Completion!

Sometimes projects take longer than expected to be completed.  Life gets in the way and interests shift.  That might explain my temporary disappearance on here, but really that doesn't mean I haven't been creative for the last few months.  No, it just means that I've been thinking and planning and completing less.  However, I did finally finish decorating my office at work.  As a follow up to two previous posts on the same subject, Circle, circle, dot, dot. and Office Space, I have done just about everything I would do in an office space that isn't at home.  The biggest project I gave myself was the wall photo collage.  If you recall, I purchased a dark brown metal wall hanging from Home Goods.  The wall hanging has interlocking circles and before I ripped them off mostly with my bare hands, had candle holders on hinges at the bottom of the circles.  I spray painted the remaining wall hanging white and proceeded to cut out silver matte boards to fill the background of the wall hanging.  I purchased from A.C. Moore white picture matte boards in various sizes and cut out sections of the larger silver matte board to accommodate them.  Let me tell you, that was not easy!  And by no means did it come out perfect.  But, I think it looks cool.  

Back to the rest of the office for a moment... Remember, the cool clock I got from Home Goods?

 I also got some vases and a really cool hourglass.  I love hourglasses!  I learned my lesson from David Bromstad of Color Splash, group things in odd numbers.  Either one item, three or five.

I already put up a series of three photos that I took and a really cool faux succulent planter that I painted white (also from Home Goods). 

 

Putting it all together!

 

 

 

For the photo collage, instead of pictures of flowers and such that I've taken and which I already have on the wall to the left, I decided that I would pick some of my favorite and most happy memories of places I have visited. When I look up at my photo collage which is directly over my desk, I am transported to those special places once again and I feel happy.

 

And now for the final reveal of the photo collage!

Okay, so I know that it is a little hard to see the pictures clearly but..... 
Bottom left - California coastline near Big Sur off of Pacific Highway 1
Middle left - Ghost Tree along 17 mile drive in CA (right near the famous lone cypress which was a great picture too, but this one won)
Top left - Building facade in Old San Juan, PR
Middle right - The Palace Riu Hotel in Aruba from my balcony overlooking the fabulous pool with the ocean as a backdrop!  Palace Riu take me away!
Top right - Pretty mysterious gate leading into a lush green garden in Nantucket, MA
Bottom right - Close up of tiny pink flowers covering or rather carpeting the rocks and moss along the coastline of Lover's Point in Pebble Beach CA.  I hadn't and probably never will again see anything like it! 

Thanks for stopping by and Stay tuned for more creativity!!!

Circle, Circle, Dot, Dot.

In my post Office Space I showed you the metal circle wall hanging that I am going to be putting up in my office at work. I had gotten so far as to spray paint the piece white.  Here's a reminder of what it looks like.

The next step was to get matte board large enough to fill the circles.  I got really lucky at A.C. Moore.  They had really large silver matte board and after a few attempts at tracing the circles on the back of the board so that I could use just one board, I was able to make it work.  I initially forgot that because I was tracing on the wrong side of the board, when I turned the board over, the shape would be reversed.  Thank god, I figured that out before I started cutting!  Don't they look like warped Mickey Mouse heads?

Next step was to remove those candle holders hanging in most of the circles by hinges.  I thought I could somehow hammer out the hinge pins and the holder would come right off.  Well, I thought wrong.  Then, I got out my jewelry saw which came in so handy before, but alas, there wasn't enough room to use that tool either.  I will admit, I was getting frustrated.  Then I decided to try brute force and it worked!  I took the holders one by one and bent them forward and back - over and over - until finally, the metal weakened and the holder came off of the hinge.  I messed up my paint job and my hands were killing me afterwards, but off they were! 

Here is the new and improved metal circle photo collage on its way to being awesome!

Get the picture?  I went back to A.C. Moore and bought a bunch of white photo mattes in various sizes and my next task is to cut out the holes in the silver matte board for the individual white photo mattes.  I have picked out most of the photos I am going to display.  Don't you think it's going to look great?  Only trouble is, I will have to carry the metal wall hanging on my shoulder down the street to the Metro North train stop and find a seat where I can put this thing and then carry it through Grand Central to my building.  Luckily, my building isn't far at all and I figure I'll take a less crowded train so less people will look at me like I have five heads.  I will have to assemble at work.  It's going to be worth the pain though! 

Thanks for stopping by and Stay tuned for more creativity!

Office Space

I can't help but to make all the spaces I occupy, my own. And that includes my office at work.  It's not very big and there is no window, but there is a door and my name is on the plaque outside the door. Plus it has space for all of my supplies and things, so that's all I really need.  The walls are beige - obviously, I had no part it that decision, not only because employees don't usually get to choose the paint color for their offices, but also, I most likely would never paint my personal walls beige when there are so many other glorious colors (yes, I said glorious).  But, I can work with beige.  It is a great neutral backdrop on which to add my own little touch. 

How about this really cool wall clock made by George Nelson from my favorite store Home Goods. Isn't it cool!  It would look great in my apartment too.  Too bad the nice guy that hung it up for me, didn't center it on the wall very well.  Oh well.  (Apparently, I took this picture at 1:37pm one day).




My office is basically a square and there are two walls that are empty above the furniture, the third one has a wall of high file cabinets and the other one has the clock and the office door.  I have three framed photos that I am going to put on the wall behind me, stacked vertically.  I just have to get nicer frames.  But on the opposite wall which is the space above my desk, I've decided to do something special.  It's too wide to just put some dinky frame on the wall, so I happened to see this really cool metal wall art piece with interlocking circles in various sizes (from my favorite store) that I am turning into a picture collage.  You'll notice the color is dark brown and of course it wasn't going to stay that color and since you know me by now, you'll know before I even write it - I painted it white!  I spray painted it actually and it's now white.  You will also notice that there are candle holders which I hope to be able to use to attach matted photos to.  You won't even know they are there when I'm finished.  I'll talk more about that in the update to this post.  In the meantime here's the before and after of the wall hanging.  Do you see the two tiny circles that are used to hang this piece?  See that they are not aligned?  The left side needs to be lifted up a little bit and that is how the piece will really look when on the wall.  Do you see what I mean?  Another way to say it, is that the two big circles are actually horizontally even when hung on the wall.  I am bothering to point this out and explain it because I want you to be able to picture it. Anyway, I think it's going to be really cool when it's done.

 

 

Before:

After:

 

 

Thanks for stopping by and Stay tuned for more creativity!