DIY: Yarn Board

Once I had the Craft Room painted, and the dining room hutch refinished for storage, it was time to finally get all of my supplies set up. One of the things that I have a lot of is yarn. I'm not an expert at knitting, like my grandmother and great-aunts are, but I do know how to do a few basic stitches, and have knit some blankets, scarves, and I am currently working on another project that I hope to show you soon. With all of the skeins that I have, five of which are being used on my current project, I needed a place to store them where my adorable and not-so-little cats wouldn't be thieving them every day.

The craft room has a closet, and you've seen the hutch I repurposed for the space, but since this room is all about showing off colors and being fun, I wanted to be able to display the yarn in the space, and not hidden behind closed doors.

Enter the pegboard. I decided to use one of those traditional workshop pegboards on the wall and use the peg hooks that you can buy for them as ways to put up my yarn. But, this wasn't going to be just a boring brown pegboard, so I'll give you one guess as to what color it was destined to be.

If you guessed orange, you are correct! You didn't really think that I would venture away from the best color and my favorite color, did you? Since I was working in the basement, I laid the pegboard up against one of my painting sheets on a wall that I was protecting (not sure why, since those walls will eventually be taken out and replaced) and began painting with my fluorescent orange spray paint. Problem was, it wasn't taking the color. The orange barely showed up against the brown of the pegboard, and it's not just that I wasn't using enough. You can see how orange the sheeting on the sides of the pegboard is, yet that corner of the board was still so brown.

Since I figured that going from brown-->white-->orange would be a better transition than from brown-->orange, I pulled out some of my trusty Zinnser 1-2-3 Primer and put a coat of that on with a mini-roller first. After that dried, I tried the spray paint again and it was perfect!

While I was spray painting, I decided that in order to have the pegboard usable with the standard pegboard hooks that go through the holes and grab onto the back of the board, it needed to be mounted slightly off the wall in the craft room. I grabbed a 1/2" square dowel that I had laying around, and cut it into three 12" sections, then spray painted that the same orange color as the pegboard, that way it would blend in if seen behind or through the board. I only needed to paint three of the long sides, since one was going to be flush against the wall, which saved me some drying time and painting time.

Once all my pieces were dry, it was time to hang it all up in the craft room. If this spot looks familiar to you, don't worry - you're not losing your mind. I originally had planned to put this pegboard on the same wall as the tapestry, but when I was ready to hang it, the two different shades of orange were just enough off from each other that it looked terrible. So, I grabbed some scrap cardboard, put it under each leg of the hutch (to protect my hardwood floors and make pushing easier), and pushed that across the room next to the tapestry. It fit perfectly, so I decided that the pegboard would go where the hutch was, that way the two different shades wouldn't clash as much.

First things first, I had to attach the dowels onto the wall that way the pegboard would be slightly mounted. I did some measurements to get the width of the wall from the corner to the moulding of the closet doors, and then found the center. I marked that in a couple of places and lightly drew a vertical line in pencil onto the wall. I took the height of the pegboard and subtracted 4", 2" for the top clearance and 2" for the bottom. I made a horizontal line where the top and bottom dowels would be attached and then drew the line for the third dowel in the middle of the top and bottom ones. I then marked the center of my three dowels and placed them on the wall, lined up with the horizontal line and the vertical line I drew for centering. I grabbed my level to make sure it was straight, and then set in four nails using my nail gun.

Before you move on to attaching the pegboard, pull a little bit on your support dowels to make sure that they are secure to the wall. You don't want to add on your pegboard just to realize that something back there is loose. Add in a few more nails if you need to. 

With the supports attached to the wall, it was time to mount the pegboard. This may require two people - one to hold and one to secure, it will really depend on how coordinated you are. Because the pegboard has holes in it, it was easy to see through to where my supports were. I was able to hold up the pegboard, place the top of my board 2" above the top support, level it, and then pop a few nails through the pegboard and into the supports. With the top attached, getting the rest of the pegboard secured was easy. You'll still want to make sure that you have your board level, but it's much easier to secure to the wall with two hands now that it will be partially hung. 

Give your board a little tug when you're done, just to make sure that it's secured well to the wall, and add any additional nails if you need to. 

And now for the fun part - adding yarn! I was able to find my pegboard hooks at Lowe's, and grabbed a few in different lengths, including a hook that seemed to be made for hanging screwdrivers, but it ended up being perfect for my extra wide knitting needles!

