painting update and some driftwood letters

Remember my kinda recent post about our bedroom transformation? Well I finally got around to taking a pic of the other wall in there. There are four 8 by 10 prints hanging up (one set either side of the big window, the other set either side of the mirror) that are all handmade. The two prints by the window are shots taken on the beach (blogged about earlier, one is a heart drawn in the sand, the other a heart made with cowrie shells on the sand). The other two are simply word prints done in paint shop of things that are relevant to us (one is a humerous quote about our family and the other is a list of the places we have lived).

We already had the mirror sitting on the drawers but it seemed a little dark after our nice calming makeover so a friend suggested I dry brush a little silver paint over the frame to lighten it up. It worked so well I dry brushed all the black metal draw pulls as well! And the silver works well with the soft blues and greens. So that's our bedroom transformation complete now!

Onto some other random stuff now, Here's what you can do when there is a huge stack of driftwood on the nearby beach. I managed to find some funny shaped pieces to form a word (okay I cheated with the 'E' and had to use a bit of glue) The possibilities are endless once the glue comes into play but I wanted to try and make something as 'natural' as I could.

And finally, this is what has been keeping me busy of late. It's called shorewood and is a lovely grey/brown/driftwoody sort of colour. The main living areas are going to be painted this colour as I continue on my tranformation efforts. So to recap for anyone who is interested (that's you family and friends!) The bedrooms are all some similar shade of pale green/blue now (biggest fish didn't get a paintover yet cause her room was done fairly recently). The rest of the house will be shorewood and the kitchen is white and pacifica (turquoisey green blue) for a pop of colour.

The room out the back is being worked on (slowly) but I'm hoping to get most of it done in the next 2 months as I don't have to work weekends as much for a bit. Will show you some pics when there is a bit more progress made.

That's all for now! Happy painting/crafting/blogging!

Littlest fishes bedroom is done!

Littlest fishes room is finally done! It took a while as after the painting I had to get some other jobs finished before I could do any more. We got rid of the bright aqua turtle curtains (which lasted thru 2 fishes so they did alright) and gave the room a change from the 'white that looks a bit grey' paint. She recently graduated to a toddler bed from a cot so that was a bit change in itself, the room looked a lot bigger without it. (if you look really carefully you can see my cutting in work! As usual I forgot to take a proper before pic)

The bookcase was handy but a little messy as she liked pulling large volumes of books out to look at. The change table is a bit full as we have some bags of clothes under there waiting to be given to a friend. (hopefully it won't be around for too much longer!)

The blockout blind on the window has been letting light in the gaps at the sides so we had to fix that problem quick smart.

Here's the solution! I got a longer blind that would cover the gap where the light was coming in and hung it from above the window to make sure no light came in above. I also put the brackets for the curtain rod up near the ceiling and as you can see they are in funny spots.... That is because I have hung the curtains to balance the wall and make the window look a bit more centered instead of nearly in the built in! (you'll see a bit further down)

Here's her new little art gallery! I've been collecting lots of cute prints and cards for a while and thought they'd look good as a group. Most of the frames were cheap wooden ones that got painted white so they all matched and the larger frames were hung with a picture hook. The smaller ones were attached with stick on picture hanging strips that can be pulled off. If we find some more lovely pictures we can add them to the collection!

We swapped the bookcase for these cubes that were in the other fishes room. So the older one got the books (which is fine with her) and we just put the age appropriate ones back in here along with her favourite toys.

Here's what happened with the curtains. They cover nearly the whole wall and by hanging them evenly along the wall with just half the window showing in the centre, it looks like the window is in the centre of the wall, which made centering the bed a bit easier so it looks balanced. And you can't tell the blind overhangs the window on one side as the curtains cover it. (curtains are made with white cotton) And the paint is a very pale aqua/blue/green colour called Nippon 'seabird'. It's pretty without being too obvious.

lastly the little nook where a chest of drawers used to be now houses a little chair and a treehouse with a one woolly wombat wall hanging above them. (made by nanny fish of course) So there you have it, one little fish makeover. We bought the paint and the cotton for the curtains and a new blind. Swapping bits and pieces around meant we didn't have to buy any new furniture and her room looks bigger and brighter. The next thing we'll have to work on is where to put a single bed when she needs one!