When Mom’s Text

Am I the dumbest mom? I seriously sat in the shower and laughed while I was sending this text to Mae.

I saw this image on Pinterest and immediately came up with this dumb reason to send it to her.

Weekly Portrait -Mae Veon - 1/23/2020

We missed last weeks portrait, oops!

For this one I had a vague idea of what I wanted to do, but as per usual, just made it up as I went along.

We took the photos with our bathroom wall as the backdrop. (You can see the full bathroom makeover on my posts about the One Room Challenge. )

Hallway Makeover - Our Hand Painted House

We have this small squarish hallway leading to Jarrod’s Office, my Art Studio and the main floor bathroom. Oh, also a linen closet. I really wanted to do the entire hallway in googly eyes (shhh …. it’s okay) and started it. However, it proved to be incredibly time consuming to do each set of eyes differently and I quickly abandoned the project and fretted about how I should move forward. It sat like this for about a year:

Here’s Googly and I posing for an instagram post (showing off a t-shirt I designed) , before I betrayed and destroyed him.

While I took my time deciding if I should really spend hours upon hours painting each individual set of eyes, I turned around to the opposite wall on an ADHD whim and started this lightning/cloud pattern:

Here it is, unfinished, much like most of the projects in my life. I actually really liked where this was going and considered just taking it all the way around. In the end, I decided to just start over. (I will probably use this pattern elsewhere in the house.)

So I painted over everything with the same deep plum color and this time covered the baseboards and door frame. While I was painting I was trying to figure out what I wanted to paint on the walls. I thought about doing the googly eye thing (my family is apparently sad that I painted over it) in a simpler pattern, or actually giving them faces.

I got my iPad out to do some rough sketches:

I really just felt like this was not the place for the googly eye wall. Images of Tigers kept coming to me, so after about 18 attempts at drawing a tiger (It’s so funny, as an artist you get really good at drawing/painting certain things/people/places etc, so when I tried to draw a tiger, which I never draw, it was so….bad.) I finally got a reference photo and did a quick outline then filled in the rest myself. ( OOF! I’m definitely going to start branching out on my skills here. )

Anyways, I know, shut up already, right?

So I ended up with this:

This is the first time I’ll be making my own stencil, and I’m nervous. Also, will I regret this? I think I’ll make them really big so I’m not spending 6 months doing that much detail on each tiger. Also, the colors will be more muted than what’s on the digital version. Also, stay tuned!

Weekly Portrait - Mae Veon 1/9/2020

I’m lucky to have literally the most gorgeous daughter on the face of this planet. Can you believe she’s only 13?!

We are going to try to do a portrait every week. See last weeks here.

Make up and hair by me.

I loved how it turned out so much I did a less intense version of it on myself the next day:

Hey Melissa Mae / Funky Master Bathroom / FINAL REVEAL - One Room Challenge

Woo, man! Finished up right in the nick of time.

Painting almost every square inch of a room takes a lot of drying time between multiple layers!

I love how it turned out, the colors make me so happy.

Here is my first One Room Challenge project, done and done:

The artwork I bought online about 3 years ago and the font color on the tattooed man was actually what inspired the base color for the walls. I saw them and thought it looked like Jarrod and me. :)

I found this statue second hand and used it for a movie set I production designed (Fatherly Obsession - Lifetime). It’s been hanging out in my garage so I gave her a makeover from gold to orange/yellow.

The sinks were the most work. It took layers and layers of paint and sanding down, then adding the droplets, sanding those down, varnishing, etc. The second one took about half the time, as the first one was trial and error. But so worth it.

I love them.

I figured since everything was so colorful we would go with white towels.

I bought this album cover years ago and have had it in my kitchens as I’ve moved around. I thought it was perfect for the space.

This little room is still a work in progress. I’ll add some fun plants and weird knick knacks to the yellow wall shelf. (I just grabbed some things from around the house for temporary staging.)

As you can see, this is where Jarrod and I write notes to each other. Love notes, funny notes, inside jokes. It’s so fun, I highly recommend making a wall in your home for this kind of thing!

For this abstract wall I cut into a few different sizes of paintbrushes to create different textures and layered the colors.

Jarrod got two of these old gas signs at an antique shop and mounted it before we did the One Room Challenge. He also made that rad Darth Vadar light switch plate. I think they fit right in to the new design. :)

Little vintage shelf I found secondhand and spray painted. I’ll add some plants and other things to this little shelf.

