Design Suggestions Needed for a Dramatic Powder Room

I love dramatic powder rooms.  I mean, I really, really LOVE dramatic powder rooms!  Rooms that are full of large scale wallpaper or painted an over-the-top color with accessories to compliment, maybe lots of sparkling mosaic tile or a gorgeous over sized mirror - all those things make me love itty-bitty powder rooms with mega impact the moment you open the door.  One of the reasons I love to attend the Parade of Homes is to be "wowed" by the powder rooms.  Though this year was dismally disappointing, I have been thrilled in the past with the variety of wow-factor out there.  I knew from the start our little powder room needed to be one of those stand-out never-to-be-forgotten kind of rooms and I knew exactly what colors I wanted it to be - pink, black, white and silver.  It all flows from the wallpaper I saw once and absolutely loved - Graham and Brown's Elizabeth in Pink & Silver.  I ordered a sample of it and just received it earlier this week - it is way more beautiful in person than the little 1"x1" picture I cut out of a magazine years ago and kept all this time.  So, I now know exactly which wallpaper will adorn that room, I have the vessel sink, I think I know which mirror and faucet I want and I have the light fixture.  What I am not sure of is if I should paper the entire room (not my first choice) or just paper the wall opposite the door and paint the rest of the room a complimentary color (my first choice) or use bead board on the bottom half of the wall and wallpaper the top half all around (my second choice but causes tiling issues around the vanity).  To help you visualize the space, I have included the floor plan of the room - really, your typical powder room. 

Then, to help myself picture the room, I made up my own little "inspiration boards" in Photoshop.  One has pink walls and one has silver walls (since, though it is hard to see, the wallpaper is actually pink and silver, not pink and white.  And it is flocked.  Gorgeous!).  I know that with such a dramatic wallpaper, it is important to have some calming elements in the room so I intend to have a lot of white - white floor tiles, white trim and door, white vanity and vessel sink, white toilet, and white 4"x4" tile for the back splash.  I know the light fixture will be black and will give lots of light so it shouldn't be dark in the room.  I "think" this will be the mirror I get but since I don't have it yet, that could change.  You never know, I might find a huge silver ornate thing that is swoon-worthy - then I would do that instead!  Any suggestions on paint color?  Any suggestions on how much wallpaper to use?  I am not asking you to tell me to not use the wallpaper or to use another kind because I am most certainly using this wallpaper in this room.  If you don't like it, that is okay, you can use another bathroom if you are coming over or just ignore this post if you never make it to my house!  What I am asking is for you design divas to bring out your best design savvy and give me some direction or confirmation as to what would look best in this over-the-top glitz and glamour powder room!

Edited to add:

One reader suggested using wainscot on the lower half of the walls so I did some browsing online to get an idea of how that might look and I really like it.  So, I quickly made an "inspiration board" to include the wallpaper and wainscot option.

Faux Mantel Over a Half Wall

Since we live in a bi-level house, we have a half wall that divides our living room from our entrance.  I love the open concept home but I wanted to have a wall behind my fireplace to create a mantel. I was not about to frame out a wall so I lived with a fireplace and no wall for a number of years.  This past summer a friend of mine gave me a wooden frame that may have been intended to be a glass fronted cabinet door.  However, it did not contain any glass but neither did it contain any holes for hinges or knobs either.  She said that I would come up with something to do with it and she was right. 

After a while, I realized this would be the solution to creating a faux mantel!  I do actually have a photo of the frame in the "before" state but it is on an SD card that has mysteriously disappeared!  ** Edited to add that I found the card so here is the before! **

I ordered some mirror to be cut to the correct size then got to work painting the frame.  Ever since I heard about Rustoleum's Heirloom White spray paint, I knew I had to try it somewhere and this was the perfect project.  I gave that frame a nice coat of paint and, once it was dry, sanded down the edges slightly to give it more of an antiqued look.  After a layer of clear coat, it was ready for the hardware. 

