A Gallery of Fun

This week I am doing a mini-house tour of our brand-new condo look! We have been busy painting and decorating, stepping up this 1,000 square feet in the sky into something that is grown-up and geared-up for 2012 and beyond. I am sooo thrilled with the results and can't wait to show you what it all looks like!

Back again today with another fun update - the gallery wall! I have been dreaming of gray-blue paint paired with a black-and-white gallery wall since many, many moons ago. Pottery Barn just KNOWS me, ya know?

Even though we unexpectedly found the new oversized picture for above our living room couch, I knew that I still wanted to use all of our black frames in some form of a gallery wall. Luckily, our hallway left much to be desired after painting it the pretty new gray-blue color. The one print I had hung there looked almost lonely. So one evening (the night I got engaged, actually, I just didn't know it yet!!) I sat down with a bunch of newspapers, some scissors and some tape and planned out where the pictures could go:

After shifting and moving some of the placeholders around a bit, I was pleased with what my eye saw. I should note, the free-form placement? A big deal, y'all. You are looking at Katherine-Loves-Order OCD girl here! It helped me to keep all of the shapes within a general "square" shape, though.

A few days (and a ring on my finger, LOL) later, I sat down to fill in the creative gaps while my resident live-in Handyman got to work with the hammer drill to get the holes drilled for the photos.  

Side note: Live in a highrise with poured cement walls? We can share some tips, if you ever need them. Goodness gracious, gallery walls + cement = crazy hard hammer drill workout.

I had some of the frames already filled, but some needed some pizazz. I also wanted to add some color to the whole black/cream/white theme. Scrapbook paper came to the rescue with just the right amount of complimentary themes.

 

 

Then, let the hanging begin!

Here is the finished product. Minus the spot on the lower left. Where Brad "got into a fight with the concrete wall." Hammer Drill, 0, Concrete Wall, 1. We will fix that later :)

 
I wanted to keep some of my M.C. Escher prints, so I picked out two of my favorites to incorporate onto the wall. 

I also used a spare oversized map (long story) to cut out parts of the world we want to visit someday.

At the bottom of the wall, I framed a piece of sheet music from one of my cello drill books. Mwahaha no more practicing that sonata anymore!

I particularly love the view of the gallery wall from the kitchen. Without any lights on, it adds some brightness to the end of the "hallway" where our washer/dryer and coat closet are.

And when I turned on the flash, it especially showcases the change in paint color that happens from the kitchen into the hall. The kitchen is a shade lighter, but it flows so well that you might not even notice it at first glance without the help of a camera flash. Our painter? Amazing job on that line, sir. Amazing. Especially since that corner is curved AND textured concrete. Amen.

The last thing I really love about our new hallway is the red-orange photo frame I hung around the peephole, Friends-style.

This one's for my BFF, Laurie! She is a Friends fanatic! The plain white frame was $4 at IKEA, and with so many cool, neutrals going on in here, I knew I wanted a pop of some color here and there. The gallery wall has a few similar pops of red, as does the living room. So I picked out a bright spray paint and went to town.

Well, that's that! What do you think? You have seen the entire place all done up. I hope you love it as much as we do.

It's been fun to live in a place that now seems so hotel-ish. It's amazing what some paint and some pictures on the wall can do for a place, isn't it? :)

Brand New Living Room!

This week I am doing a mini-house tour of our brand-new condo look! We have been busy painting and decorating, stepping up this 1,000 square feet in the sky into something that is grown-up and geared-up for 2012 and beyond. I am sooo thrilled with the results and can't wait to show you what it all looks like!

Remember this, you guys?

Yep, my bright, sunny yellow wall. A welcome respite from the beige that preceded it, this wall represented all that was "me" when I realized I owned this here condo and could paint things whatever. the. heck. I. wanted!

But then I got tired of it. It lacked sophistication. It lacked style. And ultimately? It was hard to match against with anything other than black and white. Sure, my houndstooth chair and white sofa were fine with it, but forget any new throw pillows or blankets! Yellow is a seriously hard color to complement.

