The (Very) Slow Evolution of a Rock Garden

You may remember from this post way back in October and this post back in January that we've been working on a rock garden against the back wall of the house. Well, "work" is kind of an overstatement. We've been dragging our feet on it (um, I'm not really sure why) but with growing season upon us, we thought we'd better get things going a little before the bed gets taken over by weeds again.

Robert put down some weed barrier back in January but somehow little green buggers always find a way to pop up around the corners and seams. We thought a double layer of barrier and rocks would gives us a little more defense. So today we finally bought some rocks to fill in the bed. We got as many bags as my little Corolla could handle and were able to fill in about half the space:

We'll definitely need another trip to Lowe's to get more rock, but the exposed weed barrier should keep things at bay for another week or two.

Eventually I'd like the space to look a little something like this:

Once we get that first layer of small rocks down, I can start the hunt for some bouldery-type rocks and some good plants...

Making Your Own Household Cleaners

In an effort to be a little more green and a little less toxie, I've been experimenting with making my own cleaning products over the last couple of years. I started out making my own glass cleaner and just slowly added products as I found more recipes and ideas. They really aren't hard to make and can definitely save you some dollars. And the ingredients that go into them (for the most part) are common grocery store and household items: water, white distilled vinegar, baking soda, and liquid castile soap*.

Here are my favorite DIY concoctions :

glass cleaner (for windows, mirrors, shower doors)

• equal parts water and vinegar in a spray bottle
• spray and rub it down with newspaper 

all-purpose surface spray

• 2 cups water
• 1/2 cup white distilled vinegar
• 1 teaspoon castile soap
• 20 drops lavender essential oil 
• (put it all in a 32 oz. spray bottle)

For years we've been using the Method surface spray, which we've really like. It smells great is just generally a good product. But I've been experimenting with this recipe (which I found here on Young House Love) to try to match the feel and smell of a store-bought cleaner. Until recently, I hadn't been adding the essential oil 'cause I just didn't have it around the house. A trip to Whole Foods revealed just how expensive this sh*t is. Am I the only one who didn't know about this? A small 15mL bottle is like eight bucks. I bit the bullet and bought it—I figured I can get a few batches of spray out of it. And the lavender definitely adds a little something something to the mix.

soft scrub (for bathtubs, sinks, and fixtures)

•  roughly equal parts baking soda and castile soap 

The first thing I do with this is gauge the amount of surface area I'm trying to clean. Then I pour out some baking soda in a little mound right into the sink/tub/etc. I add about an equal amount of castile soap...

...and then just mix them together with my hand until the it has a pasty consistency.

I rub it over the surface I'm cleaning and then scrub it with a wet rag. Then just rinse off the remaining goop. It really does make your porcelain all nice and shiny.

There are tons of recipes you can find out there for natural household cleaners. These are just some easy ones that have worked for me (I've gotten a lot of my ideas from that post I mentioned above on YHL and from this book a friend gave to me). 

* You may have to trek it to Whole Foods to get liquid castile soap.

Dining Room Evolution

Now that the mirror project is finally done and I've added a few other touches, I thought I'd give a little "360 degree" tour of our pretty-much-finished dining room. First, here's how the room looked about four months after we moved in (in June 2009):

 And here's what it looks like today:

The most dramatic change was opening up the kitchen into the dining room (which entailed removing the built-in bookcase on the right and the shelf that ran across the bookcases). We also repainted the entire dining room/living room area (way back in June when we were smack in the middle of the kitchen overhaul). It went from that kind of salmon color to a nice gray, which definitely goes better with the espresso table and the medium brown kitchen cabinets. We actually replaced the door going out to the backyard during the summer of 2010—it was the only big project we did that year while we were saving up for the kitchen. Painting the back of the bookcase and adding a pendant light over the table were easy changes that made a big difference.

Here's another view of the room from the kitchen:

And remember that bookcase we removed? It found a new home on the other side of the room:

I knew we'd have to remove it to get the look we wanted for the kitchen, but I just couldn't bear to throw it out or discard it. The bookcases are original to the house and one of the things we loved when we first saw the place. Thankfully the contractor who took out our wall was able to cut off the bookcase in one piece and move it. Then he added crown molding around the top to make it look cohesive with the space. It was great to salvage the bookcase and keep some much needed storage and display space. It's where all of our board games, candles, and photo albums live:

And although it's not dining-room related, I have to say that hanging up this little coat rack by the carport entrance has kind of changed my life.

Instead of plopping down my bag and keys wherever, they go right on a hook. If you're thinking about getting one, go for it.

