Posts Tagged ‘family room

Today one of my friends asked me how I can have blogged for almost 2 years now.

Wouldn’t I run out of content? How do I always think of what to write about?

Well, in short, if there’s one thing I’m good at, it’s talking!

My kids get in trouble for talking in class at school. Their teachers will ask me what they can do to get my kids to just stop talking already!

Honestly, I don’t know. I apologize for my children’s behavior and offer up a few half-hearted suggestions like taping their mouth shut or removing their vocal cords. Nothing works.

Poor teachers. They really have absolutely no hope. They are at the wrong end of a losing battle.

I got in trouble for talking too much from grade school through the end of High School. In fact, I was booted from an extra curricular class in 11th grade for talking too much. I seriously cannot seem to just shut the hell up!

It’s genetic. And both my kids inherited it.

And that, my friends, is why I always have something to say.

Oh, and I’m a huge tinkerer. I’m always tinkering and moving stuff around. There is always and will always be at least one project in the works at my home at all times. I just can’t help myself.

It’s an illness.

So, would you be surprised if I said I’ve been tinkering again? Probably not.

Well, I have. And it involves this horribly ugly, but perfectly clean and organized desk in my family room.

The plan for the past year has been to replace this ugly desk with a pretty one so the kids have a nice place in our family room to work on the laptop, do homework, and color.

What we have had instead is something more like this:

I LOVE keepin’ it real, yo. Just telling it like it really is.

Their desk has turned into the catchall of the house. It is a nightmare.

(pictures were taken in December hence all the Christmas crap)

The kids can’t even use the desk for their homework because it’s always covered in piles and piles of random crap.

And the plastic drawer organizer next to the desk is not doing my family room any favors either.

This little area of my house is one big fat HOT MESS.

I finally put a stop to the hot mess madness. If the kids (oh, okay, myself too) can’t keep their desk clean, then guess what? They don’t get one anymore.

{Don’t worry, I’m not that mean. I relocated their crafting supplies to the kitchen and now they color at the breakfast table.}

I totally found the perfect piece of furniture to replace the desk, and besides being free! (I already owned it) it also fits the space so much better!

Do you remember that sofa table I had behind my couch?

Yes, the same sofa table that use to be my king sized headboard.

Well, I love the new sofa table, but honestly, after a few months of living with it behind the couch, I wasn’t sold. It was hard to see back there, I had to move my couch closer to the TV taking up valuable floor space, and whenever anyone plopped down on the sofa (like, daily) they would inevitably knock something off the table and onto the floor.

Getting rid of the trash heap desk instantly gave me an idea. What if I pulled the sofa table over to the desk wall and scooted my couch back again?

Absolutely love it.

The table fits the wall so much better than the desk. It also shows off the table and makes it a focal point instead of it hiding behind the couch.

It also opens up the walkway a lot more and makes the room feel so much bigger.

(Say hi to Ben!)

I also feel like I have a lot more freedom in decorating the sofa table now. Before, when it was behind the couch, I was afraid to put anything fragile on it in fear that it would get knocked onto the floor.

Well, now I can actually put stuff on it. I’m still trying to figure out how I want to decorate it, but I’m really digging the clutter-free, minimalistic decor approach right now. Less is more they say.

The burlap covered lamp (tutorial here) is a necessity as our family room has horrible lighting.

The pots of grass are all from ikea (both the grass and the pots).

The cute little cacti look perfectly placed nestled in the corner of the table.

(Find out what happened to the cacti’s brother here. Sad, but true story.)

My most recent Target score is this adorable guy:

I’ve been eying this Buddha Pillar Candle Holder for foreveh’. But dang it, it has never once gone on sale. Ever. And I’m way too cheap and broke to pay $30 for it, even though it’s quirky and cute.

Well, as luck would have it, I found it at Target last week for $4.88! I am not yanking your chain y’all.

There were 3 available, and this guy was the only one with a clearance sticker. The other two were full price.

I managed to find one tiny chip on it’s back, hardly visible to the naked eye. I’m assuming this is why he was on clearance? I do not know.

All I know is that I snatched him up so fast and sprinted to the check out. I nervously waited as she rang him up. I just knew it had to be a mistake and she would take my Buddha away from me. But nope. $4.88 later, he was mine. All mine.

My mom thinks I’ve gone crazy loco for collecting not one, but two Buddhas. I don’t know why I like them. I just do.

Here’s a full view of the family room (pre tv-mounting extravaganza) to give you a better idea of the placement of said sofa table.

