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Craft room update
Hello, almost vacation!
Matt and I are planning a little trip to the beach for a few days. I feel like I am in desperate need of a vacation. Our last “real” vacation was two years ago to Jamaica.
So, let’s see, what have I been up to. Well, I am still working on my craft room. I think it’s going to be a work in progress for a while. It’s been so freaking hot lately that I haven’t wanted to work on the stuff I need to finish, like painting my shelf brackets or my chandelier. This past weekend it cooled down enough and I was able to get outside and spray paint my shelf brackets. I bought the Ikea Ekby Gallo shelves while we were there a few weeks ago. I knew I wanted to spray paint the bracket piece gold since gold will be my accent color. I bought some Krylon metallic gold spray paint (I think this is it) and it was the BOMB! The nozzle swiveled and the push button was super smooth. No more spray paint hand cramp. I used 1 can for both brackets.
Now that I have the shelving painted I need Matt to help me install them over my craft table. Then, I need to start working on my chandelier. It’s one mom had and is no longer using so she’s offered it up for my craft room. It’s already goldish but I want it to be a little more gold. I think it will look amazing painted the same gold as the shelf brackets.
I brought my brackets and shelves inside last night so I could take some pics and I realized my shelves are the wrong size. Whomp whomp! The brackets are Gallo or something and the shelves are not. Total IKEA fail! Thankfully the shelves were’t very expensive. I’m sure I can find another place to use them. I told Matt last night I would just have to run to Lowe’s and get a piece of wood that would fit. While not ideal, this will actually allow me to paint the wood the same color as the table, chair and trim. So it might actually look a little better.
While we are on the craft room, I said a while back I would review the fabric I bought for my chair from Spoonflower. Spoonflower is actually local, they are in Durham, and they print their own fabric. This allows for hundreds and hundreds of choices you can’t get anywhere else. I fell in love with several of their patterns and I couldn’t find anything close at other fabric stores. Here’s my review:
They have tons of fabric choices you can’t find anywhere else. They also have a variety of fabric types. Since I was recovering a chair I bought their basic cotton fabric. This runs $17.00 a yard. Not terrible considering it’s custom. I think it took less than a week for my order to complete and ship, which isn’t bad. The packaging arrived and it was pretty cute. Now the fabric. I can’t say I’m blown away with the quality of the fabric. To me, it felt kind of “flimsy”. It’s a very thin, lightweight fabric. I was expecting it to have a little more weight to it. I have various other cotton fabrics in my stash and I don’t think this feels like quite the same quality. With that said, I will say it washed okay and looks fine on my chair. I’m not sure how it will hold up but this is also a chair I don’t plan to use daily. I think the colors and pattern were what I expected and I was very pleased with that. Would I order fabric from them again? Maybe, but only if I couldn’t find exactly what I wanted and they had a pattern I liked. I think I would probably try to find something from Fabric.com first. I only got their basic cotton so I’m not sure how the other fabrics feel. They may be a little nicer but they are also more expensive. I went cheap. 🙂
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The making of a craft room
When we picked our new house I knew I was going to make one of the bedrooms into a craft room. Matt was getting an office and I wanted a craft room. We had the space so I decided to use the bedroom next to the the master. It’s the only bedroom not connected to a bathroom and I wasn’t keen on having a bedroom right next to our bedroom/bathroom so this was the perfect space.
For months I searched and searched for a desk. I found one at Ikea but due to the shipping costs I kept looking. Then I found one on Amazon that was similar and ordered it. Thanks to UPS, the desk was left in the rain by our garage, not on our front porch, and the desk was ruined. I shipped it back and continued the search. I also realized that one and the one from Ikea would have been too small for the space so it worked out.
I still hadn’t found anything when my mom called one day to tell me that her work was getting rid of their display tables. Employees would be able to purchase them for $20.00. I knew it was just a wooden table but for $20.00 I told her to get me one. Turns out it will work great for a craft table.
