The Living Room Chronicles: Step 4: DIY A Remote Control Holder & Pretty-Up The Coffee Table

Welcome back to the world of chronicles! Yes, today's edition will be just as exciting as it sounds! 

It this chronicle, I get the chance to bring more of my favorite color, green, into the room!

The colors of my living room are green, black, white, and yellow with some neutral furniture. 

The coffee table had just been checked off my list. Now, it was time to make it functional and pretty! I had a vision of neutral sectional, black rug, wood table, black tray on the table, something wood on the tray, some green foliage and some sort of green box for my remotes.  Ikea provided me with the perfect tray, wood plant box, and plant.

However, Ikea did not have the green box I was looking for.  So, I went DIY.  I found a loaf pan at Ikea for only $1.99. It was the perfect size and it was black inside, which would compliment the room.  

I knew I wanted the outside of my pan/ remote holder to be green.  I love love love love love getting as many funky patterns and graphic design into my decor and this was the place to do it!  I looked at some craft stores for cool green scrapbook paper, but left empty-handed. So, I went to a few of my favorite fabric websites and saved some lovely green fabrics as JPGs.  I am constantly buying fabric from these websites and would have used their fabric if this project had called for fabric rather than paper. In fact, I bought the elephant fabric in 2 different colors. Also, I did some very funky math when purchasing the fabric for my yellow giraffe curtains and ended up with enough fabric to decorate all of the nurseries in the entire United States. In case you can't tell, I am trying to talk myself out of feeling bad for using their fabric images.

Next, I printed them out and cut them to fit my loaf pan.  I applied Modge Podge with a foam brush to the back of the paper and adhered it to the pan. Modge Podge is a DIY must-have. It is kind of like a combo of shellac and glue. I repeated this process until the pan was covered and I was happy.  Then I went back and Modge Podged the front side of every piece.  I waited about 30 minutes for it to dry and I applied another coat.  I loved the outcome.  It brought in the perfect touch of green that I was looking for.

Then, I put some remotes and coasters (which were quilted by my talented sister) in it and tada! It was done!



Here are the 7 fabulous steps that it takes to finish up my living room:

Step 1: Move in. Put in whatever furniture we had. Hang art.

Step 2: The Craigslist deal of a lifetime

Step 3: New coffee table (Step 3 Introduction found here)

Step 4: DIY remote control holder. A tiny, tiny step, but we are still calling it one.

Step 5: Should we change out the fireplace?

Step 6: The plant table and the plants

Step 7: Finishing touches

In case you can't wait the 3 steps we have left to see the finished product. Here it is:

ps don't forget to answer the WYR at the end of this post!

Wednesday's Weekly Would You Rather Question:

WYR:
not be able to eat chocolate for 15 years
or
have to watch a nonstop marathon of the TV show, Power Rangers, for 72 hours straight (no sleeping, eating or anything else)?