We've Been Framed

The entryway is finished! Hahaha, just kidding. It's kind of sort of just getting started. You see, I have wall collage envy from other blogs around the internet world so it's inspired me to do a little something extra special cool for our entryway. I've been collecting frames for a while now and I recently took them all and spray painted them white. Some were from the dollar store, some were bought as a box set, and some were found at Old Time Pottery (which is no longer in business, sad face). The only ones I didn't spray paint white I left the taupe color that I painted them last year. So currently we are working with 6 white frames of various widths, one white collage style frame, one distressed white message frame, four large taupe square frames, two silver blocks (a W and a 9), a large teal W and a large mirror. Anyways, here is what we were working with before the lamp and mirror got a paint job and the lamp got two new shades.

I picked up this shade from Target for $7.99. I like the light it casts out and it has a small wave pattern that's cute. But...

...it was too wide for our skinny shoe bin. It touched that wall even when it was pushed to the very edge of the table top...not cool. So...

...I traded it in for this one, which was $5.99. It's white, but doesn't have any pattern to it, but is a nice small rectangle shape. And it can sit in the center of the table top and not touch the wall, yay! Oh and surprise, I spray painted the lamp base white, more on that here!

Then this is what we were working with. Surprise, I spray painted the mirror Avocado! More on that here. I didn't like how spaced out the pieces were, knowing I want to add things as I get rich find them I wanted to have the space to do so. Besides I didn't want it to look like I was actually trying to fill in the space with only 4 items. Also that stand on the floor to the left got moved to the right to help block the outlet/cord situation. 

Isn't it lovely? It's an old conveyer belt gadget that I found while treasure hunting with my aunt. I stuck some stems in it that we had on hand and called it good. 

Here are the metal pieces I was talking about earlier. I got the W for the last name this house will have come September, which is the month we're getting married in, which is the ninth month, hence the number 9 that I picked up to go along with it. 

Here is a close up of the large frame that was once wooden. I picked up four of these about five years ago in Old Time Pottery (can't remember the price, but they were on a sophomore college student budget, so they couldn't have been much). This is the second life they've had because I just change out the paper in the center to get a different look (it's just 12X12 scrapbook paper). So for a jar of sample paint (yes I was cheap) and 4 new scrapbook pages for .25 cents I get a whole new look. 

Here's one of the frames that came in a box set. I might have gotten these from Old Time Pottery as well, but I honestly can't remember. I've had these since sophomore year as well so again, they were probably cheap. I went online and found images that the artist allowed to be printed as long as I wasn't selling them. I think they're kinda cute. 

This is a neat little message board that my aunt gave me. It's cool because it's so versatile. You can hang it either by the ribbon using the knob it gave or by the sawtooth on the back. You can use the scrapbook paper as a background (it came with 4 reversible sheets), you can add stickers from the themes it came with (wedding, graduation, rustic, bright). It also has four little magnets and two tiny clothespins that you can hang something off the ribbon that runs across it. 

So do we want the background that matches nicely with the background of our musical note bird print?  This print was also from that same artist's website that lets you use her prints for non-commissional purposes. 

Or whimsy old school notebook style background? Who knows. I'd say it'll get changed about once a year.

This is a really cool piece. Nana picked it up for us at Hobby Lobby. She bought it full price at $25.99 because they only had one W left, but they are running 50% off their metal wall art this week, so she can take it in a get half back, which is nice.

Doesn't it look great in the middle of the avocado mirror and the blue green striping of the scrapbook background? 

One more close up. Then I'm done. 

But I guess the moral of this story is that you can't have enough frames? Because we tried for a while to find a layout that we liked while working with what we have but it just can't happen. I'll be making an Ikea trip in August so I'm going to pick up some inexpensive white frames there to add to this collage. There are a couple of Pinterest projects that I'm waiting to do until after the wedding that will be some filler for the wall as well. So needless to say it's a work in progress and this is what it looked like yesterday afternoon when we decided to be 'done'. So more to come I guess!