I know that the board looks sparse right now, but that's because I only had these skeins readily available. All of my other yarn is in the attic in a tote bin, so once I get that downstairs and into my craft room, this pegboard will be covered in color. 

So, what do you think? Can you see a pegboard being used for yarn storage? What non-traditional uses do you have for a pegboard? 

Unconventional Storage Solution

I know that I have teased you about my craft room and the progress, but today ends some of the teasing. I'm here to show you how the hutch turned out, and the process that it took to get there.

It wasn't as difficult as I thought it was going to be, but that's because of my palm sander and the new paint sprayer. First, the obligatory before pictures, and some background on the hutch itself. The hutch belonged to my grandmother, and she kept it in a storage space just behind the kitchen in her apartment. The bottom held all of her Corningware, and the top was for food storage. It was a two-piece hutch made of solid wood, never finished, and was slightly too large for the space she chose for it.  

When it came time for her to move out of the apartment and into an assisted living facility, the hutch was stored in my parent's garage. It spent two years there, until Dylan and I moved into our second apartment, where we had space for it since my parents were moving to Georgia and weren't going to be taking it with them. At that point, the raw wood had aged a bit from being out in the garage for so long, and it had started turning to a darker color. I had already started disassembling the bottom part of the cabinet, so you'll notice that the hinges are already off, but that just shows you the difference in the color of the wood where it was protected by the hinges and the rest of the hutch that was out and exposed to the elements in the garage.  

The first step in refinishing it was to sand the wood down. I wanted to get the years of dirt off of the piece and by sanding it, I would be able to make sure that the paint would be absorbed into the wood properly, leaving me with a good finish. It took me just about an hour to sand all of the shelves, the doors, and both the inside and outside of the two large pieces. I had decided to paint the inside of the hutch as well, even though the bottom part would have it's doors put back on, painting the inside white was going to help make it brighter and easier to see the contents. Painting the inside of the top  of the hutch white was going to be necessary because I had decided that I wasn't going to put the glass doors back on. They made the hutch look a little too traditional, and I wanted some easily accessible storage space with open shelves, which would work out perfectly without doors.

I began the painting process with two coats of primer, both of which I painted by hand with my favorite brush and mini-roller, and it took me about two hours to do the bottom part of the hutch and all the shelves and doors. I took a break to eat dinner and then painted the top half of the hutch. And I repeated that the next day. And it was so boring, honestly. In fact, I was so bored with it, that I didn't start the actual painting until I was trying out the first paint sprayer I bought. When that one didn't work as expected, I tried out a different paint sprayer, and in all my excitement, I decided to just use it on the entire thing, not just the shelves and doors as originally planned. And it turns out that that was a genius idea, because the hutch only needed one coat of paint with the sprayer, and it was done in less time than it took me to hand prime just the bottom part of the hutch!

Have I mentioned how much I love this paint sprayer? Didn't think so. :)

Anyways, once it was finished, I had Dylan help me bring it back upstairs and into the craft room, where I pushed it into what I am hoping is it's final location in the room. I'm still not quite sure if I like it where it is, but if I need to move it around a little bit, it should be pretty easy to do so. In the meantime, however, I did populate it with some of the items from our wedding, the boxes from my favorite shoes, all of my fat-quarters, my sewing machine, the Cuttlebug, and in the closed part of the hutch are some fabric scraps and batting, and paper products. It probably won't stay that way, since I still have tons of stuff in boxes that needs unpacking, but for now, it's great! It's so funny that a dining room hutch would be the perfect solution to storage for a craft room - just shows how repurposing furniture can end up working out so well!

In terms of the hardware, I didn't change it out, as the holes were already there, and the hinges were in good condition, they just date the piece a little bit. But, instead of keeping them black, I decided to prime them and then spray paint them orange! A little more color in a room for crafting just makes it happier, plus, a little more orange is never a bad thing, especially since it's my favorite color!

The knobs were in good condition too, but they were just a little too small, in my opinion. I took a trip to Hobby Lobby to see if they had anything fun and playful, but I didn't realize how expensive knobs could be! So while I was there, I just went to the wood crafts aisle and grabbed a bag of 4 round knobs for less than it would have cost me for one knob! I put a few coats of high-gloss white paint on them, and then decided to pull out the paint rollers that I used for testing swatches on the interior walls of the house that I had been storing in plastic baggies since the Fall! Since they were stored in air-proof baggies, they still had a lot of paint on them, so I just took out all of the rolls and starting pressing them onto the knobs in different places. And when I had almost all of the white covered and all of the colors of the house, I left them to dry, and then put them up on the doors of the hutch and loved them!

