Laundry Room Quick Art projects

September 11th, 2012

While shopping for little decor items for the new laundry room, I came across these beauties at Home Goods. I love canisters, and I love galvanized steel, so this was an easy buy for me. Plus they were pretty cheap to boot, so I scooped them up! The only problem with them is the labels. Flour, Sugar, Tea, and Coffee are hardly laundry room material. But no matter, I’m a graphic designer I can whip up some labels!

Here you can see them in the laundry room, I have two on the shelf next to the detergent, and two on the countertop.

And of course I have them backwards so you can’t see the kitchen labels. This will be my first little art project for the laundry room. I haven’t had a chance to design the labels yet, but here are a few ideas (chime in if you have any good ones)

Bleach Crystals or 100% Crystallized Bleach Granules

Powdered Fabric Softener

20 Mule Team Borax

Powdered Laundry Detergent

Super Washing Soda

Anything else you can think of that would be in a laundry room? I’m going to probably get these going this weekend, so check back next week for an update.

The other art project I want to work on for the laundry room is getting some art on the batten wall. I have these papers that I designed for The Sweetest Thing, and the color palate matches my accessory shelf and brings in some bright tones

So for now I just placed the papers up on the gallery shelf

But I need to figure out the best way to display them. I don’t know if I want the bulkiness of frames, so I could mod podge them on some thin canvas or wood boards. Or I could press them between acrylic sheets with some metal hardware… Or I could put them in frames and do some cool arrangement with different sizes. Any suggestions?

I found these few ideas on pinterest:

Mounted on shelf board and hung on the wall. I could do a 2×4 or 2×6 arrangement like this over the batten wall.

Source

Or something with letters or shapes instead of squares. But not sure how much I can make it relate to a laundry room unless I used the words “laundry” which is a bit too literal for me.

Source

This is a cute idea – odd shaped frames, plates, ovals etc with the paper. I like it the best, but It would be a lot of hard work (and time) to find enough eclectic items to fill the space.

Source

Or I could do a collage type gallery wall but instead of frames just have the paper cut into different sizes for visual interest. Something like this:

Source

Those are the only ideas I have so far, but maybe you have some super creative ideas too! I don’t know when I’ll get to this especially if it’s more detailed, but hopefully soon. This baby is coming in less than 2 months, so I’ve got to kick it into gear with all these projects!

11 Comments »

Laundry Room finished + progress photos!

September 7th, 2012

When I last reported on the laundry room we were knee-deep in renovating it. Now we are sooooo close to being finished! By the time I publish this post I should have the final “after” photo right here:

Let me give you a good recap of all the happenings of these last two weeks… Tile guy finished the herringbone marble tile floor. It looks AMAZING. So glad we decided to just do it. Also the white on the floor makes the room feel much bigger and brighter. Here’s a quick detail shot (still doesn’t show it’s true awesomeness).

*** Okay I have to do a disclaimer right now… first of all, I’m not a great photographer, secondly this is a really really hard room to photograph, thirdly the lighting changed so much between daytime and nightime shoots and then finally when the lighting was installed. So you’ll see a variety of coloring and I’m sorry! I tried to color correct etc, but there were so many photos that some are kind of blah, and some are super bright! Please forgive me!!***

While the floor was being finished, Mr. Project built the cabinets and frames according to the measurements on our plan. After the floor was installed, the cabinets were installed too. (with a little cleanup help from Mr. Oliver)

And once the cabinets went up, the shelves went up, along with the “backsplash” of wood planks.

The wood planks are just left-over flooring that we had lying around. It’s the back-side and stuck on the wall with adhesive and finish nails.

I don’t think I ever mentioned the batten wall that we decided to do. I wanted to do it all along, but knowing how busy Mr. Project was, didn’t want to push my luck. In the end he decided to put the batten wall up, and I’m soooo happy that he did. It’s such a great balance to a very lop-sided room. Here is the batten wall prior to painting:

And then after being puttied & sanded:

FYI the size on the base is 5.25″, the batten strips are 3.5″ and the header is 7.25″

Now that the cabinets were installed, we could dry fit the wood countertop that Mr. Project made from solid 2″ Alder wood, and cut it to size. (and make sure the washer and dryer actually fit!)

Of course Mr. Oliver had to help with more cleanup first:

Mr. Project was also busy building a rolling hamper cart to go on the right-side of the W/D. I purchased the John Louis baskets from overstock.com, and once we got them in the mail, Mr. Project made some quick plans and then built the cart to fit everything. Having never seen the baskets, I wasn’t 100% sure that it would work out, but it all came together perfectly and fit into the space perfectly too. I had originally thought about doing plastic laundry baskets that slid in and out of channels in the cart, but at the end of the day I wanted something with a higher-end finish, and these metal baskets definitely fit the bill. I’m planning on doing a little vinyl “darks” and “lights” on the front of each of the baskets in the future. The top basket holds the softener sheets, baby detergent, cleaning rags etc. All those little things that you tend to need at your fingertips when doing laundry.

