Baby’s Own B&B

I consider myself a pretty punctual person.  Actually, I really hate being late and, until I had kids and time just slips away into the abyss when you’re getting them and yourself ready, I rarely ever was.  But, like I said, kids can throw a wrench into that agenda.  This doesn’t just go for getting from place to place but it goes for the blog as well.  We’re going to dig back a year for this little post.  Remember this Jenny Lind changing table we bought at a thrift store for $14?


Well we turned it into a co-sleeper in the week before Sebastian was born...Anthony’s dad was here and literally put in the last few screws the day before we came home with our first little guy.  It became his very own Bed & Breakfast – bed since, obviously, and breakfast because his food source, me, was right there next to him and at his beck and call.

We originally wanted to just buy a co-sleeper like this Arm’s Reach one (we borrowed a friend’s when we had the girls) but we didn’t want to spend the money to do so at the time and I couldn’t find a good used one anywhere.  It’s okay though because I love this one 10384 times more than the manufactured ones.

Unfortunately, since it was a last minute project and I was 40 weeks pregnant at the time we were building/refashioning it, I did a horrible job at documenting the process!  So sorry!  I’ll try to explain things as best I can in case you want to take on a Jenny Lind switcheroo yourself!  If you have any questions about the process that I don’t answer in the post, always feel free to email me (beaninlove@gmail.com)!  :)

The changing table itself was in pretty good condition.  It had been painted the periwinkle color and some of that paint was coming off in spots but it wasn’t a big deal since we were going to repaint it anyway.  The first thing we had to do though was get what would be the bed part level with the top of our mattress.  We figured out that if we just cut off the bottom legs completely, it’d be the exact height we needed it to be.  That meant that the bottom shelf would sit directly on the floor which made the whole contraption very stable.  The next thing we did was rebuild the top part of the table.  We removed the rails and spindles there and filled in all the holes left with wood filler.  Then Anthony built a three-sided frame with some narrow pieces of wood on the three sides that wouldn’t be up against our bed.  After all that was finished, he took it outside, sanded it down lightly, wiped it down, and gave it a coat of spray primer followed by a coat of white spray paint.  We let it sit outside in the unusually mild December weather to gas off for a couple of days.


We wanted to add a mesh layer around the top frame for extra security and so Sebastian could still use the co-sleeper when he learned to roll over.  I had a hard time finding mesh like the mesh they use on the top of actual co-sleepers so I just bought some strong white tulle from Walmart and Anthony stapled it around the top frame. 
Except when he was finished it looked really shoddy and was really rippled and so we ended up removing it.  It was tough to staple it on and make sure everything was straight and tight so we’ll figure out another way to either add some extra rails or mesh for the next kid.  For the time being, we used this co-sleeper up until the first sign of rolling over and then to the crib, Sebastian went.

To the two shelves below the sleeper, I added a gray and white geometric fabric I found at Hobby Lobby (here is the same fabric at fabric.com).  I made a simple template by taping together several sheets of computer paper I laid next to each other atop one shelf and used that large piece to trace and cut out the fabric shelf liner.  I attached the fabric with glue; several small dots of fabric glue placed every six or so inches around the shelf perimeter did the trick.
 

I also used the shelf template I made to cut out a mattress, made from some three-inch foam we bought at JoAnn Fabrics.

  

Last, I whipped up a little fitted sheet I made out of a queen-sized sheet I found at Dirt Cheap for $3 that matched my shelf liner fabric (tutorial here).  I laid a waterproof mattress cover (from Babies ‘R Us”) over the foam mattress and put the sheet over that so that if our spitter spit up on his bed, it wouldn’t soak down into the difficult-to-clean foam.

Here’s the co-sleeper in action (minus the now one-year-old baby):


When I posted the after picture at the beginning of this post on Instagram, there was a little confusion about how it worked and I even received some emails questioning how safe it was.  Yeah.  My bad for posting it away from the bed when in reality, that’s where it belongs.  Hopefully this clears up all that confusion and those who were concerned about Sebastian’s safety can rest in peace knowing we don’t intentionally endanger our kids.  :)

 
We actually moved my nightstand over and slid the co-sleeper all the way up to the wall when we used it.  That way, I was face-to-face with him and didn’t have to sit up and bend over to see what he was or wasn’t up to.  Also, everything that Sebastian owned was stowed in baskets underneath on the co-sleeper shelves which was awesome.  Since he didn’t yet have a room to call his own, it was great that he at least had one space where we could store all his stuff.
 
