One of the rooms in our new on-base townhouse that definitely needed some spicing up was our kitchen. It is a long galley-style kitchen with a small eat-in area. The cabinets are honey, the floor is grey, and behind the counter, the “backspalsh” is this grey plastic sheeting (which also happens to cover all our bathroom walls-eek). The combination of grey, white, and honey make the room look very “bleh”. I knew I needed to spice it up a bit, so I busted out my red accents–canisters, tea towels, salt and pepper shakers, and brainstormed on what to do with that backsplash area.

At first I thought I would get some decals, but all the ones that I liked were repeating patterns, and it was going to cost me $200+ to cover the whole area. Then I thought back to the Halloween party we host every year. For the party, I used red tempera paint to write in “blood” on the glass of many of our family portraits. It looks great, and washes right off with a little windex on November 1st.

Tempera paint dries to a matte finish that holds up pretty well, but then easily washes off, so it was the perfect solution. So I ordered some red tempera paint and an inexpensive wall stencil and I took this:

to this!

I love how it turned out! It’s not perfect…ideally you should paint a matte base coat behind the stenciled area first (obviously not an option for me with the glossy plastic sheets). This base coat keeps the paint you stencil on from running. So if you get up close, it’s far from perfect. But overall, I think the effect is great! And I love  it a heck of a lot more than the bleh grey! What do you think?

Several of you have asked about the clocks I have hanging in our living room. Well you were jumping the gun, because I was already planning on posting about them!

Back in California, we had an oversized clock that hung in our living room (a present from my folks). But alas, right before the big move to Japan, it fell off the wall and broke. We joked that “Mr. Clock” was Ollie’s first friend, because when he was teeny tiny, he would just stare at it. I think in his baby book I even listed “Mr. Clock” as his first friend. So sad. We miss you Mr. Clock.

After an appropriate mourning period, I knew that it was time to move on–we needed to replace Mr. C. But instead of getting one really large time piece, I opted to put up three little ones and set them to different time zones. This works out really well since our family is now spread out all over the world! It’s like Mr. Clock had babies! (Yes. I just said that.)

The first one is set to Atsugi, Japan, the second is set to wherever my Hubby is, and the last is set to LA time. When I know the West coast time, it’s easy for me to calculate midwest and East coast time. The clocks were uber-cheap from Ikea and the letters are just scrapbooking letters I had on hand in my craft boxes. Score! I love inexpensive little projects like this!

Phew. Crisis averted.

When I found out we were moving to Japan, there were many question I asked myself. Where would we live? Would I have a job? Would we take out dog, Paul? Will I ever be able to find pants that go past my knees?

As we started working on the details of our impending move over the fall, the answers to those questions became much clearer (on base in a townhouse, yes–I would begin telecommuting part-time, we had the option to bring Paul–but  because of our small yard we elected to send Paul to live with family in North Carolina, no–but  thank goodness Gap and Banana Republic mail to foreign bases). But one question that I was never able to find the answer to was “Would I be able to feed my addiction to spray painting?”

If you’re a longtime blog reader–you know that many of my home improvement projects involve spray paint. Don’t believe me? Check out the guest room, the nursery, and the man cave for just a few of the many items in our house reinvigorated with the elixir of life…ahem, I mean spray paint. Would I be able to continue repurposing? Friends…I now have that answer.

Ta Da!

Yes…only five minutes away from me right here on base at the Navy Exchange Depot (kind of like a mini office max/home depot) is a great little selection of Krylon Spray paints. Boy am I relieved! So you can look forward to many more spray paint projects over the next few years. It’s the little things…