Here's a larger view of the entire area so you can kind of see the lay of the land:

So I would say this turkey (a.k.a dining room) is pretty much done in my book. I'm comin' for you next, living room:

Living Room Mood Board

Our living room is one of the last rooms in the house to get a little redesign treatment. We've acquired a new (well, hand-me-down but new to us) sofa and armchair since moving into the house, but that's about it. I'd love to bring in a sectional, an area rug, and some other accessories to finish out the room. Maybe something like this:

We're also thinking that we'd get rid of our super long Ikea coffee table (that I bought right after I graduated college) and replace it with an ottoman that has storage capabilities. You can see the extra long table in action here:

We also have these great mid-century side tables (handed down by a family friend) on either side of the sofa set that I would love to keep in the room (if they'll fit on either side of the sectional we end up getting).

The sectional will be the thing that sets for tone for the room, so we'll probably get that before we make any other purchases for the space. 

Source list for the mood board: 

Sectional: Macy's

Floral throw pillow: World Market

Lattice throw pillow: Etsy

Rug: Overstock (Thom Filicia)

Lamp: Overstock

Ottoman: Overstock

Mirror, Mirror

Despite a few setbacks (ahem, broken mirror)...

...the mirror project is complete!

Because of the mishap, I had to bite the bullet and buy another UNG DRILL mirror from Ikea. Since I already had the frames painted, I just detached the mirror from the new UNG DRILL and put it in the already-painted frame. I'll either sell the unused frame or donate it to a friend. Any local takers?

Anyhoo, I used this tutorial from the Bemz blog to paint the frames and get a bit of that shabby sheek look. First you detach the mirrors from the frames. Then you rub the edges and corners of the frames down with a candle (the wax keeps the paint from sticking to the frame in key areas). Sounds weird, but it works.

Then spray paint away.

After the paint has dried, gently sand the corners and edges to expose the original black underneath.

The effect is a worn look that just makes the mirrors a bit more interesting.

After my incident with the 3M strips, I decided to take my chances and just nail the mirrors into the wall. Luckily, the patch stayed in tact and didn't crack at all. Whew. The patch is behind the mirror on the left:

So lessons learned from this project:

1. Don't trust the weight specifications on the 3M adhesive strips.

2. Don't listen to your husband when he tells you not to nail through the patches in your wall (it may just turn out ok in the end).

3. Spray paint is still the cat's meow.

Mirror Mashup

So my mirror project was going along pretty swimmingly, albeit some delays due to the Florida rain (no spray painting on those days) and going out of town for a few days in February. I was going to do a whole post about it when they were sitting pretty up on my wall, but I thought I'd share a recent hiccup with you:

I know, I'm sad too.

See, one part of the wall I was going to hang the mirrors on was patched when we moved into the house. There used to be an air conditioning unit there that was probably removed when the previous owners installed central air. Because the patch is a weak spot in the wall, I didn't want to nail into it and possibly crack the patch.

Enter what I thought was a brilliant idea—3M adhesive wall hooks. The hooks stick to the wall with adhesive tape (no nails, no holes, no cracks).

Each hook is supposed to hold five pounds (the IKEA UNG DRILL mirror is six pounds). So I used two hooks and some picture wire to secure the mirror to the wall. It was looking good and seemed secure enough. Fast forward about twenty-four hours and SMASH—the hooks came off the wall and the whole thing came tumbling down. I wasn't home when it happened. Robert called me to tell me the bad news.

But I'm not giving up yet. I may just have to nail into the patch and hope for the best (and maybe do a little repatching if it cracks). Wall be damned, I'll get those mirrors up somehow.

Cool Stools, Man

Ever since we acquired a bar during out kitchen redo, we've been looking for the perfect bar stool to slide up in front of that sucker. There were some serious questions to think about as we assessed the bar stool scene: back or no back? swivel or no swivel? vintage or new? You may remember that we had kind of settled on these stools from Target a while back:

We dragged our feet a bit, watched them go on sale (yay!) and then back to regular price (boo!). I decided that the next time they went on sale, I would just buy them and that would be that. But then, as I was perusing Craigslist ads one day, I found two great mid-century slat back bar stools that someone was selling for $70 (for both!). They looked a little too short from the pictures, so I called the seller up and asked him to measure them. Wouldn't you know, they were the perfect height for our bar—29 1/2 inches from the seat to the floor. Sold! We drove down to his warehouse last weekend and picked them up:

They're super comfy and light weight. We've been sitting at them every night this week to eat dinner.
Unfortunately, the original vinyl seats are pretty worn on the edges, and one seat has a substantial tear (which was disclosed in the ad):

It's too bad 'cause the vinyl is a cool green color with a nifty stripe pattern:

Our plan is to recover them—I'm not sure with what but we're thinking about options: vinyl? fabric? I'm kind of excited to find a fabric that will add something new to these vintage babies.