{renovate} back entry: week by week

Bet you thought, from the title, that I'm going to show you the finished back entry?! The good news: The entry is done! For now. The bad news: The photos are trapped on my camera thanks to a faulty card reader. Boo.

In case you haven't noticed, projects around this house take just this side of forever. Or maybe I'm just too close to the situation? Either way, it's hard not to compare myself to the other bloggers who whip up projects like it's their job. Even though a lot of the time it is their job :). But, our back entry reveal is a long time coming.

I'll get a new card reader this weekend and on Monday I'll share with you a full reveal! Today though, I thought I'd walk you through our process and show you  both why it took a while and a few sneak peaks :). We decided, at the beginning of this whole back entry project, that we needed project parameters. Rules, if you will, so that we weren't completely burnt out at the end. We've made the mistake before of working weekend after weekend on projects, which on top of our regular 45+ hour a week jobs, gets to be a little much. It leads to burnt out, cranky, and not very fun to be around spouses. And it's after projects like these that we usually don't touch the house again for months. So we figured, to make this project as fun as possible, plus still have energy for other projects we want to tackle this spring, we'd set rules. The project might take a little longer, but we value our sanity, and our relationship with each other.

Our rules for the back entry (and the hardwood project) was work only on Saturdays. That left me Fridays to play (I work 4-10's), and Chris and I Sundays to play. We had our good friends helping us, so we promised ourselves we'd get up early, work our tails off and then break at a reasonable hour and share dinner with them. This plan worked well! Yes, we were super tired by dinner on Saturdays, but each weekend we got tons done still had a day or two to play. At this point we're sick of the project, but not BURNT out. So, our parameters were a success!

So, let's take a look at how this process went down.

2008

This is what the back entry looked like when I moved in. Horribly ill-fitting (and completely non energy-efficient) door, spare refrigerator (obviously), bad linoleum, and walls that consisted partially of lath and plaster, partially of wood and partially of concrete. Needless to say, the extra fridge was the FIRST thing to go after I moved in.

2010

Baby steps. We had already moved the fridge out, and we replaced the door with one that fits! Yah for less draft and lower heating bills! :)

This (hilariously kindergarten-esq) picture give you a better idea of what we were working with, uneven wall wise. At some point Chris had started to tear up the floor. I can't quite remember why he didn't finish. 

2011
WEEK #1

I, ahem, tore up the linoleum and the 80+ year old tile underneath. More about that here.

WEEK #2

We heart our friends! They began helping this week. Originally I'd wanted to pull out the stairs and built new amazing ones, ala Centsational Girl's beautiful stairs. Once we got going though, it was clear that the walls and floor in the room were neither straight nor square. Awesome. Tearing them out completely was the only part of this project the boys said *no* to. Instead they tore the tops off, stabilized and reinforced them, and put them back together.

WEEK #3

The beginnings of board and batten! We had a couple things working against us in the this room: uneven wall surfaces, and less than square/even walls and floor. It took us forever to even begin working on this room because we thought we were going to have to gut it, and that sounded like SO. MUCH. WORK. One day it occurred to me that we didn't have to gut if we could just cover up the uneveness. Yah! Board and batten was a perfect choice because we could cover up as far as we wanted, and the perfect shelf height covered all the weird surfaces.

I felt pretty bad for the guys though. The internets make board and batten look like a piece of cake. But when you're dealing with uneven walls, there's a lot of piecing together, and reworking to make sure everything is level. They were such rock stars.

WEEK #4

Once the walls were up, week four was all about adding some trim and tile. Tiling was actually super easy (says the chick that didn't tile)! The square tile I picked out fit perfectly across the room.

WEEK #5

More detail work. I mean really, look at the angles we were dealing with here!

WEEK #6

Chris was starting to look like this .... so we took a week off and went to the beach. :)

WEEK #7

This was the only week we broke our *Saturday only* rule. Once I start painting, I have a really hard time stopping. HAhaha! I just realized that sounds weird. But, it's true. So, I started on Friday, Chris and I worked on it all day Saturday and I finished up on Sunday. Phew! It was soooo nice to have done though.

WEEK #8

This week we started moving things back into the space ....

Adding finishing details such as hooks ...

and art!

We love how the space came together and are so, so, so excited to show you the final pictures Monday! I hope you all have a great weekend! :)

{create} chocolate peanut butter tarte

First off, thank you for all the sweet comments about my chalkboard vases! I keep moving them around the house because they look so good everywhere :). And along this line, I created a DIY project gallery this week! I've been wanting to do this for awhile. It's the spot to go if you'd like to make any of the projects I've posted here. I'll be updating it with all upcoming projects as well.

At some point, I'll make gallery for recipes also. Or, I guess baked goods would be more accurate! New here? I LOVE to bake. And today I'm going to have to demand that you drop everything and go make this recipe. It's that good :).

I've mentioned before that we're a gluten and dairy free household, but we're secretly in denial. We don't want our food (especially our desserts!) to taste gluten or dairy free. What's the fun in that? So it's my mission to find recipes that are amazing and everyone will love. This recipe had me a chocolate peanut butter. Uh, hello classic delish combo.

I first made this recipe one night when we had my parents (the ultimate test) over for dinner. They LOVED it. So we made it for friends. Who, of course, loved it. But it was when my dad requested that I make him this tart, instead of a traditional birthday cake, for his birthday last week, that I knew it was time to share it with you guys.

