Mom's house

My parents built a beautiful new home about 2 years ago, and if any of you readers know my mother, she has ZERO, ZIP, NADA, NONE, NO artistic, decorating, or creative skills in her body.

So in addition to my house, the decorating in my parents house is also a work in progress. The living room and dining area a pretty much finished, the bedrooms and office need work.

They decided to have an accent stone wall(s) installed in the dining room and the living room. It is gorgous. (I have to credit mom for the idea of putting up the stone, so maybe she has .00000001 oz of creativeness)

I designed the layout of the house and consulted on most of the tile, fixtures, etc, but I was not actually present during construction. I can do a A LOT online :) Who knew? Mom would be in Lowe's or where ever and tell me what she liked and I would look it up online and tell her yes or no! I will credit her and dad with the choice of stone and brick, because I could not make the trip to OKC for that decision, but they did a great job.

Here is the completed house. Dad and I won and got the porch railing (mom didn't want it)! HA!

Here is the stone wall in the dining area

Here are a few shots of the inside at Christmastime. I'm working on the tv stand situation, but in my defense, he had just gotten the monstorous tv for Christmas when this photo was taken. It looked fine with the 24" tube tv!

My brother and I bought mom the clock on the wall years ago for Christmas. I purchased the star and had the family photo framed for mom's Christmas gift. i.e. I picked the decor out! Mom is not allowed to decorate without approval :)

For the dining room stone wall, I wanted something simple, but still reflected the western feel of the house. My Grampa Turner gave me some old ribbon barbed wire and I decided to make a wreath out of it. The wire has quite a history. Back in the day, my great, great grampa was assigned by the President to teach the Pawnee Indian tribe how to farm. Each family was give 160 acres and enough barbed wire to fence the property. This wire was from that time. I thought it was a neat story. Here is how the wreath turned out:

I wish I had a photo of the entire room, but I don't. This is very simple, but the simplicity of the room design really lets the individual elements show. Next time I head to OK, I will have to take some more photos.

I have another piece of the ribbon barbed wire that I plan on making myself a wreath like this one. Won't it look great on my barn door...... (SNEAK PEAK of my new living area!!!!)

See you next time!
ji

Graduation Posters

In the past couple of years, several people I work with have had children graduate from high school. Since I am the creative guru at work, they asked if I would design senior photo collages for them. Here are some example of my work:

It all started with Morgan.....

Then came all the rest....



I feel lucky to have a large format printer at work and an agreement with the boss. As long as people don't abuse the privelege, I am able to print large poster for them.

***** I am for hire, but I create all of these for free :)

ji

Bathroom Renovation

As promised, I am posting some after photos of the house. I will start with the bathroom because it is the only room in the house the is completed (for now….I still have a couple of changes in mind J)

As a reminder from the earlier post, here are a couple "before" shots of the bathroom. Notice the blue speckled tile. Classy!

We removed all of the tile. It went all the way around the bathroom.

In the shower, we replaced it with a simple white subway tile and new hardware.

The chandelier just wasn't working for me, so I replaced the light fixture as well.

The rest of the area was a little tougher because we had to patch the drywall and mud it because the when we removed the tile, chunks came out of the drywall. In the end, it was well worth it because it looks much more modern. See for yourself.

Most of the accessories came from my college trip to Honduras. I put sand and shells into jars and framed photos from the trip. The coke bottle is from Grampa Turner, and the vases and flower are from Hobby Lobby.

In the end, I removed all the tile, floor linolum, painted the walls/trim, plumbed for a shower, installed tile on the floor and walls, new shower/cabinet hardware, new light fixture replaced the subfloor (toilet had leaked and the floor was rotten), painted the cabinet black, put up floating shelves and a black framed mirror, and I'm sure there was more stuff here and there.

My goal is to replace the countertop, sink and faucet, but for now, the bathroom is marked as COMPLETE!

State Flower of Kansas

Since I bought my house, I have been on a kick. I like to take old things and make them useful. Now....this has not been an easy task. My brother and bf like to make fun of my "treasure" hunting trips. They call it junk. They don't know what junk is.

My last trip home, I got a very unwelcome surprise. My very favorite brother (NOT) bulldozed my favorite treasure site. Who needs to make room for a new shed? There was a lot left there to be discovered, but I guess my feelings don't count :)

Luckily my mother loves me so very much, she tried to get as much stuff that I wanted as she could. One of the things she rescued was these old, rusted coffee cans. Of course dad and the bf wondered what in the he** I was hauling home, but I was excited. Here was the before:

Yes, they were rusted, so I just cleaned them up and sprayed a good coat of clear acrylic to keep the rust from coming off.

This is the final result. I think it turned out pretty cute. Even the bf admitted it was neat :) I don't get those compliments about my "junk" much.

They make super cute centerpieces for the dining room table. They are short enough that you don't have to peer around them to talk to someone on the other side of the table.I even put one on the shelf in my office.

I have done several floral arrangement projects with old buckets and cans. I absolutely love to use old cream cans. This cream can was my very first venture into using something old. I got hooked on this project. I do not have a before photo of the cream can, but picture an old rusted cream can, that's what it looked like and I did not change it.

Here, I have it grouped with an old rusted, bent bucket and and old teapot (both found in old barns, too) Here is a distance shot (please excuse the non-painted front door (its on the list)).

That is all I have for this post. I have plenty to post, so stayed tuned for more.

Hasta Luego,

JB

New Venture

Hello friends,

I created this page in September of 2009, thinking blogging might be fun…….. I haven’t posted since September of 2009. I never felt like I had anything worth saying, so I never blogged.

A couple of weeks ago, a friend mentioned I should start a blog to feature all my crafty and design projects, and the light just CLICKED in my head. So here I am again.

My blog is going to be a mish, mash of all different projects from home renovations, to craft projects, recipes, and my design and photography work.

I will start with the single biggest project in the past year. My house. On November 3, 2010, I signed over my life for the change to own a cute little yellow 2BR/1B house.

Since that time, I have changed, well, everything. Almost everything, that is. With the exception of the kitchen cabinets, I painted every surface in the house and replaced all the flooring on the main floor (basement is unfinished and my crafty area). I finally moved in the house in late December.

Here are a few before and after photos.

The front: It has not changed much. I bought some paint, but that a project for this fall.

Now here comes the good part :) The INSIDE, BEFORE!

Entry/Living area

 Bathroom BEFORE- Oh my, I try NOT to remember this tragedy.

 Dining Room/Kitchen Before

Master Bedroom Before:

 

Guest Bedroom Before

 

 

Backyard Before- There is a "backyard" and a "back, backyard" Thhe back part is a garden.

 

 

This is pretty much the grand tour, except for the basement. That is another post in the FAR future.

 

I will soon start posting the AFTER photos. I am by no means completed, but it will at least give you something to compare.

 

Toodles,

JB