Someday

Someday I will have a room used for the sole purpose of storing and making wonderful things. It might be wishful thinking but adding these pictures anyway.

 the one and only martha stewarts craft room

this one is so vintage!

pottery barnesque? I think this one is my fav

I also have found some unusual stuff among various blogs and while surfing the web for other things. Every time this happens I save the picture and say that one day I will put them up on the blog. Well that day has finally come because there are enough of them, they're pretty hard to explain so you'll just have to take a look!

irony

 if the shoes fits

this is actually real, i have to keep reminding myself

modern library in an ancient building

 I would have read way more if my library looked like this

light to read by

i'm not so sure i could make my house a feline funhouse

I hope you enjoyed these lovelies, I'm always on the lookout for more! Happy Monday!

"Today you are You, that is truer than true. There is no one alive who is Youer than You."

-Dr. Seuss

When is a door not a door, when it's a table...

I’ve been wanting to do this for probably 3 years now and I’ve finally gotten all the pieces to get it started. As a big fan of shabby chic, and vintage a coffee table made out of an old door seems like the perfect use for an unused door. Not only will it look cute but it reuses materials  that would otherwise be thrown away but I find it very fitting to use a door for a coffee table. A door is something that you use to enter a home and an open door is known to be a symbol of being welcome in a place and wear else would you want to be welcomed than your living room with your best friends, resting your oversized coffee mug on your cute vintage door coffee table. Cute vision huh? I obviously haven’t thought about this at ALL. Now that I worked up all expectations, including my own this coffee table now has to be perfect. The saga of the table began with a new back door.  About 2 years ago my dad told me they were getting a new backdoor and wanted to know if I wanted the old one. I immediately told him yes and then spent the next half hour working on what I would do with this door, and not working on whatever project or listening to whatever prof I should have been at the time. Well a year and a half went by and the door was forgotton, mostly because I was in Waco and the door was in Houston and we had quite the dysfunctional long distance relationship. I would think about him occasionally but he never showed his face out of the garage and always waited for me to come to him. But always the patient door, a year and a half after he became mine I found some old wooden bed posts painted teal. Well not only are teal bedposts awesome in any setting but these just seemed perfect for the  coffee table idea and were only about $15 at an antique fair. My dreams were finally becoming a reality! As this table saga continues, this is where the real action starts.

the antique fair find

THE door, post cut in half

Starting the base, look at those tools!

Once all pieces were  in place it was time to get out the power tools. I drew a sketch of the table I wanted to make and with some consulting help from my dad we headed to lowe’s to get some wood for the base. We settled on 1x4 wood pieces and then cut the wood, with a very rusty saw that did not make things easy! After getting to use the nail gun (my favorite part!) the base was ready to assemble. I painted the wood and the legs a blue color so that they would match, i used a stain instead of a paint so that it would be able to see through it just a little bit. I really love this blue, but I mean really who doesn't love blue? Blue is relaxing and pretty and awesome. The door also needed a light paint job and a wooden peg to cover up the doorknob hole. Luckily dad knows more about building than me and he said we needed to add some supports so that the table wouldn't be so wobbly, so we added some holes in the legs and some dowels so that the table was more stable (love the rhyme, don't ya?). Then it was time for assembly! The legs, dowels, and base got attached to the top and done!!! It's always so satisfying when something you've thought about for so long (and maybe too much) finally becomes reality.

Setting up the base again

 sanding the table legs made my hands this lovely shade of green



NAIL GUN & air compressor, i did get to use these, but i didn't take pictures while doing it (that might have been a bad idea)

All the supplies ready to go

she was lots of help making sure we did everything right, well when she wasn't chewing her rawhide bone

The makeshift painting station, we had to hang the legs so we could paint them without them sticking to anything! It's a bit dinky but it works.

More painting, don't worry I know your noticing the paint thinner, we did do this in a well ventilated area

 All primed

With blue stain added

The assembled base without the top

DONE!

