50 Shades of Gray

I was just thinking, coloring was so much more fun when it was just crayola.  Here's where we are; the hold up has been paint color.  Originally, we painted the family room after we knocked down a wall and bought 5 gallons of this light gray paint.  When I poured out the paint, I was fearful because it looked white.  But, as I began painting and it dried, my beautiful light gray took on a purple hue.  Soon after that, the kids got home and they kept telling me they liked the purple room.  AGGGHHH!!!!  I had people over and they commented on the "lilac swatch" I had painted on the kitchen wall.  This "lilac" was the same light gray I was going to paint the ENTIRE downstairs!!

(PLEASE excuse this photo! It's the only one I have of the new couch and paint in the family room right now.  The couch had just been delivered and I was rearranging furniture and cleaning the room since we had been camping out on the floor in this room from the power loss.)

So, for about 4 months, I have been staring at this lilac swatch while my husband finishes up the wainscoting. Right next to the swatch, I have painted the other shades of gray for comparison.  I kept going back to the color I chose for the playroom and dining room and decided that I was going to switch and do the whole downstairs in that gray instead because it's just a great color.  I mean, I even painted my craft room that color!
Well, it had been a while since I was rubbing elbows with the home depot paint center until last week.  My friend was painting her living room gray and asking about my colors.  Her gray came out blue and she asked me for some advice.  I told her she could use my swatches I'd saved.  But when she went to home depot, they had switched out ALL of their paint samples and apparently the home depot guy said he couldn't look it up in the computer.  I had to see for myself and strolled over yesterday and was delighted about a bunch of new choices but bummed my old ones were gone since I was only 98% sure "gentle rain" was THE color for my whole 1st floor.  I grabbed a few swatches, came home, changed my mind and bought two samples; natural gray and cathedral grey.  I slapped some paint on a few walls and (GASP) not only does my whole house look like gray camouflage, but the paint looks purplish... AGAIN!!!
Back to the drawing board looking at my idea board, comparing colors of the new couch I bought last week and fabric I'm about to construct Roman shades out of.  JEEZE!!!  I needed help and J wasn't helpful because he was the one that sent me back to home depot to buy two samples of purple.  Fortunately, I spoke with the girl in the home depot paint center and she said she could look up my old color.  I logged onto www.Behr.com and looked up the color "gentle rain" to check out the next shade darker.  I was shocker to discover, well sort of, that gentle rain is in the blue family.  I played around with the shades and by going just a shade cooler to the yellow family, it's my office color!  My point is this..... when hanging out at home depot and staring into their color wheel of paint, it's not so obvious which direction to go to find your desired shade.  My suggestion would be to grab a color you really like and go to behr.com and find alternating shades from their.  Yeah... it takes you a little longer and costs you an extra trip but finding the right shade of gray has been more difficult than anything else I have done around here!
At this point, I'm trying to decide between ocean pearl and koala bear.

Again, I'm sorry for the delay and lack of posts.  The wainscoting has taken FOREVER and we were greatly affected by the central Ohio storms two weeks ago.  We lost half of our roof, the top of our chimney, had water pouring in the fireplace, the ceiling began leaking in 5 spots with the rain soon after and we were without power for 4 days and 5 nights.  Throw in the super high temps and we spent most of last week keeping cool at the pool and avoiding our 98 degree living room.

****************UPDATE!!!! August 25, 2012*************************
Do NOT go with Koala Bear or Road Runner if you are looking for gray.  Turns out that both are definitely shades of beige-ish green.  I was really disheartened and went back searching for the right gray and it turns out that the right shade was in front of me all along.  The gray I used in the downstairs master bath ended up not having a blueish color and remained a neutral gray through all hours of the day with different sunlight.  So the final choice will be Dolphin Gray by Behr for the living room and kitchen.  You will see it pictured in the wainscoting post HERE.

