Friday, June 5, 2015

She Wings It, And She Scores!

Don't you just love when you have a vision but no idea how to do it so you just wing it and it works! That's pretty much this entire blog because I never have any idea how to do something before I I dive in. Fortunately it works out most of the time if you wouldn't mind forgetting the mandavilla homicide for a moment.  But seriously...if you randomly found this blog by googling something along the lines of "frisbee, paint, and Crosby" and you're looking for DIY tips...don't sue me if my methods make your house fall down!

I made a few tweaks in the office this week. They were quick and easy and surprisingly successful. First up, Crosby got another bed. Not a new bed...an additional bed. She still has her princess and the pea throne up in our bedroom.


It's perfectly reasonable and not at all over indulgent for a dog to have an upstairs bed and a downstairs bed right? Right?? She really does love spending time in the office. If we're downstairs and she's not around we can usually find her curled up in here so it was an easy buy when I spotted one that would fit in with the new colors.


Then I whipped up that piece of art hanging in the corner next to Cros. It might not live here forever..I eventually want to frame both of our diplomas and they may end up in that spot but it's living there for now. I stole this idea from my lovely friend Courtney. Sorry about the glare. I found this old window at a yard sale for $5 and then just got a $3 engineering print at Staples! The print isn't perfect, if you get really close you can see a few printer lines running through it but it's because those engineering prints are meant for blueprints, not wedding photos! It adds to the charm I think. I love how it turned out!


And finally...and this is where the winging it part comes in. I hung a peg board for all my real estate signs!

I wanted a way to organize my sign riders and I'd also been itching to work with pegboard. I know...you are such a weirdo Laurie! Anyways, I picked up some pegboard and some hooks at Lowes and had them cut it down to size for me. It was brown...boring! I had some some left over sample paint from when I was looking for a green for the office so I just did a quick coat of primer and two coats of green. Super fast and super easy because it's small.  That's the same green that was runner up for the wall color. I'm patting myself on the back right now for going with the blue.

Here's the winging it part. The Lowes guy sent me home with a peg board and two 1x2 strips. The 1x2s had to go behind the pegboard so that the hooks have room to hook in and behind. Like this:


So the dilemma was, how do I get the peg board onto the 1x2 and into the wall while keeping it level and strong enough to support the pegboard and my signs.

Problem #1...my stud finder is the pits. Really bad. It cannot find a stud so I just don't use it anymore. I tried the knocking test until I remembered I don't know how to do the knocking test. So then I just said forget it and went with my trusty wall anchors. I LOVE wall anchors. Seriously....remove almost anything in our house and I've probably got an anchor behind it. I could mount a feather on the wall and I'd probably anchor it. It just makes me feel better.

Problem #2....this is really a two person job and I am impatient. Derrick would have no problem helping me with this when he got home from work. I am, however, extremely impatient when it comes to these things so most of the time I figure out a way to forge ahead on my own instead of doing the more intelligent and adult thing...wait. Basically I ended up screwing my pegboard into the 1x2s just enough so the sharp screw tips stuck through the wood. Then I balanced a level on the 1x2 while I pressed the ends of the screws into the wall to make an indention. Then I just put anchors in each of those indentions.


Four anchors, a little bit of balance, one ding in the wall, and a sore drill arm later we have success!



I thought about putting it on the wall in front my desk because I wasn't sure how it would look in this spot when you walk into the front door but I like it here. It's tucked out of the way and if our visitors get a little reminder that I'm a realtor when they walk in the door....so be it :)

1 comment:

  1. Very clever - I love the peg board sign holder!

    Love, Mom

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