2013 In Review

As someone whose never been able to maintain a scrapbook or journal, one of my favorite parts of blogging is being able to look back over my projects. 2013 was a year where I decided to blog less, but love what I blogged more and I ended up with some posts I'm really proud of. Let's take a look!

My Home Office

My office is still a work in progress (all paint color suggestions welcome!), but is the perfect sunny spot to get my craft on.

A Beautiful Mess Feature

A total dream came true this year when the first floor of my rental was featured on A Beautiful Mess, my alltime favorite blog.

Polka Dot Bathroom

Before this year, I had never seriously decorated a bathroom in my rental before. SO worth it!

Reupholstered Counter Stools

I looooove brass and rattan and nearly fell off my couch when I found these stools on craigslist. All they needed was a little new fabric on the seats!

Macrame Plant Hanger

After searching online for a macrame plant hanger, I gave up and just made my own. Sometimes you just gotta get your hands dirty to get what you want.

Ceramic Paper Bag

Because sometimes all it takes is a coat of paint!

My Camera Gear

Taking photos has been one of my favorite things to do in 2013. This is my current gear setup.

Bar Cart

Can furniture make you feel sexy? With this bar cart, the answer is most definitely yes.

Record Console

Sometimes a craigslist find completely transforms the look of your room!

How to Apply Gold Dot Decals

I was always a little scared to apply wall decals, but it turns out it's not very difficult. Here's how I did it.

Tips for Cleaning Vintage Chairs

Caigslisted furniture doesn't always come in the perfect condition, but before you decide to reupholster or paint, try a little cleaning. Here's how I cleaned this green vintage chair.

So there it is - a year of my favorite posts!
If you're curious, here are my reviews for 2011 and 2012.

BUT... Here's the big question, and I would be SO GRATEFUL  for your feedback...

What would you like to see more of on insideways in 2014??

Thanksgiving Treats + Holiday Cooking Tip

I'm a little late to the Thanksgiving blogging party, but I couldn't go without posting a photo of this Mojito Jello Shot recipe I tried from A Beautiful Mess. It was SO good, super pretty, and not very diffiult to make. I highly recommend trying it for your holiday parties (I'm definitely going to make them again for New Year's Eve).



And now for the tip! I love having friends over to cook for the holidays, but it can be tricky to show everyone where all of the cooking supplies are. Sticking labeled post-it notes on cabinets and drawers is easy to do and makes kitchen navigation easier for your guest chefs.

Here's to good eats and happy holidays for all!

Tips for Applying Gold Dot Decals

When I initially started giving this little bathroom some umph, I envisioned the back wall covered in gold x's, like a big cute cross stitch reference. Needless to say, that didn't work out. Oh, and there were tears involved in the not-working-out of it. As a DIYer I know the feeling of "now for plan B" VERY well.

Lucky for me, plan B ended up being better than plan A ever could have been - metallic gold vinyl polka dots.

Even though I've already done a whole bathroom reveal, I thought I'd go a little more into how I applied the dots. Here's what I used:



Gold dot decals cut into individual squares, a wall-mountable laser level, and tape measurer.

A little more about the dots: I bought two sheets of 2" gold dots from Walls Need Love. I definitely could have just bought one sheet, but I'm glad that I played it safe. The decals are completely removable, which is GREAT for renters (and yes, I've tested it).

The easiest way to apply the dots was by peeling off only half of the paper, positioning the dot, then removing the rest of the paper.



I used the laser level to align the tops of every dot.



For the next dot, I used a spacer (a cut up piece of paper) combined with the laser level. The method was great and went super fast once the first dot of each row was up. My dots were spaced out about 5 inches width-ways and 7 inches height-ways.



So that's that! Please let me know if you have any questions and I'll answer them in the comments below. Happy polka-dotting!

Small Changes and Perfect Plants

Over the past several months I've been embracing something a little unnatural for me: the slow down. Contrary to my "I can do anything and everything," efficiency-high loving, ultra productive tendencies, I'm getting to know the value of recognizing and being happy with taking a little more time to enjoy my day in a quality instead of quantity type way.



In terms of decorating rooms in my apartment, that has meant slow adjustments instead of blitz finishing a room in one weekend.

Which brings me to my lovely new plant: a gorgeous Staghorn Fern (from Serendipity in Old Town Temecula) perfect for the empty corner in my dining nook.



So here's how the slow-changes went down... That corner started with a 6 foot fiddle leaf fig tree - a set-up that ran into some problems:
1. The kitchen heating vent was right next to the tree - Mr. Fig hated having hot air blown on him and lost several leaves in protest.
2. The size of the tree made the dining area feel a little cramped.
3. Tim and I want to add a small bar cart to the dining room and Mr. Fig was taking up prime cart real estate.



So, Mr. Fig moved out and Lady Philodendron moved in. She was wild, curvy, filled the space beautifully and... oh... toxic to cats. Dangit.



Don't worry, the cats are fine.

In the end, I'm glad Lady Philodendron didn't work out because look at this Staghorn...!



That's one sexy fern.

Next up - find a cute bar cart! Fill it with cute glasses and yummy liquors! Live like beautiful people straight out of Mad Men. Well, maybe that last one's a little ambitious...

What do you think? Are you digging the fern? How do you like to decorate - slow steps or all at once?

Easy and Affordable DIY Wedding Seating Chart

Because I've been sitting here for 30min trying to find a way to start this post, let's pretend for a moment someone just asked me, "Jen, how in the world would you go about seating 60 people at different tables for a party?!?" Well imaginary internet person, I am so glad you asked! It just so happens I got married a little while back and had to deal with this very question.