I'm so glad that I have this room started and that I now have some great storage in the space. I'm really looking forward to getting things finished, and checking another room off the list. Just a few more things to hang, some tables to set up, and a chair to find, and then this room will be done until I decide to tackle the serious lack of organization in the closet. 

Have you ever painted a piece of furniture with a spray gun? What about decorated your own furniture knobs?

No More Brushes

A few weeks ago, I bit the bullet and finally ordered a paint sprayer. I had been wanting one for a really long time, and honestly, it would have been great to have one when we were painting all of the doors on the first floor, but I was just not ready to purchase one yet.

I was caught up in reading every review I could possibly find on all of the different types of paint sprayers and all the different brands. And then I thought I had found it, so I ordered it. It's known as The Critter. Bloggers have praised it, Amazon had amazing reviews, and it's price was amazing at only $50! Plus, it was just an attachment for an air compressor, which I already had.

It arrived in two days, via my Amazon Prime subscription, and I immediately brought it downstairs into my basement workspace. Now, this little paint sprayer is quite creative - it uses mason jars as the paint containers, which means you could buy a pack of twelve at the store and have a container for every paint color you need! I filled up the jar with my white paint, thinned a little with water, as the paint manufacturer suggested, and hooked it up to my air compressor. I let the compressor fill and when it was ready, I pulled the trigger to start spraying.

Except, it didn't spray. I fiddled with the height of the nozzle and the opening in the straw, but it still wouldn't spray. I messed with it for an hour before I set it down for the night and gave it a rest. The next day, I started up with it again. I let the air compressor tank fill completely, and again, pulled the trigger. I messed with the nozzle, and finally got a little bit of paint to come out. I messed with the nozzle a bit more to see if I could get more to spray, but at that point, my air compressor ran out of air and needed time to refill.

I spent a total of three hours trying to get this thing to work, and the best point that I got to was being able to spray for about 30 seconds, at which point my air compressor ran out of air. Most of this was the fault of the air compressor, as I guess it wasn't strong enough to power The Critter, but I still didn't like the paint sprayer. When I did get it to spray, it was the smallest line of paint I have ever seen. In fact, you can actually see some of the test sprays on the sheet in the right side of the picture below - they were that small. I was painting the shelves in the hutch that I was refinishing, and I was maybe getting two inches of paint on every line. Overlapping was causing drips and minimal spacing was leaving visible lines when the paint dried, especially since I was using a semi-gloss paint over a flat primer.

It just wasn't working for me. The spray area was too small, and the fact that it didn't work well with my air compressor was enough for me to send it back. I'm sure that with the right equipment, The Critter would work really well, but based on the results that I saw, I believe that this sprayer would be best for detail work and not something large scale, like painting shelves, doors, or furniture.

Back to researching. It didn't take me long to find a different paint sprayer, and although it was more than double the cost of The Critter, I decided to go with the Wagner 518080 Control Spray Max, which is actually a HVLP spray gun that has a built-in air compressor. Like The Critter, it was delivered in two days via Amazon Prime, and when it arrived, I couldn't get it out of the box fast enough. I was so excited to give it a shot. I pieced it together, filled up one of the paint containers with my semi-gloss thinned paint and tested the spray on the plastic protective sheeting I had hanging from the wall in the basement.

And it worked! Amazingly and perfectly! All I had to was adjust the pressure of the spray to make it a little less globby and it was good to go. Painting one side of the shelf took approximately 15 seconds and it looked perfect. There wasn't a single drip, there weren't blotchy areas, the overlap was perfect without being too heavy, and I could even tilt it to the side to get into difficult areas and the paint would still feed through the straw!  Best of all, though, was that it dried without streaks and with a perfect semi-gloss finish, just like I asked it to!

I was in love, instantly, and actually, I still am. I have used this on shelves, doors, and actually full pieces of furniture and it has worked tremendously. And with the exception of it only coming with two containers, I am so happy with this spray gun that I couldn't recommend it more. I'm on the lookout for some additional containers that work with this model, and while I'm sure there are some available to purchase from Wagner, I'm wondering if there are any around-the-house items that may end up working, like perhaps an empty mayonnaise jar? Worth a shot, right?

