My life...just not on the road I expected (but it's still dang good).

Annie's Room (Finally)

If you're looking for info. on the Clickin Moms drawing, here it is.

If you'd given up hope that I'd ever show photos of Annie's room, read on...

I actually planned to post photos of Annie's room a long time ago, but kept holding off because it's not quite finished.

The baseboards still aren't nailed up, her closet and bedroom doors haven't been painted, I need to find some new drawer pulls, etc., but since I've already moved on to Courtney's room, I figured I might as well show you what I've got so far...

That's the view from the front door. (I tried to refinish the floors myself, but after busting a half-dozen sanding belts, I gave up and hired someone who knew what he was doing.)

Annie sleeps on top of that big puppy almost every night. (A Christmas present from Grandma Jo & Grandpa Tom.)

I found the quilt at an old junk shop. (It's a little short, but its so cute, I couldn't pass it up.)

The pillow and the old Raggedy Ann are junk shop finds as well. (Much to my husband's dismay, I just buy stuff at junk shops/garage sales and store it until I find a place for it in the house.)

I made the bed out of old, solid-wood doors that I picked up for $35 each.

Basically, I made the headboard out of three panels of a door and the footboard out of two panels of a door and then I attached another full-sized door (to support the mattress) to the headboard and footboard with big, metal L-brackets.

Unfortunately, the whole frame would sway forward and backward whenever Annie crawled onto it, so I attached the headboard to the wall with screws to keep the whole bed in place.

I'm still looking for a cool metal letter 'A' to attach to the headboard.

I just lucked out finding the perfect sized wooden boxes to hold books between the mattress and the footboard.

I made the frame high enough to put another mattress underneath it. (I made it for sleep-overs with cousins and friends, but it also makes a really great fort.)

And I made the hanging hearts out of old books, patterned paper, cardstock and fishing line.

Basically, there is a front and a back side to each heart and I attached them to the fishing line (and then attached them to the ceiling with white tacks) using Hermafix tabs (Does anyone even use those anymore?) and glue. (So the fishing line is sandwhiched in between two paper hearts.)

I kind of did it the hard way (individually cutting out each heart only to find that I didn't cut them all perfectly so when I glued them back to back on the fishing line, they weren't exactly the same size, requiring me to do even more trimming), but that's just how I seem to learn best.

Of course, you could use a die-cut machine and whip this project out in no time, but if you don't have access to one of those, feel free to use the guide and instructions below:

1. Double-click on the heart image below.

2. Right-click on the heart image and select 'save as' and save the file to your computer.

3. Cut patterned paper to 8.5x11 inches and print this guide onto the back of the paper. (You may have to resize the guide to 8.5x11 inches before doing this.)

4. Place two pieces of patterned paper together with the patterned sides facing each other (so the back sides of the paper are facing out) and begin cutting out the hearts (You'll be cutting out two hearts at a time and since those hearts will be cut out exactly the same, those are the two hearts that you should attach back to back on the fishing line.)

5. Attach the hearts to the fishing fishing line using using adhesive (I used Hermafix tabs along the center of the hearts to initially hold the fishing line in place and glue along the rest of the heart) so the fishing line is sandwhiched in between the two hearts.

6. Tie the fishing line around the tip of a tack and then press the tack into the ceiling. (You may want to stick a glue dot to the underside of the tack to really make it stay in place well.)

 

On either side of the bed, there's six 10x10 prints, mounted onto white foam board. (I had these done at ScrapbookPictures.com, but they recently went out of business. Anyone know who else prints onto WHITE foam board? And the borders on the prints are some that I designed myself a long time ago.)

That calendar was a countdown calendar while Josh Downs was in Afghanistan. (He made one for each of us.)

Since the bed is so high, I put an old stool alongside the bed.

Found that old globe for $12.

I already had the lamp, but found the cute little shade for it at another junk shop.

Got that shelf from Target a few years back.

the wire baskets at the bottom are from Office Depot.

The suitcase and the top blanket are from junk shops and the white blanket is one of Annie's old baby blankets.

The magazine rack is from Office Depot, the Zebra was a present I picked up for Annie in London and the old-fashioned CD player was from Santa. (I heard he found it on Ebay, but I can't confirm that.)

The piggy bank is from target and most of those books were passed down from Ross.

I still need to change the knobs on that dresser (and I need to hide that ugly cord).

The old books were an Ebay find, the frame was from Target, the shoes and the orange canister where sent by Josh from Afghanistan and all the other stuff is junk store finds.

Got the old trays off of Ebay to use a magnetic boards. (I just drilled holes through them and attached them to the walls with screws.)

Found that old coat rack at a junk shop a few years ago. (I had been using it in the bathroom as a towel rack.)

Found the blue metal desk for $30 at a junk shop.

Have had the old mirror for awhile but decided to paint it white.

And the basket underneath the desk is for recycling. (Found it at a junk shop too.)

The apple is a timer from a local teachers shop (Class-E Professor), the canister holding the crayons was from a junk shop (but I see them all the time at Target) and the pencil holder is an old flower vase.