So this is what I made (yes, we're going to use the word "made" very loosely): a cute little stack of index cards to nostalgically direct my loved ones to their seats. They went on the table pictured below with our cake (and topper) and family photos.

(Photo above and below by Kaitlin Jane Photography)

But, why little bitty index cards? Well, while I love all of those gorgeous pinterest seating charts made with old windows, chalkboards, botanicals, or vintage keys, at the point I was making our seating chart (coughtwodaysbeforetheweddingcough) I needed something cute and simple.

So I looked at all of the finished elements of our wedding for inspiration. What do we have that I could write names on and display in some interesting but functional way...? Index cards! I'd already used them for our wedding invitations, our wedding website, and they would be making an appearance for our guest book. Done.

Bonus - We already had most of the necessary supplies and everything else was was available at Staples:
Markers (we used black and red Sharpies)
Sticky Tabs
Index Cards
A Business Card Holder

For the "doing" of this DIY, I made three types of cards:
A "Find Your Seat" card - to sit in front and tell people what this thing is
Letter Cards - for organizing the seating chart alphabetically
Name Cards - just a name and table number... done!

Double Bonus - it worked! Everyone found their seat and we had a lovely dinner. Yay for working, being cute, fitting in with other design elements, costing less than $10, and taking less than an hour to finish!

Tips For Making Your Wedding Hair Piece

Initially, I hadn't planned on DIYing my wedding hair piece. Mostly because I had no idea what I was doing and I figured it would be pretty easy to find something I liked. Not the case.

So yup, I ended up making my own and it really wasn't very hard!

Here's the hairpiece sans my head for your viewing pleasure.



It looks like one seamless piece, but I actually made the bird cage veil separately (using this GREAT tutorial by The Dapper Bun) so I could take it off later in the night.

Like so...

(Photo by Aleks Messier)

Because everyone has different tastes, I'm not doing to do a full tutorial for how to make this particular hairpiece, but I will give you some tips you can apply to any hairpiece :)

My first step was to explore Michael's and Joann's for supplies I thought were pretty. I landed on ivory beads on gold wire and fake peonies. I was shocked at how real fake flowers look these days! Pro Tip: Make sure you choose whites that match your wedding dress. For example, get ivories if your dress is ivory and bright whites if your dress is white.

For the hair piece's base, I used a plastic comb, BUT metal ones are better and I hear hairstylists like clips best - plastic is what I could find and it ended up working just fine. Note: I have thick curly hair, so I don't usually have a problem with hair clips etc. falling out.

Before I attached anything to the comb, I tried various layouts of my flowers and beads and attempted to hold them to my hair in the bathroom mirror.

Once I was satisfied with my general arrangement, my basic technique was to use thread and hot glue to attach the flowers and beads in any way manageable. Think lots of experimentation and gentle nudging. Really that was it, which is mostly important to know because it's not more complicated or scientific than that. You can get a really great result from not very much effort :)

I do recommend using thread instead of hot glue as much as possible. Hot glue can fall or melt in a hot car, but thread will stay where you tie it.

As a finishing touch I put a piece of ribbon across the comb so glue/thread bits wouldn't get caught in my hair.

If you decide to use fake flowers you will need to remove their green bases so your flowers can attach flush against your comb or clip. Carefully remove the base then run a needle and thread through the resulting hole to hold your flower petals together. You might also need a bead as an anchor in the middle of the flower.

The last tip: If you have a professional stylist do your wedding hair, bring your hairpiece with you to your trial hair appointment  Your stylist can give you feedback or suggest improvements based on their professional experience, allowing you plenty of time to make adjustments.

Though I was hesitant at first, I'm really glad I took this project on and got exactly what I wanted. Now I just need to find another occasion to wear it!

(All wedding photos by Kaitlin Jane Photography unless noted | hairpiece photos by insideways.com)

Fortune Cookie Party Favors

Today I'm pretty excited to share my favorite wedding project - who am I kidding... they all feel like my favorite, but this is ONE of them for sure.



Candy filled fortune cookie party favors!

Since most of our guests were out-of-towners, Tim and I knew we needed party favors that were a) small enough to take home, b) not breakable or c) edible. Edible seemed like the best option - everyone loves candy (and I refuse to believe otherwise) - but we wanted to make things a little more interesting.. why not package our candy in handmade fortune cookies?!

(Photo by Kaitlin Jane Photography)

(Video Still by FortyOneTwenty)

Here's what we needed to get going:
Tan felt
Cute Baker's Twine
Cellophane Baggies
3/4" Round Avery Labels (5408)
Hershey's Kisses

Then we got to making!

1. Cut out a felt circle. I used an embroidery hoop to trace my circles.

2. Sew the circle in half, leaving a little bit near the edge un-sewn.

3. Fold over your felt. This might be the most difficult step to visualize or photograph, but I promise it works when you try it - it's magic!

Now for the innards.

4. Print the fortune cookie sayings and cute messages onto the Avery Labels. (We printed our fortunes on a light card stock paper so they felt fancier.) Then stick your labels onto the bottom of the Hershey Kisses - they're the perfect size!

5. The assembly process is next. Stuff the candy and fortune into the cookie and stuff the cookie into the bag. Tie with twine.

And there you have it - a very easy and affordable party favor. This next photo shows it in action (thanks Shannon!).

It seemed like these were a lot of fun for our guests. At the very least, Tim and I enjoyed opening all of the leftovers and eating the candy :)