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and then we started living like grown ups again

November 18, 2014

We did it! After 2 years, 4 months and 14 days … we don’t sleep on the floor anymore!

master bedroom bed

Side note:  For everyone asking about cleaning the new ceiling fan, I’ve officially done it. Once the bed frame was all assembled I took a feather duster type of thing to the paddles on the ceiling fan and it worked great. We sanded down the floors after we installed the fan, poor planning, I know, so it had gotten pretty dirty pretty quickly. I dusted it all off  and then swept up the floor before we brought the mattress in. The plan is to try to remember to clean the fan when I wash the sheets because I vacuum our mattress (Is that weird?) so I can dust the fan, let the dust settle and vacuum/sweep it up from there. We’ll see how it goes.

We did have a luxurious little stint of sleeping in our guest bedroom bed while we had the master all tore up, but there is something magical about settling into our very own room … with a bed.

The bed frame we’ve actually had for a long time. I would say we bought the headboard probably 14 years ago when we were living in Carmel, CA, and I’m pretty sure we bought it from furniture.com … you know, back in the day when all of the urls were short and sweet like that. Who knows if the same people even own that url now. But then in a stroke of luck a few years later, on clearance at a Pier 1 in Indianapolis, IN we saw the matching foot board and bought it. The side rails are 2 x 6s that I just kind of Jerry rigged together back in the day. All of the pieces have just been hanging around here getting in the way waiting for their time to shine since we moved down.

master bedroom bed

I was just going to toss it back together and get it into the room as is, so I can move ahead with the “it’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas” theme that is in my brain. But it turns out Joel wasn’t real fond of that strategy. So I put out a call for help on Instagram and Facebook to see what people thought we should do to update the look. I was torn between paint or stain and there were some really fun ideas tossed around like a paint/stain stripe combo and even upholstering the center part of the headboard.

I think where I was getting hung up was that I had an aqua color in my head, because we have a lot of shades of that color lying around left over from the bathroom door and the bedroom ceiling. But with a lot of encouragement from everyone it was easy to settle on a whitewashed/driftwoody look.

master bedroom bed

I am the sloppiest, laziest, least perfect white washer I know. I literally just put some water in a tupperware container, slap some paint on the piece and then follow with a water-soaked brush (the same paint brush, of course) to first create an almost grayish coat (even though I’m using white paint) all over.

master bedroom bed

By the time I’m done with the piece it is pretty much dry so then I just dab the very tip of the paint brush in the white paint and create a little bit of a second layer of streaky paint. You really can’t do it wrong.

master bedroom bed

And it took it from the “I should be in a mountain lodge” look it had to the “I belong here in a beach house” vibe we’re going for around here. And it didn’t cost a penny since I reused the same old 2 x 6s for the side rails and used semi-gloss white paint we already had (we use off-the-shelf Behr White for all of our trim in the house).

As for the bed frame assembly I followed the same steps I took when I made the wood bed frame for the guest bedroom. But I mostly avoided all of these things this time around. 🙂

It would have been helpful to have an extra set of hands for this part, but since I didn’t I attached the side rails on one side to the headboard and foot board through pocket holes I drilled with a Kreg Jig and then used wood scraps to prop up the mattress support part of the frame to my desired height and got that all in place.

master bedroom bed

When I attached the side rails to the other side, one pocket hole at each end was blocked by the 2 x 4 frame, so if you have an extra set of hands you may want to attach all side rails first and then slide the mattress support piece into place.

I used 2 1/2″ screws for everything and the mattress support is secured to the headboard, foot board and all along both side rails.

master bedroom bed

Any complaints about my lack of appropriate work shoes can be directed to Olivia Pope, she is handling all of my scandalous behavior these days. 😉

I’m busy feeling like a grown up in our master bedroom.

master bedroom bed

I don’t think the night stands are right, but they’re what we have so I’m not worried about it. Maybe they’ll get painted, or revamped, or replaced with some awesome street find. But for now they work just great.

And Joel’s only complaint about sleeping in the guest bedroom (he never had one complaint about sleeping on a mattress on the floor for over 2 years, mind you) was that he didn’t have a nightstand. I’m pretty sure he could care less about the fact that the shade of white doesn’t really go with the shade of white on the newly revamped bed frame. 🙂

But I kinda like how they help camouflage the fact that our curtains are a good 8 inches too short. So project lengthen-the-curtains might have just plummeted down the priority list as well. 🙂

‘Cause hey, Christmas is coming, and there isn’t anything I can do to stop it.

does this ceiling fan make my room look big?

November 14, 2014

Hey there! We’re chugging along in the master bedroom and we’re thisclose to moving back into that room for good.

master bedroom headboard

Don’t worry that the curtains are too short and there isn’t even a bed to go along with the headboard. The fact that it even resembles a room, where people might actually find solace at the end of the day, is a feat in itself. 🙂

I realized the other day that this will be the first time since we’ve lived here, almost 20 months, that we’ll be living in every room of the house at the same time. They won’t all be finished, but they will all be functional, and for a 1300 square foot house that feels like a bit of a luxury.

