Sunday, January 26, 2014

DIY Accent Trays

This Saturday was a great day! My good friend, El, and her ADORABLE baby girl, Harper, came over to visit. Since becoming a mommy, El said she was really itching to do a DIY project and I was equally itching to find something to put on our bedroom dresser since recently adding the gold IKEA hardware.  We decided to go with making accent trays while baby Harper took her nap.

Well, not all goes as planned - the little cutie patootie wanted to join in on the fun instead, so "Auntie" K took charge and hooked mommy up! 

El picked up the "trays" from Michael's the day before.  She saw on a blog that one girl used clear box frames and lined them with paper to create a tray.  The frames were $8 each for the 11x14 size.  

However, rather than lining the "tray" with paper, I thought it might be cool to take it a step further and spray paint a geometric pattern on the back side of the tray (so the inside could be wiped down easily) instead.  It ended up being the easiest thing ever and would probably take a half hour.  Or in our case, a few hours, since girlfriends need to chit chat!

Here's what you'll need:

- spray paint color of your choice (I picked us up gold metallic by Valspar) Cost: about $5 at Lowes
- 11x14 (or size of your choice) clear box frames (El found these at Michaels)  Cost: $8 at Michaels
- 1" painters tape
- template of your choice printed out to fit inside of tray (geometric works best for taping)

Our wedding design was inspired by this tray from Up in the Air Somewhere.  My friend, Sarah, gave us the actual tray as wedding gift, but I keep it protected from little hands in one of our glass display cabinets. I just love the pattern and thought it would be a perfect, subtle way to pull in a design from our wedding in our bedroom rather than a shrine of pictures (that's in the living room ; ) )! 

Gold Zag Tray Pre Order
Up in the Air Somewhere
To make life easier, I printed out the pattern on 11x17 and trimmed it down to 11x14 so I could "trace" over it with painter's tape. 

(note: plastic primer wasn't needed, I just grabbed it incase)

Next, take the template and flip it upside down in the frame. You'll need to tape it to the bottom so it doesn't fall down when it's flipped over.


I taped off where the 'negative space' was.  Don't worry about being super accurate, they still come out great if it's not "perfect".  Also, remember to tape the edges of the 'tray' so you don't get spray paint on them!


Next, spray away!


Once dry, begin to peel off the painter's tape.


...and Voila! Your pattern is complete! (of course, now I can't decide where I'd like to use them!) 
To really protect the paint on the bottom, consider buying those small, clear pads for the base of the tray.





Friday, January 3, 2014

Bedroom Update

Our bedroom was one of the last rooms to be updated and, although it still has a little way to go,  I figured I'd post the progress! Here's some of the original photos of the room:

View 1
View 1 with Brown Teepee Paint

View 2

View 2 with Brown Teepee Paint
View 3 Head Wall with Brown Teepee Paint
 For the longest time, the room just screamed "bachelor pad". Here's a real old pic, before I made a new headboard to replace this lacquer bad boy!


 Clearly, a new bed was needed and the nail head headboard I made to replace the old lacquer one (picture not shown) just wasn't cutting it anymore. So after a long, patient wait, I decided to order this one from Amazon back in the fall.  I was lucky enough to get a bunch of Amazon gift cards for my birthday, so I was able to use those towards the "grown up" bed!  We are HUGE Amazon Prime addicts, so this bed shipped to us for FREE! Gotta love it!


The Faux sheepskin rug is a recent purchase thanks to a Home Goods gift card I got from my in-laws.  Although my original plan was to get a larger area rug that would go under the bed, I ended up grabbing this smaller one to avoid the frustration of trying to get a big one under the bed! Not sure if I love it here though, I think a larger, cut pile one would look better. Thoughts??


We painted Rick's black nightstand white, added a door, and hardware to it.  I found my nightstand at Home Goods.  I saw this "snake skin" look online a long time ago and loved it, so I was thrilled when I stumbled across this at Home Goods on my way home from work.  I also found a smaller version at Target, but this was the perfect height and had more storage. The lamp is an oldie; from Christmas Tree Shop a while back, and I'm looking to replace it with this one from Ikea so I can use the other one in the Guest Room.


The Starburst Mirror above the bed was hand made by yours truly.  It's showing a little yellow in the photos, but is not that yellow in person.




When I repainted the Guest Room, I also painted our hallway BM Revere Pewter. Since I had a gallon or so left of that from the hallway, I decided to just paint our bedroom the same color since I was looking for a soft neutral anyway.  (One recommendation: when painting, especially a bedroom, be sure to use a No or Low-VOC paint.)  I made this mistake because I ended up having Lowes match the color to their Paint/Primer in One.  However, the smell was so strong, we had headaches from it! So always, always go with a NO-VOC paint!)

Under our TV, we have these dressers from Ikea. 


 I want to 'hack it' a little by adding some hardware to it and was going to buy these pulls from Ikea during my next trip down there. I think the gold would be nice to play off of the subtle gold accents in the room. After all, who says you can't mix gold and silver?!


Well, my friends, that's where we are for now.  I'll be sure to keep you updated as to whether or not the dresser hack was a success or fail!  Happy New Year!

K


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