Chocolate Peanut Butter Tart

Adapted from Healthy Indulgences

Ingredients:
Peanut Butter Crust

• 1/4 cup crunchy natural peanut butter
• 2 tablespoons unsalted butter
• 2 tablespoons beaten egg
• 1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
• 1 cup blanched almond flour, packed
• 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/4 teaspoon sea salt
• 2 tablespoons honey

Chocolate Filling

• 1 can full-fat coconut milk
• 4 tablespoons honey
• 1/8 teaspoon sea salt
• 3 tablespoons cocoa powder
• 4 oz semi-sweet chocolate, chopped or chips
• 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
• 4 tablespoons organic unsalted butter
• 3 egg yolks

Method:

Peanut Butter Crust

1. Preheat oven to 275 degrees.
2. Melt peanut butter and butter in a heat proof bowl. 
3. Stir in vanilla, egg and honey.
4. Add dry ingredients and stir to form dough. It'll be sticky.
5. Press the dough up the sides of a 9" tart pan.
6. Bake for 20 minutes. At 20 minutes, turn off the oven and do not open the door. Leave until ready to assemble.

Chocolate Filling + Assembly

1. In a medium saucepan, heat 1 1/4 cup coconut milk, honey and salt and simmer on low.
2. In a separate bowl, whisk together the rest of the coconut milk and cocoa powder. This helps the de-clump the cocoa powder. Add the mixture to the saucepan.
3. In another separate bowl, separate the egg yolks, and slight beat with a fork. Add 1/2 cup of the warmed coconut mixture into the eggs, whisking constantly and then add the egg mixture back into the saucepan.
4. Keep whisking. Cook for 3-5 minutes over medium-low heat stirring until mixture coats the back of a spoon.
5. Remove from heat and stir in vanilla and butter until butter is melted.
6. Remove your tart shell from the oven, and pour chocolate filling in almost to the brim. 
7. Cool tart uncovered in the freezer until the top becomes firm. Transfer to the refrigerator and cover with plastic wrap.

Note 1: When you get to the assembly step, you will have filling left over. This is a very good thing. You can do two things. 1. Pour into ramekins or muffin tins and freeze for snacks. 2. Pour into ramekins and put into the refrigerator for pudding snacks. Either is awesome.

Note 2: This dessert is best accompanied with Bailey's. Be warned though: this is not for the weak of heart. :)

I learned this weekend that my aunt doesn't like chocolate/pb combo? What you say? Yes, we all said that too. So my question for you is: what's your favorite chocolate combo? What's your least favorite combo? Mine: I LOVE chocolate mint, but HATE chocolate/fruit anything. :)

{create} chalkboard vase

Update 8/2/11: I'm submitting this post to the Pinterest challenge, because before Pinterest was all the rage, I had this little project tagged on the site to remember to actually make it. And sure enough, a few weeks later, I actually did! I can't say all my *to make* projects have been successful, or even attempted, but I do love this one. Thanks for stopping by! And, if you'd like to follow me on Pinterest, I can be found here. 

Happy Monday all! Did you have a good weekend? I missed you all on Friday! But, the sun was out, the temperature hit 65 degrees in Portland and, considering this was the first nice AND warm day we'd seen since last October, I didn't have it in me to sit in front of a computer. So I went outside and played instead and it was completely lovely :).

Today, I have a fun do-it-yourself project to share. A couple weeks ago I saw that Terrain is carrying these adorable chalkboard vases:

I immediately thought: um, I could make that. Do you guys do that? I do it ALL. THE. TIME. In fact, that thought keeps me from buying a lot of stuff, even though I usually never do make said item. So, I guess that's my internal budgeting feature kicking in :). BUT, I LOVED these vases and I did actually make my own.

I think they turned out super cute, so I wanted to share a quick and easy how-to + couple ideas how to use them, so you too can have cute chalkboard vases this spring.

First, I gathered a few glasses, jars, wine bottles, etc. that we had lying around the house and gave them a good washing.

Then, I coated them with an oil-based primer. We haven't had the springiest-spring (see first paragraph), so I went with a brush and paint route, rather than spray paint. Either would work for this project.

For paint, I grabbed a couple Martha Stewart sample pots from Home Depot and painted a few coats of each on both the outside and inside. I really like the look of the painted inside and outside of the vase.

Then I just taped off where I wanted the chalkboard paint and painted two coats on each bottle. Make sure you read the directions on the chalkboard paint. It gave very specific dry and re-coat times. I was a little worried about pulling the tape off, but it came up great and neither the background paint or the chalkboard paint chipped.

So once you've made the vases, what can you do with them? Here's a few ideas:

1. Use them as a centerpiece.

Put a couple sprigs of flowers in each vase, group them together and you have an arrangement that's both springy and graphic.

This is how my vases are currently hanging out in our kitchen.

2. Place settings

I would love to use these as place settings at my next dinner party or family holiday gathering.

Each person could take their own vase and flower home, which would be an adorable gift to give your family and friends.

I think this idea would also work so well for wedding place settings/favors. They were incredibly inexpensive to make -- especially with the *recycled* glass. And, I, personally, would love to take something like this home from a wedding!

3. Give away to friends to brighten their day.

I've surprised a couple friends with flowers over the last week or so. They're a great *happy new home*, *thanks for inviting us over* or even just *happy spring!*

How would you use chalkboard vases?