Where are You?

Please note that I have moved my blog to a different page. Please join me on the next page.

Can you hear the music?

So now that the staircase is finished, I'm back in my daughter's room where I'm supposed to be.  I designed a custom Modello to go behind her bed. She found the a sillhouette online which I used as a starting point. I used metallic foils through the Modello and I love how it came out.

I wanted to add a unique light fixture near her bed, so I used a birdcage that she already had by flipping it upside down, and making an opening for the bulb. There's one bird inside and one on the door. I tried to camoflage the hideous bulb with wire and beads. It's prettier when it's on. I know it's wierd, but I love it.

Stairway to Heaven

Thanks to my husband's impulse, I was down on my hands and knees up until 60 minutes before our first guest arrived for Thanksgiving....

When I informed him I would be having our nasty carpets cleaned prior to our annual Halloween party, he tore out the carpet and started an unplanned home improvement marathon. There is very little time between Halloween and Thanksgiving so we had to make rush decisions on replacing it with wood floors. This would have been enough of a challenge, but since they were going to drop the price if we also had the stairs done, we added that on top of what was already an ambitious project.

I have been lusting after the stairs at Modello Designs since their creation. Melanie Royals has a big staircase in the studio with different patterns on each riser, created through her Modello Marquetry method. It's a technique she created that imitates wood inlay. Her staircase is jaw-droppingly beautiful and I have wanted to do my own staircase ever since. So I had the installers use unfinished maple on the risers to give me a blank canvas.

I chose two different Modello patterns and alternated them up the staircase. The patterns I chose are set up to use four different colored stains. It's more work but I have decided after looking at all of Melanie's floors that the more colors there are, the more beautiful they are. Go to her blog and check out her private office's floors....stunning.

These pictures show the progression of stains. It's so fun to watch it becoming more beautiful with each new color and layer removed.

It was a challenge, but I think it was totally worth it. It would have been nice to not be working on a deadline, but at least I made it. I pulled off all the tape one hour before our guests showed up. I will admit it was nice to finish a project and then have an instant public showing. At least it's done and now I can get back to my daughter's room.

Take a deep breath...

I just did something I have never done before. I listed a canvas for sale on my Etsy shop (link right here on my blog). When I finished a project in a downtown loft this summer I was just so in love with the color scheme and downtown San Diego that I just went for it. I love how it came out, so now we'll see if anyone else does.

Perfect disaster

Dianna and one of her two female BFFs started a day ahead of time, and set the tone for the room.

I'm sure most people will hate this, but to me it will always represent a certain moment in time for my daughter. It's not a pretty room that she has to grow in to, or a classy room that she can't relax in. It's her, right now, with the people she's closest to. Full of inside jokes, and secret words and the miriad expressions of individuality.

I'm not sure if I mentioned that 80% of my daughter's friends are boys...so you can imagine the fun of putting brushes in their hands and letting them go.

They even let me teach them how to stencil. They loved the retro stencils especially and they did a really good job. There are several images proving the male need to mark their territory.

But it's still cute at this age, right?

Spray paint stencilling

Over the weekend we did some spray paint stencilling in Dianna's room. I got this great book full of ready-made retro stencils. Since spray paint is typically oil base and toxic, I used this great contraption that you can pour your own water-base paint in and use as an aerosal. I thought it worked really well. I wouldn't use it on a big project, but it was ideal for these little spots.

I hand painted some musical notes with gilding size and applied metallic foils. They came out great.

Dianna's favorite band.

Today all of her friends are coming over to put their names and anything else they want on the walls. I am so excited that I woke up at 5am. It's like Christmas for me. Pictures will be posted as soon as I wash the paint off my hands.

Happy Halloween

Our front porch is ready for trick-or-treaters. I put a fairly elaborate porch together every year. All year I save all the plants I've killed and recycle them into my spooky abandoned looking porch. This year my girls grew Mammoth Sunflowers (yes, that's their actual name), which I saved and dried and then strung up along the sides of the porch. Some of their heads weigh 20 lbs. So to have them hanging in toward treaters is really cool.

We have several crows which are my favorite along with a rabid cat and several rats, one of which is screaming from a trap at the front door. It never fails to scare the crap out of somebody. I usually add something every year. This year I bought these eyes that glow out of whatever plant you stick them in, but what I didn't know was that you attach it to the bush and it makes it shake and growl. Bonus! Combined with the skeleton that's begging to be let out of a cage ("come on you guys, I'm serious!") it will be pretty loud out there.

Dianna puts all these spiders climbing the walls and around the doorbell which is hysterical. Now we have to get ready for our party. All our neighbors come and chat while the kids run around getting all their sugar energy out. Always a good time had by all.