Sun-burst of Inspiration

When we moved in, we replaced the light in the hallway because it was falling apart. The easiest thing to do at the time was to throw a "boob light" where the old one was and call it a day. We weren't really happy with it, but it would do for the time being.

We knew that we liked the look of more expensive light fixtures, but it is hard to tell yourself that it's worth spending $80 on a light that is in a hallway, so we put it on the back burner. Cool flush mounts light this kept catching my eye on Pinterest, but with crazy price tags.

That's right. $697.50 for a light. Sheesh.

That's when I came across an amazing Pin that answered all of our prayers!

Pam at Simple Details are the Difference had cracked the code! She had found a way to buy a sunburst mirror from Home Depot for $35 and a $10 light to make a $600 difference to her foyer. Happy Day! I showed it to Scott who was on board, so I looked up the Martha Stewart mirror we would need to check the measurements.

It was sold out. Completely. And not sold online. Great. We gave up again.

Until the other day. When Beth and I were checking out possible lighting solutions for her kitchen at Lowes, we came across this guy.

It was perfect! The inside of the clock face was exactly 7", which is the same width as the base for the simple $10 light that was sold in the next aisle.

It was meant to be! Not only did we come home with these...

But we had also done so for $10 cheaper than the knock-off. Total win.

I started by taking the clock out of the packaging and checking out the back. I needed to get the clock face out to allow the light to fit through it. Thankfully there were a bunch of tiny screws that allowed me to accomplish this with little trouble.

This left in the glass from the front, but I carefully pushed it out of the sunburst frame and was left with exactly what I needed.

I then went to the light fixture and took it out of the package. I found the base and double checked to make sure it fit. Once I was satisfied, I readied them to be painted.

I used the same oil rubbed bronze that we used on the door knobs so that it would be a nice match. I gave everything one good coat and let it dry. I then brought them back inside.

I dry fitted them together to see if the gap between them would leave any ceiling exposed. It did slightly, so I fitted the glass globe onto the fixture and checked it again.

Doing so had fixed all of the problems. The overlap from the globe would be enough to hold the lightweight sunburst frame up AND cover up any gap that might have been left. So far, this had been a real winner of a project.

Rather than waiting for Scott to get home (famous last words), I decided to put it up myself. I had seen him do this many other times and was pretty confident. I turned off the power to the hallway and proceeded to dismantle the old light. I then attached the white wire to the white wire in the ceiling and black to the black wire with wire nuts. The ground wire was screwed to the mounting bolt that was green, then the mounting screws were screwed into the bracket. The fixture slipped over the mounting screws and turned to lock it into place. I then just tightened the mounting screws and put in the light bulb.

All of that explanation had only gotten me this far, but the next parts are super simple. Put up the sunburst frame, then lock the globe onto the base. That's it. I turned on the power and checked out the awesome.

It's so cool and adds a nice little bit of interest to an otherwise bland space. It makes me want to go and use some ceiling pant to cover the crazy paint job that was left on the ceiling. It's not quite as impressive from the dining room, but it still has a nice presence. We have been referring to it as a 'stubborn octopus stuck to the ceiling'. This is in no way a bad thing.

And anything is going to look better than a light that is called "the boob light", lol.

We are really pleased with it (and my new found light installing skill). Not bad for about an hours time and $35!

A Picnic For Two

Or a table made for four. Or six. Any of these numbers would be an upgrade from what we were using as an outdoor dining set before.

The picture might be pretty, but our eating and sitting space wasn't. We have been looking into outdoor seating for a little while now, trying to find something that matches our style and budget. A recent purchase really put this to the top of the list.

 Scott has a new baby, a Texas-style smoker set up that he is hoping to get a lot of use out of, so the need for an eating area right outside was becoming much more imperative. Our little yellow table and camp chairs weren't wearing well in the wind and rain, so we started the online search. A lot of outdoor dining sets seem large, expensive, and a little less casual than we would like. The only thing we found that caught our eye was this set from Ikea.

This didn't seem like a 'this summer' purchase to use, though, even at that price. After debating some other possibilities, such as building a table (for which we would have to buy/build chairs, making it not as cost efficient as we would have liked), we set our sites on what seems like an obvious solution, an $88 picnic table from Lowes.

As soon as we had decided that the picnic table was our path to outdoor deliciousness, I had a mental image of how I wanted to go about making it a fun place to eat. Manufacturers recommend painting and/or sealing a picnic table before allowing it to sit in the elements, so we knew that some treatment would be necessary. I just wanted to make it a little more interesting.

I envisioned using blue stain and a little stenciling to create a fun, colorful space for us to stuff our faces with ribs and corn.