I can't wait to use this more, and I already have a ton of projects in mind, because not only will this spray gun work for paint, but you can also use it with stains and finishes, which means refinishing the futon frame we have may end up taking way less time than anticipated. And, I can throw away all those brushes, and never have to clean one out again! Not really, but this spray gun will certainly cut back on the amount of brush cleaning I will have to do, which is always welcome.

Do you have a paint sprayer? What brand did you go with? Have you used it with products other than paint? Fill me in!

Sanding Indoors Makes a Mess

Whoa there, it's been a while, huh? I've kind of fallen off the wagon with blogging, and more specifically, Flash Sale Friday, because things have been so much busier than normal and I just haven't had the time! I'm really hoping to jump back on, so look for one at the end of the week!

In the meantime, I've been up to a lot. I have started to refinish some of the furniture for the house, and am still constantly looking for other pieces to add to our decor. I knew that I was taking a risk in sanding down the furniture in the basement, but it's just been too cold outside to do this in the garage or the driveway.

What I didn't realize was that even though my random orbital sander has a dust bag attached that it wouldn't catch everything. So, my basement ended up covered in a sheet of sawdust. And I'm talking like 1/8" of sawdust, everywhere, including on the top of the laundry detergent bottles and covering the hot water tank. Everywhere.

Prior to this, I was using our house vacuum to clean things up because they weren't that messy, but I just didn't think that my house vacuum would like that dust all that much, so I bought a Wet/Dry Vacuum, and boy am I glad that I did. The basement was a mess, and this thing worked soooo well, thankfully.

And now that the basement is clean again, I've started to actually paint and stain the furniture. It's a lengthy process, especially when I only have time to work on the projects when I get home from work.

All set up for painting, this is the two-piece hutch that will be going in the craft room. Along the right side of the picture you can start to see the drawers of the bureau, which will be refinished for the guest bedroom.  Once these two pieces are done, I'll start on my favorite item - the card catalog! One thing I have learned from this process is that I will be making a sanding station in the basement, cordoned off with some drop cloths, that way the entire basement doesn't end up in another layer of dust!

Live and learn, right?

What have you been up to recently? Any plans to refinish furniture?

DIY: Goodbye Brass!

One of the things I have hated the most about this house is all of the brass hardware.  Ironically, there isn't any brass in the kitchen, but it's everywhere else.  All of the door handles on all three floors of the house, the hinges, and even the outdoor light fixtures are brass.  Since we're literally painting the entire house, I figured what's a little paint on the hardware in addition to the paint on the walls. Replacing door hardware for over 15 doors is quite costly, so as a placeholder, I decided to paint the hardware a brushed nickel color, just like I did to the front door hardware.  

Since I was already removing all of the hardware from the downstairs doors to put a fresh coat of white paint on them, I figured this would be the perfect time to refinish the hardware.  

You'll notice in the picture above that the pieces have labels on them.  Some of the doors were cut to fit in the frames, and the hinges were altered too, so I made sure to label the back sides of the hinges as to where they belonged. To distinguish between them, I made sure to mark top and bottoms, as well as frame and door, that way I knew exactly where each piece went and I could match everything back up perfectly later.  Although you can't see them from the pictures, I labeled the insides of the door handles and the inside of the door latches too, that way I had the matching pieces and everything was working after I reassembled everything.  

I'm pretty sure that the hardware hadn't been cleaned or even wiped down in years, so after I had everything taken off, I gave all the hinges, door pins, and door plates a much need bath to get all of the grease and paint off them.  I ended up needing a razor blade to remove some of the paint, but I wasn't too worried about scratching the metal since I would be sanding them down before painting them.  

I let them sit to dry for a while so I could make sure that there wasn't any water left in the hinge tracks. If you are pressed for time, you could tightly roll a sheet of paper towel and slide it inside to dry it out, but if you just leave them out to dry, evaporation will do the work for you!

I used medium-grit sandpaper to roughen up the surfaces. You will likely only need to sand one side and the hinge tracks, since the back side of your hinges will be flush against either your door or your frame. Don't forget to wipe down your pieces one last time before applying your spray paint, as you don't want any sandpaper particles or dust on the surface.  Lay out your pieces in a well-vented area and begin spraying.  

Don't expect to get great coverage on the first spray. You'll need multiple coats to get an even coverage, but allow for some time between coats before applying the next.  

