Picture Perfect Old Window

The first house my husband and I bought when we were first married was 700 square feet of never-been-updated-1950's-pure-bliss.

I'm fibbing about the pure bliss part.
But it was our first house.

The little old man who owned it before us left lots of treasures in the garage, including storm windows for each of the windows on the house.

Shortly after moving in, we replaced all the windows leaving the storm windows in a forgotten corner.

When we moved 5 years later we left a lot of the original treasures and on a whim I told my husband to pack one of the storm windows into the moving van.  I thought I could put pretty papers in it and it would make a great picture.

A few short years later, old windows became in high demand on the brocante market.

I kick myself often for not taking more of those beauties.

We moved into our home in 1999, I put pretty papers in each window pane and hung that baby up.  

And never looked at it again.  ( <--- highly embarrassing)

As the remodel took shape this year and we stripped everything out of our home, I saw the old window for what it had become.

UGLY.

It's ok if you cringed.  I do too.

I decided if the hallway was to truly be a Gallery Hallway then why not add more pictures?

The best part?  It cost me a $1.48.

I looked through pictures of my boys and found some great personality shots.

I sent them to be printed to Office Max.

Office Max?? 

A little known fact:  Office Max will print your pictures 

on Engineering Paper (11x17) for pennies!!  

For this project it was perfect.  It is not on photo paper, 

so it best to use this service for a project like this or one that involves decoupage. 

Here is how I turned ugly into personality!

The tools you will need:

1.  Pictures printed on paper large enough to fit each frame.  

2.  A template the size of each window frame.

My frames are 11 1/2 x 10 3/4" and I used one of the papers previously hanging in the window.

3.  Painter's Tape

4.  Marker

5.  Paper Trimmer

Lay the template on the section of picture you want shown in each window frame.

With the marker, mark the photo at all four edges of the template.

Line the marks up with the blade of the paper trimmer and trim.

Important : If your window frame sizes are not square be sure your template is lined up on the paper the correct way.

Once all pictures are trimmed, arrange them how you want them placed in the window.

Be sure the tops of the pictures are placed at the top of your window frame.

Flip each picture over and using the painter's tape, tape each picture into place.

Here you see that one of my pictures was printed vertically making it a smidgen too short on the sides.  

No worries.

I taped the picture into place and grabbed some scraps that I had previously trimmed off.
I flipped the scraps over and used the white backsides to frame in the vertical picture.

With everything taped into place, I flipped it over

and hung it back on to the wall.

A reminder of where I started ....

...and what I have now!

It was such an easy and inexpensive project making it super easy
(and guilt free!) to change the pictures out often.

The entire project took less than an hour and cost less than 2 bucks.

My lattes cost more than that.

P.S.
I apologize for the glare on the window glass; 

no matter what angle I took the picture I just couldn't 

get rid of the closet door trim trying to take center stage of the picture.

Trim can be like that.

Inspiring Spaces

It's time for some weekend inspiration!

Below are just a few of my favorite spaces I stumbled upon this week.

I love the simplicity of the black and white. 

The faux fur on the chair brings a comfy element against the starkness of the white.

This is a perfect example of combining two spaces. 

The yellow on the wall is echoed in the next room with the yellow chair. 

The cubed space on the far wall is repeated in how the pictures are hung on the yellow wall. 

Not only do I love the color of the cushions, I love how it ties in perfectly with the trim of the house.  Gorgeous!

The kitchen island looks like a piece of furniture rather than cabinetry.  

This brings an element of uniqueness to this space and is further accentuated with painting it a color completely unexpected.

Hopefully you are inspired by this week's finds and get a creative bug to do something in your home this weekend. 

Now, go and do!

How To Have a Gallery Hallway

My husband takes fantastic pictures and I am always looking for a way to showcase them in our home.  I decided to turn our hallway into his very own art gallery.

This could pose only one problem ~ the pictures would have to be perfectly aligned or it would drive me crazy.  (Ok, I may have design OCD tendancies).  Here is the step by step and EASY process of how I got all 5 pictures to be perfectly aligned. 





The blank canvas I began with.

The tools you will need for this project :

Start by setting the picture frames apart roughly the distance you will want to hang them on the wall.  Once they are spaced the way you would like them, measure the distance between the hangers on two of the pictures.



Using painter's tape, rip off a section the distance measured between pictures. 

For my pictures I rounded up to an even 24 inches.

Grab two of your handy-dandy picture hangers.  I hold them in my mouth.  You might not want to do that.

As I am hanging 5 pictures I am starting with the middle picture.  To find the exact middle of the wall, I measured the wall space I am using and divided by two. 

The area I am working with is 14 feet ~   divide that by two, and I knew I wanted my middle picture to be placed at the 7 foot mark.

Here I placed the edge of the painter's tape at the 7 foot mark and worked my way to the right.

Check to make sure the painter's tape is level on the wall.  The great thing about painter's tape is you can easily adjust it if you need to.

Place a picture hanger in the same spot on each end of the tape. 

To keep it simple, I used the upper corner each time.  I am not an expert picture taker (thus the big shadow in the middle of the picture) but you can see where I placed my hangers at the same spot on each end of the tape.

Repeat the process by simply moving the tape over using one of the hangers you just hung as your starting point.

You can see the blue tape between picture 2 and 3.

Continue on until all your pictures are hung.

Just look at how straight those pictures are!

Ta Da!  The completed project.  Well, almost complete as I have yet another idea brewing.