I decided to be lazy and not actually strip or sand the table down. I bought some Kilz instead and used that as my base. Next I painted the table with 2-3 coats of paint. I decided to use our trim color since it wasn’t quite white. I thought a bright white table might clash. I’m really glad I used the trim color to be honest. Everything flows nicely.
Since the table was going to be used for crafts I thought it might be a good idea to put a top coat on the top. Boy, that was a mistake! I bought a spray clear coat. I did several light coats but the finish wasn’t glossy like it was supposed to but so I decided to put it on a little heavier. Well the damn stuff turned yellow, the can said it wouldn’t turn yellow! Grrr! So I ended up having to sand the top down to the gloss off so I could then add another coat of paint. In the end it turned out fine but it was kind of a pain.
Before, with Julio photobomb 
Fast forward a few days. The table has finally been painted and I ask Matt to help me get it into my craft room. Well I didn’t measure the table. Whoops. After about 20 mins of trying every possible way to get the table in Matt decided it wouldn’t fit. Okay so that’s not really an option. I immediately told him to cut the feet off. He was hesitant at first but we took the table back downstairs and on the front porch he sawed off the bottom few inches. I found some casters to replace the feet with and I think everything will be fine now. This will also allow me to move the table around should I need or want to.
The chair for my craft room has been a little less dramatic. I found the cutest chair at the Flea Market a few months ago. It just needed a little paint and some new fabric. I’ve been on the hunt for fabric since I found it.
Over the weekend I was able to get the chair painted with the hope that it would make finding a fabric a little easier. Well today was the day. I was going back through my fabric board on Pinterest and finally decided to order one. I think it will look really nice on the chair. It should be here in a week or so. If I like the fabric, I’ll do a quick review on the fabric store I used.
Chair before paint. Notice the brass tips on the feet. I’m going to spruce those up with a little more gold paint. 
Chair after paint. I need to add the gold. 
Fabric for the chair seat. I still have more work to do but this is the start.
~k
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Flea Market Finds
Yesterday Matt played golf, so while he was out, mom and I went shopping. First we went to a nursery I pass each day on my way to work. It has a very nice facility so I figured it might be kind of pricey, which is was. It was still fun to go look around and see what might be good for the yard though. Then we headed to the Flea Market. Mom’s been asking to go for a while now but it’s been either too cold or rainy. I also wanted to look for a chair and a picture frame. I’m slowly starting to get ideas for different rooms.
A few weeks ago I purchased a workstation desk from Amazon for my craft room. Thanks to UPS, my desk was destroyed. Matt said the box was ripped and banged up not to mention they left the box sitting in the rain. Needless to say I was pretty bummed (and super pissed!). Anyway, I think the desk would have been too small for the space anyway so I’ve been looking for different options. Since I know I’ll need a chair, I’ve been looking around. A new chair would run me well over $100.00. I really didn’t want to spend $100+ on a chair. That’s accessories and things I can’t buy. I started looking on Craigslist and found a few mid-century modern chairs I really liked. These were all running under $100.00. That’s a much better deal but would also require me meeting someone. I figured the Flea Market would be a good place to check.
As mom and I were walking around, I found a cute picture frame. I need something to put in my closet to hold my necklaces and earrings and I love the frame holders everyone seems to be using. I will add some paint, fabric, and wire grating and I should have something cute. As we were leaving the booth where I bought the frame, we came to a booth with tons of mid-century modern chairs. I found the vendor and asked how much. He told me $45.00! After a brief negotiation, I got him down to $40.00. 🙂 He put the chair aside and we walked around a little longer. When we got ready to leave we went to the car and drove around to pick up my new chair.
I plan to paint the chair and add some cute fabric. I also LOVE the gold cap feet. I think I will paint them to make them more gold. I’ve been looking at fabric this morning and I think I’ve found the One! I originally planned to decorate my craft room with coral and gold and maybe a touch of navy but the fabric I found doesn’t really have any coral. It’s navy based with pinks, purples, blues, greens, and yellows. It’s really fun and festive but also a little more dark and cozy.
I’ll post pics of the finished products, hopefully soon!
~k
