Recipes, projects & products that don’t suck.

When we purchased our home nearly nine years ago, almost every single wall in the house was off-white. At the time, I was into bold color. So I went nuts with color on the walls. Bright, sunny yellow in the living room. A cool medium blue in the kitchen/dining room. Warm mocha in the bedroom. Tuscany olive-green in the entry. You get the idea. While I didn’t put any red on the walls (except in the basement), I had touches of red everywhere – in accessories, furniture, artwork. In the kitchen, we had a red hutch and red bar stools. A couple of years ago, I was ready for change. I decided to go more neutral. After the walls were toned down, I slowly began…

TGIF! Not only is it Friday, but it’s also makeover day for 86 Lemons. Check out the new blog design – what do you think?! What I had before was a purchased WordPress theme, which I did my best to customize. But my programming skills are, well – NIL! Fortunately, a friend referred me to an amazing programmer, Mila. I redesigned the blog in Photoshop, then sent my files to Mila and voila! – she made it all happen. I’m so thrilled with the results! A little bit about Mila. She is from Ukraine (and lives there currently). Her English grammar is better than most Americans’. We’ve only communicated through email and it has been a breeze. If you are looking for a blog/web programmer/designer,…

This floor lamp has been begging for a makeover for years now. When I first got it, I painted the rusty metal base ivory to match the shade. It’s been that way for over ten years now. If you’ve been following along, you know I have a slight obsession with a paint color by Valspar called Summer Cottage. I used it on my front door, my wall and my hutch. At the risk of overdosing on Summer Cottage, I decided to paint the lamp shade this color, too. And the base got a fresh coat of bright white paint. Here we have the “before” shot… I taped off the sockets and cord before applying a couple of coats of Rust-Oleum Painter’s Touch Semi-Gloss White. The…

On Friday, I gave you a little sneak peek of this project on Facebook. I’ve had quite a bit of red in my decor for some time now, and I’m ready for a change. Slowly but surely, I’ve been swapping out my red pieces for fresh, light colors. We’ve had a red hutch in our dining room for about eight years. I considered painting it white. But, believe it or not, I already had a white hutch in another room (talk about shopping the house!). It was being used as a bookshelf/office storage in Hubs’ office. I never really liked it in that room – too big for the space. So, the white hutch took the place of the red one, the red one was…

Our front door was neglected and had so much room for improvement. I’ve been trying to decide on a new paint color for a couple of months. First, I was sure it should be navy. Then black. Hubs wanted red (um, no). Then I was inspired by this amazing house. Can I please live there?! I chose Valspar’s “Summer Cottage” (you may recall my use of this same color for the pop of wall color). We actually used it on the door first, and I liked it so much that I bought a gallon of interior paint. I might use it for our bedroom. Or the bathroom. Or both. Painting the front doors (there are two) sounded like such a simple, easy, quick thing to do. But…