Staircase nook

Hey hey all! Well, it’s about that time! I’m off to Atlanta today to prepare for the Haven Conference that starts tomorrow. It’s been a year of planning and I can’t even believe it’s already here! SO excited to see everybody.

So I finished up a quick little project this week that I’ve been meaning to do for months. Or a year. A year and a few months.

We have a little ledge/nook/cut out spot in the basement staircase that has been sitting half way done for that year and a few months:

You may remember that I installed a wood wall on the main wall in the staircase about this time last year. I still LOVE that wall. So very much.

Before we had the basement finished the wall next to it going down the steps had a weird cement wall bump out thing. Instead of drywalling all the way up I asked them to make it a little ledge instead. They installed a wood piece that I was planning on painting later, hence the stain spatter I didn’t worry about:

But since then I’ve decided I wanted it stained instead. I’m kind of obsessed with the look of the dark wood against the gray blue walls (Marina Gray by Ben Moore) and white trim down there.

So I needed to sand off that stamp and the stain dots:

It just took a few seconds and I was ready to go – then I taped everything off with my Frogtape really well. I find it’s hard to keep stain from going everywhere since it leaks easily and spatters all over the place. (It could be the operator, who knows.):

After I wiped everything down well (and let it dry), I grabbed my dark walnut stain and went at it:

Remember when you stain to work quickly and to keep the “wet edge” – if it dries at all during the process you’ll see where you left off. OH, and wear gloves!! Trust me – no matter how hard I try I always end up with stain on my hands.

I let it sit for a few minutes and wiped the excess off. I only usually do one coat – I find that’s plenty for the color I want.

While it dried I started hanging the frames I’ve had leaning there forever. Most of them are pics from the Macy’s Thanksgiving parade/NYC trip I showed you here, but there was one collage my stepdaughter gave us last Christmas (so sweet!) that I wanted to include too.

Here’s a little tip when hanging pics that have two hangers instead of one – just tie a piece of string or wire between the two:

Then hang that on the the nail. SO much easier. I mean, sometimes what you’re hanging is heavy enough you’ll want two nails, but most of the time I find one is just fine. And this way you don’t have to worry about measuring, finding a level, all that stuff. Ain’t nobody got time for that.

Like all of my gallery walls, I just kind of put stuff here and there – yes, that meant a few extra holes in the wall but they’re tiny. The wall will survive:

I was trying to use frames that I had on hand and I liked the (mostly) matching frames, so I didn’t go crazy trying to fill empty spaces. The “S” we’ve had for years and it perfectly filled one spot that was bugging me.

The ledge has plenty of room for accessories, but for now I just left a couple candlesticks we had here before (they ended up on there because I was too lazy to take them all the way to the storage room):

They are fake candles and they operate on a timer, so it’s kind of cool to have that little glow as we walk down at night.

It was a quick project and I think it turned out pretty cute! I love how it looks with the planked wall:

Next up in this space – touch up the wall and ceiling paint and install chunkier baseboards. Maybe I’ll tackle those in another year. Baby steps.

So are you loving gallery walls? I am and I don’t think they’re going anywhere soon. It’s such a personal, easy way to fill wall space! And remember you can find frames at Goodwill for super cheap and spray paint them. One color for all of them will unify frames no matter their design. 

Where in the world have we been map

So this is yet another tale of it-was-sitting-in-the-garage-for-three-months-before-I-did-it. There are a lot of those, if you haven’t noticed. It is how I do.

I’ve mentioned like 50 times that one of the things about our basement that I LOVE is the potential for the walls – there are a ton of them. There are not in the rest of the house (open concept, few walls without windows, I’m really not complaining, it’s a great problem to have).

But I do love having a space that has expanses of wide open walls ready to be decorated in the basement. There’s this one that you see when you get down the stairs:

Gloriously empty. And big.

Months ago on a trip to IKEA (I think I got this six months ago?), I picked up one of their huge wall maps. It wasn’t necessarily cheap, but for the size (more than six by four feet), it really wasn’t too bad.

I’ve known I wanted to put it that spot but wanted to change it up a bit. At first I was going to cut the map down into three equal sizes and then mount it somehow – just for something different.

But I knew I’d need something large to mount the maps to, and I didn’t feel like spending the extra cash on big sheets of particle board and all. So it stayed in the garage. (It also lived in the dining room/library and in the mud room for a while too – I like to change up the scenery you know.)

I also had an idea I wanted to implement on the map – I wanted to make it personal and interactive for us. My plan has always been to figure out a way to note where in the world we’ve been – a way to mark where we’ve each traveled. But I didn’t want to use pins that would ruin the map and I wanted it to be safe for little visitors. I mulled over the idea for months and on the flight home from Disney last week it hit me – I knew exactly what I was going to do!

So the other night I started putting the map together…finally. It was VERY easy:

I didn’t get the map as taut as I wanted, but it’s fine. It was easy to put together but not so easy I was willing to do it all over again. :)

I got it hung and you know my middle name is Can’t Leave Well Enough Alone, so I knew it needed a little something. I got some of the cheap, thin lattice boards at Lowe’s, stained them and then cut them down to make a huge frame around the map:

I started out by trying to glue the wood around the edge of the map, but it wasn’t secure enough so I ended up just using my nail gun and installing it that way. The metal frame is so thin and lightweight I knew the nail would go through easily.

It worked great! And I was so happy I added the dark frame – it was the perfect way to finish it off!

The final step was to take a hole punch and some random vinyl colors I had around and start punching:

As I mentioned, I wanted this to be something personal and fun for our family, so the little dots represent each of us (red – me, silver – hubs, yellow – Bub) and I started placing them on the map. I don’t know why it took me so long to think of vinyl instead of push pins, duh, but it worked!

Hubby has been to the coolest places by far:

  

Together we’ve been to some pretty amazing spots too:

 

And the kiddo isn’t doing too shabby in his U.S. travels, considering he’s only six:

That’s not even filled up yet -- I realized quickly that the dots are going to be too big. I am on the lookout for a smaller hole punch so I can keep adding to the U.S. map. :)

I love how the whole thing turned out – I stood back and realized the colors in it(blue, green and yellow with the touch of dark wood) are the exact colors I’m using throughout the basement.

Haaallooooo – perfect!

And I just love that there’s a little extra something that is significant to our family:

You don’t really see the dots until you get up close. I think it will be fun for the kiddo to show his friends where in the world he’s been. :)

If you’ve been around for awhile you know I’ve been using a lot wood tones down in the basement – I’m going for a comfy but ever so slightly industrial/funky vibe down there. I didn’t notice till I was taking pics how well the wood frame ties in with the wood planked wall on the stairs:

I meant to do that. ;)

I’m loving maps lately, obviously – I realized after it was all done that I have two hanging right next to each other down there. OH WELL. I’ll deal. Are you digging maps lately? I’ve seen them used in all kinds of new and fun ways over the past year or so. Love it!