You'll also want to flip over your pieces after the first side has dried to apply some additional coats to the backside. While you don't necessarily need to cover the part that you don't need painted, I decided to put a strip of painter's tape over the back of my hinges since I had my labels on there and didn't want to accidentally paint over them.  

Painting your door handles is almost exactly the same as the door hinges.  You'll want to roughen up the surface with some sandpaper and then apply a bunch of different coats of spray paint. You may need to flip your handles onto the sides or even hold them at different angles when painting them, depending on the shape and size, and where you need coverage.  You can also tell in one of the pictures below that I was able to get creative and used the side of a cardboard box to prop one side of the door handles up so they could dry without putting a mark in the spray paint.

The biggest difference in painting your handles versus painting the hinges and door plates is that the handles have moving mechanisms.  To make sure that you don't paint your handles stuck, make sure to twist the knob or pull down the levers before you apply each coat of spray paint. If your door hardware has a locking mechanism, also make sure to twist the locking mechanism to make sure that doesn't get painted closed or open.  And lastly, if you are painting the door latch (the part that keeps the door closed in the frame), don't forget to push down on that a few times before each coat too. After all, the point of having a door latch is so that it keeps the door closed, so if it can't be pushed in, it's kind of counter intuitive.   

Give your pieces at least 24 hours to dry after you have applied your last coat, and then you can attach everything back together.  This was the most exciting part for me. After having had our doors off the hinges for almost two weeks, we finally put them back up, and not only did they have a beautiful coat of new white paint on them, but then they also got this hardware makeover!

Once your hardware is attached, you can choose to go back and dab some spray paint on the screw heads and the door pins, since painting them before will just get them scratched up during installation.  This solution isn't perfect, as you can tell in some spots, but I don't think that many people will notice unless I specifically tell them to look at the door hardware. This is really only a temporary fix, too. Down the line, we will replace the door hardware altogether, but for right now, we want our money to be spent on some other things, and this quick $5 fix is a perfect way to hide that brass and make this house look just a little more modern and contemporary!

The only brass left is on the outdoor light fixtures! So exciting! Have you spray painted your hardware? 

How $45 Has Saved Me At Least 10 Hours

One piece of background information is needed for this post - I am a Google Chrome user. I'm sure most of you can understand the use of this browser, but if you haven't already made the switch from Firefox or (gasp!) Internet Explorer, please do for these reasons: safety, ability to share bookmarks across devices, integration with Google Accounts (Gmail, Calendar, Drive, Blogger, Analytics, AdSense, etc.), it's extensions (Pinterest, AnyDo, Evernote, etc.), and most importantly, it's tab-enabled. Now, what goes along with this post is the part about tabs - I am a tab hoarder.

Don't believe me? Well, I don't need to explain anything using words. I'll just show you a screenshot of my current browser.

I won't make you count, but as you can see, there are a lot of tabs open - 52 to be exact, but that's just on this one browser window, on this computer. I use almost all of these on a daily basis, and the others that I don't visit as frequently are there as a reminder that I need to check something.

Now, you're probably asking, "What does this have to do with this post?" Well, one of the tabs that I have open is above is the Sears webpage. I refresh the page every morning to check what's been put on sale. One day a few weeks ago, I finally had hit the jackpot. The DeWalt Random Orbital Sander that I had been eyeing was marked down to just $45! I decided to save on shipping so I stopped by the store after work with the intention of purchasing it. Turns out, though, that the price was only valid for online purchases, and the in-store price was $60 - not outrageous, but still more than I wanted to spend. Bummer, right?!

I was disappointed, but then I figured out a secret! I decided to just bring up the Sears website on my phone, order the sander, and set the delivery option to In-Store Pickup! Since I was already at the store, I just had to walk over to the Merchandise Pickup Window, and grab the sander. And I did just that.

I was able to get the sander for the online-only price of $45 and had it within 5 minutes at the pickup window. So, there's a tip for when you are in store. Always check the online price before making your purchase, because that nifty little "In-Store Pickup" option can help you save a lot of money!

Now, as the title of this post suggests, this sander has saved me hours and hours of time. How?

Sanding doors.

About two weeks ago, we removed all of the interior doors on the first floor to paint them. In addition to that, I also removed all of the hardware and gave it a good bath in some soapy water. They really needed some TLC, but that's for another post.

I wiped the doors down to get some of the grease and buildup off of them, and then sanded them down using my brand new random orbital sander! So, for a total of 10 doors (so far!), I was able to save myself at least 10 hours of sanding, since each door took me about 15 minutes with the sander rather than over an hour by hand.