And just a few shots from different angles. (The wall color is called Pink Wink by Valspar and the trim color is Betsy's Linen also from Valspar.)

If you have any questions, just leave them in the comments section.

The scrapbook room/office.

 

When you walk up the stairs and turn to your left, you're directly in my scrapbook room/office.  It's about 15x13 and is the only room in the house with the original wood floors.

I got the white cabinet on the left from The Mulberry Tree in Grants Pass (quite a comedy of errors trying to get it up the stairs, over the railing and through the door) and the table from the Collectors Market in Medford.

We had a steel top put on it but it has to be replaced already because I wasn't smart enough to know that I needed a galvanized steel table top since plain old steel rusts (and rust doesn't look so good on all my white cardstock).

I bought those feet to make the table tall enough to stand at while I work.  They look goofy though so I need to stain them or something.

Most of the stuff in this room was something I already had, was found at a junk shop or found on Ebay.  (Unfortunately, I was feeling blue one day and my best friend, Jill decided to introduce me to Ebay to cheer me up.)

That little red perpetual calendar is my favorite thing I've ever found on Ebay.  (Thanks Jill.)

The Puritan Leaf Lard bucket holds all my date stamps and that metal sign holder will eventually hold a couple of back to back photos as soon as I figure out which ones to put in there.

All this stuff sits on top of my work table.

I think Jill and I were up in Sellwood (near Portland, OR) when we found that silverplate dish.  And Jill picked up that silver tray for me.

And that's an old surgical try that sits next to my paper trimmer and holds a bunch of my favorite adhesives.

I made the dividers for the drawers all by myself. 

This old, wire shelf hangs on the side of the table opposite the drawers - has most of my wood-mounted rubber stamps on it.

I don't remember where I got that old, red chair - I just remember it was really cheap and I had to have it.

And Josh and I made that blue paper organizer that goes under the desk.  It's got really cool molding all around it, rolling feet and two glass drawer drawer pulls so I can pull it out from either side of the table.

I store all my paper by color - works for me.

Found most of those old locker bins on Ebay and at junk shops too.  They hold chipboard and punches and stuff like that.

This one holds all my acrylic stamp sets sorted in those clear Making Memories acrylic stamp pocket page thingies.

Jill had the idea of hanging these trays (there's six of them) on the wall.  I attached old buttons to round magnets for hanging up photos and other cool junk.  I love them.

This old Dewey Decimal Index card catalog holds a GOB of stuff.

Most of the jars/canisters on top hold lace and stuff like that.  That stand on top was from the post office out in Jacksonville, OR - has a bunch of old postal stamps on it.

I used that old typewriter to label all the drawers the other night.

Josh made all those dividers for me.

I don't know what the old can was for but it's perfect for rolled up papers.

The red box is an Erector Set box and I don't know what the blue one was used for but someone took a Sharpie pen to it and wrote the word 'Salmon' all over the sides of it...so even though it doesn't smell like fish, I'm guessing that's what it was used for at some point in time.

That's Josh testing out my old typewriter.  I kept asking him if he loved it...his response is at the bottom.

I got that card stand from Pottery Barn many moons ago - never even took it out of the box when I got it; just had Josh haul it down to the storage unit.  (He was irritated about it at the time...but I had a plan for it...even if had to sit in the storage unit for 2+ years.)

It holds lots and lots of stuff that I want to keep in plain view.

This thing was the steel of the century - found it in someone's front yard for 15 bucks.  Didn't even  have to paint it.  It holds all my stickers, rub-ons and a bunch of chipboard.

Got all those Hoosier jars from junk shops and garage sales - perfect for ribbon.  The green and white floral boxes are from Target.  Most everything else is a junk store find too.  (I much prefer old stuff over new stuff.)

That blue, wooden box on the left is the ring box we used when we got married. 

 Those are just little Hobnail flower pots.  Got most of them on Ebay for $2-$5 each.

That's an old sign-maker stamp set (in the box) that Josh and I found a long time ago.

Those blue boxes are Martha Stewart's.  I had instituted a self-imposed ban on Martha Stewart for a long time, but I broke it for those blue boxes.

Trying to remember where I got those bins...all I can remember is that they were ridiculously prices.  If I remember, I'll post it here later.  (Oooh, I remembered:  here's a link to the bins.)

More stamps.  (I like stamps.)

All my inkpads.

So this blue wire shelf sits perpendicular to the white cabinet so I can hide my treadmill desk (which I'll show you in a minute) behind it.

I want to attach some fabric or something to the backside of the shelf to hide the treadmill more though.

The closet is more functional than cute but Josh and I put all those shelves in.

If you like Narratives, you're going to want to come over and hang out in my closet.

All the bins at the bottom of the closet hold all my Narratives paper, transparencies, sticker sheets, etc.

Josh put up those peg boards so just about every product I ever designed is hanging on them.  It's like a big, Narratives warehouse full of stuff that goes back to 2003.

The bins are all full of acrylic paints, embossing supplies, all my office supply stuff, etc.

That green cabinet has all my photography books and lots of paperwork, etc.  Going to put a little T.V. in there too.

That chimney used to be covered.  One of the many projects that I started but Josh finished.  Still need to put the molding up though.

