A Powder Room with Punch!

     I'm working up to painting the ENORMOUS living room, those 10ft. ceilings and the open floor plan are truly daunting. But a powder room - now that, I can handle. It's small and according to Sarah Richards you can have some fun in a powder room. So, here's how it went.

     A little tiny room, with really tall ceilings, boring, flat oval mirror and a toilet. *sigh* I didn't even want to go in there! It does have nice hardwood floor and I like the shape of the pedestal sink.
     I have this vase of flowers that are a pale, spring green with raspberry centers. This was my color inspiration, and anything with that little spiral is also always a nice addition.
    I have a love\hate thing with wallpaper, I love a lot of the patterns but I don't like that the repeat is usually too close and I hate taking it down when I change my mind. So, I decided that I would just paint my wallpaper on, that way if I hate it, it's easy to fix. For the base, the walls went very green, Valspar, Intense Celery.
 - I found a picture on the internet to use for my starting point:

 Mine look like this, it's about 2' tall and there really isn't a pattern repeat to them, they're just randomly on the wall, spaced about 12" apart.

      I bought a specialty marker from Michael's (Copic Sketch $7.50) that has a fine point on one side and a fat chisel point on the other end. I simply drew the shapes on the wall using the fat end. So easy!

    The next thing that needed to be dealt with was of course the flat mirror. It's in my garage now if anyone has a use for it. I went to TJ Maxx and picked up a really snazzy round, framed mirror for $35 - love the shape, hate the color (white). Easy to fix, I painted it with an amazing color - Olympic, Fuchsia Flock.

     I like it so much better now! The rest of the story is just the odds-n-ends that add personality to a room. They look like this:

 Painted the bird -  love his new color! Added the wrought iron candle holder because it has that lovely spiral. Filled a vase with some bright yellow sunflowers. Added the Jimmy Newtron lunchbox to hold extra soap. I like that the crisp white of the trim and the fixtures sets things off nicely and the little hits of intense fuchsia give the space a little fun, a bit of whimsy. I still need to find a fun rug for the floor but everything else is done.

A fast project - one Sunday afternoon - with awesome results!
I'm feeling brave enough now that I'm thinking about starting the living room.... blues, purple and pale, pale green.... it's going to be amazing.

Laundry Pizzazz

     Laundry - UGH!

     When we were looking at new houses one of the biggest selling points for me was the laundry closets UPstairs!! You know a woman came up with that. In our old house the laundry was in the unfinished basement, dark, damp, spidery, cold - I hated it.

     The new washer and dryer were the first major purchase I made - I got them the day we went to settlement on the new house! There was no way I was going to bring my 30 year old set to my shiny new house!  What I really wanted was the new fabulously colored sets, teal or fire engine red - but my budget didn't quite stretch that far. I was puttering around on the internet looking for some way to make the laundry a place I actually wanted to be. I found some pictures of a set that a woman had painted with big polka dots. Very snazzy - but I know a bit about paint and I knew this was too much trouble for me and I wasn't sure that the paint would hold up.

   Putter, putter - I came across a site...... Wallies - oh, yes! Just what I needed. They sell vinyl and paper images that you can just peel and stick or wallpaper to stuff. Awesome! I opted for the wallpaper, it's easy to put on, easy to take off (I may want a different look at some point!) and... so, so cheap!!

     For under $20 and in about 30 minutes you can have a seriously fun place to wash, dry, fold. Simply get the circles wet with warm water and a sponge, stick 'em to the wall (or whatever strikes your fancy!), wipe to make sure you have no bubbles and good adhesion - bang, you're done! Now every time I open the closet it makes me smile - looks like giant, colorful soap bubbles in there!