Chairs Gone Vintage!

When my brother was a lot younger he used to enjoy dumpster diving... sort of. He believed in the power of treasures that is for sure. One day when he was walking home from school, probably as a middle schooler, he discovered a desk and matching chair that had a "Free" sign on them! He could never resist free! So as a twelve year old he drug down the street a large desk and this chair:

The memory of how we obtained the chair is too precious for me to get rid of it. The desk I think is either taking up residence in my parent's garage or has otherwise been gifted to someone else but I have always hung on to the chair. It is a little run down and rugged but I like that it has a vintage vibe and so I decided not to repaint it at all but to leave the worn spots just how they were. 

It needed to have some established character so it could finally discontinue it's life as a nomadic chair.

I saw this chair at A Beach Life and thought that it was so simply done but yet had great character...

I liked the numbers! So I decided that is just what my chair needed too.

Since I have been so busy redoing the master bathroom I thought this would be a great place to house Mister Chair, especially since there was no spot to sit to paint your nails or if you're like me and have long hair, you need somewhere to sit to brush it. 

My Mom made that great pillow out of a placemat from Target. She is so creative! Though I am start to accumulate quite a few pillows... hmmm.... Look how happy Mister Chair is now!

Soon that door behind him will be replaced with nice white curtains but it adds a really great vintage and cozy feel to the entire room. I'm in love with my chair even more now and so is Justin. 

His thoughts on the whole thing: "That chair has a 12 on it." 

Does anyone else have any fun pieces of furniture or other treasures that they can't bear to part with?

Linked to: Creating a House of Grace, Savvy Southern Style, A Beach Cottage, Christina's Adventures, Beyond the Picket Fence

Vintage Wall Art. For Freeeee!

My bathroom has been sorely lacking in wall art since I decided to start redoing everything. One of the things that I really wanted to do in the bathroom was create a very different vibe then what was in there before. I wanted something that was vintage and classic but still maintained a sense of the feminine. 

And a sense of the overall budget which was little to nothin'.

So I was surfing around The Graphics Fairy where you can find an unprecedented amount of free printable clip art! It all has a great amount of vintage flair too it and it was exactly what I was looking for! On the blog there is a tab for "search" which lists all of the major categories of different clip art. 

Remember my huge-normous Little Mermaid poster? Well I knew that I would still have to incorporate mermaids somehow because I love them. Using the search tab on The Graphics Fairy blog I found an entire segment for mermaids!

I fell in love with this image almost instantly:

It's exactly what I wanted! I used some scrapbooking paper that I already had as well as some inexpensive WalMart frames and printed off another image that was full of seashells out of an old sea life dictionary.

I just printed them off of my home computer and cut them out! It was a quick and easy project but it adds so much character to the room that I love it a lot. Plus! I get to keep my mermaids.

Let There Be Energy Star Light!

One of the main things that I was looking at when I was planning the master bathroom reno was the light fixtures. I updated all of the light fixtures in the guest bathroom {here} and it looked roughly 100x better then before. I wanted to do the same thing in the master bathroom especially since the light fixtures were a little Hollywood horror-ish:

Yeah that's not very pretty I don't think... every time I open one of those bi-fold mirrors I have to move the light bulb around so that it doesn't get broken which only makes it harder to access my impressive collection of sunglasses.

I was just going to spray paint the brass strips and fix the creepy hangy light UNTIL! I went to Lowe's and found a smoking, finger burning, pee your pants its so amazing deal on two matching light fixtures for only $12.05. I had to have them! I literally save $160.00 on both of em because they were originally 95.00 a piece! 

I took a picture of the tag for proof! See?

 The best part about it is that they are both EnergyStar rated and look gorgeous! So it was time to take down the old so the new could go in. This is the monstrosity that I found behind the scary light bulbs.

Hold your breathe it only gets worse, check out the previous owner's "adaptations" for the old set up. I am concerned about what the people before did to the house... there was some seriously strange rigging going on.

I had to wait until Justin got home so that he could fix the lights for me, originally I had it assembled, hung up, gorgeous, cute, and otherwise amazing when much to my dismay I realized that I had not anchored the fixture. As I was reaching to take a glorious photo for the blog here the entire thing tipped out of the wall. 

I may or may not have sworn at it for several moments.

I'd prefer not to say.

But! After Justin demonstrated his fantastic DIY electrical skills we assembled the light again (correctly this time) and have the whole thing up and running! The lighting is much better for putting on make up and it looks so much better too! 

I'm painting the doors today and tomorrow don't be concerned. I swear they really will eventually be painted.

Let's check out the list of To-Do's in the Master Bath again:

• paint ceiling and trim
• paint trim around doors
• paint towel cabinet white
• paint vanity cabinets dark brown
• paint walls grey
• paint mirror frames
• create new wall art for above tub
• add new towel hooks/bars
• clean up over the potty thing
• remove foreclosure stickers
• new accessories
• DEEP clean and organize
• line all shelves and drawers
• figure out new light fixtures (paint the brass ones? invest in new vanity lights??)
• remove useless doors and replace with luxurious curtains
• create new window treatment

Good progress so far I think! Almost done with everything! I have 6 of the 8 total walls painted in the bathroom! The only ones that I haven't done are the ones that need the major patching done but otherwise the rest are pretty much ready to go. Exciting!

What do you think of the new lighting set up? Major improvement?

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