by Amy | Jun 7, 2013 | Blog, The Art of Projects
This is a wooden shipping pallet.
And this is what creative people are doing with them.
A quick search on Pinterest for the word “pallet” will pull up all kinds of awesome project you…yes, YOU can make from a shipping pallet. There are whole boards committed to pallet projects.
Now…if you are anything like me you love these projects, but you don’t own a Wal-Mart. So you probably don’t have a lot of shipping pallets hanging around. The dilemma then becomes,where to find these cast off gems.
Here’s the skinny on where to get your very own pallets. Let’s start basic. Pretty much every business that receives products, receives those products on pallets. Also, construction sites usually have them. Then they burn them at the end of the project. Which brings me to my list of tippy tips for scoring your very own free pallets.
1. Think small. A little research showed me that most big businesses are contracted with shipping companies to return their pallets and recycle them. Your best bet is to call local companies and ask them if they have pallets that they dispose of.
2. Good businesses to contact are hardware stores, garden shops, lumber yards, etc.
3. Small construction companies are good too. You can call their office and they may tell you sites that would have some you can pick up. If you are driving past a new development and you see a stack you can also stop {without obstructing their work} and ask for them. Chances are, they’ll be burning them at the end of the job.
4. If you see a stack near a business, don’t just assume you can take them. Even some small businesses recycle their pallets, so if you take them you might hurt their business or cause them to incur a fine.
5. Wear gloves when you go collecting. Pallets are not perfect and they are kind of splintery!
6. Be nice. Thank the business that give you free stuff. Maybe even shoot them an email with a photo of what you upcycled from their dumpster. I know you are awesome…so they’ll probably love you and you’ll make lots of new friends.
I called 5 businesses here in Minot. Four of the five had pallets that they dispose of free for the taking. I scoped them out and found that not all pallets are created equally. Since they are destined for the dumpster, some are pretty beat up. Some are more sturdy than others, some are longer, some are shorter. It’s all about being willing to go out and dig around until you find something worth using. A little elbow grease and a little calling around will pay off big time with free wood and free building blocks for lots of DIY projects.
by Amy | Jun 6, 2013 | Blog, The Art of Projects, the house
The bedroom is pretty much done.
I know, can you believe it? I can’t. I did it. And I will even have a few days to spare before my family arrives from out of town. I pinky swear I’ll show you the {nearly} finished project on Friday. I just want to get a few things prettied up in there, and the guest room {aka temporary tool shed} cleaned up before I take you on a tour.
In the meantime I’m looking ahead to my next project{s}. Now that the weather has warmed up a bit I’ll be taking this project train outdoors. Coming up first…window boxes.
I’ve spent time combing the Internet for DIY window boxes and good things to plant in them. Here’s what I found.
Let’s start with one from one of my favorite sites: This Old House {fitting, right?} I love that this is a salvaged project. They used vintage base trim…but it could easily be created with new trim from the hardware store.
This next one is from Lowe’s. I love the texture on the front…and that it’s classified as an “beginner” project. Video instructions don’t hurt either.
Isn’t this box from How Does She just scream fresh and clean? Better yet, she made two of these bad boys in 30 minutes! Best yet, each one cost less than $5!
I showed you these dresser drawer planters a while back when I did a round up of things to do with dresser drawers. Kammy’s Korner did a great job!
I love this last one from Just So Lovely. It’s simple and so pretty. The tutorial here also goes into detail on hanging the box…which is helpful!
Speaking of hanging your boxes, take a peek at this step-by-step guide for putting your beautiful box on display.
Apartment Therapy has a great list of 10 low maintenance window box plants. Drought resistant, shade lovers, sun lovers, they are all there.
Even more exciting is this planting guide from Better Homes. They’ve laid 17 planting recipes for your new window containers.
Lastly, the Impatient Gardener gives a great list of tips and tricks for planting the perfect window garden.
Here’s the thing. Googling and Pinning are one thing…but building and planting are a different creature. I’ll keep you posted on how things go. Because if I can do it, so can you. Be sure to come back tomorrow. I scored some free pallets for a couple projects and I’ll be tipping you off on how I did it!