So now that the cabinets and shelves are installed, finish work can begin! Lots of puttying, sanding etc. to make everything look just right. And the wood counter tops, now stained and sealed are ready to be installed and then the wood paneling above it. Oh and I can’t forget the sink and faucet. That was a huge upgrade getting a sink plumbed and installed yay!

You can also see the crown molding has been added!

Now to Paint Paint Paint! Mr. Project is such a great painter! He painted the wood planks SW Duck White, and the cabinets are 75% of KM Acapulco Aqua. The Color looks good.. but also scary! We definitely had some nerves about it especially since the surrounding walls are SW Sea Salt, and we didn’t want the whole room to look like an aqua bomb had gone off in it. I knew the board & batten wall would help bring in more white to the space (along with the white floor and backsplash) So I just hoped it would all come together in the end.

The cabinet doors still needed to be painted, that took 2 days of spraying in the garage. In the mean time I kept myself busy by looking for some accessories for the shelves. I originally intended to use some baskets but found that they felt and looked so heavy in the space, so I just ended up with a mish-mash of items a few new, but mostly older things that I’ve collected here and there. I’m sure it will change a bit over time, I like to move things around in the house as I find new things and discover old things that I forgot about. I definitely like the look of the open shelves and how it makes the space seem much more open and large compared to just a whole wall of cabinets. So glad I made that design choice.

And this is what you do with your toddler while you’re trying to organize and accessorize:

Mr Project painted and installed the doors, and it was like a hallelujah chorus! The color looked so great, and the edging on the cabinets really helped ground the look of the aqua and make it look expensive.

The next day I got all the pulls in the mail… I was a little nervous about these too. I tend to go with shiny metals unless it’s oil rubbed bronze. But when I was faucet shopping, I found a brushed stainless faucet and so I decided to match metals in this small space and get some brushed nickel pulls. The pulls look really beautiful, the styling on them is perfect – a little masculine, but a lot feminine and definitely high-end. I purchased Restoration Hardware 8″ Strand pulls for the tall doors and sink “drawer” and Restoration Hardware 4″ Strand Pulls for all the other doors. I also got the cute RH Strand rectangle knobs for the drawers which I had originally intended on using a crystal knobs for, but couldn’t help myself when I saw the Strand set all together. I’m really happy with how they turned out, though I think I could have gone with Oil Rubbed Bronze and been equally happy (but would have had to find another faucet I think).

And here they are in the wild:

So with all the pulls installed, the small drawers in place, the room is pretty much complete! We had some can lights installed today by our handy electrician, and Mr. Project made the attic access look a little less noticeable as well. And now the last thing to be done is have the new outside door installed (just waiting for our door order to come in!), and then the room will be absolutely perfect. I’m so glad we went with the blue cabinets. I know I was nervous about it before, But I love how the space has so much life to it instead of just being a dull laundry room. I just wish that the room was a bit bigger so that I could take good photos of it. Really you have to see it in person to enjoy how beautiful it is. I tried to do a panoramic photo by splicing a few other photos of it together… so you can get a better feel for the space… ignore my terrible splicing – the wide-angle lens really does a number… any photographers out there want to take pity on me?

And if you can forgive me for that monstrosity, keep scrolling because here are the official “after” photos now that the new (much brighter) lighting is installed:

(ignore the old brown door)

Whew!! It’s been a long 3 weeks, much more so for Mr. Project who is so amazingly awesome (as you well know by now). So a special super duper thanks to Mr. Project for all the hard work he does, and of course a nod to Ollie for his cleaning help – and mostly for being really good during the craziness.

20 Comments »

Carpool/School schedule planner *Free Download

August 27th, 2012

I’ve had a few people ask for some sort of weekly schedule to organize all the carpools and before/after school activities and/or child care situations. I know a mom of 4 who is just constantly on the go when school starts taking kids to and fro and making sure everyone is accounted for and taken care of. I can’t believe how incredibly complicated her weekly schedule is! Of course when dealing with such a complex schedule, it’s hard to make a one-size fits all type of schedule form. So I tried to simplify as much as I could. I created 3 columns – Carpool schedule, Before school schedule, After school schedule. If only one or two applies to you then you can cut off the others and just keep your weekly carpool schedule in your house binder. You can also fill this out and keep a standard weekly schedule in place – or you can print one out weekly to make sure your on top of all the variations in schedule during the week. Hopefully keeping it simple means that it’s a workable form for most anyone who has a lot to do during the school week.

Click on the image below to begin download of PDF file

Click on the image above to download a PDF version of my printable carpool schedule. The downloadable PDF in this article (and across my entire site) is free for personal use only. If you would like to blog about this free download, please accompany any images from my site with a credit and link back to this article. As a courtesy please do not link directly to a downloadable file but rather to this page. At this time, no customizations of this or any of my forms are available. Forms are a free download AS IS. Also since you’ve made it this far, please subscribe to my RSS feed and facebook page so you can find me again! And don’t forget to tell your friends!

