Posts by Lindsay

Cracked

Posted by Lindsay on Mar 14, 2010 in Featured Articles, Likely Solutions | 1 comment

Our woodstove has a crack.  It’s an Earth Stove, but that’s all I know.  My husband thinks it can be fixed by welding it, and I’m crossing my fingers that it can because 1) wood stoves are expensive, 2) it is our main source of heat and 3) I like the way it looks.  It’s scalloped edges are so cute.  And it works awesome.

Old picture, but the only one that’s handy at the moment.  And yes, we’re still using it, even though it has a crack.  We do have a carbon monoxide detector, so we can sleep peacefully about it.  But not too peacefully… Anyway, we’re taking the proper precautions to make sure we’re safe, but we’re both anxious to get it fixed.  Hopefully it can be welded (as long as it’s not made of cast iron, which Glenn thinks it’s not).  But that will be a process because it obviously can’t be welded in our house and it’s heavy…we’ll see how it goes.  Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated!

Barn Door Love

Posted by Lindsay on Mar 12, 2010 in Decor, Design, Featured Articles, inspiration, Likely Favorites | 2 comments

Someday my home (not my current home – my future dream home!) will have doors on barn-type slider tracks.  Like this…sigh…

Besides being visually attractive, they are very functional as to eliminate the space you need for a door swing.  Either way, I love it.

Via Design Sponge.

This house (below) is where my barn-door obsession began about 5 years ago – I saw it in the March 2005 issue of Western Interiors and I still have the issue.  I even used this house in a few projects in design school (with permission from the architect! .  Please follow the link to see it in full below – you won’t be sorry!

Via studio.bna (Audrey Hall photo)

Via Apartment Therapy.

Apparently they’re easy to install, you just need a kit.  Visit Remodelista for more info on where to find the fittings and supplies!

Have a great weekend, everyone! I’m excited to do my daycare playroom install tomorrow, so hopefully I’ll have those pictures up for you soon!!

xo, Lindsay

Hello.

Posted by Lindsay on Mar 8, 2010 in Design, DIY, Featured Articles, Laundry Room, Wallpaper | 2 comments

I have a problem.  I start a blog post, but don’t finish it.  I find 1 good inspiration image, then I get stuck.  My draft list is getting longer and longer on here.  I try to squeeze a post into the free moments that I have, but it’s not enough time.  I have a ton of photos on my camera that never make it to my computer.  And then I have 5 client projects I’m working on.  And calories that need to be burned.  Where was I going with this? 

So I’m going to stick in one or two (okay, 3!) images of a cool product that I’m actually considering for my own house…because I am so excited that the wall between my garage and my laundry room will soon be a distant memory, and it will be replaced with another set a few feet back.  And it will be the new home of my refrigerator and my new pantry.  Because putting food on the open shelf above my washing machine isn’t cutting it anymore!

Beadboard wallpaper. Oh yes…because who can stand to paint brand new wood?  Because I want it painted.  And who can afford to run it floor to ceiling, like my inspiration image.  I saw this image (below) and have saved it for my laundry room.  And I’m a bad blogger and don’t remember where I got it.  Sorry!  I think it’s Martha Stewart, but I’m not sure.  Please let me know if you know!

Cool glass containers should go above my washer and dryer.  Not food.    And I found the cool wallpaper while browsing the latest Land of Nod catalog.  They’re now offering wallpaper (I love the paintable textured options) and eco-friendly Mythic paint from their catalogs.  I’m sure I’ve seen it before, but I forget about things with so many options!

$30 for an 11 yard roll (20.5″ wide). And my mother-in-law can hang wallpaper.  And I am getting a tax refund.  And I’d like to spend it on my kitchen…what are you spending yours on?  Home related or other?  I am excited that our big kitchen plans might be coming to life sooner than expected!

Have a great week!!

-Lindsay

Go ahead, write on the walls

Posted by Lindsay on Feb 22, 2010 in Creativity, DIY, Featured Articles, inspiration, Tricks of the Trade | 4 comments

Cool product alert.  Have you wondered how to actually install a look like this? Is it a big board? Is it on a roll (like wallpaper?)?  Is it….hmmm…

