Remodeling and Regrets-the Living & Dining Room Debacle

Dear Readers:

I have been dragging my feet for quite some time on an issue I normally attack with my ninja skills. I want to repaint and redecorate two rooms in my house:

The Dining Room

And the Living Room.

Now, there’s nothing wrong with these rooms and I do feel rather American wanting to redo a perfectly good room. The idea when we first chose this light gray paint was to have a very minimalistic, clean look (Bicep’s desire) but with a little color (my desire).

However, it just feels cold and blah.

I am determined to do it with no money out of pocket. This means selling things I own to buy new decor and paint, making deals and waiting for sales. I have been patient, grasshopper.

Here’s what inspired my color choice originally. While on tour, I came across this unique cinder block fence. I loved the turquoise color and filed the color in the back of my little creative brain.

Months later, I put together my case for change and presented this color board to Biceps. Lo and behold, the minimalist man liked the idea and enthusiastically supported it.

He has become a big supporter of my decorating prowess after I redid the Master Bathroom and Master Bedroom while he was on tour. I think he became this aforementioned big supporter mainly because he didn’t have to do any of the work. Heh.

So, dear Readers:

Here’s why I am writing to you. I have the inspiration, the go-ahead, the non-budget-budget and the time. It’s getting to the ridiculous point of just needing to pull the trigger and I can’t seem to do it. I think I’m afraid to paint a color so bold and possibly trendy. Should I just jump in, no regrets and slap that paint on the walls?

Funky Gold Medina

I can’t pass up tacky gold objects. I have an addiction,
and I’m alright with that. My lengthy affair with silver seems to be coming to a close.
After browsing one afternoon at Habitat for Humanity, I found two gold light fixture medallions for $1 a piece. And I made this. Want to know how? Read on, sister!

A medallion is the part of the light fixture between the glass that houses the lightbulbs and the ceiling. It covers over the ugly hole in your ceiling cut by your contractor or a housewife that tries to replace a ceiling fixture while her hubby is away.
Not that that’s ever happened.

What you’ll need for this swanky wall hanging:
Light fixture medallion
Oops Paint (2 colors)
Paintbrush
Rubber Cement or White Glue
Textured Wallpaper or textured craft paper
Card Stock or cardboard
Scissors

Trace the inside opening of your medallion onto your card stock and as Uncle Joey used to say, ‘Cut it out!’. Cut a square of textured wallpaper or craft paper out that is slightly bigger than your piece of card stock.

Cover the card stock with a sufficient amount of glue and adhere it to the back side of your wallpaper.
I set a large book on top of the wallpaper to stick the two together.
Sit and wait. I chose to listen to Getz and Gilberto while I was waiting. It was most enjoyable.
Actually, I did a load of laundry and made dinner and returned some phone calls. But a girl can dream, can’t she?

Once your glue has dried, cut away the excess of wallpaper from the card stock circle.

Paint your circle with some of your favorite ‘oops’ or leftover paint you have lying around.
Pay no attention to how messy my brush is in this picture. It was for dramatic emphasis for the reader.

I found a silhouette of a feather that I liked online by, are you ready for this?-googling the words ‘feather silhouette’.
I am a genius.
After tracing the silhouette on your circle, grab your second color of paint and go to town.

Here’s my silhouette taking shape.

After the feather was dry, I mounted the circle into the medallion using double sided foamy squares (the kind used for spacers in scrapbooking and card making).
Then, I hung the finished piece on a tree I have outside. My neighbor just looked at me and asked me what I was doing.
I told her I was decorating the tree.
‘Uh, huh’, she said.
I hung it up in my office eventually, but I just liked messing with my neighbor. She can take it.