The Interior DIYer
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A touch of glass

Back in December my edible Christmas ornaments were entered into the DaWanda Creative Xmas Decorations Facebook competition, which I was quite excited about. All entrants received a €20 gift voucher to spend online at DaWanda, and the winner received a €100 voucher. Not bad at all … My DIY didn’t win said Facebook competition {and I wasn’t expecting to}, so I was pleased as punch with my gift voucher. Now, what to spend it on? 
I trolled the DaWanada site and decided I should treat myself and spend my voucher on something I wouldn’t normally buy. A little fancy treat. Home related, obv. So I searched, and I don’t know how I happened upon Everstraw one day, but I’m glad I did. 

Made by Michael Kraus, Everstraw glass straws are exactly what you think – glass straws. They’re beautiful, dainty and the perfect quirky accompaniment to our bar cart. I was worried they’d be quite frail, but they’re tough and have survived their first wash in our sink. I bought six straight straws, and a bent straw to throw in the mix to make it look more convincing and natural. Do other straws look natural? Nope. You get my meaning though.
We took our new glass straws for a spirited spin yesterday {for photographic purposes, of course … } and they’re very smooth to drink from! Does that sound weird? It does to me, but they were really nice to drink with. 

For those of you wondering, we have teeny pipe-cleaners at home that I use to clean them, alternatively Everstraw sell cleaning brushes for their straws. For those of you, like me, who immediately thought of the maintenance side of things and how many hours I’d have to spend cleaning them. All of 30 seconds should do the trick. 

xx A

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Raising the bar

On my way home from work two weeks ago, as I cycled into the underground car park, what did my peripheral vision see – only the lonliest of bar stools, dumped in a bin. My heart jumped. It was lovely, but clearly in need of some TLC. It was filthy and the seat was cracked in two. I took a quick photo {below}, and in one fowl swoop, stool came upstairs and I made him a cup of hot chocolate. 
Stool sat in the hallway that Friday night and on Saturday morning, I woke up nice and early to clean it. However, in the light of day, I saw just how truly filthy it was; the stool was black and very tacky to the touch – I assume from years of being in an old, greasy pub. Black. You see the picture above and don’t think much of it, but in no way could you see wood. I put on my rubber gloves and got to work. As I began to scrub, I was quite surprised to find under all that sticky blackness, some really lovely wood. I annihilated 2 brillo pads in the process, but 2 hours later, stool was spotless. I followed up by sanding it and scraping it with a pallet knife to give it a smooth finish. 

My next question was what to actually do with it – paint the legs? Paint the seat? Varnish or paint the whole thing? Gold? Black? White? I didn’t want to rush into a bad decision, so I let some ideas ferment. 

I really loved the shade of wood it was, so I decided to keep some of it natural. I wanted to paint one aspect of it, and since the seat was broken in two and needed to be repaired, it became obvious to paint the seat. “Don’t worry stool“, I whispered. “We all have a crack in our seat“. 

Inspiration struck one day when I was doing the dishes and in particular, cleaning the new cheese board my parents got husband for his birthday. I really liked its clean lines, natural wood finish and black handle. Hey, perfect combination! I’m always amazed when inspiration strikes, and what causes it. Sometimes it’s the silliest things that have almost no connection. 

Since my dad has a work bench, he kindly volunteered to glue the seat, clamp it for 24 hours as well as add two connector / mending plates to keep the seat together {as seen on the underside of the seat below}. I sanded it down until it was smooth and painted the seat with Shock Black spray paint from Montana.

Not a huge transformation, I know, but the pictures really don’t do justice to how lovely the wood is. At the moment it’s au naturale and doesn’t have a stain on it. I might add a stain at a later date. Nonetheless, it’s a lovely little addition to our living room. It might move, but I can’t be sure where to just yet. I’m not going to loose sleep over it though. 
Welcome home, little stool. xx A

UPDATE: you can check out bar stool’s new look here! 

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I love you to the Death Star and back

Today is a special day as it is husband’s birthday. He’s turning the ripe old age of 27. The same age I was when we got married. Yep, I’m a cradle robber. Represent. Anyways, I had a very special present in mind for him this year and I had it stored in my memory bank for some time …

Back in April my lovely friend Pat from In My Wheele House blogged a project she had done with a globe, some chalk + chalk paint and blew my mind by drawing the Death Star right onto that baby. I knew it would be a perfect home made present for husband. I found a globe in a charity shop, picked up some spray paint and I was on my way.

First I washed the globe, let it dry then I sprayed it with one coat of Iron Curtain grey paint – how very appropriate. Since it was plastic I went with spray paint to avoid peelage. And of course I went with my good old reliable Montana. I let it dry over night, and the next day I taped it off with washi tape. I used a thinner-than-usual black washi-style tape I got in IKEA. The reason I chose washi tape vs. masking tape is because it’s a lot more gentler when it comes to removing. 

I taped out a grid  of sorts {as seen above}, then sprayed with a darker shade of Montana paint {I cannot for the life of me remember its name right now}, peeled off the tape and again let it dry overnight. And please excuse my incredibly shoddy phone pic above. I was working sneakily in the spare bedroom at night – not the best for taking photos. 

The next day I used a Montana acrylic extra fine paint marker to draw in the details. I free-handed the wobbly and incredibly inaccurate lines and finer details, hoping it would closer resemble the Death Star. Yeah, I know it doesn’t look exactly like it, so if you’re a hardcore fan, please be gentle. If you squint your eyes at it from far away, it’s a dead ringer though. The perfect addition of nerd to our living room if I may be so bold.

It’s about to get sappy all up in here folks. You’ve been warned.

Happy birthday husband. You are the light of my life, always and forever. And as I wrote on your card, I love you to the Death Star and back.