makeover Archives - Page 2 of 4 - Spoonful of Imagination

Hutch Makeover For A Cause (Foster Care Update)

September 24, 2013 By Erica Deuel 19 Comments

Have you ever purposefully destroyed something you created?

One of my first babies (and I’m not talking about my live kiddos…but one of my first painted furniture pieces), I just destroyed to makeover. This painted hutch started my love for painting and repurposing furniture. I re-painted it for our foster care bedroom, so it only seems natural to share with you where we are at in our certification process.

Yesterday, we had our LAST home visit. If you have been (or know of anyone who has gone) through this process, you know what a big deal this is to us. It has been such a journey, and we have been on it for almost a year now. God is so good to bring us to where we are today! We are thrilled!

We are so close! Once our paper work is processed, we will be certified foster care parents.

Our foster care bedroom is almost complete. We have painted it, created a wood planked wall, made wall art, and repurposed this hutch for it. We are praying that whomever comes and stays with us, will feel safe and loved while they use this room.

Now, for some more HUTCH details! This is the piece as I painted it about six years ago.

I love the use of color and patterns, but my taste has been a little bit more refined in the last few years. Even if I still love both of those concepts, I no longer loved this piece. So, it was time for a hutch makeover, and I sanded it down like crazy. It took a lot of muscles and a week to recover before I wanted to tackle it with the next step.

This past weekend, I painted the bottom a really pretty black. I decided to leave a little of the former color on top to give it a more rustic/distressed look. I wanted this piece to look weathered and not perfect.

After the black paint dried, I sanded it a little more. We used a fine grit sandpaper to smooth the top and used a rougher sand paper to sand the sides of my black paint job (to create a more aged look).

I then stained the whole piece, wiped it down, and let it dry. Once it was dry, we brought it inside, added some new hardware and screwed the doors back into place. It was complete!

I love how it came together! It now looks like a more classic piece that can still hold lots of colorful things on top and be a fun accent piece in the room. It just wont make your eyes go crazy, as if you were looking at a Dr. Suess book. 🙂

I think it’s so funny how our taste can change and refine with time. I guess that is life.

A spoonful of imagination in the midst of it all can help us to never be scared to try something new, because it can always be changed again!

A Safe Place

July 25, 2013 By Erica Deuel 10 Comments

One of the things I have been working on around here is getting a bed for our foster care bedroom. If you read my last post about when life happens, I hinted that we have a bed! I am excited to share it with you today.

After scouring Craigslist for weeks, I realized finding a daybed with a pop up trundle and two mattresses was going to be expensive-even if it was used. In a last resort kind of thought, I asked on facebook if anyone had one they would want to sell me. The next thing I know I had several comments and exactly what we needed was provided-for free! We had a beautiful bed given to us. I am still amazed and so thankful God provided through a really generous lady exactly what we needed.

After getting the bed, we decided to give it a quick spray paint job. We want to give the room the most “gender neutral” feel, so we had to paint over the floral decorations.

Side note: do you spray paint in your pajamas barefoot with your six-year-old taking pictures too? 😉

It took four cans of spray paint to cover both sides of the bed thick and evenly. I used my favorite spray paint (Dark Bronze), and I couldn’t be happier with how it came out!

I will show you the bed put together, but first I wanted to also show you an inspirational pillow I made for this bed!

I took a $3.00 Ikea solid white pillow case and used a stencil to write a message I hope my kids (and any foster kids that come into my house) hold in their hearts: Believe in your dreams.

After the stencil was outlined on the pillow case with a pencil, I used a dry brush technique to paint the letters in. I wanted it to look somewhat rustic, so I didn’t paint the letters solid and thick. If you have never done this technique, you can see this quick 60 second clip of me demonstrating how I do it.

I know the kids that stay in this room might not be able to read this pillow, but I will read it to them. No matter where we come from or what has happened to us, we all have dreams. Those dreams give us motivation, joy, hope, and drive.

One tip for painting with this technique is to not dap a freshly filled paint brush all in the same place. It will create more of a “solid line” look rather than a “rustic by accident” look. You can see my mistake below. You can also keep a paper plate or something close by to tap the freshly dipped paint brush a couple of times before applying it to your fabric to get the more faint and dry look.

I love the start of our foster care bedroom. We now have the bed complete! I have big plans for the rest of the room and will keep showing the process as it comes together. The ultimate goal is for the children to feel welcomed, loved, safe, and protected in our home. I hope our house and ultimately this room will give that atmosphere.

Thanks so much for being on this journey with us!

DIY Ruffled Shower Curtain

July 6, 2013 By Erica Deuel 9 Comments

It’s been a while since I took on a good sewing project and the kids’ bathroom was calling to me. I did away with the old rubber ducky shower curtain they have had for years and created this DIY Ruffled Shower Curtain to take its place. It was relatively easy to sew. It just requires doing the same few steps over and over (for as many ruffled rows you want to create).