Since it was the dead of winter when he was born and I needed blankets, I also tucked the comforter and sheets that were in the way between the mattress and the co-sleeper so that they wouldn’t somehow end up over Sebastian.

I think for our next kid we’re going to do a little reworking with the top frame since the netting didn’t work out.  I’m not sure how that’ll all go down yet but we’ll add a few more rails in there probably.  I know it looks like there’s a good amount of space in between the two top horizontal rails but you’d be hard pressed to fit a newborn through that space and, like I mentioned above, we only used the co-sleeper until the first signs of rolling over happened, then it was to the crib he went.

 .           .           .

Update:  When our fourth kid, Gianna, came along, I whipped up some fabric straps that I tied along the top of the co-sleeper frame. 

But back to the original post…

.           .           .

I borrowed a model for effect:


I hauled this thing from Sebastian’s room, where it’s been sitting for the past year, into our room for pictures and then hauled it back into his room and now it sits in his closet and serves as extra shelving which works perfectly!  In use even when it’s not being used for its intended purpose!  I like those kinds of things.  :)

One last before and after:

I’ve been seeing lots of Jenny Lind changing tables like this one all over second-hand sites so if you’re looking for a great co-sleeping option, you should take a stab at this one!  If and when we rework the top of our sleeper, I promise to write up a full tutorial!

Happy Monday!

Cabinet Makeover + Cheap DIY Sponge Pattern

Where oh where did we leave off in regards to the laundry room cabinet…oh yes, paint.  I filled in the scrollwork and got it painted and then left you all hanging because life, as it usually does, got in the way.  Well, last week, after three straight days of all three kids napping at the same exact time, I finally finished.  See?
 
[Sorry for the sun glare in the ‘after’ picture…naptime also happens to be my take-a-picture-of-completed-projects time and at that time, in the laundry room anyway, the sun doesn’t play nice.]

It looks SO much better than the old wood thing it started out as, especially with those decorative holes and the scrollwork filled in.

So after I painted it, we set it back in the corner where it now lives.  Next up was installing a couple of shelves in the top part (we removed the very top shelf you can see in the ‘before’ picture because it didn’t extend all the way to the back of the cabinet, replacing it with a new one that did).  There were already holes drilled down the sides where I could place shelving pegs to hold the middle/second shelf, but they didn’t go up far enough to fit in another shelf at the top (the previous one was held in with wood supports that we removed).  So, I drilled my own holes. 

First, I measured where I wanted the shelf to go.  It was as simple as measuring up from the next shelf down (the second shelf) and making a few marks that were vertically in line with the existing peg holes below.  I had to make sure that when I drilled the peg holes, I didn’t drill through the sides of the cabinet.  But, the holes needed to be deep enough to fit each peg.  So, I stuck the drill bit in an existing peg hole and taped off the end where it met the cabinet.

Then I drilled a hole where I had made the peg marks, only drilling until the tape touched the cabinet.  

Comprehendo?

It was an easy way to prevent myself from drilling through the side of the cabinet.

Later, I simply inserted the shelf pegs and the shelf.  You can kinda see how the pegs (purchased at Lowe’s) work in this picture:
 
There are four – two towards the front of the shelf and two towards the back – that hold up the shelf. 

Next, let’s talk about the cross pattern on the back of the cabinet.  What you saw in that ‘after’ pic above was not my original intention.  Initially, I wanted to draw a pattern on with a gold sharpie paint pen.  And I did, but I only got as far as the very bottom of the cabinet…thankfully.  When I had finished drawing the pattern late one night I thought I might as well go in and put a coat of Polycrylic over it for extra protection to stay ahead of the game.  But, when I started painting on the Polycrylic, my (painstakingly) drawn on pattern was smearing and disappearing right before my eyeballs!!
 