Amy
by Amy | May 22, 2013 | Blog, The Art of Projects, the house
Things are coming along quite well in the project department. As you can see, I’m not sleeping on the couch any more. As you may also be able to see…there are cords coming from my blanket. That’s because at night it’s only been around 40 degrees and it’s an electric blanket. In May.
Anyway. I found myself dreaming tonight about what it’ll be like when this is all done. And about how I’ve come this far. Let’s take a look back at the last few days.
Okay, so here is our new closet and the hallway. On the right side you can see where the door to the office once way. The photo on the bottom right is the finished product after it had been all textured and painted.
The left column is upside down and I apologize. The bottom left photo is of the new closet going in. That’s the chimney on the left side of it. The door to the hall used to be there. The upper photo is after all the drywall went up.
Again with the backwards layout. On the right you will see the mortar process. Because the chimney is old and crumbly I needed to coat the whole thing with mortar to keep all the nasty inside. Once all the drywall was up, the joint compound put on, walls textured and floor cleaned up the painting began.
The worst part of this whole process was the dusty, disgusting floor. You can see just how gross it was in the mortar photos. I really don’t like sitting around in piles of dirt, but there was nothing I could do about it. After all the drywall had been cut I was free to sweep and mop. {Thank goodness.}
I painted Saturday. If you follow along on Facebook you probably know that I had quite an afternoon. The whole thing took lots longer than it should have. I fell off a step ladder, I knocked over a gallon of paint, and a shocked myself on hot {mislabeled} wires. But by midnight all the walls were painted and the floor had been polyurethaned.
I put together this final image to show the before and after of my traumatic day. The top image is my very first roll of paint onto the walls. Only 45 minutes later I fell onto my love handle and ended up with this shiner. Gross!
All in all it’s coming along very nicely. Today I {spent more time than it should have taken} cutting and putting baseboards and trim in place. I’m terrible at math, so measuring and cutting and visualizing angles is a nightmare for me. But now they are all in place. And tonight/tomorrow installing my closet system!! I cannot even begin to express how excited I am to access my clothes again.
xo
Amy
by Amy | May 14, 2013 | Blog, The Art of Projects, the house
Dear Mr. Gorbachev,
I tore down the wall.
So it’s almost 9pm on Monday night and I haven’t had dinner. {Strike one.} And I haven’t seen yesterday’s episode of Mad Men. {Strike two.} I’ll show you progress on the second floor renovation…before I strike out all together.
I had an amazing crew of 5 friends and one visiting mother {a friend’s, not mine}. And one awesome contractor. Together, with professional guidance we tore through my wall and made one nice sized master bedroom. Here’s what I started with:
To clarify, that’s two rooms. One is blue, yes…very blue, I know. We used it as an office. The other room is the “master” bedroom. It’s pink. Pink floor, pink walls. I took this photo from the very corner of the room. I drew in those fancy white arrows to show you what wall was torn out.
Now…if you missed the previous post when I talked about ripping down the closet wall…you should go read that now.
1. Demo started bright and early on Saturday morning. That’s Darell. He’s starting in on the wall with a giant sledge hammer, nbd.
2. My house is old. So, go figure, the wall is old. We we a dirty mess from ripping out all the plaster and lath.
3. I’m very bummed this photo is blurry, but I love it anyway. As you can see, the girls were posing for a photo…leaving the boys to work.
4. Once we tore into the wall, we realized that there was originally a door connecting these two rooms. I just can’t figure out why. If you have any inkling why a doorway would connect a bedroom and a very small room {that had a closet of it’s own at one point}…let me know in the comments.
5. Good bye old closet!
6. Hello new closet!
I was so amazing how quickly we got the wall and debris out. It took about 90 minutes total. I told you I had good help.
This picture cracks me up. At a certain point there really wasn’t anything left for us rookies to help with. So we were pretty much just standing around telling awkward stories while Darell did the skilled work.
So now that all that is done, where does that leave me? Good question. I’m doing a lot of the easier tasks myself. Easier…meaning they don’t take years of industry experience. Not, easy like…easy on the body, un-time-consuming, or won’t make you sweat.
