Family And Food--Need I Say More?

Just had a great week with my sister Crystal and her hubby Mike at Tybee Island!  My husband was attending the American College of Physicians state chapter meeting in Savannah and I tagged along and stayed to enjoy some fun family time.

Love you guys!

On the drive home I stopped for a fill-up in Metter, Georgia.  The town motto is "It's Better In Metter".   I asked one of the locals for a recommendation for lunch and they pointed across the street to a locally owned restaurant behind the Chevron station called Jomax BBQ.  

 I've noticed this place before--the parking lot is usually packed at lunch time.

The tantalizing aroma of barbecue meat smoking was in the air and there is a mouth-watering menu of selections but when I saw the chalkboard just inside the door that featured specials of the day I decided on a vegetable plate.

 I sat down and was immediately greeted by a friendly server who took my order--zipper peas, fresh creamed corn, and fried okra with a wedge of cornbread.  Mmmm mmmm!  And I splurged on sweet tea--you can always tell if a southern restaurant is the real deal by their tea...Jomax is the real deal!  The tea is perfectly sweetened and the servers keep coming 
by to refill your glass!

The dining room is clean and full of interesting tchotchkes.  If you have a sweet tooth the counter laden with homemade cakes and pies is a thing of beauty.

Thought I'd share this little hidden gem for those of you who may be traveliing along I-16.  Jomax is located at exit 104--just go north after you exit (right turn if you are headed toward Macon and left turn if you are headed toward Savannah).  The restaurant is on the left--just turn at the Chevron station and you will see it.

You'll be glad you did :)

Do you have any "off the beaten path" faves?  If so, please do share!

DIY Tutorial: Stenciling With A Freebie Seahorse Stencil!

 I bought this piece to use in the living room at Doc Holiday.  I thought It would be great to put a TV, DVD player and cable box in the top and store other stuff in the bottom half.

I loved this little cupboard in all of it's rustic goodness but I decided the black was just not going to work in the color scheme I had planned, so I decided to paint it.  This is how it went down.

First the piece (or pieces--it came apart into two pieces) was sanded with a medium grit sandpaper and my friend Loretta brushed on Zinsser Cover Stain primer--the one with the gold label.  Then it was sanded lightly with a finer grit sandpaper to eliminate brushstrokes.

Next I painted the piece with Sherwin Williams' Duration acrylic interior paint in semi-gloss.  I had some left over from painting another piece of furniture for the Coral Cottage.  The blue is 

SW 6485 Raindrop and the white on the drawers is SW 7005 Pure White.  I let the first coat dry for a few hours and then applied a second coat using a good brush.

 I had a little bit of lighter blue paint--SW 6763 Retiring Blue--from painting a dresser so I decided to try putting some stripes on the white part of the cupboard doors and drawer. 

 After measuring I marked off the lines with Frog Tape, a painter's tape that would come up without damaging the fresh paint.

Next I found a free printable seahorse stencil online to use on the doors.  I printed it and my son Jordan cut the stencil for me using an exacto knife and blue transparency-type stencil "paper" that I got from Michael's. 

 

 Jordan is very meticulous and exacting in all he does and he did a 
great job getting the stencil just right!

He was supervised by Rafael and Lucy so how could he go wrong?

 I measured and placed my stencil on the cupboard door.  Then I taped it in place with 
painter's tape....

 The key to stenciling is to use paint sparingly and to apply it with an almost dry applicator.  I used a pouncer sponge but you can also use a stencil brush.

 Get as much paint off the brush as you can and then apply to the surface in an up and down motion.  If you use too much paint or brush it on in a side to side motion, paint will creep under the stencil and it won't be a clean image.

I was using latex paint and I had a little too much paint on my first attempt so it is not quite as crisp as I wish it were.  I cleaned the stencil and did a mirror image sea horse on the other door with better results.  I am still fairly happy with the overall results so I left it--after all it's handmade!

For knobs I used these glass starfish knobs from an online source.  For more info check out this recent blog post.

This is how the lower part of the cupboard turned out...you likey?

Stay tuned and I'll show you what happened with the top of the cupboard!

Doc Holiday Dining Room--Done!

 Once the dining room space  at Doc Holiday was defined, it was time to decide where the dining room table would be placed so we could get the chandelier wiring in the right place to be centered over the table.  I needed to allow a minimum of 36 inches from the table to the wall so that chairs could be pulled out and diners seated comfortably.

 

After lots of measuring and pondering I decided to go with a round table and I started looking for one that could be expanded.  I wanted it to be larger than 48 and smaller than 60 inches in diameter--a size which turned out to be difficult to find.  After several trips to flea markets failed to turn up the right thing, I resigned myself to splurging on a new table.  For something as vital as a dining table that we would use constantly, it seemed like a necessity to make sure we 

had the right one.

 

When looking for something with specific measurements or features, I like to shop online.  It's so much easier to zero in on items that meet your needs and once you've selected something you can easily comparison shop for the best price with a few clicks of your mouse.  That's how I settled on this 54-72 inch Paula Deen dining room table...

 

 

 I like that it is a pedestal table because it will be easier for chairs to go around--no legs in the way!  The color is called "linen".  As much as I love a stained wood color we went with white because it would help the large piece of furniture to blend in with the walls and not take up so much space visually.

