A Project Here, A Project There, A Project EVERYWHERE!!

I am afraid to look at the date of my last post, goodness! I have never been a consistent blogger although I really admire those who can do that. Even still I think about my blog and all things I wish I was doing that could fill up these virtual pages. The last project I completed was of course my daughter's bedroom. Since then I have been in the process of trying to complete not one, not two, but five (possibly more) different projects. My beautiful bed arrived shortly after my last post and my husband and I got busy painting our master bedroom. Right now we have our bed, bedding, two new bedside tables and sitting chairs but not much else. I need to find things for the walls, curtains etc. My son's room is so close to being done, in fact it is so close I am going to post pictures of it anyways. The thing that is holding me up is the mural, which has proven to be more time consuming then I had realized. I have taken breaks from it for various reasons (birthday party, visiting in-laws, work on the house...) and I work on it a little at a time. His room has turned out exactly how I had envisioned it all but the part about not being done yet.
We have lived in this house since November and a few weeks ago my husband decided it was time to paint a few of the main living spaces. We painted the living room, entryway, hallways and the dining room. None of these areas are complete. Each have there coats of paint on them but that is it. We had all our lower level (plus master bedroom) windows cased out and added window sills. They have added such an amazing look but this would be another project that I am needing to complete ie: fill holes, sand down, and paint. My craft room/guestroom is functioning really well as a guestroom and a catch all room but not much else. We painted it, built a work table (hubby rocks!), and I built one Ikea shelving unit, that room needs some work. I would love to snap my fingers and it all be done and avoid this constant limbo of projects. I will say I love that we got rid of the horrible flat dirty white walls even though I really need to paint all the trim and molding. The paint has made such a huge difference. I am not a home decorator and really am having a time bring in design elements for the various areas. I know it will be a process especially since we really don't have furniture. Much of our furniture is piecemeal and left over from my husbands single days. I am dreaming of the day we bring in furniture that creates a cohesive look and feel.
Well I am going to pretend that my son's mural is 100% done vs. 95% and do a big reveal? Either way I will come back and post the completed mural at some point.

I had two inspirations for my son's room, Pirate and Nautical. I meshed the two together and these were my starting points, a pirate mural from Elephant on the Wall  

and the second was this photo  from HGTV but I can't find the link now.  

Once the mural arrived my husband and I got to work on painting the room. My son's room is the only room so far that I spent little time picking out the color. I went to Home Depot picked out Rich Navy by Glidden (using Behr paint). On the suggestion from the color mixer person (not exactly PC..) we took the Rich Navy and lighted it up to create the 2 other colors (map background and the lower wall color).
If you have textured walls and would like stripes here is a little tip for you: 1) Tape the area off that is to be painted in stripes. 2) Use clear paintable caulking, with your finger smooth the caulking along the edge of the tape overlapping the edge and the wall. Let dry and then paint.
The caulking seals the tape and leaves you with minimal bleed through and little if any touch up. You can also do this for your ceiling and transitioning between colors.
The mural is  Paint by number and is 8'x6', that need to be traced and then painted on to the walls. I had calluses on my fingers for 2 weeks after tracing. It was a bit difficult because of the textured walls. I just visually went back and touched up the areas that didn't trace well. I ended up not tracing out the jagged edge of the map for two reasons, one I was exhausted and two I was exhausted. I may go back and paint a straight boarder but then again I think I won't. So without further ramblings here is my son's room:

I was able to find a few "almost" before pictures on my phone. It doesn't show the room in the color that it orginally was or the doorway that went to the master bedroom. The previous owners used this room as an office. The picture quality isn't the best but it gives you an idea:

Taping  off for the navy blue stripes

 8 foot x 6 foot sectioned off for the map

 Hours of tracing ahead

After:

We are pretending his race car bed is a boat!

 The mural is very close to being done just one big section (upper middle) then little details.

 Detail:

 Detail:

 Pirate Ship we found to complete is room, he LOVED it!

 Ikea Trofast, love the storage..

I am not sure when I will be back to share another completed project but in the mean time I am linking up to these link parties:



http://makingtheworldcuter.com/blog/

http://todayscreativeblog.net/things-to-craft/

 

A Princess's Kingdom!