[Take a picture.  It’ll make you feel better…not.]
Water-based yo.  DON’T USE WATER-BASED SHARPIE PAINT PENS IF YOU’RE PLANNING ON WIPING-DOWN OR PAINTING POLYCRYLIC OVER YOUR MEDIUM!!!  I don’t know if I’d be sane right now if I had figured that out AFTER I had drawn the pattern on the entire back of the shelf as was the plan…I’m going to say not sane.

So, after I mourned the pattern, I wiped off the Polycrylic and what I could of the pattern and painted right over the top of it with white paint, to start anew.  Onto plan b.  Instead of the sharpie route, I sponged on a cross pattern using a sponge brush I had laying around.

I cut the pointed top off of it and used the flat surface that gave me to sponge on two intersecting lines.
I had a picture of the sponging in-process but I can’t find it so hopefully you get my gist.
Each cross is a little different and the whole pattern is very imperfect but I like it.  I semi-measured, semi-eye-balled cross placement and for the most part, everything’s pretty even.  I used a test pot I got for free with a coupon (color:  Desert Hotsprings by Valspar and from Lowe’s) so plan b didn’t cost me a dime…a slight condolence after my sharpie fail.  :)

I sponged the crosses onto the entire back of the cabinet (minus the electrical box door) and was planning on sponging the tops of the shelves as well but in the end I only sponged it onto the bottom two, wood shelves.  We ended up buying an uber-cheap remnant of laminate for the top two shelves and I didn’t know if they’d hold up being painted in a laundry room cabinet that was going to hold some hefty stuff.  So, I kept them as they were.

I went back and forth between sponging or not sponging the electrical box door.  (Anthony did such a great job cutting out a little hole for it, no?)  On one hand I thought it’d look great it if was sponged and blended (hopefully) right in to the back of the cabinet but on the other, when we move someday and (possibly) take this cabinet with us, I’m sure I’d be cursing myself for making my future, moving self have to paint over the crosses on the panel when I had 10947 other things to do.  So, for now, it stays plain jane.

There’s still a lot of organizing to do on the cabinet which involves the need for some new storage bins (anyone have any ideas where I can get cheap storage containers??) but it’s a lot better than the pile-up we had before:

Maybe?
It’ll look even better once I figure out a better shoe storage solution next to it and I might even cover the front with a fabric curtain to just hide everything.  Time will tell.

Oh, and can I just go on a tangent here?  I found this tip on Pinterest last week on how to avoid plastic bag clutter by folding your plastic bags and storing them that way so that they take up less space and so I folded all of our bags (they’re all hanging on a knob I screwed through a hole in the top right of the cabinet – like the knobs I placed on the girls play fridge).  Five minutes later I placed them back into the bag whence they came and look at how much of a difference it made:
 
Same amount of bags; just folded.  Crazy, isn’t it?!

In the Corner

Wow-eee.  Life is busy, no?  Places to be, things to do, people to see, thoughts, more thoughts, kids, more kids, throw in a cold or four…add yours to the list because I’m sure you can relate!  That’s why posting around here has been minimal the past few weeks and why the project I’m about to tell you about has been in-progress for a month now and still isn’t finished.  You see, we’re on a mission to re-organize our laundry room.  I’m not sure why this whole process started…it might’ve been the annoyance of looking at this to long:
The corner in question.  It’s organized ‘per-say’ – drawers full of painting supplies, spray paint, tools, paint chips - but overall it’s just a big heap of random stuff that’s really not the most aesthetically pleasing sight we ever did see.

Enter this big lug:
 
I found him at Goodwill a month ago.  At $19.99 his tall, dark, and not-so-handsome physique was just what we needed to take that corner of the laundry room to the next level of organization.  We removed the built-in lighting and also ripped out the top shelf, as it didn’t extend all the way to the back of the cabinet, in order to replace it with a few more shelves and left the bottom opening as it was because it’s the perfect size to accomodate our shop vac.

The plan was to paint him white before we put him in his place.  So first things first, I wanted to make him a little less country and a lot more modern by filling in the scroll work and decorative holes.
 