So when it came time to choose colors for the living room, I knew I wanted to glam things up to a 9.8. I wanted to take advantage of what is a naturally-bright room from sunshine and 10-foot ceilings. Time to go --- DARK.

Hooray!! I am sooo in love with this room now. The color first is what wows me. On the swatch, it was pretty, but on the walls, it is quite stunning. We kept the ceilings and trim shades of beige, and so now you really notice just how high things are in here. We chose Whale Gray 2134-40 from Benjamin Moore:

Also, that print above the couch? We randomly came across it while at IKEA. This print, as huge as it is, was only $50. And it came framed! I figured, even if it becomes one of those over-used IKEA prints, there is no loss, because it was only $50. We can always upgrade later. In the meantime, a shot of our ultimate favorite city is the perfect accessory in our A-town home.

The new color on the walls meant that the couch needed some jazzing up, too. After a good steam clean, I went out and picked up some new throw pillows from Ross. My favorite is the gray zebra print one, but I honestly really love how they all go together while being so different even more.

Since the room is now much darker, the evening vibe gets super chill in here. I think the late-night look is almost as cool as the daytime version!

Last but not least, St. Thomas the Fish also got a little decor fix in his corner. We have another IKEA print (circa 2007) hung over his tank.

So, what do you think? Does the new blue-gray look high-rise appropriate??

Stay tuned for more. I have one more big post to share with you this week!

Blues and Grays and Greens

This week I am doing a mini-house tour of our brand-new condo look! We have been busy painting and decorating, stepping up this 1,000 square feet in the sky into something that is grown-up and geared-up for 2012 and beyond. I am sooo thrilled with the results and can't wait to show you what it all looks like!

Redecorating the condo has been a fun but challenging process. For someone who has lived in a world of mostly beige for almost four years, it was hard to imagine what walls full of color will look like. Even harder was figuring out the theme of the colors throughout the entire condo. See, we have granite counters in the bathroom and kitchen that look like this:

And brown cabinets that look like this in both rooms, too:

And floors and carpets that looked like this:

Add to that, a master bedroom full of greens and browns:

Whatever colors I chose, I had to choose wisely. With a place the size of this, too many colors might make the place seem smaller than it actually is, but then colors had to complement the natural fixtures and textures we already have in place.

Thankfully, I found three (yes, three!) colors that flow nicely from room to room -- so well, in fact, that you really wouldn't be able to tell that they are different at all. I know this because my party guests testified this over the weekend!

While I will reveal the entryway and living room colors tomorrow and Friday, today I wanted to showcase the dining room/kitchen and bedroom/bathroom colors I chose. You already saw a bit of the first with my book wreath post:

The dining room and kitchen have the same light blue-gray shade to them. Someday, I will get a grown-up camera to better capture these colors, but for now, here they are.

Imagine that "Gourmet" sign hung-up. It's our last hole to drill :)

It's so nice to have some color amongst the appliances and cabinets in the kitchen. It pulls everything together. 

 

This is the color of the living room and dining room, Gull Wing Gray 2134-50 from Benjamin Moore:

To complement the browns and greens of the bedroom and granite, we chose a brown-gray for the master suite, Benjamin Moore's Winter Gates AC-30:

And here is how it turned out! 

I love how glamorous the bathroom now feels. It was so plain before. 

Ignore all the items on the bed - I was so excited once the painting was done that I couldn't wait to snap a shot! :) 

 Clutch: the new color all but camouflages the obnoxiously-placed circuit breaker box in the master.

Of course, now that the walls were painted, it was time for some hanging to happen! I made some templates for our degrees, since they are very different shapes. This helped us pinpoint exactly where to use the hammer drill.

How lovely! Since both of us work in cube-world, it's nice to have a place for these beauties at home even without a true home office. 

Coming tomorrow: a living room reveal! In the meantime, what do you think? Do you like the first two color choices?