You can see right into our bathroom from our bedroom door, so if anyone ever walks in (kids) I thought I’d provide a little more privacy by painting stripes in black and then varnishing over the glass in between to create a frosted glass look.

I love our spouty guy, Oh look, there still painters tape on there…oops.

As I’ve mentioned in earlier posts, I really love to just create on the fly. My brain seems to work best that way. With a rough plan, I just start and then the next idea comes and I start to put the room together step by step while I’m in the actual space.

My goal with our house is to make it fun, inspiring, and unique. Each room will be hand painted, like this one. This is the fourth room I’ve done in our house, and my daughter just asked me to redo her room next. I already have lots of fun ideas brewing.

Thanks so much to whoever came and scrolled through and took the time to look at our new bathroom. I had so much fun doing it, but I’m also glad its complete! I had a great time taking part in the One Room Challenge.

Hey Melissa Mae / Funky Master Bathroom / One Room Challenge Week 5

This week for the One Room Challenge:

Painted the countertop with Rust-Oleum Countertop Coating in Pewter. This is my first experience using this product, and it was a bit tricky. I did a few layers and used a paint brush in quick short strokes to create a texture. Once that was dried, I added a strokes of white, black and orange.

Before. Sometimes I make it into the shot looking like a weirdo.

After

When that was complete and dry, I taped off the first sink and painted it 2 layers of black, sanded it down, added water drops, then painted another layer of black around those. Jarrod took the handle off of the faucet, which has been spray painted blue.

Next step is to add more water drops with shading and then move onto the next sink.

Jarrod started working on the mirror frame:

Four boards stained teal will be cut down to size and mounted around the mirror above gray backsplash tile.

Not pictured: Shower metal frame painted black, closet and bathroom doors painted black, and inside the separate toilet space, the molding, door frame, and ceiling have been painted orange, pink and blue. I’ll post photos of those once I have better photos.

This week:

  • Paint the floor

  • Mount hand towel bars

  • Hang art and plants

  • Touch ups

I’m really excited for this final week! I love the entire process of creating a space, but the best part is standing back and taking it all in when it’s done.

To end this post, I’d like to share how I found my glove the other day:

Well, I never!

See ya next week!!!

Hey Melissa Mae / Funky Master Bathroom / One Room Challenge | Week 4

Welcome back to our master bathroom makeover for the www.oneroomchallenge.com.

Week 4 was a slow one for me. We got back from a four day trip to Sacramento where we stayed at a friends vineyard in their guesthouse. It was so peaceful and the views were breathtaking. The best part of the trip was watching my stepdaughter officiate my stepsons wedding. It was a beautiful event. Everything about the trip was magic. Anyways, I got back in a fog and pretty much spent the first part of the week laying around listening to records, taking hot showers and reading.

Once I finally came out of la la land, (where I spend 99% of my time) I got back to work.

I finished painting the cupboards with the base in Behr Marquee in Watermelon Smoothie and the cupboards and drawers in Behr Marquee Inferno.

I couldn’t decide between black or yellow hardware. Jarrod voted black, my son Sawyer voted yellow. We decided to do both.

(sorry for the bad lighting, we just got back from an impromptu, unsuccessful trip to Yellowstone, which randomly closed the day we went due to weather! So I’m posting this late.)

Finished Spouty McDrippy:

And painted the doorway arch in Inferno:

Jarrod installed his custom towel bar:

Here’s a few more photos for your peepers:

I think the mess is art in and of itself:

Next Up:

-Paint the sinks matte black

-Paint the countertop slate gray

-Paint the faucets black / (or yellow?)

-Paint the floor magenta

-Install hand towel bars

-Create a frame for the mirror (still not sure on final plan)

Thanks for coming!

Hey Melissa Mae / Master Bathroom One Room Challenge Week 3

I’m feeling really good about the progress so far on our master bathroom for www.oneroomchallenge.

Got the walls and ceiling painted and now I’m working on the cabinets and the shower. Next up is painting the floor. So much paint! I love it.

The cabinets will be a glossy orange with black hardware. I still have a few more coats to go on them, and I think I may do the cabinet frame the same pink color that I used on the walls so there’s some contrast.

Here is where the towel bar that Jarrod built will go (You can see part of it on the floor)

Once I’m done painting the cabinets and floor, I’ll go back with a palette and do touch ups.

Still trying to decide what I want to do with the doors. I’m thinking black door frames and then something colorful on the doors? OR, make the doors black and do the frames with a pop of color. Thoughts?