I am so incredibly pleased with how my daughter's room turned out. She slept in her room for the first time since I started this (3 weeks ago) and I asked her today what she thought of sleeping in there. She said " oh mommy, I loved it! I felt like I was in a fairytale!!"

I know I gave what was suppose to be a sneak peek a couple of days ago, here. Of course I was a bit picture happy and showed you the whole room minus the furniture. Today I will show you the room complete with furniture. I had in mind to purchase a brand new bedding set but wasn't having much luck find the perfect one. Well as it turns out her current bedding was perfect for the room. I was lucky enough to find curtains at Bed, Bath and Beyond.
Just a quick recap:
The mural was created using a stencil kit from My Wonderful Walls. I added shading details and the special detail to the princess's dresses.
Wall Color: Serene Sky (Behr) Peridot (Behr), hills faux painted using glaze and craft paint.
I added a clear protective coat made by Valspar because the hills seemed to wipe off during touch ups. This added a sheen to the stenciled images (craft paint is matte) and makes me feel more comfortable that all my hard work is protected
Toy Storage is the Trofast from Ikea and I LOVE them!
My Wonderful Walls is offering my readers 15% off of their entire purchase now thru December 31, 2011 just use coupon code:  Mcp15 

Okay on to the complete room, you may now enter:
 

Before:

 

After:

 A little detail:

There are a total of 3 princess on the wall, I posted up close pictures in my sneak peek here: Princesses

Thank you so much for letting you share my daughter's room. I worked really hard and it was totally worth it to see how delighted my little girl is. Next up will be my son's room which will be finished a a few weeks.

Linking to these Parties:

Princess Room a Big Sneak Peek!

Moving into a new house doesn't leave much time for blogging but I am excited to give you a glimpse into what I have been working on the last couple of weeks. The first project I have tackled in the new house is my 5 year old daughter's room. I wanted to do something more then paint  the walls and had researched DIY mural's. I was happy to find several options from paint by number, wall stickers, and wall stencils. I showed my daughter several different styles from fairy's to garden themed but she was adamant about having a princess room. I decided to go with My Wonderful Walls Perfectly Princess Stencil Kit, (see coupon code below) I liked the number of stencils and thought with this I could really create a "Kingdom" in the room. The stencil kit arrived very quickly and included brushes and a color suggestion chart. I changed up the colors slightly but only in the shades of the particular colors. I started out painting the  backdrop for the stencils, a sky and hill scene. I have to say finding the perfect sky and hill color took me some time. I had planned on painting the sky portion pink but my daughter told me "the sky is not pink it is blue" and she wanted her sky to be blue too. Okay, finding a sky blue color that wasn't to blue, gray, or loud was a process but I finally found it and it is beautiful!! I chose Serene Sky by Behr and for the hills I chose Peridot. Once the room was painted (thanks to the help of my sister and hubby) I decided to add addition depth to the hills and faux painted them.

On to the stenciling, I had some concerns with how the stencils would work on my textured walls. I spoke with the owner of my wonderful walls and he did say they would work but that it would had some bleed through. It did have bleed though but I had plenty of background color and it was easily touched up. I will show this to you in the pictures below. The hardest touch up was on the faux painted hills because it wasn't just a solid color that I could dab into but I figured it out. It took me quite a few days to complete the room but I am so pleased with the results. I think I would have been done sooner but I really wanted to add a little more detail to the images and I went back and added shading and detail to the princess dresses. It is not necessary to do that because the stencils on there own are loving but I do like the effect he added detail gives. If you are looking for something to make your child's room special I would recommend My Wonderful Walls.  I am giving you just a sneak peak into the painting of the room because the room isn't fully put together yet. I havent' decided on curtains and bedspread just yet. I will be back this week with the "BIG" reveal! Once this room is complete I will be starting on my son's room which is a Pirate theme, I just order his mural which is a paint by number Pirate Map Mural.  Well I hope you enjoy this little sneak peak!

Here is a coupon code especially for my readers: Mcp15 Enjoy 15% off your entire purchase at My Wonderful Walls until December 31, 2011.

Before:

Painting:

Adding the faux touch:

 Bleeding Through

 Touched up

 Finished Painting:

 Just a little detail:

 The three requested Princesses all dressed up!

I hope you enjoyed looking at my blog today. I will be back in a few days to share the completed room with you!

Linking to these great Parties!!

Making the World Cuter Monday