Aqua Obsession

I have an obsession with aqua lately. I'm surrounded by such intense colors in my room (red, black and white) that I felt the need to put something fun and colorful in there. Hence, aqua obsession. I'm slowly, but surely adding in bright aqua pieces.

I saw this Krylon Ocean Breeze at Walmart, and said, "She will be mine. Oh yes, she will be mine." Not really. Although, I do quote Wayne's World a lot. Who can pass up a good, "psycho hose-beast?" I digress. This was the exact color I wanted to introduce to my room. Room meet Ocean Breeze. Ocean Breeze meet Room. Problem was, I didn't have anything to make aqua.

Ew. You's ugly.

Cue Flea Market Collectibles & Things, where I found a super gaudy, gold mirror. To anyone with spray paint, a gross, old mirror like this is a freaking jackpot find. Don't believe me? Check any of the blogs I read, they all want this crap. I have caved to blog peer pressure, and I wanted it too. So I got it, for a decent price. My mom looked at me like, "Seriously?" Yes, mother, seriously. My lovely grandmother would have kept it in this gold color, and it would match the other 231298274 gold frames and mirrors in her house. She knows how to make gold work. It works for her. Not my style. Homie don't play dat. Just like my aversion to browns, I have an aversion to golds. They assault my eyes and my general sense of happiness.

Apparently, that box was from a drugstore.

Here's the mirror, mid-makeover. I don't love the color that it was looking like at that point. I started to freak out a little bit, thinking it was going to be that powder blue. NOT aqua. I do not have a powder blue obsession. Not cool, wet paint, not cool. Thankfully, it dried into a lovely aqua. I should probably wait to freak out until the paint is dry.

The thing that actually made me semi-freak out was that I clearly didn't do a great job taping the cardboard to the mirror, because little aqua particles were ALL over the mirror when I took them off. I had no idea if it would come off, or if I was doomed to look through grains of paint for eternity. Thankfully it scraped off.... albeit not easily. I spent a while scraping it off, and really didn't do a great job cleaning it before putting it on my wall. Someday, when I care enough, or get sick of the smears, I'll actually clean it. For now, it brings the right shade of aqua into the corner of the gigantor master bedroom. Good job, me! (Stay tuned, I might get nuts with some glaze to make it look more aged and antique-y.

Hey baby, lookin' good.

Next up, an aqua gun rack. "A gun rack? What am I gonna do with a gun rack? I don't even own A gun, let alone many to necessitate an entire rack? What am I gonna do with a gun rack?" Oh Wayne, you slay me.

How I gave myself carbon monoxide poisoning....AKA the Shutter Headboard Adventure

So I've found this store across town that has become my new heaven: Flea Market Things & Collectibles.  I stumbled upon it while trying to find the Habitat for Humanity ReStore. Best accidental discovery, EVER. It's basically an indoor flea market without a bunch of people hassling you. You can just shop through the different sections and pay for them at the front.

I found a ton of things that I scooped up, but this little story is about the ugly pink shutters I found.  I imagine the ugly, pink shutters I found lived a depressing life as a teenager's abused closet doors. They were absolutely HIDEOUS. I'm talking hot pink, sticky, glossy paint with additional paint splatters all over the place. INTENTIONAL paint splatters. GLITTERY paint splatters. Awful. It was like those poor, pathetic shutter doors fought in a puff paint war, and were declared a casualty.  So there they were, gaudy and horrible, sitting in what someone must have thought to be their final resting place. I saw them and had a vision. A moment of clarity.

Hello gorgeous! This picture really doesn't capture how awful this paint really was.

I had been searching Craigslist and everywhere in between for a queen size headboard. I've never had a headboard on any bed. It's a sad affair, being so headboardless. As I just moved into a new house, with a GIANT master bedroom, I knew it was time. Even my old vintage furniture doesn't fill this monstrosity of a room. (I know, I know... wah wah wah you have a big room.) I just don't have enough to fill this space. I did a little feng shui-ing (not really, I just moved things around til the room didn't look so ridiculously big)... and knew that I needed to do something big to make a statement in this room.

I had no desire to even attempt to strip the paint from these.... Too much work, and let's be honest, I'm still learning. I covered both sides with some Krylon Gray Primer, which took for-freaking-ever. I realized that I also had no desire to paint the back of the shutters since no one was ever going to see them if they were against the wall. The least amount of work sounded great to me.

Primed and ready to go.

Next up, layer upon layer of Krylon Flat Black Spray Paint. Thankfully, black is great for covering up imperfections (just ask any bloated woman). Although you can still see the drips of paint from the previous, bad paint job... I figure no one will be looking that closely... and if they do and actually say something, I'll smack them.

The final product. Yes, I probably could have made my bed. Clearly, I need to work on my staging for these big reveal pictures. Whatever.

So here's the ridiculous part of this adventure. I did all of this in my garage, with the garage door wide open. There was a nice breeze flowing through the garage. Silly ol' me didn't bother to wear a mask of any sort. Silly ol' me has had pneumonia in the last couple of years. Because there's nothing that says "spray paint without a mask" like respiratory problems. My friend, Ian, even said something about the fact that I shouldn't inhale all of those chemicals, which I brushed off nonchalantly. Worst plan ever.

So later that night, I looked in the mirror and noticed that I was a lovely shade of bright pink. I'm talking... princess pink. I had been hiking in the mountains earlier that day so I figured I had a nice, little sunburn. Usually when I'm sunburned, my skin feels hot to the touch.... this was different. I was just.... PINK. I ignored it, thinking I was being silly...until later that night when I was having a conversation with my roommate and suddenly became VERY dizzy... and immediately ran to my bathroom to throw up. This means a lot. I think that throwing up is the worst feeling on the planet, and will do anything to avoid doing it. I started thinking about all of my symptoms, and had a flash of an episode of CSI. I remembered an episode where the parents died of carbon monoxide poisoning, and when found were a lovely shade of bright pink. Yeah. After a little more self-diagnosis via the internet, I realized what was going on. I gave myself minor carbon monoxide poisoning.  Ridic.



Moral of the story: Wear a mask, moron.

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