I followed the same technique I used to create my trapeze frames, using eye hooks and cable wiring and crimps.  After the eye hooks were installed, I inserted the mirror using glazier points stuck in the back.  What a neat and tidy way to hold that mirror in place.  When it came time to find the rafters that the mirror was to hang from, we ran into a little snag.  We knew that the rafters ran in a certain direction over our entrance.  What we were not aware of, however, was that right over the fireplace, the rafters ran in a different direction to accommodate the roofline, making it impossible to hang the mirror where I wanted it.  Well, difficult, not impossible. 

My dearly loved and super wonderful hunk-of-love husband crawled into the attic for me and held 2x4s in place in the exact location I wanted to hang the mirror, creating studs!  (This is not a finished attic, this is a hop-from-rafter-to-rafter-and-dig-through-the-insulation kind of attic!)  Once I installed the eye hooks in the newly formed studs, the mirror was ready to hang!  I love the new look!  I love the abundant decorating possibilities!  I love the new "wall" it creates! I now have a fireplace mantel complete with mirror!  Let the decorating begin!

As for decorating, well, I used to have 2 of those apothecary jars flanking the candles.  However, my sons thought playing frisbee was an indoor sport and the one jar was the casuality of such foolishness!  Grr.  For now, this will have to do until the Christmas decor comes out!

As usual, linking up to Sandra's Party! 

Outdoor Holiday Planter with Branches

I had a vision in my mind of a large holiday planter using various branches so on Saturday I went out to the country property and cut various types of branches. These included Golden Willow, Highbush Cranberry, wild Dogwood and spruce. This morning while the kids worked on school, I put these planters together in the entrance. I made two so I could have one to flank each side of the garage door. I love how they turned out!

First off, I took some scrap metal mesh, like a really small sized stucco wire, with about 1/2" squares and cut a square about the size of the top of the urn.. You could use chicken wire as well. I smushed the wire on top of the soil that was already in the planter. The wire is just to help the branches stay in place.

Then I took my branches and pruners and started cutting and placing the branches. I started with really long willow branches in the center and worked out from there. I made sure to stagger their heights and to provide more fullness as I got closer to the pot. I love the color difference in the gold of the willow and red of the dogwood, the berries on the cranberry branches and the green of the spruce. Once all the deciduous branches were in place, I used the spruce branches to cover all the wire. I used larger pieces to spread out across the bottom and then used really small leftovers and stood them up in the very center of the pot, where all the branches came together. Not sure if that makes sense so just look at the pictures. Stand back often to make sure it looks balanced and to ensure that all your pots (if you are doing more than one) look similar enough. I love the large size of the arrangement and can see it lasting well through the winter. And to think it was completely free!

I am linking up to

INSANE Deals for Project 2012!

Jay and I had some very important interviews this morning. We are applying for our Enhanced Drivers Licence or Identity Card in order to travel to the USA by land or by water. We went that route as opposed to passports because it was cheaper and (we thought) easier. Well, cheaper, yes, easier, no. Anyhow, the applications are in, the interviews are done and now we wait to see if we are approved. Then we plan our trip to Minneapolis! I can hardly wait! While Jay was in his interview, I took the kids to the mall to hang out for the hour wait until my appointment. I spent all of that time in Liquidation World, a treasure of a place that sells items they receive through bankruptcies, store closures, and other such means and then sell for less than the other stores that carry those same items. I like the fact that I never know what to expect plus I usually find some great treasure for an even better price. I scored and I mean scored BIG today! I mean HUGE!!
First off, I spotted a number of chandeliers on clearance! Remember, this is a place that liquidates other people's leftovers. Their prices are already better than others. They would be the equivalent of other store's clearance prices. Add another clearance price on top of that and you have a major "I-am-practically-stealing-this-the-price-is-so-low" low price. I brought home two lovelies that will be perfect for the next house (and may just find their way into this one for the short run - although, I do like the idea of keeping it special for the next one!).

This first one I picture in one of the girl's rooms. I actually like it black and I love all the wire wrapped around the arms and accented with small little baubles.