To do that, I used a plastic putty knife with this Elmer’s wood filler that we picked up from Lowe’s: I’ve used it before (to fill in holes in this desk and this dresser and cracks in this loveseat) and have been really happy with it.  It dries nice and hard without cracking.  However, it doesn’t sand down to a very smooth finish so I usually use it in conjunction with spackle.  More on that later.
Side note:  For the loveseat, I used a tube of the wood filler and when I went to use it for the desk, I found it had hardened near the opening, even though I had the lid screwed on nice and tight.  So, since the stuff towards the other end was nice and soft, I cut off the top of the tube and pulled from there, taping the opening off and storing it inside a plastic bag for extra protection against drying.
 
Hoewever, when I pulled it out again for this project, the whole tube was hard and unusable so we that’s when we purchased the tub of filler, hoping its fate will be the opposite.  I’ll keep you updated but so far, so good (This just in!  Kelly told me she puts saran wrap over hers before she lids it and it keeps hers nice and nothardened!  Thanks for the tip Kelly!)

To fill in the scrolls and holes, I scooped up a large chunk of wood filler and spread it over the holes like I was buttering bread, making sure I pressed it in enough that it filled the entire area.  Then I drug my knife across the surface, scraping off excess.  When you do this you don’t want to scrape off all the excess.  There should be more filler than you need over your filled areas, sort of like a miniature hill.  You’ll make everything smooth and level by sanding the dried excess off later.  Make sense?  Here’s what the top of the cabinet looked like after I was done filling:
 

So, after everything was filled and dry (since the holes were pretty deep, I waited a whole 24 hours to ensure the filler was completely dry), I went over it all with a fine-grit sanding block to remove the excess and level the surface as well as I could.
 

I mentioned above that I like to use spackle in conjuction with wood filler.  Wood filler has fibers in it that make it unable to be sanded down to super smooth surface.  So, using this spackle and a metal putty knife (our plastic putty knife has some tiny divots on the edge so metal was better to get a smoother finish)…

…I went over all the areas I had filled with the wood filler using the same technique, only with spackle.
       
After that was dry (I spackled in the morning and it was good and dry by late afternoon), I got out the fine-grit sanding block again and sanded everything until it was smooth and level.  After wiping it all down with a damp rag to get rid of any sanding dust, I was ready for paint.

The cabinet front, bottom, and shelf are solid wood; the sides are particle board.  The wood parts had a few large knots which tend to bleed through latex paint (so I’ve read). 

To keep them from bleeding through my handiwork, I brushed a thin layer of oil-based primer over them first. 

Once those areas were dry, I primed the rest of the piece with some Kilz primer.  I reminded myself over and over to take pictures of the cabinet primed before I painted but still forgot.  Not a huge deal but just know that when I prime, I just make sure everything is covered.  Primer will probably always be splotchy and that’s ok.  Next up was paint.  It took me three hours on four different nights and naptimes to prime the cabinet so I opted to spray paint the cabinet with its final layer of latex paint.  Not canned spray paint though.  Some good friends of ours offered to let me use their paint sprayer so I used some basic white latex we had on hand (by Olympic).  This Graco paint sprayer is what I used to spray on the paint.
It was really cool to be able to borrow it so I could get a feel for how paint sprayers work and whether we should invest in one.  It definitely took me more time to set up and learn how to use it than it did to paint.   However, I apparently have a lot more learning to do because one side of the cabinet turned out really drippy…
 
I either added too much water to my second round of paint or painted too close so next time I’ll have to pay attention to those two things to make sure it doesn’t happen again.

I painted the cabinet outside and while it was drying, there were some things to take care of in its corner:
I wanted to paint the doorbell white (like I did our other doorbell), spray paint the electrical box white so that it’d blend in in with the back of the cabinet, and touch up the wall paint where we removed an old key box.
 
To spray paint the electrical box, I simply protected the area around it by taping pages of a magazine (thank you Franciscan Way) to the surrounding wall.


Then I primed it with Rustoleum’s Clean Metal primer and spray painted it white.


Then in went the cabinet!  We have yet to cut out a hole in the back so that we can access the electrical box without having to pull the entire cabinet out from the wall but so far so good!
 