Please ignore the gross painting/cleaning/tool-using clothes again. It's also necessary to dress in layers for working in the basement. 

Best investment ever. Seriously. I haven't even tackled the doors on the second floor yet, not to mention all of the furniture that I will be refinishing, so this is easily the best $45 I have spent so far in my home renovating and DIY-ing. And for the amount of doors I was sanding, I probably would have gone through that amount of money in sandpaper had I been sanding by hand!

We just put the last coat of paint on the doors and today is the end of the 24-hour curing process I like to let them sit through, so we will be putting them back on the frames tonight after work. I'm so excited to have doors back - the cats are messing with things in closets and it's just awkward because we can't have guests over when there's no bathroom door!

Have you purchased a tool using Sears' In-Store Pickup option? Were you able to catch a break in the price, making the purchase that much more justified?


Please Note: I was not compensated for writing this post. I was not contacted by Google Chrome or Sears to provide this information and review. All opinions are my own.  

The Power of Paint

This has to be one of the most exciting transformations that I have completed so far using just paint! Are you ready for it? Great, because I can't wait to show you!

Remember the corner bedroom that was the only room in the house that had natural wood-tone trim in it? Well, it's gone! Forever! The same weekend that we painted the small bedroom/craft room, we also tackled this room. With the help of a family friend (Thanks Again!!!) we were able to actually paint two rooms completely, one of which was the craft room that I already showed you. The other, I haven't yet - I'm not quite finished with some non-paint things, so that's on hold for right now.

But, this room. The transformation is amazing, guys! So let's get to it, right?

Here's the before. Please ignore the large rolled-up rug and the box of crap in the middle of the room.  The rug weighs over 100 pounds, and I just didn't feel like moving it.

Boring, right? I mean the wood is nice and all if you like stained wood, even though it's just bead-board, but it wasn't working for me.  So, we changed it. And now? I think it looks fabulous!

Huge difference, right? The power of paint, right there folks.  I am so in love with it and can't wait to start adding in the furniture I have planned for the space!

Now, while you may think that was just too easy, let me tell you that it wasn't as easy as it looked. It took two coats of green paint, two coats of primer on the wood, and then four coats of white paint in order to get the coverage we needed.  And not only that, but I had to do a lot of caulking where the seams on the bead-board were showing and the nail holes were never sealed.  

Also, you might not have noticed from the before pictures above, but the quarter round along the base of the moulding wasn't actually quarter round. It was concave, ugly, broken in some spots, and the worst thing I found was that whoever installed the moulding nailed it into the hardwood floors! I couldn't have been more furious when I found that out.  But, that explains the giant gaps between the moulding and the bead-board - it wasn't even attached!  

Instead of just working with it, however, I decided to replace it. A few 8' sections of quarter round wasn't going to be too much for me to handle, especially when it makes such a big difference in the way the room looks. So, I kept the old molding in place so that I could protect the floors when we were painting, and since the new quarter round I was buying was going to be slightly taller, I didn't have to worry about being neat down there at the bottom.  

Once I had three coats of white paint on, I removed the existing foot moulding.  And it was so easy. In fact, after I had done one wall, I had to video the removal of the moulding on one of the others, because despite it being nailed into the hardwood floors, it came up like it was just installed with double-sided tape!

Next, I figured out the measurements of the amount of quarter round I needed, and then began cutting, using my miter box.  I ended up purchasing PVC quarter round because it was cheaper than wood and was already primed, so it made the project just a little easier for me.  Using the existing pieces of moulding as a guide, I was able to figure out the cuts that I would need to join the pieces together.  If you are not working with existing quarter round, figuring out the cuts is a lot easier than you would think. For a perfect 90 degree angle, which is what you will typically have in a room, you will need opposite 45 degree cuts on your two intersecting pieces. You want the cuts to be so that the back of the moulding is the longer side, which you can see in the picture below - that is a picture of the right side of a corner piece being cut.  

For long walls that you need to add additional straight pieces to, think about the cuts like you accidentally cut a piece into two when you didn't mean to. Those two pieces will go back together perfectly, if you just put them back the same way you cut them. In other words, make sure that the pieces of moulding are facing the direction that you want them to, then do one of the cuts on one of the pieces, and then the same cut on the other.  Don't over-think the cuts - they will work out!