Here is how I made mine in case you want to make it as well! I started with gathering some fabrics together that I loved. I had some on hand, but I also went out and bought a few more to have enough fabric. I used a painter’s drop cloth as the foundation that I sewed my fabrics onto. I love the way the drop cloth added a heaviness to this project as well as a plastic lining that I think will help it to hold up well.

I cut all my fabrics into 12″ wide strips. I didn’t measure the actual length in inches but just sewed enough 12″ strips together to make a long strand that I could then use to ruffle up to cover the length of the drop cloth (which just so happened to measure the width of our shower stall). After all my fabric strips were cut, I ironed the edge of one side of each strip about 1/4″ up and sewed down that fold to create a nice finished edge for my strips to become ruffles.

I then folded and pinned my fabric in a way much like I did on my ruffled fabric bag to create ruffles. I simply sewed down the line of pins to attache the ruffles to my drop cloth. Make sure you are not sewing along the edge of your strip you just hemmed. You want that neat, pretty side to stick out and show. This was the start of my shower curtain coming together. Note: if you have any seems you want to try to hide, space your ruffles so they get hidden in the center.

After I had the first ruffled row sewn on, I drew small little lines where the edge of the ruffle laid on my drop cloth. I then pinned a row of pins two inches above those penned line marks. I wanted my ruffles to overlap a good bit, and this two-inch space created that. I then simply picked up each pin and pinned it right back down to hold the next ruffle in place. After that whole ruffled row was pinned, I sewed it. I then started this process back over until all my fabric rows were complete.

At the end of my fabric ruffles, I saw I had a small margin of drop cloth to still cover and my new shower curtain was way shorter than my old shower curtain (when laid on top).

I decided to line burlap and create a ruffle using that for the bottom of my shower curtain. I decided that the contrast in fabrics would look good, especially since this last ruffled row measures more like 17″ than my 12″ fabric ruffled rows. Once the burlap ruffle was attached, I folded all my fabrics over the edge to wrap around the drop cloth, and I sewed down the side. This step created a finished side and now prevents any of the ruffles from completely flying up.

I then turned the shower curtain over and trimmed all the back pieces off to make the inside look clean and finished; although, I will still use a cheap plastic shower curtain to hang with this decorative shower curtain.

I couldn’t decide if I wanted to create loops, make eye holes, or sew my new shower curtain onto an old one to create the eyelet holes at the top in order to be able to hang it. I think I will go back and create the eyelet holes, but for now I was afraid I would ruin it, if I was to try that. I am a lazy sewer and don’t like changing the foot on my machine. 🙂 I simply folded some ribbon over to create a double thick loop that I sewed onto the top of my shower curtain. These could be easily removed later down the road, if I get brave enough to try the eyelet holes, but they work for now.

I love the way it came out! I have some fun art and other accessories that I am working on using in this bathroom, but the space already feels so much different with the new shower curtain.

It turned out a bit more girlish than I was intending, and as my six-year-old son pointed out, there are two boys using this bathroom. I promised him green towels and a boy-ish picture on the wall to help compensate…more to come on this I am sure 🙂

I love the way these fabrics look together. I used some of my scraps to sew two embroidered hoops. I would like to give them away to one of you! Simply, let the rafflecopter widget load below the picture, and enter as many ways as you want! I will announce the winner right here on Friday, July 12, 2013.

a Rafflecopter giveaway
I hope you had a great Independence Day and are enjoying this weekend!

Little Girl’s Bedroom

June 13, 2013 By Erica Deuel 9 Comments

Reagan’s Bedroom is one of my favorite makeovers I have ever done. I think because for half of the creating and planning for it, we were not even in our new house yet. I learned a lot about trying to create for a space that you don’t get to walk by and stand in everyday to imagine and “see” your project come to life. I was stretched and now have made something I am proud of as a result. If it was my choice, we would play in there all day everyday.

Although she may only be two, it is something Reagan is proud of as well. If you were to walk into my house right now, she would ask you to come upstairs and see her room…even if you have already seen it. It makes my heart so happy. Some work might have been required, but what an easy way for me to show love to my daughter by being able to create something she loves.

Since before we moved, I have been showing tutorials and DIY projects that I have been creating to incorporate in her room. I thought it would be helpful to put all those in one place, so there is a little summary of how create this room. Please feel free to bookmark it, pin it, or share it. It is my hope all these hours of creating can inspire others to create as well.

Minnie Mouse Silhouette

DIY Fabric Bunting

Burlap Lampshade

Refinishing Ikea Furniture

Painted Stool

Stick Heart Wall Art

Teal Rustic Dresser

DIY Painted Striped Wall

It’s so nice to have all these links in one place! Many of these projects are some of my favorites, and I am so glad I can give you this summary. A few other items that I have incorporated into this room are shown below.

Wood Log End Table

You are My Sunshine Rustic Sign

Hair Bows and Headbands

Thank you so much for checking out my little girl’s bedroom summary! I hope these links and posts can help inspire you. Please feel free to contact me, if you have any questions about how to do any of these tutorials!

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