Bookly Decor

This week I am doing a mini-house tour of our brand-new condo look! We have been busy painting and decorating, stepping up this 1,000 square feet in the sky into something that is grown-up and geared-up for 2012 and beyond. I am sooo thrilled with the results and can't wait to show you what it all looks like!

Before the days of Pinterest, I was a Google Reader "star" person extradordinaire. In fact, even just thinking about the number of blog articles I have starred in my lifetime from hundreds and hundreds of blogs, bookmarking them for future inspiration or resource, makes my heart palpitate a bit, because I know firsthand that I likely will not be checking out most of those stars anytime soon (or ever again). Maybe I should go back and start pinning some of those articles instead ...

There were a handful of starred articles, though, that I kept going back to again and again over the years. My friend Living with Lindsay's 2009 article about a book wreath was one of them.

I loved how she took something so simple -- a paperback book and a craft wreath -- and turned it into this statement piece! Plus, I love to read, so I knew one day, I'd like to have this wreath in my home, too. Too bad, though, I had all beige walls. A beige wreath on beige walls just wouldn't do.

UNTIL we got the condo painted :) :)

As soon as the paint was dry on the walls, I started scheming on what mini-decor updates I wanted to do around the house. First on my list was making my own book wreath!  Lindsay's tutorial was really easy to follow. I sat down with a nice glass of wine one night after work and got to work. A few touch-ups the next day once the pages had set, and I was done!

I am loving the unique texture and depth the wreath adds to the wall. Plus, I love that I made it myself! I feel so crafty :) It looks nice in the corner by my cello, too. That wall was always so awkwardly bare.

Thanks Lindsay, for the inspiration!

Have you crafted decor for your home recently? Was it a pin redux, or just homemade inspiration? Do tell!

Happiness Is...

I won't lie. These last seven days since getting engaged?

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Yep. A lot of that.

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I have pretty much been floating around in a bit of a haze.

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Sure, I have lots going on and lots to do.

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But when I get a moment here and there, I find myself smiling wide and just staring into space.

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I think that's a pretty good sign of things to come :)

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Soupy Slow Cooking

I've got a winner of a crock-pot soup for you today!

I have been rocking through the recipes in my Fix It and Forget It cookbook, which features TONS of recipes made just for a slow cooker. A lot of the recipes are similar and most often can serve simply as inspiration for you as you learn how to best throw things together for a slow cooked meal. The beauty of crock pot meals are that they are also extremely flexible beyond the variable cooking time. Don't like that vegetable? Skip it! Want a cheesier soup? Add two cans of the cheese-based condensed soup instead of one.

This recipe was just one of those meals for me. I wanted a basic minestrone soup, so I found and used a recipe for inspiration. I skipped the usual pasta and instead used the suggested barley, which kept things really low-calorie but super hearty. You could add in or substitute red kidney beans, zucchini and many other veggies.

My key to maintaining my weight during the week most often depends on healthy lunches, and soup is my go-to for a quickie lunch that fills me up. I made this crock-pot meal overnight, dealt out servings in individual containers the next morning, and took one with me for lunch while freezing the rest. Then, throughout upcoming days and weeks, I have a supply of healthy soups to grab in the morning, no defrost required. I just let the soup sit through the morning at my desk before heating the container for four-five minutes in the microwave for lunch.

Enjoy!

Minestrone Soup
Adapted from Fix It and Forget It

Source: laurenslatest.com via Gay on Pinterest

Makes six-eight lunch servings

2 boxes of Tuscany-blend chicken broth
3 carrots, peeled and diced
1 Spanish onion, chopped
4 ribs celery, chopped
3 garlic cloves, minced
3/4 dry barley
1 can chickpeas, drained
1 Tbsp. parsley
1/2 tsp. dried thyme
1 tsp. dried oregano
1 Tbsp. rosemary
28 oz. can diced Italian tomatoes
1 tsp. salt
1 tsp. pepper

Combine all ingredients in slow cooker. Cover and cook on Low 6-8 hours or until vegetables are tender. Optional: stir in baby spinach once soup is done, and/or top with grated Parmesan cheese.