My Book

 

 

 

As I type, I am in awe. I can’t believe this is really happening! My book is actually being printed as I speak!

After spending A LOT of time on designing this book and clearing many hurdles on trying to get it in print, I finally found someone who is able to print and bind a book the way I envisioned. Holmes Printing Solutions is doing such a great job and they are super to work with! They have been extremely helpful and have provided very prompt service. Not once have I felt like “just another number to move through and get out of the way.” I could continue to gush here but I think you get the picture!

My goal while writing/designing this book was to inspire people to use what they have and create what they want, while not spending a lot of money doing so. My sub title pretty much says it all:

Thrifty, do it yourself ideas to turn any house into
a home using a shoestring budget.

I tried to keep any tutorials & tips simple and easy to understand.

There are five parts to this book. Following is a glimpse inside the book…

Part 1 is “Our Home” where I give you a tour of our home, along with page numbers where you can turn to for instructions on how I made various things throughout our home.

Part 2 is called “Paint Passion” where I share various painting techniques that have worked for me over the years.

Part 3 is “creating signs,” which is all about different ways of applying graphics to wood, fabric and more.

Part 4 is “furniture creations & makeovers”

And last, part 5 is “random projects”

 I set up a little “store”, powered by Ecwid, along the right sidebar, almost at the top of my blog, for you to order a book.

I will also be doing a few book signings this spring, so watch for those. And you can be sure I will carry a box of these books with me where ever I go, so don’t be afraid to contact me directly to get a book!

The book has a soft cover and measures 8x10 inches. It has 144 color pages.

I like to think you won’t be disappointed!

Thanks for visiting…

-Mary

Island Makeover

 

I know it’s been a while since I posted and I apologize for that.. I’ve been pretty busy with working on decorations for a wedding, which was last week.

For a while our house had a touch of flowers, vintage jars and other weddingish decor strewn about…

 

Oh and I promise you that soon I will post all the details about this wedding. Unfortunately I didn’t get the chance to take many pictures so I’m waiting to see if I could get a few from the photographer that took pictures during the wedding…

But for now let me put in a good word for wedideas.com. They did such an amazing job with fixing a fake flower garland for the arbor. (pictured above)

Okay, let’s get to the subject at hand..

This week I had a paint job where I painted an island and some book shelves for someone, which I will share here.

I felt privileged to do work in this beautiful home! It’s located in the country with rolling acres of meadows and woods. A dream place, for sure!

Here is a before picture of the island that will get a new look..

(They have the most adorable little dog named Charlie:))

After taking all the doors and drawers off, I took a medium grit sandpaper over the island frame & beadboard and sanded enough to get rid of any dirt and dull the surface a bit.

As you can see, I sanded enough to create a dusting of white powder, which I swept up and wiped off before applying paint.

I used a paint and primer in one by Do it best. I got this paint at Ormes hardware. The color is a really nice gray, called Rocky Bluffs. (a Valspar color)

I applied the paint with a bristle brush. Gray is such a fun color to paint because it covers so well. In fact, at times I use gray paint to apply between two different colors such as going from white to red or vice versa. It’s such a good neutralizer.

For the island I applied two coats, though one could almost have covered it. I thought for an area that gets a lot of use, two will be better.

After the paint was dry, I applied a coat of Polycrylic, by Minwax. I’ve said this before and will say it again, I love this stuff! I am a firm believer in focusing more on the top coat than the bottom. From experience I’ve found that applying an extra coat of primer only adds an extra layer on your surface, therefore possibly enabling it to come off more. The thinner the coats of paint, the less it will come off, if that makes sense..

I also brushed the Polycrylic on using a bristle brush.

I took the doors, drawers and shelves home to spray them. We were blessed with a few nice, though a little windy days this week that I could spray outside on the driveway.

 I also sanded the doors using a medium grit sandpaper.

I sprayed them with slightly watered down gray paint and Polycrylic. The Polycrylic is thin enough that it need not be watered down to run through a sprayer.

So again, the before…

 

And now, the after…

 

 

Okay, I admit this picture is more of lil’ Charlie, with a newly painted island in the background. :)

The kitchen was beautiful before already, but it’s amazing what a little bit of paint can do to make it “stepping into a magazine” lovely!

Happy Easter, everyone!

-Mary