Make sure to dry-fit all of your pieces first, that way you can make any changes that you need to with additional cuts or even sanding. You want the pieces to fit tightly, but not too tight, as you don't want them to warp or bend.  

After you have your pieces cut perfectly, you are ready for install. I was so excited for this part, because I had just bought myself a pneumatic nail gun! I got it on sale at Sears, and after using some of my points from previous purchases, I only paid $60! Talk about a great deal, right?

I already had my moulding pieces in place from the dry-fit, so I just moved around the room with my nail gun, putting one nail in the center of each piece, and then every 10 or so inches to each side, including one towards the end of each piece. After each piece was in, I tested to make sure that it was attached securely by gently pulling at it and then I added some extra nails when necessary.

Please ignore the gross painting/cleaning/tool-using clothes.  I was a stylish DIY'er until I ruined my favorite pair of jeans. 

Once all the moulding was installed, I caulked the seam between it and the baseboard, and put a little dab on all of the nail holes, and then put one last coat of paint on everything to blend it all in.

After I was done, I was so proud and amazed at the way the room looked.  It's such a dramatic difference in the look, and it is so much brighter with all of the white paint! Now to add some furniture! Woohoo!

Do you have a pneumatic nail gun? Ever installed moulding before? I can't wait to do more!

DIY: Sunburst Mirror Clock

It's finally done!

Over the weekend, I finished up a project that I was so excited to make - I was finally able to get our sunburst clock up on the wall!  You may remember this clock from the Family Room design plan, and I believe that I told you that it was inspired by some mid-century style mirrors that I had come across. I have seen some people recreate the mirrors, but I wanted to take it one step further and make mine into a clock.  We used to have a clock up on that wall, but the style matched my parents furniture more than it matches ours, so we took it down when we were prepping the walls for painting.  Ever since then, you know, back in December, we have constantly been looking at that wall for the time, so we knew that we had to get a clock back up there soon.

Now, this project wasn't very difficult, but there were a lot of steps, so this post will almost be picture overload. Sorry, I'm not sorry! 

The first thing that I did was decide how large I wanted the clock to be.  I wanted it to be a statement piece on that large purple wall, so I thought that three feet in diameter would be perfect. I bought a 12" craft mirror from Hobby Lobby, as I didn't want something expensive since I would be gluing things to it and drilling a hole in the center.  

I also picked up some wooden dowels in two different diameters, so that the sunburst clock had some depth. I chose to go with 1/4" and 3/8" diameters, and bought the 4' dowels so I could get as many sticks out of each dowel as possible.  Using just a wire cutter, although you could use a hack saw too, I cut the dowels into lengths of 13", 12", and 11" making sure I had the same amount of each length and width.  I chose the lengths because I wanted the dowels to extend to a maximum of 12" from the side of the mirror, and I needed approximately 1" for securing the dowel to the backside of the mirror.  Make sure that you take that into consideration when cutting your lengths, as you don't want to end up with a smaller size clock than you anticipated.

After cutting the dowels, lay out the dowels in a pattern of your choice, keeping in mind that you may have some that are both different sizes and thicknesses. I started with one of the dowels and placed each one of those in a space on the outside of the mirror. I then followed that by a different size dowel until I used all of the sticks in a consistent pattern around the mirror.  I didn't follow any of the directions that others have online, and only did what I liked, so you should do what you feel looks good. 

Once all of my dowels were in place, I did, however, do some simple calculations to figure out how much space I should have between each dowel. Using the diameter of the mirror, 12", I used a circumference calculator online to determine that I was working with 37.67" and then divided that by 30, which is the number of dowels I had, and got 1.25" between each one. If you want to be picky about placement, like me, you can do these same calculations, but if you don't want to, you can always just eye it. 

After being satisfied with how the clock looked, I wrote down the pattern of the dowels, then I took them down into the basement to my spray painting station and coated them with some silver metallic spray paint. Don't forget that the best method of spray painting is in light layers and not thick coats, so you may want to put three or more layers of spray paint on the dowels in order to get them evenly covered.

While I was waiting for the dowels to dry between layers of spray paint, I started to prep for drilling the hole in the center of my mirror for the clock mechanism.  First, in order to protect the glass surface of your mirror, prop it up on a soft, but raised item. As you can see in the photos below, I used some cleaning cloths I had and supported the mirror on them, while at the same time, leaving the center unsupported, that way the drill bit wouldn't hit the towels or the work surface when it finally cut through the glass. 

