Wordless Wednesday~Shoot From the Hip

One of my biggest photography issues is my hesitation to pull the trigger, so to speak. I'll follow and follow the action, waiting for the "perfect" shot to form in my viewfinder.

To try and overcome this tendancy, I followed my kids around, camera in hand~~literally. I kept my camera at my waist and just shot away.

Not all of them were great...in fact, lots of them were junk.

But some were like this...











I even laid down flat on my back and shot some...






It was lots of fun and very liberating! Probably not something I'd try before digital photography.... :0)

Why don't you give it a shot?

For more Wordless Wednesday, try 5 Minutes for Mom, Extraordinary Mothers, jollymom, and of course, good old Wordless Wednesday.

witty "pillow"-related title here

Without a doubt one of the quickest, easiest and cheapest ways to get a new look in any room is with throw pillows.

So I wish I had the foresight to take pictures of the veritable time capsule that my living room pillows were. When I started recovering them this time I cut off the old covers.


Underneath were older covers.


Underneath that were older covers.


Underneath that were the original pillows that came with the sofa.


I think they were about 2 inches smaller than what I started with. :0)


Anyway, I decided to bring some blue and white into my brown walled living room.


The addition of white I posted about here and here.


The blue I brought in with my rooster lamp, and the new pillows!





Believe it or not this was really the only fabric I could find at Joanne's that had the blue color I was looking for. And honestly I wasn't really sure about it at first.


But I'm an "instant gratification" kinda gal, so I wasn't about to go ordering something online.


And it turned out fine~~because once I started doing the pillows, I really love the fabric.


I used the blue/white patterned fabric, some brown cotton duck, and the white fabric I used for my bedroom pillows.





I love this family pillow. I got the idea from SOMEWHERE and for the life of me I can NOT find the link!!! I'm so sorry if this is yours! I used iron on t-shirt transfers and played with the font, sizing and placement until I got what I liked, and ironed it onto the white fabric. Then I attached the white piece to the brown cotton with 2 rows of brown stitching and pulled threads to fray the edges.




It's right on the sofa that faces the front door, so it's one of the first things you see when you walk in the door. And I love that.


Then I did a simple white pillow, but put brown bias welt around the edges. I'm fortunate enough to have a commercial machine with a foot designed to make welt, so I can sew yards and yards of this nonsense fairly quickly. And it's soooo worth it. It makes a huge difference in the end result of your products and how professional (or not) they look! If you don't have a welt foot for your machine, you can do it with a zipper foot. It won't be as tight and not as easy, but it's worth a shot!


For the Eiffel Tower pillow I freehanded a simple graphic design, cut it out and traced it onto Wonder Under and the blue fabric, and zigzagged around the edges. I love this pillow. The only problem is it was one of the last I did and I was running out of the brown cotton. It could have been a little bigger. So now it pulls a bit, and sometimes looks a little like an "A".


But I still love it.





I did two of the big pillows~they're just the blue patterned fabric on one side, white on the other, and the brown welt.





The brown pillow I call my "pleats" pillow. I did a band of the white fabric down the center and just stitched rows until I thought it looked good.


The last pillow I did may be my favorite. I just made a simple white cover, and then sewed rows of ruffles across it and frayed the edges:





Now I play musical chairs with all my new pillows...moving them around...which ones together???




I still have more to do in the living room before I do a final reveal of the whole thing. The most glaring issue?

This:



It was this:



A $3 grocery store clearance picture of red flowers. It was pretty, but didn't go in the new blue scheme. So when I was painting the hallway I rolled over it with white primer. And now I'm stuck.

So there it hangs, waiting for inspiration.



I tried saying it was a commentary on the overuse and gluttony of the throwaway society in which we live...a symbolic representation of an attempt to declutter a life drowning in materialism and consumerism and recreate a symbiotic oneness with nature, purity, and a simple life.

I don't think anyone's buying.

Linking up here:


    





and I Heart Naptime's Sunday Scoop

elements of tables

Here's the thing.
I started talking about my mini living room redo quite a while ago.

And I actually have done quite a bit of it.

But I haven't taken or posted pictures of it for a very stupid reason.

We have three large windows that face the front of the house.
And when the sun shines through the windows the living room has such a warm glow...it's cozy and comfy and I love it.

But do you know when the sun shines through those three windows?
When it's rising.

As in: first thing in the morning.
As in: when googiemomma is still in bed.


Ahem.


Well, today I decided enough was enough. So I set my alarm and got up with the early birds to take stunning photos. Uh, no. I just took the pictures with the available light and put my mad photoshop skillz to work.
Actually, they didn't come out too bad...


So, without further ado, I present {part} of the mini living room makeover!


Here's where we started. And these photos? Well, you know those "loose 10 pounds in 2 days" ads you see where the "before" picture is someone deliberately making themself look as bad as they possibly can--pushing out their stomach, wearing a too-tight bikini, sad sack face?

Yeah, it's kind of like that.

Except with kids, toys, bad flash photography, general mayhem and foolishness.








I wanted to brighten and modernize, but without painting the walls. And the sofa, loveseat and chair are staying for now.
I was sick of the rugs. They went, courtesy of Craigslist, and added $40 to my budget :0). I want to get something simpler, maybe just a sisal rug...but I'm still searching. The layout of the room also needs help. It's a long narrow room and I've always had trouble with it. (Read: I move the furniture around on a regular basis)

But there are good things here: I do like the paint color, and I love my floors. The windows are big and bright, and the big thick trim is custom googiedaddy stuff. I also like the mirrors & picture over the sofa. I have fought with that area and probably tried 10 different things and combos of things without loving anything. This is the closest I've gotten to completely happy, and I'm not looking to change it right now.

Anyway, today I'm going to cover the three tables in the living room and the changes I made to them.

Remember this lamp? It's from part one: gathering stuff and spray painting it white.




I gave it a coat of white paint and recovered the shade in the same white fabric I've been using everywhere. It's sitting on the black end table next to the sofa.
And I LOVE it.





I added a white bowl I got at the thrift shop, an old book {that I got to try my hand at one of those "paper wreaths" that are everywhere, but decided I liked the book sitting on the table better} and the "LOVE" I got at a yard sale. (I actually grabbed that because I had some ideas for a photoshoot with it, but the kids sat it there and I think it looks cute!)





Googiedaddy loves lamps. (I know, weird, but we've discussed that before) So to make him happy I'm adding them wherever I can. And the soft glow of this one makes us quite happy.


And that bowl? An impulse buy on my mad quest for "white" stuff. But can I tell you how much I love this bowl? It was $1!!




For the other side of the room, I took some black and chrome nesting tables from Ikea and (surprise!) painted them white. I neglected to take a before picture, but trust me--they're much better now. They're home to the blue rooster lamp.



And apparently these tables also function wonderfully as a chair and desk combo for LittleBear. Who knew?

This table needs some help. I keep trying different combos of things on it, but have yet to strike paydirt. I think the rooster stands alone.

The final table in the room is actually an ottoman that is our coffee table. It's a soft leather tufted ottoman that googiedaddy made.







The wooden tray was $6 at Ross (LOVE that store). The milk glass bowl was a $1.99 snag at the thrift shop at the same time as the feather bowl on the other table. The candle holder/moss rock holder I redid and posted about here.

And the white obelisk thingy? Also a thrift shop purchase for $1.99. It started life like this:

 

Yuck! So much better in white!

Ooohhh...are you trying to get a look at those pillows in the background?

I knew it! Well, you'll have to come back tomorrow for the big pillow reveal!!

Linking up here:



















and
I Heart Naptime Sunday Scoop