I wanted something fun in the shower and played around with the idea of a bunch of eyes directed at whoever is in the shower, because naked! Before I painted it black, I started painting a sun with his mouth as the spout but it started feeling too involved, so I combined the spout mouth and the eyes looking down at the person showering for the final design. I still have details to add to him, but I he’s fun and I love him.

Next week I’ll finish the cabinets and paint the floor, and hopefully we will get hardware built and installed as well.

Thanks for stopping by!

Hey Melissa Mae / Master Bathroom - One Room Challenge

It took me a good while to finish the hand painted hand wall, and I decided against going around the entire parameter of the bathroom for times sake.

I added some geometric shapes in black to break up the green base color:

And started adding zig zaggy striped to the ceiling:

I’ve had to take the last few days off of working on the room because I got a call to do a mural for a movie and it’s a really quick turn around. I’ll be back to our bathroom in a couple of days!

Thanks for stopping by! And remember to go check out other participants at www.oneroomchallenge.com

One Room Challenge - A "Hands On" Project

Oh boy, I’m excited. This is my first time doing the One Room Challenge!

A quick intro from me to you: I’m an artist and a production designer/set decorator in the film industry. We moved into our house of June 2017, and I’ve been looking forward to owning a house my entire life, so I could do whatever the hell I wanted when it came to design and decor. The problem is, I’ve been so busy designing spaces and art for movies and tv, that I’ve hardly had any time to work on my own home. So thank you, to the One Room Challenge, for being a great reason to finally start my creative blog.

So that’s a little bit about me! Thanks for coming and checking out my blog, by the way. I’m excited to see what everyone else is doing with the challenge!

Originally I was going to do the Living Room, but my husband, Jarrod, got so tired of our towel bar falling off of the wall, he finally designed his own, and it’s pretty freakin rad. We decided together to finish our master bathroom, him taking care of the custom hardware, and me on the design and painting.

Prior to starting the challenge, I had already painted one of our walls a lime green but hadn’t gone any further with it. I knew I wanted to keep the color, but ended up picking one with a bit more yellow in it.

Here are the before pictures: (click to scroll through for more photo’s)

Below is a concept sketch I came up with (I use Procreate on the iPad Pro.)

Obviously I love color….

Some of this design is subject to change, as I’m a half plan, half fly-by-the-seat-of-my-inspirational-pants kind of creator.

I mulled in my head off and on about what pattern or design I wanted to paint on the walls and finally came up with the idea of Jarrod and I tracing our hands and then I would paint them black and add detail in brighter colors. Time consuming? Yes, but so worth it. (My goal with my house is to have all hand-painted walls, so it’s going to be really fun coming up with something unique for each room.)

The first step was to tape and plastic the bathroom so I wouldn’t drip paint everywhere. (I still did, and still managed to get it in spots it’s not supposed to be. Classic Melissa!)

Next I painted 4 layers of Citronette by Home Decorators Collection on all of the walls:

Then I stole Jarrod away from script writing and we traced our hands on cardboard for stencils. It was so romantical.

I traced the cardboard cutouts in a random pattern then filled them in using Behr Ultra paint in “Totally Black” then added detail with Behr Ultra in Pacific Coast Blue and Watermelon Smoothie.

(click to scroll through for more photo’s)

I’m really loving the hand design, and am planning on doing it on every wall.

That’s all I got for now, thanks for stopping by!

One Room Challenge - Bathroom Design

Wow, it’s been awhile since I blogged! I feel like I’m going back in time.

I’m starting this blog with the One Room Challenge, Fall 2019. I have some rooms I’ve finished in our house already that I will post about after the challenge is finished.

You can also follow along on my new YouTube channel, also starting with the One Room Challenge.

At first I was going to do the Living Room, but then my husband Jarrod designed a pretty rad towel bar for our master bathroom, and we were inspired to finish our bathroom based off of that. So Jarrod will be joining me! He won’t necessarily be a part of every design I do, but I’m happy to have him whenever I can.

My background: I’m a freelance illustrator, painter, mixed media artist, and a production designer, set decorator and artist in the film industry. I prefer to create however and whatever I feel, I don’t like being cornered in by one creative medium or limited by someones else’s vision. This is why I’m beginning my YouTube channel and blog, so that I can create authentically.

My goal with our home is to make it into a unique space with as much DIY as possible. I love the challenge of coming up with custom design and not relying too heavily on mass produced items and trendy ideas. If it’s colorful, bold and weird, I like it. If it’s over the top, I like it. If it’s unconventional, I like it.

Thanks for being here!

Melissa Mae