The hanging crystals finish it off ever so nicely! It measures 17" across and 18" tall and is a 6-light fixture.

The price?


This next one is huge! I think it will be our bedroom light - or maybe the foyer? I don't see it staying white but definitely wouldn't do anything about it just now. It is missing a number of the crystals but I don't think they should be too hard to replace. Like I said, it is a big one - it measures 23" across and 25" tall and is an 8-light fixture!

All for the bargain basement price of

Finally, this is the main deal! This is the big kahuna! This is the reason I am still giddy. How many of you know anything about plumbing fixtures? I am talking about bathroom taps, shower heads, etc? Yeah, me neither. Thankfully, my father is a plumber - has been since before I was even born - and probably knows most anything and everything about plumbing. As I perusing the aisles of this wonderful store, I stumbled across a couple of shelves of Price Pfister bath fixtures. Honestly, I had no idea where they fell on the scale of high-end to low-end. I saw this gorgeous Marielle roman tub faucet set in a rustic pewter finish. It has a distinctive French Country styling and was . . . well . . . gorgeous.

It was priced $78.88. Yeah. Meant nothing to me, either. So, I called daddy! Just to inform you, Price Pfister is a top-of-the-line company. Depending on what you are buying, their products can easily and generally run in the $200-$400 dollar and upwards range. $78.88 is a bargain. Dad asked if the rough-in parts were included - apparently they are often sold separately for at least $100. Yes, they were snuggled in their own little box within the larger box containing all the other parts, like the handles and the spout, which, apparently, can and are sold separately. So, for the complete set $78.88. Yup, it was a bargain, all right. I threw it in the cart and didn't look back. Well, I did look back but only to look at the Price Pfister 8" Rain Shower head selling for $28.88 - maybe I will have to go back (again) and get a second look! After I got home, I looked up this faucet set online - Home Depot, actually. They still sell this style of tub faucet. Their price? Are you ready for this? Are you sitting down? $306.31. Yeah, you read that right. Over $300. But wait a minute. That DOES NOT include the handles? Another $76.37. Remember the rough-in parts dad asked me about? Another $110.50. So, if you are doing the math (you really should be sitting) - the total cost at Home Depot for the exact same thing I just bought for $78.88 was $493.18. Are you as stunned as I was?! That is about 525% more than I paid at a wonderful place called Liquidation World. In my opinion, they had no idea the retail price of these. For example, they had some really nice Louisville Slugger bats in funky shades of orange and pink and yellow - the sale price sticker from the previous store said $199.99 and LW was selling it for 40% of that amount (no, we did not buy one but we certainly looked). I think because there was no price on these items, they just priced them however. Their loss, my gain! (Just so you know, I would never have paid $493.18 for a set of bathtub taps - that is just a whole lot beyond me - but when you can "steal" them for $78.88 I am all for it!)

Thanks for sharing in my excitement! Now it is time for a fashion show - you know, showing all the clothes I bought last night at Value Village to hubs! Gotta love it!

Red & Turquoise Asian Pillow Wraps

I have been wanting to build something lately - I have that building itch! (I am REALLY hoping I get some wood for Mother's Day so I can build a porch swing - the pattern is just waiting for me!) But since no building has yet happened, I decided to do a little sewing.

Remember those black pillows I bought after I made my beautiful upholstered headboard (which I am still loving!!)? Well, they were a little . . . plain. Boring. Uninspiring. They needed a little something.

That, in combination with my love of fabric, prompted me to walk the aisle of fabrics at WalMart. It is a really short aisle but this beauty caught my eye. I love - and I mean LOVE - Asian fabrics. They are so beautiful to me. In one fabric store I seldom get to, they have a whole section of these awe-inspiring fabrics. Something about the way they marry colors together or the whimsical prints of mythodical creatures or maybe the smooth, satin texture gets to me. I absolutely adore it! So, when I saw this red and turquoise combination, I knew it was coming home. And I knew those pillows were about to change!