That means I’m piecing in hardwood between the rooms. Putting a thin coat of mortar over the chimney, which became exposed after removing the wall. I’m mudding and texturing all the drywall. Oh, yes and resealing the hardwood floors. And of course, doing the fun jobs like painting, picking finishes, installing a closet organization system and moving all the furniture back in.
Remember. The due date on this whole thing is June 8th. {And I’ll be gone 7 days of that…Florida calls to me…} I really hope I can make it. Who am I kidding…I’m Amy Allender. Of course I’ll make it.
{I hope.}
I’ll keep you posted.
Amy
by Amy | May 9, 2013 | Blog, The Art of Projects, the house
I think we all have an Achilles Heel. Mine is board games. I may have alluded to it a few weeks back when I told you about Mall Madness. Really, though, you have no idea how much I love games. I love them. All of them. Not like, “Oh, I love to have game night.” Every night is a game night. Derek plays games with me all the time. When we first got The Game of Life we left it set up on our table for two weeks. We just kept playing it over and over.
We love games.
And cards. I hate to think about how many decks of cards we own. It’s a collection of its own.
Anyway, I’ve amassed a sweet board game collection. The problem was that all my precious games were hidden away in the back of our coat closet.
And for a collection as sweet as this, the back of the closet just wouldn’t do. So I made a new home for my games.
Back in 2006 my mom’s office was getting new furniture. This bookshelf was given to Derek for his college house for free. Since then it has moved five times and is on it’s last leg. When I took everything out of the office to start renovating, the bookcase was up there. The books are now stashed in the basement until next winter when we finish the basement. Until then I figured I’d either throw this piece of junk away, or pretty it up and try to get another year of use out of it. Being cheap, I did the latter.
After a coat of paint and adding a few extra nail and screws when it started to totally fall apart, I had a new place to stash my games. All of them.
I totaled them up last night. And you won’t believe this. We own 58 games. I could host a game night every week for a year and never play the same thing twice. Yes, they are all fun. Yes, I’ve played them all. They range from the common {Monopoly, Life, Checkers and Chess} to the obscure {Pipeline, Punchline, Hoopla and Picture Picture.} I have vintage games, discontinued games, new games, card games, easy games, hard games, word games, party games. I just love games.
So, just tell me when you want to come over and play.
Amy
by Amy | May 7, 2013 | Blog, The Art of Projects, the house
Have you ever dealt with carpet glue?
Me either until just a few days ago. Now it’s my new arch enemy. I’m vowing here and now never, ever, ever to allow anyone ever, anywhere to use carpet glue in my house. It’s just the worst.
By now you probably know that I’m in the midst of my upstairs renovation. If you missed my intro post, read that here. Things are coming along. But I’ve really hit a road block. You guessed it: Carpet glue.
See, here’s the thing. Our house was built in 1911 and has beautiful hardwood floors. But over the century that has past between then and now those floors have been covered. The downstairs hardwood was unrepairable. {See the brown carpet here.} Pink asbestos backed linoleum stopped us from restoring it. {See the pink here…I’m not even making that up.} Instead we covered it with a fresh update. {See that here.}
The second story held more promise. When Emily and I ripped out the master bedroom carpet we uncovered that beautiful hardwood. The salmon pink {no joke} carpet was held down with a tacking strip around the edge…so it came up swimmingly. The hall was the same. But the office is a different story.
Here’s the office before we took anything out. Yes, very blue, I know. Very soon the wall dividing the office and master bedroom will be gone and I’ll have a bedroom that can actually fit all of my furniture inside. (more…)
by Amy | May 6, 2013 | Blog, Crafts, The Art of Gathering, The Art of Projects
I’m so excited to be showing you some highlights for a baby shower I threw yesterday. Not only was it fun, it was super special because it was a shower for…not one…but two babies! Yes, that’s right, twins!
The best part of any shower {for me at least} is picking the theme. And boy, did I go threw a long brainstorming session before choosing a theme for yesterday’s get-together. I mean, how often do you get to celebrate two babies at once? To make things even more exciting my friend Kim is expecting one of each. A boy and a girl!
After lots of list making, and learning that the nurseries will be decorated in a jungle/monkey theme I decided on “Two Little Monkeys Jumping on the Bed.” Okay, okay…enough of the chit-chat. Here’s the highlights.
