Do You Collect?

Do you collect things?  I had a stamp collection and a music box collection as a kid.  (I was one of the cool kids.  Can you tell?)  As an adult, I didn’t really have the desire to collect anything.  Until I saw a collection of globes in an issue of Better Homes and Gardens.  I NEEDED a globe collection.  (Still one of the cool kids.  Can you tell?)

I started looking.  Globes slowly started popping up in thrift stores.  I refused to pay more than $10 for a globe.  Slowly but surely, I have completed my globe collection in our office.

I found my final globe this week-end while thrifting with the lovely Kim.



The globe on the left was the last globe in my quest.  I found the one on the right a couple of months back.  I just hadn’t added added it to it’s home.  Lazy much?

I’m a little sad that the globe hunting adventure is over but I do like how the completed grouping looks…




And for those of you that e-mail wanting to know how I balance working, blogging, and having a tidy home….I don’t.  This is the cleanest our office has been in months.  It is the dumping ground for all things that we don’t feel like putting in their proper homes.  I cleaned it right before snapping these photos.  It previously looked like this…




Feel better?

This room is my next decorating victim.  New curtains, new couch, new wall hangings, styled shelves.  Now if only the vision would come to me! 

At least it’s cleaner now.  And full of globes.  And cleaner.

Do you collect anything?  How do you organize all of those important papers, papers, etc that pile up in the office?  How do you feel about this wall color?  (I’m torn on the whole painting thing.)

Powder Room Reveal

Our powder room is done-ish.  We still need to add crown molding and wall art. I might also switch out the mirror and window treatment.  I’ll count it done-ish enough until next week-end.  Why? Because I finally finished stenciling and painting moldings.  Can I get a high five?!

This room is a little bolder than my usual conservative style but I’m digging it…

I used the Nova Trellis supplied to me by the wonderful Royal Design Studio.  (I’ll do a full stencil review and giveaway later this week!)  The white is Ultra White by Valspar.  The black is Black Leather by Dutch Boy.

I was originally inspired by the moldings and use of stencil in this room that I found on Pinterest via Apartment Therapy…

Drool worthy.

I’m extremely happy with my copycat.

It’s hard to believe this is even the same room…

Gosh. I love moldings.  Nate wants me to blog that I hate painting them in hopes that I will remember that I do not want him to install more.  He’s such a trooper.

Have you stenciled before?  Do you think the term “powder room” is funny?  My family and friends laugh at me.  Who’s a fan of moldings?  Who’s a fan of moldings but not of painting them?

Dining Room Crown Molding

We were busy little DIY’ers before we left for our trip to Tybee Island.

Along with working on our guest bedroom (read about that process here), Nate and his dad hung crown molding in our dining room…and it’s pretty…




(Nate snapped these photos before I returned our glassware to the hutch…you can never be to safe around this house!)

How’d we do it?  Exactly the same as the office (read about the process here) except we did have to deal with this vent that was installed a little too close to the ceiling…



Here’s our easy fix...

The vent is a return vent.  This vent pulls air from the room and returns it to the geothermal system to properly cool/heat the house.  It’s an important vent but not so important that we couldn’t touch it.

We removed the cover…(we apologize for the poor light balance…)



We hung the crown molding as we did in the rest of the room…



Nate then replaced the vent cover by screwing it into the wall in it’s new location.  We may lose a tiny amount of air circulation by doing this but not enough to affect the heating/cooling of our house. 
(We still needed to fill in the splice where the crown meets above the vent.)



There you have it.  Another room checked off the crown molding to-do list!



What do you think of the vent fix?  Would you have noticed if I hadn’t pointed it out?

Next on my to-do list….learn how to set the table all pretty and grown-up like.  Growing up my family didn’t use anything fancy like table cloths….or matching dinnerware for that matter…so there will be some blog/pinterest stalking in the future for fancy table decorating ideas.  Do you have any you want to share?