Like I said above, we’re not done yet.  There are still a couple more things we want to do before everything gets put back and organinzed and those things started with a bang last night in the form of a DIY fail.  Stay tuned.

Also, a sneak peek!  The french door leading from the kitchen to the laundry room is becoming a reality…slowly!  We used an old wood door we found at ReStore, cut out the middle (which is now on top of the washer and dryer working as a countertop), and hung it!  I managed to prime it while I primed the cabinet but that’s all the farther we’ve gotten.
 
We would’ve had it finished a few weeks ago but the glass insert turned out to be more expensive than we thought so we had to postpone in order to save up.  A typical step in the life of budget-ridden folk, I guess.  :)  All the details on how that all went down up to come hopefully soon.

And that’s all she wrote…so far!  We’re moving the kids rooms around today which means that Sebastian is going to his own room and the girls are moving to another.  I’ll be crying out of sadness that they’re getting older and smiling out of happiness that I won’t have to tip-toe around my own room anymore to avoid waking a sleeping boy, all while I move furniture this afternoon.  What are you up to?  Any projects that have been in-progress for quite some time now or are you pretty good at starting and finishing without too much time in between?  Any paint sprayer users out there?  Any secrets or tricks I should know?  Spill ‘em!  I need to make this relationship work!  :)

Have a great Tuesday!

Tuft Love

In case it’s your first time to casa de Bean In Love, here’s the nutshell about what this post is all about.  We had a rectangular coffee table, bought a sectional a few years later, rectangular coffee table didn’t jive well with new sectional, sought out new, round coffee table, found octagonal one at Goodwill for $12 in hopes to turn it into an ottoman for our footsies.  Got it?  Good.  :)

Here ‘tis:
 

Here’s how we did it and how you can make your very own.

Let’s start with…

THE FRAME
The coffee table came home with us from thrifting pretty beat up but I did the usual light sanding (because it was so worn I barely had to sand this piece), a couple of thin and even coats of white spray primer (Rustoleum from Walmart), and a few thin and even coats of white spray paint (Rustoleum American Accents).

THE CUSHION BASE/WOOD
The original plan was to cut a piece of wood that was the exact same size as the glass top, thereby fitting right into it’s spot.  Then we were just going to upholster the entire top of the coffee table; wrapping and stapling the fabric over and under the existing ledge.  But, to keep the ottoman from looking too much like a large mushroom, we (Anthony) came up with a better idea to upholster a piece of wood slightly larger than the existing glass but smaller than the top of the table. 

The red line in the picture below represents the size the wood was cut to and the red dots represent the holes Anthony drilled and how/where the screws that held the cushion on would go. 
 

We used 1/2 thick plywood from Home Depot and (bonus!) actually bought a large piece that gave us two wood bases instead of one.  The plan is to make a second cushion we can switch out with the first one when the need for change strikes.  But that’s on the back burner with baby #3 coming in a month.  We might add a 2x4 underneath and across the base and for added support but the 1/2 plywood was strong enough to withstand Anthony standing on the ottoman and will definitely hold up to our resting feet and the climbing tots.

Home Depot cut the plywood into two large squares for us so all Anthony had to do was cut off the corners to get the octagon shape we needed.  He used some fancy measuring and a circular saw and that’s all I know about that.  If you have any questions about cutting wood, inbox me or comment and I’ll refer them to the pro.  :)

THE FOAM
You might remember it took me forever to find foam.  Working on a budget, we didn’t want to spend the $44 it would have cost to buy a three-inch thick slab of foam from the fabric store (and that was during a 50% off sale!) so I scoured the interweb and after a few frustrating surfs, found this post over at The Shabby Creek Cottage.  Gina upholstered a coffee table using an egg crate mattress and it looked pretty darn good.  My friend Jenn also used the same thing to upholster a headboard and it too looked and still looks awesome.  So, my decision was made.  I made a trip to Walmart and grabbed two full-size foam mattresses (one-inch thick).  (Side note:  I couldn’t find “egg crate” mattresses so settled on the “5-zone” kind hoping it’d all still pan out the same, which it did.)  The plan was to layer the mattresses to give us the height and cushion we were looking for.