 

I saw it offered by several online stores and it even was sold by one of my favorite flash sale websites, Joss and Main.  But I found out that a store in Savannah named Whelan's carried this line of furniture and they were willing to offer me an incredibly good price and free in-home delivery without a wait! Sold!

Next I needed chairs--blue ones preferably.  These were some of the candidates under consideration...

 

 

The one from Pier One (bottom left) was the winner!  I bought six chairs and outdoor cushions to make them more comfortable.

 

I'm super-happy with the bar that divides the kitchen and dining room.  It was made from wood reclaimed from the renovation of the house.  It has some of the rustic imperfections that make it perfectly imperfect!  I love it!

The bar stools were one of my first purchases.  These well-priced, heavy duty, gorgeous yellow ones spoke to me (really!) when I saw them at Overstock.com...they are now also 

sold by Target.

 One thing I love about the dining room is the lighting above the bar.  When we were planning lighting for the house, designer Jane Coslick suggested we put a couple of these outdoor lights in.  They add such personality as well as light!

 And let me not forget to show you the mirror that my husband Henry painted.  It was found for next-to-nothing at a flea market and now that it is painted with Sherwin Williams Coral Reef paint (SW 6606) it really pops!

I'm still on the hunt for a secondhand buffet/console/sideboard to go beneath the mirror.  It's easy to find good or inexpensive ones but I need one that is good and inexpensive--not easy.  Woe is me--I guess I'll be "forced" to keep shopping until I find just the right thing:)

I had planned to use it in one of the bathrooms but it was too tall sooo...we made adjustments and I think it looks great!  

So this is the dining room!  Do you like it?

The table is shown here with the expansion leaf in.  It can easily seat 6 and possibly 8!

Are you free for dinner?

  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Chandelier Shangri la!

I showed you lots of chandeliers in my last post...lots of bee-u-ti-ful chandeliers that I loved but had to pass by because they were too costly for me at the end of our major restoration of 

Doc Holiday cottage.  But I was determined to find Chandelier Shangri la in my price range.

So, starting with an inexpensive off-the-shelf chandelier from Home Depot

    

and some spray paint--Rustoleum Painter's Touch Ultra Cover 2X Satin spray paint in Aqua--to be exact this is what my fixture looked like (minus the glass beads).

 It was in great need of some embellishment and some shades for the light bulbs! 

Here's what I did...

First I consulted my friend Beth Silvercloud, a very gifted jewelry artist--you can drool over her creations on her website here.  She had some great ideas and showed me which tool I needed to purchase in order to recycle some of the hooks from the glass bead strands.

 When Beth saw the shell necklaces I had purchased from Michael's she suggested that I use something with larger shells.  She felt (rightly) that the smaller shells were too tiny for the chandelier.  Here they are hanging on the chandelier.  They were kinked from being in the bag and I was trying to get them to straighten out.

In the interest of the budget, I decided to use the smaller shell strands for half of the project--the part where the strands come down from the top of the chandelier to each arm.  Like this...one...two...three...four...five...

...and six!

Then in keeping with Beth's suggestion that I use a larger scale strand of shells I found this rope with shells attached one day while shopping at Home Goods (where else?)!!

 I played with the strand to determine how long each section needed to be to look pleasing as it draped from arm to arm on the light fixture.  Then using some covered aqua-colored wire I found at Michael's, I marked each section

 Then it was time to attach the rope and shell strand to the arms of the chandelier.  I unhooked the other small shell strands temporarily and then reattached them after I attached the rope.

One at a time like this until I made it all the way around...

 Once the rope strands were attached I re-hooked the smaller shell strands.

Almost done!  I had some extra starfish left over and I decided to add them to give a little extra pzazz!  This is what it looked like...

 

Last but not least--shades.  The bulbs are way too bright without shades.  Voila!

 

Ahhh---It's Chandelier Shangri la!

Let's Be Enlightened!

The crown jewel of most dining rooms is the chandelier.  My remodeling budget at this point was more like rhinestones than crown jewels.  I did lots of looking around for a bargain.  First I went to a great flea market in Savannah called Two Women and a Warehouse.  They can usually be counted on for some funky, fun finds--and they did not disappoint.  I found this cool chandelier with 

strands of turquoise....

It was nice but a bit too small. 

I spent some time looking at online sources.  No luck with Craigslist or eBay but I checked on Etsy and found a vendor who made these fun pieces with canning jars.....but at $385.00 I had to pass them up.

 Here are three of my faves from Shades of Light--one of my all-time favorite sources.

I would have loved one of these especially the jute one (on the far right above) but they were way too pricey sooo.... I kept looking and found this gorgeous oyster shell chandy from

Low Country Originals...

 So many pretty things--so many expensive pretty things.  It became clear to me that I was going to have to buy an inexpensive chandelier and rework it so that is what I set out to do.  I found these great chandeliers at Home Depot that were more in my price range.

 

But the chandelier that really caught my eye was this one from Home Depot...

The glass beads could be replaced with strands of shells and it would be easy to spray paint the gold-tone metal before putting the shell strands in place.  At $169.00 it was more affordable so I decided to take it home!

Here is what it looked like after being sprayed with Rustoleum Painter's Touch Ultra Cover 2X satin finish spray paint in Aqua.  The electrician had just finished hanging it and he hooked the chain to make it shorter so the workers would not hit their heads as they worked.

It was time to get busy embellishing the chandelier.  I'll show you what I did next time!