So see? I’ve been tinkering again. I thought the sofa table had a permanent home behind the sofa, but here we are 4 months later and I’ve already moved it. Maybe it will stay here permanently, but you never know. I love it today, but tomorrow I might drag it around the house again.

All I know is that with all this tinkering and furniture switching, I will probably have enough content for this blog for the next 10 years! So help us all!

Are you a tinkerer? Do you constantly have to be rearranging your furniture and nick-knacks? Or are you of the more sane variety and can just leave stuff alone?!

*the art above the sofa table is by Rodney White. You can read all about my crush on him here.

So, are you as sick of hearing about that damn to-do list as I am?

What on God’s Green Earth would inspire me to round up twenty-freaking-four projects and put them all in one tidy little post? And then, to add insult to injury, I gave myself a deadline of December 31st to complete the list.

Of course, you know that means there’s absolutely no way I completed that list by December 31st. But I did put a pretty good dent in it. And now I have two more projects to check off, plus a bonus project that isn’t even on the list.

Shall we get to it then? I think we shall.

First up on the never-ending list:

Project 12: Paint window moulding.

{before}

I’m happy to report that I busted out the trim paint and got busy painting all the moulding on the 4 windows in my family and breakfast rooms. And I’ve got proof, baby!

I’ll tell you what, I loooooove hanging trim and moulding. I could do it all day. But I HATE painting it. I think painting trim and moulding is one of the worst punishments I can think of.

Does this look smooth as butteh or what?

And now for a little tip. A long time ago, I showed you how to hang moulding along windows and edges that are rounded. I filled the gap with joint compound and sanded the heck out of it. And it looks good. But that was way too much work. So I found an even easier way to make those rounded edges look pretty good.

Caulk.

Yup. Just fill them with loads of caulk, smooth it out with my finger, let it dry, and give everything a nice ol’ coat of paint. Saves me hours doing it this way.

You can totally pin that picture if you want. Just sayin’.

And now for the 2nd of 3 mini projects…

Project 19: Finish painting stairwell

{before}

Can you believe we lived with stair-stepping paint for months? Can you believe I actually painted stair-stepping paint in the first place? Tack-to-the-double-eeeee. I finally coerced Ben into painting that hard-to-reach stairwell for me. He is da-bomb.

Someday I’d LOVE to rip out that half wall and put in a wrought-iron railing. That would be delish.

Yay. I can check 2 more projects off that damn to-do list. Oh, and sit tight for an official to-do list update post. You know, once I quit avoiding it.

And now, the moment you all have been waiting for… the third and final project update. It’s such a small thing but has made such a huge difference.

Remember when I added board & batten in Kinsey’s room?

Well, I never quite got around to buying and installing new plug covers.

Why does that last 10% of a project always take the longest to finish?

If you guessed that this project is about plug covers then you win a cookie!

Did you know that plug covers are ONLY about a quarter each? They are one of the cheapest things you can buy for your home. So next time you get paint all over one, or you ram your foot into one and crack it, just go buy a new one. They are not scary or intimidating. They are plastic and have only one screw. Replacing outlet covers is one of the easiest DIY projects.

The board and batten project can officially be declared “complete” now.

I thought about pulling the plug outlets out of the wall and installing them on top of the battens, but after about 2 seconds thought all I could think was, “too much work!”. So I improvised and had the battens go completely around the outlet covers, and it worked perfectly.

I spent about $1.50 on plug and switch covers and had them screwed in and ready to go in about 1 minute. They totally finish off that board and batten.

And for added suspense, I’ve been doing even more work in Kinsey’s room this week! I can’t wait to show you what I’ve been up to. It includes two trips to IKEA and lots of new storage. Squeal! Stay tuned for that update.

Have you been working on any little projects lately? You know, the annoying ones that take only a few minutes that you put off for months or years? What projects have you been taking care of lately?

Have a fab day!

This weekend Ben and I FINALLY got around to mounting our TV on the wall.

Mounting a TV on a wall (and concealing all the cords) is really not that hard. And it only took us about an hour or so. So, remind me again why it took us year and a half?

Oh rrrright. Because I’m the President of the Procrastinators Club. I even added this project to my to-do list, and I still put it off another 5 months. Shame.

Okay, so here’s the eye sore before we tackled this afternoon project:

If there’s one thing Sarah and I have in common, it’s our general loathing of power cords.

Every time I walk to my bedroom, the laundry room, or the garage, I’m greeted by that horrible disaster of cords. I’ve got permanent hives and a twitch in my left eye just from seeing that monstrosity several times a day for a year and a half.

But check it out NOW! No more cords! All is right in the world.

