I also {finally!} jumped on the bandwagon and created a Heart Tree Home Facebook page.  I know that many people don’t use blog readers to keep up with new posts, so this should help!  You can now follow along on Facebook or Twitter to be notified of new posts and see my Instagram photo updates.

{ coconut chicken curry soup / my new favorite shoes / eddie as a pillow / barnes and noble browsing }

I love Instagram.  It’s probably my third favorite app, slightly behind Words with Friends and Pinterest!  Please let me know what you think of the new look!

I put it on my Christmas wishlist on a whim because I just love Mindy Kaling on The Office, and I’m so glad I did.  Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me? contains short musings on a bunch of random subjects which are totally hilarious and relatable.  I highly recommend this book; you won’t regret it!

Now I’m on the lookout for another great book to read.  Any suggestions?  Only nine more to go to meet my goal of 10 books in 1001 days, ha!  The six seasons of How I Met Your Mother that we’ve been feverishly watching on Netflix are about to come to an end, and I’m going to need a good book to console me in my free time.  {And while we’re on that subject, watch HIMYM!  It’s the funniest show I’ve seen in a long time.  I could turn around and re-watch all six seasons right now, but I digress.}

This was a phone snapshot of the desk I came back to after going on my honeymoon back in 2009.  My friends wanted to keep me in the loop of all the inside jokes happening while I was gone, so they wrote notes every day and stuck them all over the place.  I couldn’t have asked for a more welcome return.

I’m so thankful in this economy to have my job, but sometimes I miss my old company and getting to see my friends every day at work.  It doesn’t feel so much like work when you work with friends.

I did a little post Christmas browsing and couldn’t pass up this USB powered retro mini fridge {for 80% off!} for my desk at work.  It now holds my daily can of cherry Coke zero!

Eddie got a Christmas treat of his own from his “grandparents”… a bone big enough for an 85lb lap dog!

This past weekend, I decided to grab a piece of MDF and a few brackets from Home Depot and add a shelf in my closet.  There was a lot of wasted space above the existing shelves, and now I can put some out of season shoes up there and free up the more valuable space.  It makes me unnaturally happy.

My favorite brother-in-law got me some great home decor pieces for Christmas.  The Made By Girl LOVE poster I had been coveting…

And the Z Gallerie faux deer head!  I wasn’t sure which item I preferred above the campaign chest in our bedroom, so I tried them both!  I figured the poster would cover up the hole I drilled to hold up the deer if I preferred the poster.  Which do you prefer?

I think that I will likely leave the LOVE poster above the campaign chest and incorporate the deer head into a gallery wall above the desk nook in the living room.  I think a mini gallery wall will be perfect to fill the awkward angled wall space. 

Recognize the chair below?  I found this chair in the same Kalah Blue fabric I mentioned here at Target for a steal, thanks to a sale and a coupon code!  I’m super pleased with the comfort and quality of the fabric {it actually is the exact Kalah Blue fabric}, but I’m not super pleased that I didn’t measure the width of the chair versus the width of the desk opening.  Rookie mistake.  So, now I’m on the hunt for a new desk for this space, and the campaign desk will move up to the guest room.

I also finally took the plunge and ordered the fabric to make the Kalah Blue curtains for the other side of the room.   I think it will look great to have this little pop of the same fabric in the desk nook to tie into the curtains.  I got the fabric at a much more affordable price by buying it at fabric.com.  It was out of stock for quite some time, but I stalked the site daily until it came back in.  I used a coupon code for 25% off my total purchase, and walked out paying $15 a yard.  That’s $10 cheaper per yard than the same exact fabric at Calico Corners.  Now that is what I call smart shopping, especially when you need 14 yards!

Last but not least, we brought my parent’s old wingback chair into the living room to see if the scale and style was right for the room, and I actually love it!  I think it could really work in the space if reupholstering it isn’t too expensive.  As you can see, Eddie loves it too!

So, those are the happenings in the Heart Tree Home lately. Anyone else get spoiled with home decor from their Christmas wishlist? I got spoiled with lots of things, many of them being clothes/shoes/accessories… if I ever get the courage to do some outfit posts you’ll see some of them!

Is it weird that I kind of love building websites?

As of the new year, I’ve been able to fully cross off 30 of the goals in the first 500 or so days.  Percentage wise, that’s about 30% of the goals accomplished in about 50% of the alotted days.  UH OH!  I’m a little behind. 

It’s worth noting that a few of these 30 completed goals were kind of major {such as adding on a patio, going to Europe, etc.}.  Also, there are approximately 10 additional goals that I’m on the verge of completing very soon, which would put me a little closer to being on track.

I can’t believe this challenge is halfway over.  I really need to start focusing on picking a few realistic goals to achieve each month {or even week!}  I have about 70 more weeks to go, and 70 more goals.  YIKES!

I put together a mood board for the space {the mister actually requested one!} and I think it satisfies the need for both function and beauty.

The IKEA Expedit unit will still remain in the room {along with my sewing machine and craft supplies in storage boxes}, but its main purpose will be a place for the mister to have all his manly stuff displayed and play video games.  And, as a bonus, I will be able to watch TV now if I’m using the room.

The three posters are gifts I’ve gotten for the mister over the years.  You can find them here, here, and here.  The chair, bookcase, and desk are already in the room, but the existing orange boxes will be replaced with the green version.  The only major purchases are the TV {which I scored a great deal on at Slickdeals} and the locker media cabinet {$99}.

10. DIY Donnie Darko Sharpie Painted Vans Shoes

9. New Recipe: Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Cupcakes

8. Halloween Party 2010: The Costumes

7. DIY Alice in Wonderland Sharpie Painted Vans Shoes

6. Wizard of Oz Themed Surprise 50th Birthday Party

5. Campaign Chest Makeover

4. Best Unique Halloween Costumes for 2010

3. New Recipe: Watermelon Cake Pops

2. Halloween Party 2010: DIY Coraline Halloween Costume

1. Guest Bedroom Reveal (Sorta)

And two honorable mentions since they just missed the top ten but were two of my favorites written in 2011:

Vintage Baseball Themed Surprise 80th Birthday

Gourmet Burger Bar Summer Party

Thanks so much for taking the time to stop by Heart Tree Home this past year.  I’m excited to see what 2012 brings!

I started by collecting photos of inspiring gallery walls to see which style I wanted for my space…

{via 1, 2, 3, 4, 5}

Through this process, I discovered that I strongly prefer a random asymmetrical arrangement as opposed to a grid of frames.  I also found that while I do love the look of mismatched frames, I wanted a bit of continuity with the style and color of the frames and mats.  My final decision was to go with IKEA Ribba frames for their affordability and variety of sizes.  I chose black frames over white because the gallery wall is in our dining area, near a sea of black granite in the kitchen and across from a humongous black box of a TV in the great room, and I thought that it would balance it out.

IKEA is fairly far away from my house, so I wanted to be absolutely sure of a shopping list before I went to get the frames.  Naturally, I did what any obsessive compulsive over-planner would do – I created an excel spreadsheet.  {Don’t judge me.}  I made each cell into a square shape by changing the column width; each cell represented one square inch.  Then, I found the specifications for each frame on IKEA’s website and drew them out with black, white, and tan shapes.  I made sure to “group” each frame’s shapes together so that they would all move together automatically as I copied and rearranged them.  Then I fiddled around with some different layouts.

The gray box behind them is the existing piece of artwork that I already had in the space, so I could visualize how much bigger it would be on the wall.  The one below was the winner, with the exception of a 5″ x 7″ frame put in place of the furthest right 4″ x 6″ frame pictured…

My final shopping list was:

• 1 – 12″ x 12″ shadowbox
• 3 – 5″ x 5″ shadowboxes
• 3 – 8″ x 10″ frames
• 3 – 5″ x 7″ frames
• 5 – 4″ x 6″ frames {one more than I planned to use, just in case…}

All of the frames totaled about $110.

Once I get them home, I laid them out on the floor just to make sure the layout still looked good in real life and not just my Excel world…

HOORAY!  I still liked the layout, but the hard part was yet to come… I won’t lie to you – the IKEA Ribba frames are very poorly designed.  There’s a reason why they are so cheap.  There are no D-rings on the back, only clips that slide up and down on the vertical part of the cardboard backing.  Therefore, if there isn’t a snug fit of the clip around the cardboard, the clips can easily let the frame sink down on the wall once you hang it.  And, the smaller frames {4″x6″ and 5″x7″}, don’t even come with a set of hanging clips.  Also, some of the frames tended to lean off the wall at the top.  I was able to solve these problems fairly painlessly.  Here are my tips:

1. To place the nail on the wall, I used the screw-in-a-paint-stir-stick method.  Basically, you place a small screw halfway into the end of a paint stir stick.  Then, hang the picture wire on the screw and hold it up the wall.  When you find the perfect spot, remove the picture while holding the paint stir stick in place.  The location of the screw is the place you want to put your nail.  Give it a light tap and there will be a mark on the wall for you to hang your nail.
2. Make sure you make little marks on the back of the frame where the clips are at the time you found the nail spot.  That way, if they shift around on you, you don’t have to fiddle with them randomly to try to find out where they were before.  I may end up supergluing my clips in place eventually.
3. The smaller frames {4″x6″ and 5″x7″} only come with one clip each, which is pretty useless if you ask me.  So, I removed the clip from the 4″x6″ frames and added it to the 5″x7″ frames so I could at least have the larger frames hanging.  For the 4″x6″ frames, I cut strips of Command Velcro picture hanging strips in half lengthwise, and put one on the top and bottom of each frame.  It seems to be enough to hold the 4″x6″ frames up.
4. For the frames that were leaning away from the wall at the top, I used a halved Command Velcro strip at the top in addition to the picture wire.  It’s not enough to support the weight of the larger frames on its own, but it’s enough to hold it flush with the wall.

Hopefully those tips will save you some of the pains I went through in hanging mine!

For the artwork, I picked out some of favorite photos and turned them to black and white.  {You can do this with free programs like Picnik or Picasa.}  Just to be safe, I laid them out in the Excel file to ensure that the sizes and orientations for each photo were correct.

I placed the order online at the Costco online photo center since I was pretty certain they did 12″x12″ printing.  I was extremely pleased with the price and quality.  In total, all of the pictures were under $15.  Here it is with all of my black and white photos in place!

I wanted the three 8″x10″ frames to be filled with black and white art as opposed to photographs. My sister had drawn a Seattle illustration that I knew I wanted to use, and she offered to draw a picture of Eddie as well for the vertical one. Until she finished with those, however, I wanted to fill it all with photos so that it would look complete.

I just love it! All of the pictures are either photos I’ve taken from the different places we’ve been together or family pictures from the wedding.  It took longer than I thought, but it was so worth all the work to be able to display our favorite photographs…

Do any of you have a gallery wall? I’d love to see it!  And I hope you all have a safe and happy new year!

Here is my mom and sister…

My grandma, uncle, aunt, and cousins…

And my sister and I on the way home… {Does anyone else get confused where to look when taking a forward facing iPhone pic?}

I highly recommend seeing the play if you have the opportunity; it was hilarius and will completely change your perspective on the Wizard of Oz story!  I’ve got my program hanging in my cube at the office now to remind me of such a fun day…

On an unrelated note, I just had to share the snapshot below.  We were watching some funny doberman videos on YouTube and Eddie was just glued to the TV!  Sometimes he’d run over to the speakers too when there was barking…

Speaking of YouTube, have you seen the Jimmy Kimmel challenge videos? They’re the funniest videos I’ve seen in a long time.  The older brother at the end of this one is my favorite!

I hope you all have a merry Christmas!  I’m looking forward to spending lots of time with family and finishing some {long overdue} half-completed projects around the house on my week off.  There is also a plan for my sister and I to do a thrift store challenge {to find something from the thrift store and make something cool out of it} so I’m super excited for that, too!