Craft Room

My craft room is my haven.  In the old house, there is where you could find me when I wasn't in the kitchen or playing soccer.  But, because I've been so busy with everything else around here, I haven't had the time to dedicate to making it a beautiful place to work or work on simple crafts.  I work on it a little bit here and there but , this is all I have to show you right now:

 I still don't have a chair for the desk I distressed so, I use one from the dining room when I actually get a chance to work in this room.  I still have boxes of my craft stuff packed up and haven't pulled out my sewing machine ALL YEAR!!!  That's crazy talk if you know me personally. But, I did manage to mail off Christmas presents I misplaced last month and I sat right here at this desk to do it.

If you are wondering about my scissor and pen and marker holders, those beauties are from IKEA.  I found them in the kitchen section.  I don't feel all that original anymore though since I've seen them pinned on www.pinterest.com a few times now.  Oh well.  It's easy on the eyes and very functional for me whether I was the first to pin it or not!

Half Bath

The other task I finally completed was pulling the wallpaper off our half bath walls along with the other garbage that was hanging in there too.  My husband mixed up a solution of Lysol cleaner and water and sprayed it on the walls to remove the paper.  It worked even faster and better than my steam mop!  With his help, we took the bathroom from this:

To this:

The oval contractors mirror I replaced with this thrift-store find for $20.  I haven't decided exactly what I'm going to do with it yet as far as painting and distressing it goes.  I guess I need to figure out what color I'm going to paint the bathroom first.  I just don't know yet!  But I have time as you can see, the trim hasn't been painted white yet either.

Little bit here, little bit there....

I promise I haven't been a lazy bum!  It's just that damn wainscoting!  If J would just finish that wainscoting than I could zoom through this house painting the final rooms!  Okay, maybe J and maybe the heat too.  I have had a few projects finished that I realized I never posted.  So here they are...
My Mudroom
In an earlier post, I showed you how I made chore charts for the kiddos.  Chore charts weren't enough... I run a very tight shift and I needed a command center!  SO... I turned an entire wall in my mudroom into a sophisticated and organized command central.  It consists of the kids' chore charts, a mail area, dry erase board, calendar and pictures of my favorite people... my family!

The calendar is something I made using nothing more than and old picture, permanent marker and stickers.  All I did was draw out a 5x7 grid on the back of a piece of glass with a ruler and permanent marker.  Then, I flipped it over and used the permanent marker to draw in the dates and important events on a few dates.  On the large piece of paper that came with the frame, I attached stickers to serve as the dates and teh word "Month".  I was going to use pretty fabric but didn't want the calendar to be so busy that I was unable to read what I had written.  Eventually, I'll go with a very pale gray to coordinate with the paint we use on the walls.  But for now, it works just fine.  For everything else, I just use dry erase markers to cross off the days and write other events on the calendar.  The reason I used permanent marker on the numbers was so that I could erase whatever I had written in dry erase and not have to worry about wiping off the days of the week.  When a new moth comes, I just put a little rubbing alcohol on a cotton ball and wipe the calendar clean.  FYI... rubbing alcohol is what you use anytime permanent marker finds itself on something it shouldn't! 

Too Good not to Include

I know that this is a blog created for home improvement and tips but, now that my island is done, I've been cooking up a storm!  I've also been doing a purification cleanse via Standard Process.  Without going too much into the cleanse right now, let me just tell you that I feel amazing, I've never hungry, always satisfied and I've lost a pound a day without even trying.  It's also allowed me to get really creative with the already nutritious meals I prepare for my family. I wanted to share this recipe because I love the Cheesecake Factory and this is my take on one of my absolute favorite appetizers there.