And I'm looking for an old, oversized chair (preferably an orange one) to go where those suitcases are.

And that's an old cast-iron bathroom mirror that I'm using as a magnetic board.  Still need to get a glass shelf cut for it.  This is another one of those things that I picked up many moons ago but never had a place for it (until now).

Almost forgot the treadmill desk.

I got the whole idea of a treadmill desk from a Dateline special.  It's simple; add a computer (at a height that is ergonomically comfortable for you) to a treadmill, set your laptop/computer on it and then walk at a 1 mile an hour pace for the bulk of your work day.  The longest I could ever get used to was about 4 hours though.

Need to get my large rear back on this thing.

Off on a tangent now, but I was moving this treadmill a couple of months ago and ripped my entire big toenail off.  The whole thing.  It hurt really bad.

So that's the full tour - planning on doing lots and lots (and lots) of scrapbooking in there now that I've determined I'm still a scrapbooker.

The new, old house.

Finally getting these posted.

A couple of things though...

I shot all these with a wide angle lens which makes the house look enormous (it's not).  Although the house does kind of seem enormous to us (it's about 2200 sq. ft. in comparison to the 1300 sq. ft. house we're in now). 

And I wasn't really worrying about composition, exposure, etc. when I was taking these shots (just wanted to quickly document what the house looks like)...so they're not all that impressive.

 

We had actually put in a couple of offers on some property to build on last year but for various reasons, none of them ever panned out.  So after getting discourage with the whole process, we just quit looking for awhile.

It must have been towards the end of October that we decided to completely give up on the idea of building our own house.  We just decided that we didn't need that kind of stress and chaos in our lives.  We also decided that as much as we wanted some acreage, what we really needed was simplicity (something that was close to school, close to Josh's work, close to the grocery store, etc.).

So we decided to start looking at houses in town.

That same night, I feel asleep on the couch while Josh was working on the computer.  When I got up to get in bed, Josh said "Hey, come here for a minute."  Then he hesitated and said "No, forget it."  Then he hesitated again and said "Ok, I'm kind of scared to show this to you, but come here." (He was scared to show it to me because he knew if I saw it that it was going to be our house).

So he showed me the house.

I dreamed about it the whole night.

And my mom and I were standing in the yard the next morning while we called the real estate agent to see if he could let us in.

We put an offer on it the next day and it closed about four weeks later (had hoped it would close in time for us to have Thanksgiving over there but it didn't close until a few days after).

Here's the rest of the place...

 

That's the front door into the living room (remember...it's NOT that big) and that's the master bedroom with the french doors (there's actually two identical doors when you walk onto the front porch; one goes into the living room and the other one goes into our bedroom).  You can see the stairwell over in the corner too.  I'll probably end up changing the color in there.

 

That's the master bedroom with the matching front door.  The other door goes into the bathroom.

 

And that's the bathroom.  Love the tile but going to repaint (the red is just too dark and makes the bathroom look really small).

 

There's a toilet and a shower in here.

 

Ok, back to the living room.

There's pocket doors between the living room and the dining room.

 

Yes, pocket doors (probably my favorite thing about the house).

 

And that's Josh and Josh's Mom in the dining room (I already repainted in there).

Actually...that built-in with the glass cabinets is actually my favorite thing about the house (it's two sided with one side in the dining room and the other side in the kitchen).

 

That's the kitchen straight ahead and the laundry room off to the right.

 

I removed that wallpaper already and Josh took out the sink and counter-tops.  Lots of work to do in here though.

 

And that's the pantry off of the kitchen (those two cabinets on the right hand side are old, pull-out potato bins...which might also be my favorite thing about the house).

   

That's the laundry room (again, it's not that big) and that's another bathroom back there.  This is all an add-on (which is why there's a window between the kitchen and the laundry room - going to remove it though).

 

That's the staircase (which has two entrances; one from the kitchen and one from the living room).

If you turn left after you get up the stairs it takes you to...

 

My office/scrapbook room!!!  Going to paint in there too - probably just white (I love white).

 

Next to my office/scrapbook room is the girls room (they'll keep sharing a room until Ross moves out - which I think they both kind of prefer anyhow).

All the rooms have small walk-in closets (the door with the glass is the closet door).

 

And then the hallway (it's not that long).

   

To the left is the upstairs bathroom (I love that bathtub - it's one of those really long ones).

 

And lots of built-in cabinets (ok, those really are my favorite thing about the house).

 

Further down the hall is Coley's room.

 

And next to Coley's room is Ross's room.

 

And that door goes up to the attic which Josh has now claimed as the 'Man Cave'. 

And apparently I am not allowed to make any decorating decisions in the 'Man Cave' (even when my husband decides that he wants to put a urinal in the 'Man Cave'). 

The whole house has old nob & tube electrical wiring so Josh is redoing all the wiring in the house.  There's no insulation either so that's our next project.

Lots of work to do and we're going to try to do it all ourselves (except the plumbing for the new kitchen sink...neither one of us know anything about plumbing).

Hoping to be moved in sometime in June (I already moved all my scrapbook supplies over though).