Our Redneck Chandelier and Barn Light Electric

We're still loving the redneck Mason jar chandelier we made for the Winter Pinterest Challenge a few months ago, and I figured I'd give an update about how it's holding up.

Winter Pinterest Challenge: Mason Jar Chandelier

If you're coming over from Young House Love, Bower Power, or Hi Sugarplum, welcome!  Take a look around The Great Indoors.  I'd suggest starting by taking the House Tour or looking at the Project Archives.

I seriously did a big ol' happy dance when I got an invitation from Katie last week to participate in the winter edition of the Pinterest Challenge.  I started reading Young House Love back when it was This Young House about three years ago now, and then got caught up in the bacon-stravaganza at Bower Power not too much later.  So it kind of feels like these girls are family!  And I'm glad to get to know Cassie at Hi Sugarplum, too!

When I got on board with this challenge, I considered several different pins, like this fun stickered canvas inspired by Kate Spade, or a super easy pillow cover, or even starting in on my guest bathroom remake with a printed (shower) curtain.  But the one that really got me was this Mason jar chandelier on Style Me Pretty (see the pinned page here and the original post here with lots more inspiration; photography by Tanja Lippert Photography).

Lusting over our Reclaimed Barnwood Table

As you saw in this post, we went from a pile of old barn lumber to a beautiful table, effectively replacing this awkward four-seater...

...with this eight- (even ten if we try hard enough) top.  It's amazing how an appropriately-sized table makes the dining room feel bigger.

Our Reclaimed Barnwood Table

As I talked about during the dining room stop of the house tour, I've been dreaming of a bigger dining room table for years now.  Our first table only held four people, and we regularly have six people over for dinner. We all had to smoosh together around a too-small table, and our food had to be set up buffet-style on the kitchen counters, which then left no room to cook anything...  And God forbid we want to invite more than six people over to eat, because then we'd probably be better off eating on the floor.  It was about time we changed that.

So for Christmas, Mr. Great Indoors built me my very own beautiful table.  Of course, I took plenty of pictures through the process and thought I'd share them in two separate posts:  one dedicated to the building of our beautiful table and one just for all the tasty pictures.  Mmmmm.

I'm choosing not to call this one a "do it yourself" project because we had specialized furniture equipment at our disposal.  Mr. GI's family owns a furniture store, and they also have a shop full of equipment for manufacturing their own pieces.  They were kind enough to let us use their lumber and tools for a few days.  You could certainly do a good portion with your own sander, table saw, etc., but it would probably take longer than the three days Mr. GI took to build ours.

DIY Week: A (Basically) Free Wine Rack

Mr. Great Indoors built us a wine rack within a month of moving into the house.  He didn't have a lot of tools at that point, so he didn't build it to be very complicated. Here's a picture of the old rack from the day of our housewarming party a few years ago.  Boy, don't things look different!  Unpainted cabinets, old sliding glass door, old dishwasher... we don't really miss any of those things these days.

The Making of a Bookcase

Our dining room bookcase had gotten overrun with things, stuffed with books and odds and ends (some decorative, others just junk).  It was time for a makeover.  I didn't take a true before picture, but here's some of the stuff that came out of the bookcase.  There was more on the floor and in the chairs.  What a mess.

Decorating for Fall

At the beginning of each season, I shake things up around our house. Most of our decor stays the same from season to season (like the bookcase in our living room or the set-up in our bedroom), but I love switching our bookshelves and the entryway chalkboard. I try to do things a little differently every season, which is tough when I'm working on limited funds.  It forces me to be creative, that's for sure!

Here's the bookshelves on our living room wall (to the left of the kitchen).

French Door: Finished!

We are looooving our French Door, especially now that we've finished it all up.

I took a few days to paint the trim inside and out, and boy did it make a difference.  First I sanded the threshold with a rough then smooth sandpaper (forgot which numbers), then put on two coats of black outdoor paint.  The white trim around the sides took three coats.

The Princess and the Pea (Gravel)

Warning:  this is an incredibly long post, but there's a ton to cover.  If you're interested, all the product links are at the very bottom of the page with the price breakdown.  No princesses were harmed in the making of this blog post.

Who can guess what these two things have in common?

Around the House: Dining Room

We love entertaining, but our dining room doesn’t quite do our hosting appetite justice. Our dining room table is a four-seater that we can stretch to six if necessary. Until we can expand to our dream table (maybe similar to this one), we aim to recover the chairs. If you can believe it, we also have a matching tablecloth….

Our dining room corner is also home to our drinking habit liquor and accessories. Taking a cue from a picture I saw online, we hung two wine cases on the wall to house our beverages and some glassware. Mr. GI built our wine rack.