Copy Cat Cheesecake Factory Egg Rolls:
Dipping Sauce:

• 1/4 cup olive oil
• 4 teaspoons white vinegar
• 1 teaspoon balsamic vinegar
• 1/3 cup honey
• 1/2 teaspoon tamarind pulp*
• 2/3 cup chopped cashews
• 1 pinch powdered saffron
• 2/3 cup fresh cilantro
• 2 garlic cloves
• 2 green onions
• 1 tablespoon granulated sugar
• 1 teaspoon ground black pepper
• 1 teaspoon ground cumin

Egg Rolls:

• 1 large avocado, peeled, pitted, & diced***
• 2 tablespoons sun-dried tomatoes packed in oil, chopped
• 1 tablespoon minced red onion
• 1 teaspoon fresh cilantro, chopped
• 1 pinch sea salt
• 3 egg roll wraps (optional)
• 1 egg, beaten

DIRECTIONS:

1. Prepare the dipping sauce by combining the cashews, cilantro, garlic, green onions, sugar, black pepper and cumin in a food processor.  Blend with short burst as not to turn the cashews into butter, but enough to chop them down into pieces the size of rice. 
2. Stir together vinegars, tamarind, honey, and saffron in a microwave safe bowl, and microwave for 1 minute. Stir until tamarind is dissolved.
3. Pour the tamarind mixture into the food processor with the cashew mixture and combine well using shorts bursts again.
4. Pour mixture into a bowl and stir in oil by hand.
5. Refrigerate until ready to use.
6. Stir together the  tomatoes, onion, 1 teaspoon cilantro, and salt.
7. Gently add the diced avocado being sure not to mash it into the mixture.

STOP HERE AND DECIDE IF YOU WANT TO FRY THE EGG ROLL S OR SERVE IN THE AVOCADO SHELLS!

Directions for the original egg roll recipe:

1. Distribute filling evenly onto center of each egg roll wrapper.
2. Position a wrapper so that a corner is pointing toward you; fold the bottom corner up, 1/4 of the way over the filling.
3. Brush remaining corners and edges of the wrapper with egg, roll up from side to side, fold top corner over all and press to seal.
4. Repeat with remaining wrappers.
5. Continue by deep-frying the egg rolls in 375 degree oil for 3-4 minutes, until golden brown.
6. Drain on brown paper towels or a clean dishcloth.
7. Slice egg rolls diagonally and serve with the dipping sauce.

Directions for my grilled low fat version:

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
2. Evenly scoop avocado mixture into the avocado shells.
3. Bake the stuffed avocados in their shells on a cookie sheet for 10-15 minutes or until hot throughout.
4. Serve avocado halves with dipping sauce.

* Tamarind pulp is found in Asian grocery stores. I made this the first time without it and it tasted just fine. I substituted tamarind jam when I made them again and didn't notice a difference.  The sauce really  good either way and what makes these extra delicious!*

**This recipe make a lot of sauce and more than enough if you double the egg roll recipe.  I would hold off on doubling the sauce unless you insist on drowning your egg rolls.**

***Half the avocados and save the peels to fill with the avocado mixture for a lighter version of this recipe.***

My Island Oasis

Some of you may know that I took a random vacation and left J to work on the house without any excuses. I was hoping that he would finish the wainscoting so I could paint when I got home but, I was in for an even better surprise! While I was gone, Jeremy installed the cabinets, rerouted the plumbing for the sink and dishwasher and had the granite installed! Seriously? Is there anything that man can't do? WOO HOO! Let me tell you what a big deal this is; I moved how long ago? February! I've been doing dishes BY HAND FOR FOUR since then! The worst part was that we bought a new dishwasher more than 6 weeks ago and it's just been collecting dust. Worse than that? We have had 4 sinks delivered to our home, three of which were broken and chipped. For some reason, FED EX couldn't refrain from dropping the front right side of the box resulting in a headache for me and my granite company. No only that, but I went through two faucets! What evs... it's in the past now. Island installed and guess what! I've still been doing dishes by hand out of habit! HA! (J wants me to be sure and include that he is done with the exception of the trim at the bottom of the cabinets for those nit picking!) Before, I had a two tiered, "W" shaped, corian topped island that was neither functional or aesthetically pleasing. Here are pictures from the first showing of the house an after we moved in
.

Now, I have a lovely 8" x 4.5" counter-height, granite rectangle that I love everything about. I've foregone the kitchen table and eat all my meals at the island now.