I started with these custom invitations:
Then my awesome-amazing-wonderful friend Emily helped me create a fun afternoon full of monkey business.
1. This was our killer dessert table. I made this Go Bananas banner with scrapbooking paper. The letters were made in Microsoft Word. I drew a gray circle and added each letter within a text box. I printed them from home, cut them out and taped them to the banner.
2. During the shower we split into two teams for a Banana-Grams face off. Each team had to make as many baby themed words as possible in 4 minutes. The team with the fewest letters leftover wins.
3. Emily prepared all the food. We tried to keep the non-dessert foods healthy, so she prepared chicken salad and veggie trays. I hung some quick and easy tissue paper pom poms from my light fixture for a little pazazz.
4. On the dessert side we put together a banana split bar. Complete with all the fixings.
5. Emily made this amazing monkey bread. I’ll be honest. It tasted like I was eating magic.
Guests spent time writing notes to the parents-to-be on diapers…to lighten the mood of those late-night changings. I was so pumped when i found these Luvs with monkeys on them.
Our second game was created by yours truly. On one side was a list of 25 famous pairs. Guests had to fill in the missing half. They ranged from Milk and {Cookies} to Ginger Rogers and {Fred Astaire}. The second list included 10 celebrities. Guests had to choose five that are actually twins. {Did you know that Vin Diesel is a twin?}
It was such a fun day! I cannot thank my partner in crime enough. Isn’t Em just adorable? She’s the best.
Hope you got some good ideas!
Amy
PS–This party is partying at these linky parties.
by Amy | May 3, 2013 | Blog, The Art of Projects, the house
Please, oh please tell me you’ve seen the movie “Fried Green Tomatoes.” It’s a 90’s classic. And you know how I feel about the 90’s. {FIY I love the 90’s.}
For those of you poor suckers who haven’t seen it, I’ll give you a brief…very brief overview. And a tip: Go rent it. It’ll only cost you a dollar.
Iggie Threadgood is a rough and tumble tom-boy living in Alabama in the 1920’s and 30’s. She isn’t ladylike and she has no desire to be. She is courageous and mighty and adventurous. Whenever she does something really brave {like rescuing her BFF from an abusive husband} she yells “Tawanda!” Or “Tawanda, the amazing Amazon woman.” I don’t know the backstory on that, but that’s just what she says. Later in the movie a present day Cathy Bates yells Tawanda while she rams her car into a punks vehicle at the grocery store and when she tears down a wall in her house.
Tawanda!
It’s a very hear-me-roar phrase.
Anyway. As you can see from the photo, I’ve started another project. As I alluded to in my post about the chair and the Gliffy program. This is my biggest undertaking to date. And I’m totally in charge. Which is fun, but stressful and challenging all at once. Ready?
I’m renovating my 2nd floor. What does that entail? Lemme tell you. Removing two walls, expanding the guest room closet, framing a master closet, refinishing hardwood floors, learning to texture plaster, framing a new master closet, framing a new wall…and of course painting and finishes.
I told you it was big. But don’t freak out. I’ve enlisted help. I’ve hired a professional to help me get the big wall down. He’s coming May 11th. And somehow I’ve suckered lots of friends into helping get walls out, carpet up, and debris to the dump. Man, I’m blessed.
The prep is well underway. My sweet, darling, lovely friend Emily has been husbandless this week. Her sweetie was off doing some training. So she volunteered to hang out with me…Tawanda style. Together we’ve ripped out a closet wall and removed nearly all of the carpeting that needs to go. I really should mention that we took that crappy closet wall out mostly with roundhouse kicks. Yep, because we are that awesome.
Our biggest helper is her dog Ellie. {Panda has been hiding in the basement. She doesn’t like dogs or loud noises…it’s been a rough week for her.}
So, things are good. You know it’s been a productive week when trash day looks like this:
I’m calling this demolition therapy. You like? Oh, and I should mention one more thing. I’m on a timeline. My family will be up to PraCan to visit June 8th…so all the work {yes all} needs to be completed by then. Tell me one thing. Amy I totally crazy, or just a little?
Have a great weekend. I hope yours includes less carpet glue remover than mine will.
xoxo Amy