1 Comment »

The Project House – Laundry Room preview

August 21st, 2012

Okay so it’s been a few months since I’ve updated on The Project House… I’m totally blaming it on the baby! Also for awhile we were thinking about moving and so we halted all projects, but then we decided to stay and so then we totally ramped up on projects. I have a handful of reveals and progress shots to post about still, but today I’m too excited about our current project to post about something that’s already done!

Last week we decided to go ahead with the laundry room re-do. Normally we’d have waited a bit longer because it was a very work-able room, BUT with baby #2 coming, we knew if we waited it might never happen. So we decided to go full speed ahead and just rip everything out.

Here is the before shot of the laundry room:

70′s style? Absolutely. Liveable? Definitely. Awesome? Not so much. And since the plumbing is so darn old, the washer and dryer sat out so far into the room, so it was a bit cramped. We had the plumbing recessed into the wall and the dryer vent will be coming out of the side of the dryer and not the back – these two things will save us a good 5″ of space in the room. In addition to that, we had a sink plumbed in. I didn’t think it was going to be possible, but I’m super excited to have a “utility” sink for all of Mr. Project’s project clean-up and even to throw the kiddos in when they are covered with dirt. The sink is going to be pretty big – 22x17x14, so it should definitely stand up to hosing our little guy down if he comes in the house all muddy (which happens more than you’d think for a 17 month old).

Anyway we started planning the space. Here is my preliminary drawing:

Lockers on the left for a “mud room” feel, sink, shelves, tiny drawers, and on the far-right some built-in wire pull-out hamper drawers (no more cheap plastic laundry baskets hanging around!)

After much debate (mostly with myself) I decided to nix the lockers. As much as I LOVE LOVE LOVE the idea of lockers, what we really NEED is storage space. So I gave up lockers that I would just like to look at for cabinets that I’ll actually use. I hate being practical, but sometimes you just have to choose function over form.

So here’s the plan that we finally decided on:

Some major differences are two doors on the upper cabinets (they are now wider than the original), a wider sink, a roll-out hamper cart/folding cart/whatever I want cart (this is to access the dryer plug and dryer vent). And then of course the big cabinets on the left. The skinny one will be for brooms and an ironing board (it will actually open on the right side – not sure how the knobs got to the left), and the wide one will be for all sorts of storage (yay!). So although I have to bid farewell to my lockers, this will be a much better use of the space. Oh and one other difference is that the cabinets will have a little bead detail instead of just a flat shaker style – just to make them a little bit more exciting . Something similar to this:

Okay so now for the fun part… We started Wednesday on the demo, and plumbing/electrical updates. That was all done by Saturday, and then the tile work started today. For the flooring we decided to do a marble herringbone. I really wanted to splurge and buy some gorgeous 4×12 marble tiles for the floor, but there is just no way that’s in the budget for a laundry room. But I was able to find some really nice white marble from Home Depot (online only), for a more budget-friendly price (though probably way more than we should have spent on a laundry room floor. The tile came on Monday and was just breathtakingly beautiful. But still I couldn’t imagine how gorgeous it would be on the floor in a herringbone pattern. Our tile guy started this morning and I just snapped this photo a few minutes ago:

Here’s a slightly closer photo – these were both taking on my phone, so the quality is just okay.

The floor is absolutely breathtaking and looks like a million bucks already. I can’t wait to see the whole room done! I do think I’m going to be sad to cover half of it with cabinets though.

Right now we are planning on painting the cabinets a turquoise color… something like this:

via House of Turquoise

or this:

via BHG

But I’m a basket case because its incredibly hard for me to decorate with non-neutrals. So I’m biting my nails about the paint color… I just picked up some tester paint – these colors:

Benjamin Moore – Peacock Blue (which I’m scared is too bright – but the room is kind of dark)

Benjamin Moore Fort Pierce Green (which I’m scared is too dull – it might make the room look even more dark)

So you’d think I’d just pick something in between, but I really can’t find anything in between, everything is either too bright or too dull. Oh and then there is the too light or too dark issue… This is why I’ll never been an interior designer – way too much pressure!Maybe I’ll just mix my tester cans together and use that! But seriously I am going to paint up some boards tonight and hope that one of these is the winner.

Of course lets not forget that I’m painting cabinets TURQUOISE which is really really scary! What if they look crazy and when we go to sell our house all the buyers are like “OMG why would ANYONE paint cabinets turquoise?!” Which is kind of the look I get when I tell people that I’m painting my cabinets turquoise… I need a valium or something. If all else fails maybe I’ll just paint them medium gray an be done with it! But if I can get the courage to go through with the turquoise, I am so a shoe-in for the House of Turquoise blog! So it will all be worth it!! Wish me luck folks!

11 Comments »

The Sweetest Thing Giveaway winners!

August 20th, 2012

Thanks everyone for entering The Sweetest Thing giveaways! It looks like these fancy new products are going to go to really great homes! If you’re listed below, I’ll be contacting you via email in the next 24 hours to get your mailing address. I’ll get these shipped out this week and I would love to see what you use them for so please share!

***************** Enamel Dots *****************