{Image via Young House Love}

As you probably know, I’m working on a project that involves a local daycare playroom.  How fun, right? Right.    It’s been a great learning experience for me, and I am thankful for such enthusiastic and trusting clients.  So of course, we looked into a chalkboard wall for the kiddies.  And if you didn’t already know, it’s simply paint.  (You’re probably saying – duh! We already knew that!  Well…the folks at the hardware store didn’t have a clue to what I was talking about so you never know!!)  Anyway, you paint the chalkboard pigmented paint right on to the wall.  The pigments dry harder than normal paint, allowing for a good surface to write on and not damage, and can also be wiped clean.  You can find it in all sorts of colors, but I stuck with black for this project.  And we didn’t do an entire wall in chalkboard paint, we did a chair rail at about 45″ (so not technically a chair rail, but it worked with the mantle above the wood stove visually!) and painted the lower half of the entire room with chalkboard paint.  A dream come true for little ones, right?  I know Harper already loves to take stray pencils to my kitchen cabinets…

I love how they painted the top of the table in the packaging, too!  You’ll have to do some web searching to find different colors, but this black version is available at Ace Hardware.

And to step it up a notch, pair it with a magnetic primer under the chalkboard paint because what kids don’t love to play with magnets?  We only have 3 letters from Harper’s alphabet magnet set left on our fridge…the rest are probably underneath it.

But this way you can paint the magnetic latex primer right on the wall to make any surface magnetic. Just a word of caution stemming from experience – if you’re going to prime, prime the entire wall or section.  I.e. don’t just put this where you want a magnetic surface and leave other areas unprimed – you can see what parts have magnetic (or any) primer, and what areas don’t after you paint a top coating on!

Either way it still looks cool and works great!  Very excited to wrap this project up – not because I want to be done with it, but because I love to see an end result!  Hopefully I can share it with you within the next few weeks!  If I ever get online to blog…

Got Water Spots? I’ve Got a Magic Powder

Posted by Lindsay on Feb 15, 2010 in eco-friendly, Environmental, Exterior, Featured Articles, windows | 1 comment

We have 2 large (8 feet wide by 4 feet tall) windows in our living room.  Nice, but they’ve actually always been an eyesore since we moved in a year and a half ago because the previous owner apparently ran her sprinkler and let it hit the house.  Here in Likely, this causes horrible water spots on the windows and you couldn’t even see through the bottom half of those windows!  We’ve tried cleaning them with normal window cleaner and a few other solutions, but those didn’t take it off, and we kind of just gave up for now because we knew we needed something better.  This has been driving Glenn’s dad crazy…almost every time he stopped by (he’s a UPS man so that is often!) he would say something about a product he heard about or asking us if we’ve tried something to fix it.  Like I said, we pretty much ignored the problem and just kept the blinds closed!

Gross, right?  We thought they were ruined and we had to live with them like this!

Now a few weeks ago Randy (Glenn’s dad) dropped off a little white jar of ‘stuff’ to clean windows, and we really didn’t think much of it.  He does things like that all the time.  We didn’t jump at the chance to try out this product or anything, it pretty much sat on top of our refrigerator for a week or so.  So one Friday morning I’m making our bed and I stop to admire the view out of our sparkling-clean brand new bedroom window, wishing it was the same in the living room and then I remembered the little white jar.  So I went out to the kitchen and found it, read the directions on the back, grabbed the materials I needed and went outside.  I put some water in a stainless bowl, then you dip a sponge in to get it wet, dip that in the jar of white powder, and then go to work on the windows.  I scrub a little circle, then grab a damp rag to wipe it off and in my amazement IT WORKED PERFECTLY!

Isn’t that a great view?  We were seriously missing out and now we open the blinds every day!  Our windows look brand new with very little effort and no harsh chemicals, thanks to a $4 jar of ‘magic’ powder! It’s called ‘Nothin’s Better Water Stain Remover’ (I’m not making this up) and it is worth its weight in gold!!

For you locals you can buy it at Carsten’s!    Check out these results…before on the left, and after on the right.

See our little jar of the stuff out there?  Love it!  And to do both of our 8-foot windows and the storm door glass, it didn’t even take the whole 4 oz. jar.  Next up is the camp trailer windows!  You can use it on all kinds of surfaces (Glass, chrome, porcelain, tile, fiberglass, aluminum and stainless steel will shine and sparkle as new.  Removes water, mineral stain, rust, scum, paint overspray, oxidization.)

I promise that I started the job, but as soon as Glenn noticed me out there working on the windows he came out to see how it was going.  And took the scrubber from me because he had to try it.  And he finished the job.  Strangely, he does that a lot.  I’m not going to complain. 

Magic.  Seriously.  Go buy some now!

Do you have water spots?  Do you have a ‘magic’ cleaning product you’d like to share?  Please tell us!!