transfer

Chalk Paint and Paste Wax

August 8, 2013 Angelique 2 Comments

Or “I’m Too Cheap Frugal For the Real Deal”

I’ve been wanting to try chalk paint for quite some time now, but I just couldn’t justify the cost of Annie Sloan. It’s nothing personal Ms. Sloan. We live on one income and have teenagers. With an eensie weensie teeny tiny budget like mine, it is imperative to find alternatives to the “real deal.”

I’ve seen several homemade recipes on pinterest for chalk paint. When I finally found a pin that featured four recipes, I just had to check it out. Denise at Salvaged Inspirations put all four to the test. Since she has worked with Annie Sloan Chalk Paint before, I trusted her judgement. Her results and the recipes can be found here.

I used the No. 2 recipe to paint these dining room chairs. It only took 2 coats of paint and I didn’t even have to use primer!

I wanted to age them and bring out the design on the chair back, but all I had on hand was plain paste wax. So, I did the sensible thing and went to Pinterest. My search wasn’t resulting in a DIY of tinting plain paste wax. So I went to Google. I ❤ Google.

I found what I was looking for at Saving 4 Six. Carrie took on the experiment of tinting paste wax for a project. The DIY tutorial can be found here.

After Sanding the “aged” areas and applying the tinted paste wax the chair looked like this:

Antiqued_chair_original

I apologize for the poor picture quality. We’ve been having a lot of summer rain lately and the garage lighting is awful.

Here is a quick roundup of the chalk paint and tinted paste wax:

Because I do not want to take credit for the work of others, please refer to the instructions on the links above.

What you need to make chalk paint:

3 Parts Latex Paint

1 Part Plaster of Paris

A little bit of water for mixing

What you need to tint plain paste wax:

Paste Wax

Oil based stain

What adventures have you had in DIYing your own version of an expensive product?

Home Decor Projects, New Life for Furnishngs

New Life for an Old Candle Sconce

August 7, 2013 Angelique 9 Comments

A few weeks ago I found a treasure trove of items at my local thrift store…all at 30% off the sticker price. Oh how I love the Purple tag sale days! I found a Rococo style mirror from the ’70’s, a Rococo style wall planter thingy, two matching wall decor frames, and this beautiful bronze candle sconce from the ’60’s. Okay, I know, it’s ugly. But I knew that it had the potential to be beautiful.

I removed the mirror and then sprayed the sconce down with a light solution of TSP and water and then scrubbed it with a nylon brush.

After it had dried, I noticed that the dust/dirt build up in the crevices was still there, so I sprayed it again with the TSP and used a brass cleaning brush. I got a set of three prepping brushes in the paint section at Lowe’s for about $3; Included were: a nylon brush, a brass brush, and a steel brush.

After it was dry–again–I gave it a nice coat of primer.

Now to choose a color. Blue? Turquoise? Yellow? Red?

I really could not make up my mind, so I posted the pics up on FB for a vote.

And the winning color was: Turquoise!

And if you forgot how ugly it was here’s a before and after to enjoy.

Linked To:

Live Life. Create Dreams.

Tag Archives: furniture

Pinterest Musings: Water Cooler Disguises

Mod Boxes

Water Cabinet