So first I traced the wood base onto the smooth side of the mattress with a sharpie.
   
I wasn’t sure if I was going to layer three or four together so I cut four just in case – two on each mattress.  I ended up using three layers.

For extra staying power, I glued two of the layers of foam “zone” or rippled sides together with some spray adhesive we had on hand.  (Side note:  Make sure to do this outside!!  It smells and surely you don’t want glue all over your stuff!)

Next I stacked the layers onto the wood base like so:

It was single layer, smooth side down first (or against the wood) on top of which were the two glued-together layers.
I didn’t glue the bottom layer to the wood because it stayed put well on its own and would even more so once the tufting was done and the fabric was over it.

THE BUTTONS AND TUFTING
We wanted our ottoman to be tufted and we wanted some deep tufting.  So I picked up a craft cover button kit from JoAnn fabrics (brand:  Dritz, size: 45 or 1 1/8 inch, direct link here).

Verses using a different, coordinating or contrasting fabric for the buttons, we used the same fabric we were using to upholster the cushion.

I won’t go into the details of how to assemble the buttons because the instructions on the button kit are awesome but I will say that, per the recommendation of a few experienced tufters in blogland, we added a dab of Liquid Nails to each button before securing the backs to keep them from popping off.  We let them sit and dry for several hours before we used them.
 

Behold, the buttons:
   

Next up, the tufting.  This is where I ran into a little dilemma.  I wasn’t sure how to pattern the tufting.  If you’re an Instagram or Facebook friend, you might’ve have seen my plea for help.  Which one?  The top pattern or the bottom?

Well, the majority went for the bottom pattern along with Anthony but my initial thought was towards the top pattern.  After deciding, redeciding, checking what y’all had to say, and redeciding again, we both decided we liked the top pattern best.  (A BIG THANK you to my good friend Lauren who supplied me with picture texts of their round, tufted ottoman during this whole process so I could see how it was tufted/constructed, not to mention for dealing with my panicked text pleas for advice.)  :)

So, once the pattern was decided upon, I carefully measured out where each button was to be placed, starting with the center and marking the spots with a sharpie.
 

Then Anthony drilled the holes where I marked.
 

(Side note:  We tufted before we upholstered/stapled the fabric around the edges so that we could get our buttons fairly deep into the cushion.  If you’re going for shallow tufting, I’d upholster first.)  Before we started installing buttons, we made sure the fabric was centered over the ottoman (and if you’re using batting, make sure you grab it and lay it under your fabric.  We were planning on using some and completely forgot!  It shouldn’t be a big deal though.)  Then we started with the center button and moved out to the circle, doing one button and then the one on the opposite side of it until all the buttons were installed.
 

Also, to make sure the fabric was evenly laid out around the ottoman and folds were where they should be, we pinned fabric together around the center button over the place where each outer button would be.  Make sense?  I hope so.
It’s probably not necessary to do this if you’re not tufting in a circle but we found it kept us from pulling too much fabric towards one button or another.

But, let’s backtrack a little to the how-to of tufting.  I mentioned above that we wanted deep(er) tufting.  (We used this tutorial on deep tufting at Sarah M. Dorsey Designs.  It was so helpful and we couldn’t have done it without it!!) 
Here’s what you’ll need to get in deep:
A long upholstery needle
Thick thread or twine (we used the same twine I wrapped these soap dispensers with)
Your covered buttons
A staple gun
Two people
 
With the entire cushion set on two of our dining room chairs acting as saw horses, Anthony laid underneath the cushion, working from the bottom as I worked from the top.

So…

First, thread the needle and push it up through the pre-drilled hole from underneath the cushion. 

Next, pull one end of the string up and out of the hole and remove the needle.  Make sure not to pull out the other end!


Then, thread on your button followed by the needle and insert the needle back down through the pre-drilled hole to person numero dos below.  I found that using the end of the screwdriver to push the needle down through the fabric and foam saved my fingers from distress.  You might too.  :)

Once person #2 has the needle and thread pulled all the way through, push on the button until it sits as deep as you’d like…

…until person #2 can tie a knot in the string and staple it to the wood to hold it in place like so:

(For even deeper tufting, you can also carve out a little more room into the foam below each button, like Sarah did.  We skipped that step.)