The dream of this table definitely changed over the course of this project though. It was meant to be a coffee table but as you can see from the picture it's just a tad taller. I just couldn't bring myself to cut off the legs to make it shorter, I just knew it would take away the character of them. I also did plan on painting them because I loved their color but it was a necessity to make sure they matched and to get rid of some pesky pink paint that had gotten on them. I still love it though and I'm so happy that this table finally came to life! Now just little touches are left to add, including a large piece of glass to cover the top, so that it's an even surface and a few decorations for the top and voila, it's home worthy!

Round Top...well almost

The vintage nerd in me strikes again! I headed to Round Top on Sunday to explore the miles and miles of junk for some hidden treasures. We actually went to Warrenton, which is outside of Round Top, they tend to have better deals, and defintely better characters (people watching is a must on these kinds of trips). For those of you that don't know, which again is probably most people, Round Top is a small town near the Brenham area that hosts one of the largest antique shows in the country. They put it on in October and March, they are so smart to do it when the weather is best. Here's a link to the shows website so you can see what I mean.  http://www.roundtoptexasantiques.com/index.html  If you are a serious collector or designer than you should never miss this but as a novice designer and really just a lover of vintage I opted for Warrenton, which also has great deals and isn't quite as stuffy. Digging through lots and lots of junk is part of the fun right? Here's a link to what goes on in Warrenton:  http://www.antiqueweekend.com/indexmain.html 

So driving through windy roads and small towns to get there would have been lovely enough but as soon as we opened the doors we realized the temperature had changed from the 85 degree Houston weather to the low 70's, it was perfect for outdoor junk hunting! We started out walking through one of the indoor buildings, which had some great pieces, but mostly too expensive and quickly headed outside to find some deals.

The first items I saw, I had to document this moment, they were just too special. Arn't they just lovely? Don't you want a velvet portrait of your pup?

I found some Baylor pride! This booth had literally thousands of pennats from 1900-now. This Baylor one was from the Bluebonnet Bowl They were a bit pricey but they were in awesome condition, sic em bears (sorry i had to).

Outside we had must better luck right away. We ended up around all the architectural salvage booths, which were INCREDIBLE. Doors and beams and windows, oh my! I'm not gonna lie I felt really cool walking around there with the many designers and architects there looking for items for their projects. Someday hopefully this will be me! There was fantastic furniture, doors, pieces from old buildings, tables, chairs, light fixtures, and all kinds of other repurposed items! It was soo much to take it!

When is a door not a door? When it's ajar.

Love it. Embrace it. you know you want to.

If only I had a giant white wall to mount all of these on.

In case you didn't know which state we were in.

I LOVE old doorknobs! I did find some glass ones that I'm going to use for a project (more pictures to come) but these just have so much character.

I loved soo soo many things but there were also some things you just think, "umm excuse me, are you really trying to sell this to the general public, ARE YOU CRAZY??

I hate to admit it but I kind of like this chair, haven't you always wanted to answer someone who asks you " Whatcha doin" and say in all seriousness " Just hanging around"

The cast of Golden Girls was selling their furniture, they didn't seem to have any takers.

Light fixture stolen from Area 51

love.

The road goes on forever and the party never ends

 

i wanted this sooo bad...cause really where CAN'T you use this?

I did end up finding some good treasures, including (don't think i'm crazy) this old TV!

Yes, it's ok if you think I'm crazy but I love it! The vendors were trying to tell me to use it as an aquarium. I quickly vetoed this suggestion: electrical wires+water= no thanks. But I am most likely going to use it as a decorative side table, it needs a little refinishing but it was super cheap and in great condition! All in all it was a fabulous day in Warrenton, the weather was great, we found some treasures, we left before my feet REALLY started to hurt, and stopped for a DQ dipped cone on the way home. Can you get much better than that? Here's a few pics of the other things I brought home with me:

Dr. Pepper crate

Super cute 60's glasses and doorknobs

There are really 4 of the glasses that match with the pitcher

Canada Dry crate

this was my favorite picture of the weekend, i admit i tweaked the colors a little bit but how cool are the colors on the chair, even if they are just different colors of rust?

I like nonsense, it wakes up the brain cells. Fantasy is a necessary ingredient in living, it's a way of looking at life through the wrong end of a telescope. Which is what I do, and that enables you to laugh at life's realities.
-Dr. Seuss