The Toes Know

I'm going to start off by preapologizing for the picture of my feet that I'm about to post.  It has to be done.  Remember back when I realized that my nail color matched the color I was paint my kitchen?

And before this I happened to have grey nails while painting the living room grey?  Crazy stuff, right?  Well last night I glanced down and realized my toes have been the color of my office for the last couple of weeks. 

How freaky is that?  None of these nail polish coordinations were planned.  My blue polish was sent to me in my September Birchbox package.  It's Color Club's Intsa-this.

I guess that means my blue office was meant to be.  My blue toes as well.  Oh, and I highly recommend Color Club polishes.  This is my 4th or so bottle.  These toes survived 4 days in New Orleans...in the rain...wearing flip-flops.  And not one touch-up since.  Impressive.  And again, I apologize for the picture of my feet. 

1/4 of the Office Complete

I am slowly making progress on my office.  Football season and traveling seem to keep getting in the way but I'm not complaining.  This weekend I moved my desk onto the opposite wall in the office and started semi-styling that corner.

I love the way it is turning out.  And I like having the desk in this corner because it's one of the first areas you see when you walk in the room.  I added a couple of shelves above the desk to hold some of my orange accents.  As you can see, these shelves were originally various colors.

I also bought a $6 bulletin board at Walmart and spray painted the entire thing white.

To help out my orange storage boxes, I picked up this cute random ceremic piece at Target for about $5.

Here's is a picture with my old desk chair.  I found this chair by the garbage dumpster of my old complex.  It was brown wood and I painted it black.  Now I'm trying to decide on what color to paint for this room.  White?  Orange?  Kelly Green?  Hot Pink?  White with an orange seat? I just can't decide.

Don't let this clean corner of the room deceive you because right across from it is my pile o'shame.  Not really shame, but clutter.

As I work my way around the room this stuff should all find a home, even if that home looks vaguely like a trash can.  The opposite wall of the office is just a hodge podge of stuff.  The MASSIVE red chair is throwing off my plan.  It's just too big for this room. 

Bevo's pouting after a loss to West Virginia

I can't decide if this chair just needs to go or if I'm going to be able to work it in some how.  While I think about it, I've started to organize the closets in the room first.  That should keep me busy for a while.

Presto Chango

It's amazing what a few coats of paint can do.  Here is my lovely desk that I've had about 10 years.  Target still sells this same desk so it must be pretty popular as far as cheap, assembly-required furniture goes.

After sanding and cleaning it off, I took it out back to spray paint on some primer and a couple of layers of white spray paint.

I ended up bringing it inside for one last hand brushed coat of paint and then let it dry over night.  I was a little worried about how this was going to turn out but at this point in the game it is a little silly to start doubting my furniture painting abilities.  It is apparently my gift.

I look forward to doing some furniture arrangement this weekend and possibly getting stuff up on the walls!  It's a little blue and white overkill right now and could use a little more color.  I will contemplate my next move as I munch down on corn dogs tomorrow at the fair.  See ya next week!

Office Curtains

I removed the gold silk curtains before painting the office and luckily I don't have to put those back up.  Instead I went with the IKEA curtains I used in the dining room.  At $9.99 for a set of panels I couldn't pass them up.  I got 3 sets in white and put them up last week.

While I was hanging up the longer curtain rod, I took a dive off the back of my little ladder.  It was not a first but it was a little more painful falling on to hardwoods.  The worst part was that my neighbors were pulling into their driveway, along those windows as I went down.  They may or may not have seen me.  I choose to just stay on the floor for a few minutes until they went inside.  While I was on the floor I noticed the curtains were just a wee too long.  After a long weekend in New Orleans, I came back to tackle this problem.

I used iron on fabric tape and hemmed them in place.  It was a piece of cake and gave all the panels a more tailored look.

Slowly but surely I'm getting this room back together.  I'm working on the desk this week and once that is back things will start feeling a little more complete. 

More Office Accessories

A few more pieces have been redone to accessorize my transforming office.  I found a few knick-knacks around the house to turn orange and then painted two more Birchboxes to go with my first two.

I also painted the mirror that originally was supposed to connect to the back of my free dresser turned sideboard in the dining room.

Nothing has been moved in to the office yet.  I need to paint my desk first and foremost and then once it's in place I can start thinking about where things will go.  Making progress!

The Office Walls are Done!

Sunday night I finished the entire first coat and then last night I finally finished the second coat and a few touchups.


One Coat



Second Coat

The second coat does not look smooth in the picture above but that is just light coming in from the windows and the ceiling fan.  I had to do much of the second coat with the lights off in the room so that the shadows didn't throw me off.

 

Now that the walls are done, I just need to paint my doors and my desk and filing cabinet.  Back to the white paint!  I'm excited to get some of the accessories I painted in the room so that everything can start coming together.  Here's an idea of the orange accents.

Hopefully in the next month this room will be done for the most part.  Aside from the decorating, there is still a bunch of cleaning and organizing to be done.  You should see the closets!  Not pretty.  Baby steps.

Pablo's New Nest

It all started at Target this weekend.  I saw this awesome lamp at Target while shopping with my friend Elsa.  I think she thought I was crazy for loving it.

But it is so awesome!  Ok, I don't really need a $60 french bulldog lamp.  Especially since I already have Milo at the front door.

Monday night I was back at Target, this time doing my grocery shopping and saw the lamp again.  I told myself I did not need it but I did look around at the other items in this "Best In Show" collection Target was selling.  I might not need a lamp but I totally needed a blanket!

At a third of the cost of the lamp, it was a steal.  See I have been on my continued mission to rid Pablo of his Christmas blanket and make him use something that matches the living room a little better.

This dog blanket would be perfect.  It is so soft!  It feels like fur, soft and slinky, and it's grey on ones side and dog covered on the other.

I really think Pablo likes it!  He burrowed down into it and went right to sleep.  He's happy with his new nest and I'm happy with the color coordination.  The Christmas blanket will still be around.  I'm going to use it as my blanket on the couch, but quickly put it away any time I have company.  Win-win.