Updating Yard Sale Frames Alongside Spray Paint

We found these babies at a yard sale and haggled them down to $10 a pop. Let us call them our twig & berries.

We immediately thought the extra tall shape of the frames would be ideal for either side of our bed above the glass based lamps on the makeshift simply-for-now side tables (they are way too small and do not have any drawers for storage) on this quite unfinished side of our master bedroom:

We certainly had plans to change out the art. They are prints of the berries and wildflowers of Alaska (which is kind of lively and fitting since we honeymooned there) but they felt a bit too grandma for us.

But we enjoyed the long rectangular shape of those $10 frames. So we hung them up, simply to see what we were dealing with. Do not mind all the blank space on either side of the walls, we still have furnishings to add to fill up this cavernous room. And once we change out the side tables we might rehang the art a bit further out from the bed or higher up depending on the new furnishings.

We certainly liked the shape of our new frames, but we were not crazy about how the warm wood tones sort of clashed with the darker tones in the thrift store wood candle holders on either side of Sir Ram above the bed…

… along with the leaning mirror, and the leather chair in the corner:

And yes, we are aware that not all couples aspire to sleep under a giant resin ram head. We are indeed a rare and special breed. Akin to centaurs and unicorns. Speaking of that above-the-bed stuff, we originally mentioned that the perhaps-too-small-art might go, but months later it is still there and has strangely grown on us.

But back to the yard sale frames. I in fact chose to do something fully insane for me when it came to them (but totally ain’t-no-thang for anyone else). I opted to spray the frames with oil-rubbed-bronze spray paint. I know you might think that given my recent ORB kick (here and here and here) this is not news. But, you my friend, would be wrong-O with a capital O. Why? Because virtually every frame that we own is white (both in this house and our first one) and we must own five million of them! Dark frames have never been our preference. White is my eternal jam..

Until now, apparently. Total curveball. At least to a white-frame loving fool like me.

I will spare you the spray painting play-by-play (you can find some general pointers here) except to point out these two things:

• the glass was so tightly fitted that I worried I’d break it if I tried to remove it before spraying – so I simply covered it with newspaper
• I laid each frame up on a big ol’ rock from the yard so the sides would not stick to the “drop cloths” and peel off the finish when I picked them up

While I was at it I carefully took out the mats and sprayed those white for a cleaner look.

Now brace yourself for the hottest picture you’ve ever seen on the internet:

My white mom legs + black dress socks = sexy beast. I cannot believe I am sharing this, but the whole dark sock thing is in fact a spray painting trick I implement nearly every time. Instead of worrying about getting rogue drips on my shoes or flip flops (or my feet, which I could then track into the house) I simply don some dark socks, spray to my heart’s content, and slip them off at the backdoor so I do not track anything in (and do not have to worry about scrubbing my feet or ruining my go-to shoes/flip flops). As for the rest of my outfit, I am nude. Simply kidding. I wear painting clothes that I do not slip off at the door (big drips only seem to fall on my feet).

A few minutes after snapping that photo was when John and I both began giving each other crazy eyes. Which means we were both having strange and exciting ideas (ideas that are fully unrelated to bedding each other under the ram – get your mind out of the gutter).

John: “What if we put those old botanical-looking prints back into these now that the mat and frame is all updated and graphic?”

Sherry: “Simply to be suuuuure we are fully over them – I agree!”

So we hung them up and we truly liked them. So we are in fact fully under them (you know, as opposed to over them as we originally anticipated). Sure, they are still a little grandma, but they are also something we could picture in Elle Decor or House Striking (with more than a $10 price tag on them). And most of all, they make us smile.

Here is where I will stop to acknowledge that not only is hanging a big white ram head over your bed one of those personal preference things perhaps-I am-crazy things, art in general is certainly a place where all folks on the internet will not come together and unanimously agree. But we are loving our twig and berries – er flowers and berries. I mean it is not like we will ever entertain in our bedroom – so we do not have to worry about what other folks might think. Which I hope is nothing weird and kinky due to the ram. Yikes.

Speaking of weird, we got an embarrassingly large kick out of hanging the berries on J’s side and the flowers on my side. You know, because ladies have flowers and folks have berries. Too far? My deepest apologies.

Then something crazy and fully unexpected happened (manage your expectations, our lives are not that interesting).

John chose to exercise his veto power on the leafy duvet cover that we ordered around seven months ago.

Did not see that coming did you? See, back when the duvet cover was one of the first things we picked up for our house (deeply clearanced from West Elm) John agreed that we could get it (we have a full agreement agreement, meaning we are not allowed to buy things without both being ok with it). But he only agreed with one stipulation: that it would not necessarily be a forever choice. He reasoned that it was affordable sufficient and I enjoyed it sufficient not to keep me from ordering it (I was so worried it would sell out and I’d forever regret it slash hold it against John The Tyrant). But he asserted that if someday he should decide that he no longer liked it I would have to be open to looking for something else that we both could enjoy – especially if the price was right and we could sell this baby on craigslist or something.

At the time I grinned and nodded, never thinking that day would in fact come. But would not you know it, John enjoyed those 10 dolla (holla!) yard sale art infinitely more than the compromise duvet. So he chose we should revisit the whole new-duvet-cover-idea and leave the art as-is (since it was kinda circus-y and compete-y to have them both going on at the same time). And you know what? In an even more shocking turn of events I agreed.

Perhaps we are simply sentimental suckers and sleeping between prints of wildlife from the place we honeymooned is our idea of romance? Perhaps we think rams and flowers and berries somehow belong together? I do not know. Either way, the leafy pattern in the duvet cover was fighting with our new leafy art so I stripped things down to our white duvet insert from Ikea and we stepped back to survey the scene.

The weird white duvet insert was certainly more compatible with the art than the competing leafy duvet cover, but not quite ideal. Meaning a white duvet cover is not going to be what we go for. We are hoping to find something with less of a bold pattern and more of a subtle texture (like a soft chevron or crosshatched design or something striped or something else entirely). The jury is still out on what will come home with us, but we are planning a few HomeGoods and TJ Maxx runs simply to see what is out there. And perhaps even an Ikea road trip.

The lesson? Grrrrr, do not compromise. Simply hold out to find something you both enjoy. Oh well, hindsight is 20/20, right? And I like to think the Alaska prints “found us” because it was meant to be. And we certainly had our fair share of decorating mind-changing in the first house, so it is only fitting that we work in a few control-alt-deletes in this house too (look honey, it is a bad computer joke that I threw in simply for you).

So yeah, we are thinking about selling the old duvet cover on ebay or craigslist. There are some on there for over $100 and we only paid $42 for our king-sized guy thanks to sales and coupon codes. So who knows, perhaps we can recoup the whole cost and list it for $45 in strong-but-slightly-used condition. We shall see…

As for what the kids think, Clara toddled into the bedroom and gave the new art two thumbs up (not lying, but she does happen to do that gesture a lot). And Burger gave it one paw sideways. He’s such an art snob.

Do you folks have any duvet cover switches or “rewinds” going on? Has anyone else had their man exercise veto power in a surprising but serendipitous-in-the-end way? Does anyone else spray paint while wearing black dress socks or sleep under a white resin ram? Yeah… likely not.