I decided to make pillow wraps (think coffee cup wraps, only for a pillow!). I took a piece of fabric, sewed it into a rectangle, then joined the two ends with a frog, completing the Asian look. I love how it adds that pop of color!

Super easy. Super quick. Super beautiful!

DIY - Upholstered Tufted Headboard

We haven't had a headboard in our room for a few years already. We do have a metal canopy bed that is currently in the garage because it is just not working for me decoratively at this time. So, I just had 2 frames above our bed. Not so pretty. Well, the pictures are nice but the whole look was just a little - pathetic. Agreed?


I decided a large, tall upholstered headboard would be perfect! And I could make it myself. Talk about going from Boring to Beautiful! So, here it is, the BEFORE and AFTER!!



Making an upholstered headboard is really quite easy. Trust me, anyone can do this! First of all, for supplies, you need a piece of 3/8" plywood cut to the size you desire (ours is 48" tall x 62" wide - 2" wider than the bed width and nice and tall!), enough 2" foam to cover the plywood, quilt batting to cover the plywood plus about 4"-6" overlap on all sides, fabric in the same size as the quilt batting. To hang the headboard, you need a piece of 1x4 wood that is about 48" long, plus 2 smaller pieces, about 4"-6" each. Find a few screws and a drill, a staple gun and some staples and you should be good to go.

First off, take your 48" 1x4 piece of wood and cut it at a 45 degree angle the length of the wood, splitting it almost in half, into 2 pieces. What you are making is a french cleat and it will be used to hang your headboard on the wall. This is an image courtesy of cat-thesis.blogspot.com


This requires a tiny bit more work than using picture hanging hardware but you will be so happy you did. It makes a very solid headboard that won't move on you. This is what that piece of wood looks like from the end. Make sense? You will end up with 2 pieces that look like this even though you will only cut one piece of wood. Attach it to the headboard in the appropriate location, towards the top, maybe about 4" from the top. Now, when attaching them, drill from the front of the headboard through to the back of the headboard. After all, if you drill from the back to the front, you will have little screws sticking out of the board and into the foam. Going from the front to the back ensures no screws sticking out plus it will be much more secure. If you look closely, I first attached it from the back to the front (the wrong way) and had to clip off the screw tips. Then I added screws from the front to the back like I should have done in the first place.


Next, take your little pieces of 1x4 wood, the ones that are 4"-6" big and attach them closer to the bottom of your headboard, on the back. These will act as spacers so attach one on each side, about 4" in from the side. Attach it in the same manner as the piece of wood you did at the top, going from the front to the back. Now the back of the headboard should look like this (notice the long 48" piece at the top and the two spacers at the bottom corners):


If you plan on tufting your headboard, mark the locations of each button on the back side and drill a hole at each mark. Make your hole larger rather than smaller. It will make the tufting easier. (And, yes, that 18V Dewalt baby is MY drill!)


Now to the foam. Cut the foam to the size of the plywood. Apparently an electric knife works great but I just used scissors. I wasn't too concerned about it being perfect because the batting will cover a multitude of sins!


Just lay the foam on the wood and the batting will hold it in place. Some people suggest using spray adhesive to adhere the foam to the wood - I tried this and it didn't work. Maybe I used the wrong stuff?


Next, lay your quilt batting over the foam and wrap it around the wood to the back side. Staple it in place, making sure it is nice and tight and smooth. To make this easier for me, I laid the headboard on a cedar chest so I could lay underneath the headboard and staple it this way. That way I could see that it was tight and smooth. Some people just flip the whole thing upsidedown and work on it that way but then you cannot see the top. Your choice.



Finally, the fabric! I choose a black vinyl as leather was too expensive. We have a nice leather storage bench at the foot of our bed and I wanted it to match. Plus, vinyl is easy to clean. When attaching the fabric, make sure it is straight and centered then put one staple in the center of each side, on the back. Work on one side at a time, stapling from that center staple out to the corners. Does that make sense? Your corners will be the most difficult part of the whole thing. Pretend it is a present and take it from there. It will take a bit of playing around but once you get one, you will know how to do all of the corners. I cannot explain what I did but I can show you two pictures. First I did this:


then I did this:


It created a nice smooth corner.

