Staircase to Heaven

Seriously, I woke up this morning with Angels singing as I walked down my new staircase. Can you hear them? (High pitched perfect A note drawn for 10 seconds) Yes it is amazing that this staircase is done and so quickly. We made this staircase one of our New Years Resolutions and it came together fast. First we needed to stain the railing to match our wood floors that we installed. (This should've been done 3 years ago when we installed them, but we were so OVER home improvement projects by the end of that baby) It was alot of work to stain them but I was reading a magazine the whole time so I wouldn't know exactly how much time it took. I would guess the project was approximately 12 People Magazine's worthy. I was nice enough to read them at the bottom of the staircase and hand him some diet cokes now and then through the project though. I'm super thoughtful that way. He used a good cleaner first on the railing and lightly sanded the poly off. Then came the Minwax gel stain, color Mahogany. We used this on our Fireplace mantel as well so we knew we liked it and it would match the floors. This stuff is sticky for 3 days so avoid touching it! After it's completely dry, use a wipe-on poly by Minwax to make it kid-proof.


Witness the incredibly boring oak railing and bare wall. Why did it take us over 3 years to do this project? (Oh yeah, cuz I hadn't accumulated enough People magazines before then to read during this project.) Next came another project doozy. Doozy, that's just fun to type! My collage wall. I'm not a collag-y type of girl. I like the simplicity of linear artwork. I wasn't sure I was going to be able to pull this off. Over the last few months I've had a few friends/clients email me some of their collages that they put on their walls and staircases of family photoshoots that I took of them. I loved them! I was totally inspired to make one of my own after seeing collages at their best. I've also seen collages at their worst, circa 1985 and didn't want a wall of "frames gone bad" at my house. So I got some advice from a friend who had executed this project perfectly. I bought the frames FIRST! Then layed them out on my rug in a order that I thought I'd like and then sat down with a piece of paper and sketched out which photo I'd want in each frame and if it was a horizontal or vertical picture. Then I ordered the photos and canvas' and waited. And waited. And waited. And then, it was Christmas! I opened everything and put all the pictures in frames and laid them out again. Once I finally got it the way I wanted, I took a picture of it so I could remember which frame went where. Then the real work began. Did you know that only 2 of my 14 pictures came with hooks? Seriously, none of these pictures which are all meant to be hung had ANY hardware on them! Outrageous! So we headed to Home Depot and spent a whopping $30 on hanging picture stuff, cuz my hubby wanted to make sure that if our house blew to pieces in a tornado that all the frames would still be securely attached. There was math used in hanging these photos and honestly I would've just eyeballed it, but it's a good thing my husband is the perfectionist and the patient one. He is the epitome of patience. Not a single swear-word or grumbling while taking on this (every night for a week) stiarcase-project. So you've waited long enough, get ready to hear the Hallelujah Choir.......


The best part of the project was when I woke up this morning my husband told me how happy it made him to walk down the stairs and see the photos. I feel the same way about photos in general. I know they're not decorating diva-ish. I know that you're supposed to tone down the personal if you're ever to sell your home. But I don't care. Photos of my family or anyone's family make me happy. Especially when displayed in a BIG STATEMENT. Yes, I will never be an understated girl. Go BIG or go HOME. Or in my case...... do both!

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