 


 Now it's just the wainscoting I'm waiting for so I can paint like I mentioned earlier. The cabinets in the kitchen will be replace next year so we will be painting them for the time being. We are almost done with phase one! Then we can sit back and relax err... J can sit back and relax, I'm unfamiliar with that word! By the end of summer, our house will be ready for guests and I won't be tripping on boxes and dodging construction. I seriously can't wait!

It's been awhile... oh how I've missed working

I know, I know.... I haven't posted on here in quite some time but that doesn't mean I haven't been working my ass off! In fact, this is what I've done: I got caught up on the last bit of laundry from the time we moved in. Ladies and gentlemen, I did 10 loads of laundry in 2 days to get rid of the piles of clothes strew about in the sitting room. I also managed to get all the book unpacked and shelved on two new bookcases in the sitting room and the desk was finally assembled and moved to the sitting room as well. We repaired the roof before we lost our home owner's insurance and we have been assembling the new island in the kitchen. I finally unpacked my craft room so I could start sewing those famous little dressed I whip up for my girls all summer long. I located Christmas presents that got tucked away and lost in the move. Oops... And that wasn't all... I finally hung pictures in the family room and worked on the yard picking up my second case of poison ivy. And here is a project I've actually taken pictures of thus far: For my craft room, I needed a place to sit. (I'll share pics of my awesome creative space when I finally have ALL the boxes unpacked in there!) I made it a point to buy a desk or build one yesterday and I did just that with this $10 Craigslist find.

The middle drawer was busted and I fixed it along with taking wood putty and filling in any holes from the original hardware that the previous owner didn't bother to do when they added the new hardware. I also sanded it slightly and whipped out my good old friend, Zinsser Cover Stain and slapped a half ass job of primer with a sponge brush on the old thing. Now, I did all of this work outside in the sun and I used solar energy to speed this process along. Basically, I didn't want a piece of shiny new furniture; I wanted something fun and distressed that I could be creative with in my craft room. I was too cheap lazy tired busy to go to the store for a turquoise colored paint so I rummaged through my acrylic stuff. It took about 5 minutes for the primer to dry so I grabbed a new sponge brush and painted the desk blue with acrylic paint right out of the bottle.

And right before the sun set, the sky itself gave me the idea to smear a little bright red acrylic paint here and there on the desk.

This afternoon, I started in on my desk again with some white paint I used to paint the dressers I did a few months ago. I was bummed though; it was too clean and smooth and thick and covered up all the brush marks I'd left earlier. Also, it was such good quality paint, it didn't do anything for me when I tried sanding it.

Oh well, I sat there mixing red, blue, green, yellow and purple acrylic paint because I didn't have any stain at the house and I was too cheap lazy tired excited to drive to the store to get stain. I had a nice brown color but dumped in too much greed at the end and wound up with a dirty gray color. Shit happens and I just went with it. Oh well! I dipped in my sponge brush and grabbed a dirty rag off the garage floor and wiped the gray on like it was a stain. I'm plenty imaginative and just pretended I bought what I actually needed.

I liked it! I ALMOST left it this gray color but I'm so happy I had taken a picture of the desk when it was blue. I figured the best way to get a light wash was to go back to my original blue color but add a little water to the acrylic paint. I did just that and used the same dirty rag to rub it off in some areas. I finished my project by distressing it with sandpaper. I had to really scrub hard to get the look I wanted. What ended up happening was the red and blue and gray from earlier peeked through in some places. I'm really happy with how the desk turned out. Better yet, the project was so stress free. Basically, I just kept layering and sanding until I got the look I wanted. Better yet, the sun dried the paint so fast!

One last thing I HAVE got to add too it that the finish on this piece is so SMOOTH!!! Sanding the desk top a little bit made the desk so sleek and shiny. I almost like the finish on this better than the dresser I did before. The acrylic paint also added a little bit of shine to it. I'm sure if you wanted a glossy finish, you could top this with a wax or polyurethane coat. However, I'm much too cheap lazy tired satisfied with how this piece turned out!