Congratulations! Your untufted headboard is complete!! Yippee! Stand back and admire it with pride! You just need to hang it on the wall. Take the other 48" piece of 1x4 that you did not attach to the headboard and attach it to the wall. On the headboard, the straight side of the wood (as opposed to the side with the 45 degree angle) is on the top. On the wall, the straight side will be at the bottom. Those 2 pieces of wood will fit into each other oh-so nicely. Make sure to use a level to make it nice and straight. We hung ours so the bottom of the headboard hung below the top mattress by about 2". Make sure to screw into studs - the last thing you want is a headboard falling on you in the middle of the night. Granted, it is padded but, really! That would be some sort of rude awakening!

Once you have that cleat in the wall, hang your headboard and VOILA!! YOU ARE DONE!! Ain't she purdy?! So, here is the untufted headboard. Nice. Really nice. It would be just fine like this for some people but for me? I need some tufting!


This next part is not hard, just time consuming. I wouldn't recommend starting it at 10 at night. Not that I know that from experience or anything! In order to tuft, you will need to gather a few supplies. You need some upholstery thread, a long upholstering needle, buttons with a shank and some finishing nails.


First off, mark the front of your headboard with the same marks the back of your headboard has. I just used washable marker since I was working with vinyl. You can use chalk on non-vinyl stuff. Cut off an 18" piece of thread, fold it in half and thread your needle.


Going from back to front, push the needle through the hole you drilled and try to find the mark you made on the front of the headboard.


Push the needle all the way through and pull it off the thread. You should now have the looped piece of thread on the back side and the 2 ends of the thread on the front side, like this:


Take that same needle that no longer has any thread on it and push it from the back to the front, but push with the eye of the needle first. I know, it is backwards but it is so much easier doing it this way than trying to go from the front to the back and finding that same hole drilled in the wood. Know what I am saying? Once again, try to find the same hole you made in the first place. It may be a little tricky getting through the quilt batting but I know you can do it. Don't push the needle too far, just enough to see the eye on the front, like this:


Now, with the needle just sticking in there, take your thread and thread your button on it. I wrapped it through the shank twice as it is less likely to break. Now, take the thread and pass it back through the eye of the needle.


Push the needle to the back and take off the needle. Now you should have thread that looks like this:


Take your finishing nail and tie the thread onto it. The finishing nail prevents the thread from pulling back through to the front. Try to tie it as tight as you can. If you can have a helper pushing on the button from the front, that would be really helpful. If you are doing it by yourself like me and it is 1 o'clock in the morning and every one is sleeping, tie it as tight as you can then start to twist the nail. By twisting enough times, you will tighten the button and it will sink farther in. Twist too many times and you will tear the thread and have to start over. Or so I discovered!! ☺ Next time, I think I will try using wire instead of thread. It will be stronger and I can sink those buttons even deeper for a nicer tuft. As it is, this will be just fine for now.


Repeat for all your buttons. Finally, an upholstered tufted headboard! B.U.Tee.Full!


Once I had that new headboard up, I really wanted new bedding. Something black and white all over. Since that costs a lot of money and I have not found one that I really REALLY like, I settled on getting three new pillows. It cost less and the room still looks fantastic.


I would definately do this project all over again. And, in fact, I just may. After all, when we get to the new house, our baby girl will need a bed of her own. And what an easy way to make something super pretty for so little. I guesstimate this headboard cost about $125. Pretty good when you look at what it costs to buy them in a store. Plus, there is the satisfaction of doing it yourself. So, one final time, here is the before:


The after with no tufting:


The after with tufting (and new pillows!):

Want more DIY projects? Check out A Soft Place to Land's DIY day!

Lots to love!