I’m going to give a quick run-thru on how to hang the tv and run the cords through the wall, but honestly, if you just follow the directions that come with the mounting kit you will be just fine.

First thing you need to do is buy a mounting kit. You can get the exact same one at Amazon for about 70 bucks.

To mount the TV you will need to attach brackets to the back of the TV and a large mounting bracket to the wall.

We laid the TV face down to attach the brackets. AFTER we were totally finished Ben googled whether you are suppose to lay a plasma tv flat on the ground. Apparently you are not. Whoops. Probably should have googled BEFORE we started. Ours still works just fine, but you may want to keep your TV upright when you attach the brackets to the back of it. Just sayin. Don’t sue me if you lay your TV flat on the ground and it explodes or something.

There should be some screws on the back of your TV plugging the holes where the kit goes. Remove them.

Here are the holes after we removed the 4 screws.

Using the hardware that came with the kit, mount the brackets onto the backside of the TV.

(The kit came with 2 sets of brackets – one to mount the TV very close to the wall and one to mount it a little further out, but gives the ability to tilt the TV. We initially used the brackets that make the TV sit closer to the wall, but the cords didn’t fit, so we swapped the brackets out for the 2nd set. All the photos you see are the smaller set, but if you do this yourself please be aware that we ended up using the tilting brackets.)

You are now ready to mount the big daddy bracket to the wall.

Do not be intimidated. This is easy!!

First, locate the studs in the wall. You want the bracket to be bolted directly to the studs. Otherwise it will probably fall out of your wall and break your TV. No worries though! Finding the studs is easy!

If you don’t have a stud finder (I don’t b/c I’m too cheap to spend like 20 bucks on one), all you have to do is nail a small nail into the wall. If it goes in easily, there’s no stud. If it is hard to hammer in, you’ve hit a stud. Pretty easy. So just take your nail and hammer it every inch down your wall until you hit a stud.

Once you’ve located a stud, it’s even easier to find the 2nd one. If your house is built to code, your studs will be exactly 16″ apart from the center of one stud to the center of the next stud. This is called “16 inches on center”. Also, studs are made from 2×4′s, so your studs will all be exactly 1.5″ wide. Make sure you find the center of your stud.

Once your studs are all located and marked with a pencil on the wall, hold up your bracket, use a level to make sure it’s level, and use a pencil to mark all the holes where your bolts will go. Now remove the bracket and drill a pilot hole into the center of each of your bolt markings, like this:

Once your holes are drilled, put your bracket back up and bolt that bad boy to the wall. If you managed to find all 4 studs and bolted directly into the stud, your 4 bolts will be plenty to keep your tv mounted and safe.

Now double check to make sure everything is level.

Oh man, are we good or what?!

Your mounting kit is officially ready to go. Now the real fun begins. Let’s run those cables through the wall!!

To hide your cords, all you have to do is cut two holes in your sheetrock and drop them through the wall. It’s really easy as pie.

Start by cutting your top hole. Cut it inside the bracket area to make sure it’s well hidden once your TV is mounted.

Once the first hole is cut, you will cut your second hole about a foot off the ground directly below the first hole.

Don’t be scared. Sheetrock can totally be patched if you botch it up.

If you are dropping cables through an interior wall (meaning it isn’t a wall that has the outdoors on the other side of it), there will probably be no insulation inside your wall making it even easier to drop the cables. If you are mounting your TV on an exterior wall (the other side of the wall is the great outdoors) you will probably have to push through insulation to get your cables through the wall.

All you need to do now is shove those cords through the wall. But wait! There’s a really easy way to do this. It’s called Steel Fish Tape.

This is Steel Fish Tape:

It’s a thin flexible piece of steel (kind of like a tape measure but more sturdy) that comes on a roll. You unroll a bit of it and “fish” it through your wall. Here, I’ll show you. It’s easier than trying to explain it.

Shove the end of the Fish Tape through the top hole in the wall…

…and then pull the end out through your 2nd hole in the wall.

Use tape or whatever you can find and attach your cables to the end of the Fish Tape.

Now just wind the tape back up and pull the cords right on up through the wall. So easy!

I seriously get giddy when I have a chance to use the Fish Tape. It is fun feeding random stuff through your walls.

Now that you’ve got your cords hidden in your wall, plug them all into the back of your TV. From there, lift the TV up and hook it onto the mounting bracket.

You are done!

No more cords. No more ugly!

Woot Woot!

I’m releived I can finally check off another project from my daunting to-do list.

Do you have your TV mounted on your wall? Did you do it yourself or hire a professional?