Getting to this point in our master bedroom is actually a month in the making. Right as we were finishing things up in the master bathroom we were also prepping for a load of family visitors and needed the use of both bedrooms. And the master was looking like this. #NotSoCozy

master bedroom

And even though we just finished refinishing the floors (we used the exact same process that we did here), as we do with most rooms, we started with the ceiling and worked our way down. And, for the first time, I painted the ceiling a color and all of the walls white. #ImGettingDaring

master bedroom ceiling

The ceiling color is actually a custom color. I first got Behr Marquee paint mixed in Misty Isle and then I decided it was just a bit too bright for what I wanted and what I really wanted was closer to their Breezeway color. So I headed on in to my local HD and batted my paint splattered eye lashes at the nice man behind the paint counter who then proceeded to spend the better part of an hour tinting and mixing and getting the color to my liking. I really can’t thank him enough.

But this isn’t really about my indecisive paint decisions, it’s about this awesome ceiling fan and light. And how cool I think it looks with the colored ceiling backdrop.

I can’t really express how much I adore it. It was a bit of a splurge but I was having a really hard time finding something I really liked. And I really liked this one. So I bought it. Here’s an affiliate link to the same fan.

 master bedroom ceiling fanThe paddles are made of canvas with light wood accents and the base is wrapped in rope. I mean perfect, right, for a coastal/nautical/beachy vibe. The light housing looks like something you would find on a boat or dock and it takes a regular, medium base, bulb … which I love. So I used one of my new Cree bulbs.

cree light bulb

I used Cree bulbs in our bathroom, too, and love that they are LED, mercury free and shine bright instantly! And since they actually look like bulbs they are perfect for those glass globe fixtures.

master bathroom vanity area

But here’s the thing about the fan that had me wondering if it was going to be totally wrong for our room … it is 68″. Which is huge! It says right in the specs that it is meant for a “great room” at least 20′ x 20′ big … and our bedroom is basically 13′ x 13′ … so pretty tiny. I worried the fan was just going to look really out of scale, but for some reason it doesn’t.

Maybe because we love the look of it so much that the size of it just works. I don’t know, and maybe it seems big to some of you, and we’re just in denial because we love it. But it just feels like it works.

master bedroom ceiling fan on

It may seem like just one small step but the lighting can really make or break the look and feel of a room. Since we’re in the Florida Keys we aren’t willing to give up our beloved ceiling fans, but I’m glad we didn’t have to sacrifice a little style in the process.

And no more sacrificing perfect light when you transition to LED. The Cree bulbs light up instantly and they now come in a plastic version to avoid breakage, perfect for the bulb that can last up to 20 years. You can find out more here and they are available at The Home Depot.

We should be ready to settle into this room next week, there’s just a few more finishing touches … and a mattress would be nice. 🙂

And today I’m at my friend Julia’s sharing a bit of our story about Living Pretty With Pets, check it out here.

But check this out, Cree is hosting a Bulb Swap, here are the details so you can start your transition to LED, too.

THE CREE “GREAT AMERICAN BULB SWAP” VISITS MANHATTAN, BOSTON, AND D.C.

TRADE UP AND SAVE MONEY & ENERGY WITH THE NEW CREE LED BULB

THOUSAND OF BULBS BEING DISTRIBUTED IN EXCHANGE FOR MERCURY-LADEN CFLs AND ENERGY GUZZLING INCANDESCENT LIGHT BULBS

WHAT:
Haven’t switched to LED bulbs? Now’s the perfect time as days are shorter and getting darker earlier. Americans can participate in the Cree Great American Bulb Swap. Just bring in any CFL or incandescent bulb and trade it for a New Cree® LED Bulb for free. The New Cree LED Bulb is up to 85 percent more energy efficient compared to energy-hogging incandescent bulbs – and it pays for itself in a year or less!

Forget the frustration and inconvenience of constantly changing burnt out bulbs– Cree LED Bulbs last up to 22 years (that’s potentially 5 presidents from now!). Just imagine all the money you’ll save on energy bills and fewer replacement bulbs. Cree LED Bulbs are also mercury-free and provide superior light quality, unlike those squiggly compact fluorescent (CFL) bulbs.

When/WHERE:
South Street Seaport Pier | New York, NY
11:00 AM- 2:00 PM, Friday, November 14th
10:00 AM- 4:00 PM, Saturday-Sunday, November 15-16th

Readers Park in Downtown Crossing | Boston, MA
11:00 AM- 2:00 PM, Friday, November 21st
10:00 AM- 4:00 PM, Saturday-Sunday, November 22nd and 23rd

Eastern Market | Washington DC
11:00 AM- 2:00 PM, Friday, December 5th
10:00 AM- 4:00 PM, Saturday-Sunday, December 6th-7th

**I first contacted Cree after hearing about their revolutionary bulbs, I am now a paid Cree Ambassador and happy to help spread the good word about their great products, all opinions are 100% my own. You can read my full disclosure here.**

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