 
UPHOLSTERING
Like I noted above, we tufted before upholstering to get our buttons in deep.  Because of this, our foam and fabric were both now secured to the cushion so all that was left to do was staple the fabric to the underside of the wood base.

Before stapling though, I cut off the upper corner of the top layer of foam to make getting a rounded top edge of the cushion a little easier.
 

Then we set the entire cushion on its side and began working our way around.  Starting in the middle of one straight edge, we pulled the fabric tight and popped in a staple, then stapling towards the corners on the underside of the wood.  We placed the staples about 2-3 inches in from the edge.  The process wasn’t any different than upholstering a chair seat, like this desk chair we did a couple of months back.   

Staple the middle of one side, staple to each corner, staple at corner, turn to next side, repeat process x 8 until all sides were nice and tight.

When we were done, there was a lot of excess fabric hanging around, not to mention the excess string hanging from the tufting knots.
 

But, a little trim later and we had a nice, clean undercarriage and enough extra fabric to make a couple of throw pillows later.


Before we attached the cushion to the table base the next morning (because by this time it was close to midnight), I took the entire cushion outside and gave it a nice spray-down with Scotch Gard for protection from stains and spills, heaven forbid.
 
This is another must-do-outside because this stuff will burn your nose hairs right off. 

And finally, our new cottoman, coined by my bestie Megan Rose.  
Originally I loved the shelf underneath this particular coffee table and envisioned baskets upon it hiding toys but now I think it makes the whole ottoman look a little too “country” for my taste.  What do you think?  It comes off with a twist of a few screws and I think we’re leaning towards taking it off for a more open feel.  Stay tuned.

I know what you’re thinking, “Something’s off in the picture above…”.  Yep, we split up the sectional hence the lack of an arm that loveseat’s not sporting.  We rearranged our living room so the girls could have a larger space of their own in the corner (no more toys stashed everywhere; they’re all in that corner now) and we’re still not sure what we think of it.  Time will tell…

 

The cottoman is definitely the bright spot in the room and makes all of the undone decorating in the room even more obvious and, well, majorly wanting.  My first thought upon seeing it all set up in the room was how bad it clashed with our $35 rug.  I was tempted to run out right then and there to grab another.  Patience be with me though.  Change be acomin’!

I wrote a little post about our plans for this room several months back but just for another quick overview, here they are in a nutshell:

 
(photo of rug idea from here, chair fabric ideas from here)

You know I’ll keep you posted on progress.  :)

And last but never least, a budget breakdown:
Coffee table:  $12 (Goodwill)
Spray primer and paint:  $8 (Walmart)
Plywood:  $9 (Home Depot) We only used half; the remaining half is cut and stored to make a second cushion.
Foam:  $21 (mattress foam from Walmart)
Fabric: $29 (Dena Nadia Green Tea from eBay but originally found at JoAnn Fabrics) I still have 20 inches to use for a couple of throw pillows or whatever else I can come up with.
Button kit:  $5 (with a 50% off coupon at JoAnn Fabrics)
Twine, staple gun, staples, and screws:  already had
Liquid Nails:  already had
Scotch Gard:  already had (Walmart)
GRAND TOTAL:  $84
Not the cheapest project to date but definitely worth every penny (and because we spent it all over a long period of time, it didn’t seem so hard on our bank account).  Just ask our feet.  :)

Anyway, with the budget breakdown I’ve hit 2212 words so I think wrapping up is probably a good idea.  Like always, if you have any questions or if I need to explain anything better, just holler!  If you find this tutorial useful and create your own coffee-table-turned-ottoman or tufted whatever, we’d love to know and see what you’ve created!  Use the hashtag #heybeanlook on Instagram or email us (beaninlove@gmail.com) or find us on our Facebook page or leave comment.  I’ll get back to you asap!

That’s it…until we reupholster the extra cushion that is.  Let’s get this baby out first though and see what 3 under 2 gives us time-wise.  :)

Have a great Monday everybody!