What Says Dog Lover More Than A... Well, You Decide for Yourself

I woke up early the other morning with a headache.

I looked in a few intuitive places (my toiletry basket, the medicine cabinet, the linen closet) for some Aleve...

No luck. So I talked myself into waking my sleeping husband to ask him where it was.

"Dan, where's the pain reliever?"

(without missing a beat) "By Roxxi."

You've seen Roxxi. If your memory is escaping you, here's a photo:

So I go back out of our room, into the living room — near where Roxxi sleeps. I have no idea why Aleve would be "by Roxxi," but I keep looking (on the built in cabinets, the mantle, the coffee table). Still no luck.

I go back to husband.

"Dan, I hate to ask you this, but can you show me where the bottle of medicine is?"

He gets up and walks directly to it:

Oh, stupid me! I should have known he was referring to the ceramic Rottweiler that's temporarily hanging out in the kitchen.

One Man's Trash is Another Man's Treasure

We live on a street that's often a cut through to other parts of Decatur and Druid Hills. It's not a busy street but a decent number of cars come by.

Sometimes we leave things out for the garbage truck that disappear within hours — long before the garbage man comes by.

Sometimes, Dan and I make fictional bets about how long it will be before items are lifted from the trash pile.

This time it was the old/traditional ceramic chandalier that was up for grabs.

Merchandised atop a stack of empty ceiling fan boxes.

I put this out at 7pm yesterday — and gone this morning when I woke up to get ready for work.

Other treasures that people have taken from our trash pile:

• A yellow ceramic sink (circa 1950)
• Dusty/dirty/old off-white carpet, removed from our living room
• An old, painted wood door (removed from the entrance to our daylight basement)
• Possibly asbestos ceiling tiles - yikes!
• A framed black and white photo of the Brooklyn Bridge

$20 Drop Cloth Drapes

While Dan was installing light fixtures this weekend, I decided to tackle my Lowe's drop cloths drape project.

I didn't realize the drop cloths had horizontal seams halfway down — but I don't mind them so bad.

The look I was trying to replicate:

This particular photos is from The Lettered Cottage.

The process:

• Iron the drop cloth (using steam) to eliminate deep wrinkles that could impact cutting or measuring.
• Cut to desired width and length, keeping in mind that your hem will reduce your final length and width by about an inch. I made each panel about 27 inches wide* by 7 feet, 2 inches tall.
• Fold over hem twice (ironing each time), about 3/4 inch (pin if you're an amateur like I am).
• Use your sewing machine (regular stitch) to hem the edge, removing the pins before you get to them so you don't break your needle.
• Hand sew the really thick folds so you don't break your needle (or your sewing machine).
• Total time for two windows: about 3.5 to 4 hours (maybe 1.25 hours for the first one, then 30 minutes per "panel" after I got the hang of it).

What went well:

• Only having to sew on two sides! The drop cloths come pre-hemmed but I had to make mine narrower and shorter than the original drop cloth (6 by 9 feet) because the windows I was working with were 36 inches wide — and about 7 feet off the ground.
• The price. How can you beat $10 per package? I used two packages, cutting out two 27-inch panels per package. (Curtain rods were about $21 each plus shipping on eBay. Seller is Browns Linens).
• Using curtain hooks — so easy.
• The clean finished look. Dan commented that he likes the minimalist look of the new drapes.
• In general, this is a great first project for someone who's never done drapes before (inexpensive materials, simple sewing). I would recommend giving it a shot. I know my learnings here will help me with sewing our master bedroom curtains.

If I were to do it all over again (which I might since the materials are less than $20)

• Get needles made for sewing heavy duty fabric (I broke two needles over the course of my sewing).
• Be more cautious about the lenth. These ended up about 1.5 inches off the floor. I wish they were a half inch off the floor.
• *Think deeply about the width. See how The Lettered Cottage's curtains have nice pleats and folds? It's because the panels are wider than the curtain rod. I made mine just as wide as the curtain rod (which I regret).
• Consider getting a double curtain rod so you can hang an airy/light fabric behind the drop cloth curtains (like what's shown in the Lettered Cottage photo above)

Any other questions? E-mail me at lifefulfilledatl@gmail.com.

Light and Breezy

Dan was a busy dude this weekend.


Hallelujah. We now have ceiling fans in all three of our upstairs bedrooms. Ahhh... the fan is such a welcome addition to our master bedroom especially.

We bought Hunter brand fans from Home Depot. This is the 52'' Augusta fan, which we used in two of the three rooms. (We bought a slightly smaller version for our smallest bedroom). Larger fans were $99/piece (more expensive than I'd hoped to pay — but they're so much more sharper looking than some of the other options we looked at).

Here's a reminder of what our bedroom looked like five months ago. I can't believe five months have passed already!

And the dining area chandelier... Dan gets extra points for this one because it required spending about 30 minutes in the 100-degree attic.

He slightly relocated the light fixture above the dining room table in our living/dining room combo room. And he switched out the old porcelain chandalier for a more "transitional" fixture. Even though we only moved the fixture back by maybe 15 inches and over 6 inches, it's now in a much better place (centered above our dining room table).

Fixture is Hampton Bay (from Home Depot). It's not exactly like this one but it's similar. Was reasonably priced at $88.

See the original hole? That'll be patched up soon.

Before.

But, womp, womp... one of the globes was broken. The broken piece wasn't even in the box... Now to figure out where to get a replacement piece...