The Dungeon: Day 7

Well folks, I didn’t finish. But, I did get a lot done and it looks awesome! I’m thrilled with how it is turning out and best of all, Jason loves it. He was blown away by the change and that is what matters. Now he has a place to study and meet with people that doesn’t look like a dungeon anymore. So I’m happy :) I might even have to rename the room now. I’m thinking we should call it the Library. It sounds posh, doesn’t it?

First I will give you a breakdown of what I accomplished yesterday and then I will fill you in on what is yet to be done and then maybe I will give you the dream wish list. You know, future stuff that doesn’t fit into my budget right now.

I woke up at 8:30 and immediately got to work. No messing around for me! I heard that there was supposed to be rain in the afternoon so I wanted to get some sprainting done and out of the way. I had 3 frames that I had found by the side of the road once that I wanted to use in the room so I took them outside to my makeshift paint spot. I went back and forth as to what color to paint them and I ended up going with gold. I’m really glad because I feel like the room needed that bright spot on the wall.

Once they had dried, I used them to frame some drawings my Dad did of plans he made when he was building Jason’s lectern and some speaker stands. You can see the post about those two items here. I had come across these drawings a couple of weeks ago and thought they looked cool and I didn’t want to throw them away so instead I framed them! Here is one of them up close:

For now, I just used some foam core board that I had on hand and glued some textured paper to it and then mounted the drawings on that. Then stapled them to the back of the frame. But in the future I would like to get proper mats and maybe even some glass :) I was out of time and resources to do that this time so I just made do and I think it works okay.

The hardest part about this little art project was hanging them on a brick wall. I had quizzed Jason before he left about how to do it and so I was proud of myself that I got it right! I usually reserve these types of projects for Jason and just let him take care of it since he knows what he’s doing but this time I was determined to do it on my own. It made me realize I can do more than I think and I might be a bit more adventurous with stuff like this in the future (not that this was even that big of a deal but you know what I mean). Here is a picture of all three of the frames together:

Next up, I made a curtain. This is another thing I went back and forth over; which fabric to use. I ended up choosing a gray and white stripe and I’m glad I did. My other choice was burlap which would have given a rugged feel but I like the pattern that the stripe brings to that side of the room. Plus, I’m crazy for stripes. But I think you already knew that! I forgot to get a picture of the curtain close up so here is one from farther away:

I was thinking about making a tutorial on how I made this curtain. If anyone is interested, please let me know in the comments. I know it’s hard to even tell what it looks like so I will take some better pictures of it soon.

You may have noticed from the picture above that I also worked on the ottoman a bit. Or rather, I ended up not working on it. I had bought that ottoman about 8 years ago and stapled the material onto it before I knew what I was doing so it looked pretty sad. And since then it has always been in the basement so I didn’t worry about it. When this project came about I knew I would recover it and I even had the perfect material. It’s a plaid and I thought it would look nice in the room. But, it didn’t look so great with the chair and that is where Jason usually has it parked. When I removed the white cover I saw that it was dark orange tweed underneath. I didn’t remember it was that color and so I put it in the room like that I actually really like it in there. In the pictures it shows up a bit brighter than it does in real life and I think it looks good. I also figured that if I am able to replace the chair sometime I could recover it then.

You also may have noticed the lamp. This is something I’m not too excited about and I hope to replace it with something else soon. I tried to find a cool cheap lamp at thrift stores but came home with nothing so I had to use what I had. The fabric that was on the shade was grandma-ish and it was coming off anyway so I just removed it and it made it look a little better but it’s still definitely a short term solution. I will just keep my eyes open for something perfect and wait until I find it :)

The little sign that is sitting on the ledge says “hey y’all, come on in and sit a spell” and I really want to hang it above the picture frames but the concrete screw I was using wouldn’t fit in the slot on the back of the sign so I just set it there for now.

And onto the other side of the room…

Putting all of that stuff on the shelves took me a long time. I’m not very good at stylizing things so I had to work at it for a while until I got it to where I’m happy with it. It will be especially nice once the last bookshelf is fixed and it will feel more even. Now it feels a bit lopsided but that’s okay :)

Do you see something in the above picture that’s not quite right? It’s the artwork on the back wall. I will have to take better pictures of that as well but I want to fix it first. I used my sewing machine to make designs on a piece of fabric and then I stretched it over a canvas I already had but you can see the design that was on the canvas through the fabric. Oops. But I was so pressed for time that I didn’t have a chance to fix it so it still went up on the wall. I just need to remove the fabric and paint the canvas and then put it back together.

I have seen a lot of magazines and pictures on blogs with the couch in front of the bookshelves and so I wanted to try it. It also serves dual purpose. There were a lot of things on our shelves before that we don’t use very often but didn’t have any other place to store them and so now they hide behind the couch.

The flag also serves the same purpose. I’m not usually an Americana themed kind of girl but we already had this flag that we hang outside in the summer and I realized it worked well with my color scheme and it would be a large thing to hang on the wall, which I needed. We also store all of our DVDs down here and I wanted a way to disguise them. That is where the flag comes in. I nailed it onto the bookcase in the top two corners of the flag and so we can still lift it up and see our DVD collection. It works great!

I’m excited for the other side of the bookshelf to be done but I’m not sure what I’m going to put on it. Those are pretty much all of our books and I can think of anything else to fill that space with. I will have to do some thrift store hunting. Maybe I can just get some random books that look cool and fill some space!

And lastly, as far as the room tour goes, here is a close up of the new chair that I promised I would take:

Isn’t it cute?! I love the nail head trim. I would like to sand down the wood parts and give them a new finish since the current one is worn and dinged. That is on my to do list.

And now for the list of things I didn’t get done. I still need to make pillows, put everything back in the desk that I took out, fix the canvas artwork, the chair as mentioned above, and clean the ottoman. That’s all I wanted to get done before Jason arrived home. My list for things that I am hoping to buy is: a new lamp and shade, chair to replace the blue patterned one, light fixture, glass and mats for my frames, 3 clipboards for above the desk to hang on the wall, and floor paint (the current floor feels a bit monochromatic and it has lots of scratches). And my list of what needs to be done but I need Jason’s help: fix the hole in the wall for the ashes (I love it that you guys are calling it the ash hole, haha!), fix the last set of bookshelves, put on floor trim, and crown molding. If I get all of those things done then the room would be complete :)

Now that Jason is home and the big push is done, we will see how long it takes me to complete the list. I always do this, I work on a room and then before it’s done I start on a new project. I really need to work on finishing a room. Maybe someday :) For now, I will just enjoy what is done!

Thanks for following me through this process! I have had fun reading your comments and getting ideas from you all. I’m hoping to work on the pillows soon and have them done by next week and then take some decent pictures of the completed after. Until next time, here is a picture of me at around 10:00 PM putting on the grates, the last thing I did before I called it quits for the night: