{Louis II}

Meeoow

{ Louis }

Andrew and I adopted a furry little kitten this weekend. We were trying to come up with a cool name to give him after we went to visit him Tuesday night.  One of my favorite architects is Louis Kahn, and one of Andrew's is Peter Zumthor.  Louis  vs. Thor.
After thinking about it, his name is now Louis (pronounced Louie).  I decided his full name should be Louis Peter Van der Rohe.  Mies Van der Rohe is also a famous architect.  He went to the shelter as a stray and was very frightened.  After spending some time with him at the shelter we both thought he would have good potential to be a loving cat with a little TLC.  Yesterday we brought him home, and I spent the whole day in his room with him (temporary the bathroom till he gets adjusted).  This morning I sat down and he came purring out of his bed and up onto my lap.  He is very loving and purrs just by looking at you.  We got a great kitten!

 Below are some photos and the last two are videos I took of him on my new iphone.

Louis on his way home from the Animal Shelter.  He was very scared.

IMG_0020 a video by photo.catalyst on Flickr.

IMG_0021 a video by photo.catalyst on Flickr.

project {suede headboard} DIY

In my past post {Claudia Bell + Albert} I showed you the plans I had to make my own headboard.  I finally found the time to do it!  It took me about 8 hours from start to finish, not including shopping time for the materials.  It would have taken me longer too, had Andrew not helped me for the last 4 hours, stapling and screwing pieces together.

All together the final cost was about 75-100 dollars after all the rebates for the wood and coupons/sales for the fabric and foam.  On average a king size suede headboard priced at about 400 - 600 dollars.  That's huge savings!

Here are a few pictures of the process and the end result.  At the end I added a few of the calculated notes I used to figure out the best way to cut my material with the limited amout of fabric I had.    I found it in the clearance section at Joann Fabric and just bought what was left on the roll.  Typically fabric like this would run about $40/yard.  I got it for about $5/yard.

If anyone is interested in a detailed description of the process, feel free to comment or email me with questions.

 

{ island adventures }

Last weekend Andrew + I finally made it up to the boundary waters for some camping.  We had great weather, zero bugs, access to a kayak, lots of fire wood, and great opportunities for some photos. Afterwards we talked about how peaceful and relaxing it was.  We might just make Bear Head Lake an annual travel destination for us.  All the photos from the lake and our day trip around the lake are here on my flickr page. 

{ Sneak Peek }

 

 This is Einstein.  He had a girlfriend Greta.  They were very friendly and bold.  I fed them gram-crackers, marshmallows and some water.  Einstein tried to carry away an entire gram-cracker at once, it was pretty hilarious watching him drag something twice as big as him through the leaves.

 

This was the view from our picnic on an island.

{meow... kitty kat?}

These are Pat's kitten's Gizmo and Gadget.  I really wanted the grey one because it reminded me of Tucker.  Soon enough I will pick out my own kitten.

{ cacti }

In the midst of packing up to move this week/weekend we took a run to Lowe's, where I found these cute, and very cheap succulent cacti.  Andrew picked out 6 to go along with my 5.  We plan on planting them at some point and keeping them in our bathroom where it is nice and bright.  Of course I want to name them, but I did give Andrew the option to name his own.  He thinks I'm slightly crazy, naming everything ... anyways I got to name them all!!

These are mine,  they were all the beautiful ones.

These are Andrew's, they were all the most defined ones.

Lady + the Tramp

Beauty + The Beast

Jasmin + Prince Ali + Jafar

Snow White + The Huntsman

Cinderella + Prince Charming

project {Claudia Bell + Albert}

We have been very busy this week getting things together for our new apartment!  Last weekend we shopped both days for a great mattress.  We originally picked out a Simmons Orthopedic, later to find the reviews were horrible.  With lots of frustration from a days worth of shopping down the drain we headed to The Original Mattress Factory.  I had to say we were both sold on the mattress before even trying out the beds.  Just the construction and quality of the bed itself was far more extensive than we had found the first day.  They sell solely from their factory warehouse, so we were able to get a lot more for our buck.  Here are the comparison photos.  Mostly look at the spring design + gauge and foam ratios.  The OMF also makes their beds double sided for flipping, where standard mattress' did without this 10 years ago. Not shown are the box springs.  Typical box springs are hollow wood framed boxes.  The OMF makes the box spring how they were designed years ago by including coils and springs.

Simmons Mattress & Sealy Mattress

 Original Mattress Factory

We also upgraded our bed to a KING!! Which means I don't need to wake up with elbows in my face and Andrew won't yell at me for sleeping diagonally as much.  The way I see it - the extra 16" are actually for me :)  Having a King size bed also means buying new linens and a comforter.  We got a great deal on our sheets from Bed Bath & Beyond and I found a fantastic sale for an Ivory alternative down comforter from The Company Store.  Because of Fourth of July Sales, I don't think we purchased anything that was marked up or greatly on sale.

I also wanted to make my own headboard because of the cost, in addition to fitting my style.  My dad was more than willing to help out.  I drew up the plans last Sunday night and he cut and assembled all the wood this week.  Yesterday I went to Joann Fabric and got some upholstery fabric for $4.50/yard!!! I also got the foam for the panels at 50% off and then got an additional 15% off my total purchase.  After rebates for the wood and all my sales the total headboard cost {for a King} was $56.00.  That is 10% of what it would have cost to buy it in a furniture store.  When the time comes there will be a blog on how this was assembled and made.

Panel + foam covering

Both are suede fabric.  The darker is for the 2x8 frame.

Andrew also surprised me this week and wanted to go apartment shopping and then let me pick out the towels.  Of course I'm going to try and get away with yellow wherever I can, so I picked out a Victorian yellow pattern and some cream/beige accent color towels.

 

This weekend we also did little projects for our apartment.  Andrew's mom, Vicki, gave us this old US military typewriter box that we painted and plan on putting in our screened in patio along with our new family member Claudia Bell.  Andrew sanded down the box, primed and painted it, while I went shopping for a new hydrangea plant.  I named them Claudia Bell and Albert.

  

Claudia Bell.  She also got a nice cedar bucket pot. 

Albert - I picked out a yellow, which is actually brighter than this.  

The original color before sanding was a military green.