I explained my idea to Beth, who was immediately on board with helping me bring this into fruition. We took her truck over to Lowes, picked up our $88, unfinished dining set and headed home.

We set up inside because it was a gray day, but if the weather hadn't been so wishy-washy, we could have done this outside with better drying conditions. We were able to keep the garage door open, though, so we weren't inhaling many fumes.

I started by giving all of the places that people might touch a good once over with the sander. I'm glad I did because it was pretty rough pine that could have caused many a fragmented fiber in many a bum.

Once it was free of splinters and really rough patches (it's almost impossible to get it completely smooth), Beth took a towel and removed as much sawdust as she could. Then we began covering the top of the table with material to stencil our letters. We ended up using shelf liner (white) down the center because it's self-adhesive and meant we didn't have to use as much painters tape.

When we were ready to start sketching, the table looked like this.

Beth measured and separated the tabletop into three spaced areas so we knew how much room each letter should take up. Using string and this method, we made circles that would be the basis for our letters.

(Notice that the circle for the "a" is slightly lower, smaller, and to the left hand side).

After we found the circles we had drawn to be agreeable, we went back in and free-handed the rest of the letter parts. Thankfully we both had the same blocky font in mind, so when we were done, we had a nice, uniform font to start cutting out.

Because the letters are so big, it didn't take very long to cut them out. I used an X-acto knife and Beth ended up with my pocket knife. Honestly, I think she just liked using my pocket knife.

When we had carefully peeled away the excess, we were looking pretty good. We ran our fingers over the edges just to make sure it was stuck to the wood really well before continuing on to the staining step.

We used foam brushes to apply the colored stain. I purchased Minwax Water Based Stain and had it tinted "Island Water" by the guys at Home Depot. Tinted stain can be a little less watery than regular "off the shelf" stain colors that you might purchase, so I wouldn't do too many coats. It tends to layer more like paint than stain. We did a single coat over the entire top because we liked the wood grain showing through.

We tried our best to squish some of the stain into the grooves between boards, but it didn't really bother us if it didn't make it. The nice thing about this project is that it doesn't have to look perfect. It's a picnic table, not a formal dining room set!

We pulled the letter stencils and were so happy with the result!

I then followed up by painting the rest of the table the same blue and coating the top and seats with 2-3 coats of outdoor-safe poly.

Scott and David showed up juuuuust in time to take it around to the back porch for us. It was immediately hailed as an instant improvement!

Unfortunately, it was a little too cold last night to actually eat at it (stupid Kentucky weather), but it was nice to at least see it in place on the porch. We turned it so that when you walk out the door, the first thing you see is "EAT" when you walk outside. It's just a really fun welcomer to our little campsite themed backyard.

And I can see us drinking many a beer and eating lots of ribs and pork butt here, too.

Seats one to possibly 8, only $88, and super fun, this has to be one of my favorite projects so far this Spring!

A Whole New Wooooooorld

We are feeling like we are a little more connected with the outside world as of a few weeks ago. When we bought the house, the large window in the now-dining room didn't open. It was apparently painted shut and the last owner of the home decided that she didn't need them to open, so she never really fixed it. Amusingly enough, she did purchase new locks for the windows that wouldn't open.

Anywho, as it happens, I was bored in early May and decided to try to get them to open. It actually ended up being a super simple technique. I just used a metal spackle putty knife and wedged it between the windows.

Then I just lightly tapped it with a hammer so that I could see it in the window below.

Continuing this all the way around the bottom portion of the window and the frame loosened it enough to push it open (with a little effort). It only took about 15 minutes of hammering and pulling on the windows to get both sides to open, though. Not bad!

That's when we realized that apparently there is no good way to get behind the window and paint the little bit of exposed wood at the bottom of the top window pane.

Oh well. Hopefully one day the whole window will be replaced anyway (especially since we don't have any window screens for the now open windows.).

Scott actually did a little preventative maintenance once we had them open. He took some White Lithium Grease and coated the window tracks with it.

This is a better lubricant than WD-40 (which was actually originally created as a cleanser, not a grease. We recommended people use it to clean up their bicycles all the time when I was working in a bike shop.), so it will last longer and work better over time. He just used the little straw and got right into the tracks with it, careful not to over coat it.

After he had gotten both tracks for a window, he would open and close the window to work the lithium grease into the enclosed part of the window track. We wiped away excess that was on the molding when he had finished.

We were so excited to have working windows that we put this picture up on Instagram!

Huzzah! Spring! Do you have any older windows that won't open? Give this a try and let us know how it goes!