Without having the proper tools to find the center of my mirror, I used a technique I found online, where you draw three lines of equal length that intersect with two edges of the circle, then draw a line perpendicular to that first one at the center point of the original line.  The perpendicular lines will intersect each other at the center spot of your circle, or in this case, your mirror. Make sure to do this on the back of the mirror, as you likely won't have much success drawing on the front side without using a pen or marker that would leave permanent marks.

You may remember that I purchased a glass drill bit, and I showed you how to drill a hole in a wine bottle for all of those neat projects you may have in mind.  I used my 1/2" drill bit for this project since the post of my clock mechanism was slightly larger than the 1/4" bit that I also own.

Applying a medium amount of pressure, I began drilling a hole in the center of the mirror.  Make sure that your drill is is a level position and don't apply too much pressure, as you don't want your mirror to shatter. Once you have an indentation made in the back of the mirror, begin adding a few drops of water to the surface of the mirror where the drill bit is making the hole. This will help the glass drill smoothly instead of chipping or cracking when you are drilling. If the water begins to dry out, you should continue to add more, just a few drops at a time.  

Continue drilling into the back of the mirror, gradually adding pressure so you eventually get the size hole you need for the post of the clock mechanism. This may take up to a half hour, depending on how thick your mirror is, how sharp your glass bit is, and how much pressure you are applying when drilling. Once the hole fits the clock mechanism, you can drill slightly on the front side of the mirror just to make sure that the hole is smooth and free of sharp glass shards, but this step is optional, and slightly chancy since the clock mechanism will likely cover any areas in question. 

Once you are done drilling, you are ready to attach the smaller mirrors to the spray painted dowels. I bought small mirrors that were 1/2", 3/4", and 1" in diameter just to add some depth to the dowels.  I laid out the dowels in the pattern that I determined earlier, and then placed the small mirrors below the dowels in order to determine the pattern for those.  

Once you have your layout finished, attach the small mirrors to the dowels. I used Gorilla Glue to do this, but I didn't realize how much the glue bubbles and expands, so if you use this, proceed with caution, because you might end up with some of the mirrors stuck to your work surface, or glue stuck to the front side of the mirrors. If you are looking for alternative adhesives, try silicone, and even though I haven't tried it, hot glue from a glue gun may also work. For actually attaching them I found it easiest to place the small mirror face down, put a small drop of glue on the back, and then place the dowel on top. This allowed me to move the dowels as the glue was drying, in case they began to slide off off center. 

After the glue dries, you are ready to attach the dowels to the back side of the large mirror. Since I struggled with the Gorilla Glue, I used silicone for this step. To make sure that I had the spacing of the dowels set correctly, I placed them all on the back of the mirror, leaving an inch on the back side of the mirror, and was able to move them around until I had an even placement of 1.25" between each one. Once they were in place, I then used the silicone tube in the caulk gun and placed a thick bead of silicone over the dowels.

Using a small craft paint brush, I spread the silicone around each of the dowels so they would be secured onto the mirror. In the picture below, you can see how the top left corner has just the bead of silicone over the dowels, where the rest of the back of the mirror already shows the silicone spread around the base of each stick.  

Let the silicone dry and once you are confident that the dowels are secure in place, you can attach the clock mechanism. Each mechanism will probably be slightly different than the other, but mine was very simple. 

Slide the post through the hole you drilled in the mirror, then on the part that shows through the front side of the mirror attach the washer and the nut and twist it until it's tight. Don't over-tighten the nut, because you don't want to crack the mirror after you have gotten this far! 

Finally, attach the clock hands, and if your mechanism came with one, pop on the little cap that keeps the clock hands on the post.  

Lastly, clean off the front sides of all the mirrors with your favorite glass cleaner, and then hang your masterpiece up on the wall!! 

Ta-da! I am very happy with the way that this project came out, however there are a few things I think I would have liked to change. It turns out that these clock hands are just a little too small for the size of the clock face, so it does look a little strange.  Maybe I will try to find some different ones, because changing out the clock mechanism should be easy as long as the post hole can remain the same size.  The other thing that kind of irks me is how small the clock looks on the wall! I can't believe that a clock with a three foot diameter could look so small. I thought that would be plenty big enough, but it does look kind of lost up there. Maybe this is just an opportunity to put some picture frames with my favorite digital art prints in them on each side of it.


What are your thoughts? Do you love this clock? Does this make you want to create your own in your own style? Should I put pictures on either side to help the wall feel fuller?