Tuvia and I have been working on the TV area in our living room for awhile. It sat on our Ikea Bjursta sideboard for two years before we got it on the wall.
We wanted it on the wall because 1- it’s supposedly the #1 source of accidents in houses with a toddler (and yes those are Aiden’s handprints smudged all over the bottom) and 2- I wanted the top of the sideboard clear (which didn’t end up happening at all).
We also put a picture rail above it because we wanted the TV at a good eye-level from the couch but wanted to make it look more cohesive and like all the different (all Ikea) pieces were a unit (which they are not). And we want to disguise it a little bit and make it seem less like the focal point since we’re fans of conversation as well as TV. A mustache would be awesome, but probably wouldn’t help for this purpose.
Not sure what Tuvia is doing with the flashlight in his mouth…I have to assume something needed to be done behind the TV
When we were trying to figure out the whole setup, we decided to get a white cover for the wires. Because we don’t own our apartment, we didn’t want to break down the wall to hide the wires so we got this cover from Best Buy instead.
Does not blend into the wall like I hoped it would
Tuvia also put the boxes on the bookshelves so they wouldn’t be a focal point either. We can’t put them all on one shelf because of wire reach and most of them shouldn’t have something on top (ventilation?). Eventually I want to get pretty storage for the DVDs so they’re right next to the DVD player but not in plain view. Right now they have any short books we can shove in there, but I am not loving the look.
There he is sitting on the sideboard again
In theory, having a white cover coming out of the TV didn’t bother me, but in reality it drives me nuuuuts! So we put up art to camouflage it a little bit. (Which also contributes to the disguising-the-TV thing we were going for)
Our first attempt at wire cover camo
The art on the sideboard as it is now…I like it better in person- still working on my photography skills!
We’ve gone through several variations on what we put there and while we like this setup, it presents two problems:
1- Aiden likes to play with his toys on the sideboard as it’s a good height for him and he sometimes knocks down the pictures which concerns us for his safety (and the pictures’ safety, let’s be honest)
and 2- we can’t figure out what to put on the picture rail above the TV without the whole thing looking too busy.
This is what we had on the picture rail originally, before we had anything on the sideboard:
I promise Tuvia doesn’t always sit on the sideboard. He just seems to in these pictures.
This is with art above and below the TV:
There was still some white peeking out and it looked way too busy. So we tried other things
It doesn’t vary much, but we wanted to work with what we had first. The picture rail art has changed about once a week since then with different photographs, frames, and art we have around the house and like the good blogger I am (womp, womp) I didn’t document it BUT we have a whole new plan now!
So you don’t have to scroll, here’s the picture again of how the art on the sideboard is now:
The art on the sideboard as it is now
There’s still some white peeking through and still the problem of Aiden knocking over the art, but this amount of white doesn’t bother me that much and once we finalize the art above AND below, there are ways to attach the art to the wall and maintain this casually leaning on the wall look.
So..we were at Target and as usual I kept pointing to things and saying things like “oh, hello there pretty thing” and “how did my throw pillow get in Target when it should be on our couch?” and I noticed that a vast majority of the things I was pointing to were from the new home decor line at Target, Threshold.
One of the many things that I made goo goo eyes at was this frame
I’ve been wanting to add some metallics (specifically, gold) to our home (and pink, but that’s another story) and really liked this as a start. We got it and liked how this picture of Mia looked in it
Mia’s gorgeous headband was made by my talented sister in law who lives in Israel
Since I’ve been really into gold lately, I also knew exactly what I wanted to go with it: a gold “LOVE” print from MadeByGirl by Jen Ramos. I am OBSESSED with her Cocoa & Hearts paintings, they are GORGEOUS and always sold out and if anyone wants to be my absolute favorite person forEVER then they will get me one. (We also have a MadeByGirl print in our room, but there will be NO updates on that until Mia is in the other room with Aiden and our bedroom stops looking like a ….okay I don’t want to say hurricane so soon after Sandy but you get what I’m saying)
Still in the plastic until we get it framed
We ordered the print and though we have yet to frame it, we are loving it where it is right now. We’re going to look for a thin gold frame like the one pictured below, at Target since Michael’s didn’t have one I liked and I do believe that the Threshold line has one…score!
Finally getting to the point of this post: we decided that (for now at least) we want to have the love print, the metallic frame with a picture of Mia in it, and a metallic frame with a picture of Aiden in it on the picture rail above the television. That way there will be some cohesion and simplicity.
In order to unify what is above and below the TV, we decided to paint the wooden frame of this picture gold
My bride from the 1920’s… from the FIT Special Collections department (a fantastic resource)
For this easy project, all we needed was some paint and a brush. We considered metallic spray paint, but felt like it was needless to expose ourselves to the toxic fumes the can warned us about when we had an easy alternative.
I have been itching to do stencil projects so I used this opportunity to buy stencil brushes and used those. I am sure I could have used others, but I like how it came out a little textured so I’m definitely happy with the purchase.
I painted on a different angle for each section and didn’t smooth out the paint to keep it a little more interesting. With only one coat you can still kind of see the “wood grain” (it’s Ikea so I have to assume it’s not actually wood) and I like how it came out!
I canNOT seem to get a picture of the whole frame that I like, but here it is:
And from various other angles…
It’s less mustardy yellow and more really pretty gold in real life.
And here is the finished product in it’s place:
The result is pretty subtle, but that works for me 🙂
And because there was some of the gold left on the plate and I could not bear to throw it out… I decided to do something else I’ve been meaning to try and I added a band of gold to the bottom of a glass jar. I used a washed out pasta sauce jar instead of one of our mason jars just in case I didn’t do it correctly or didn’t like how it came out….which is good because I didn’t read the instructions first and it didn’t come out at all like I thought it would
It could be that it’s because I didn’t clean it with alcohol first, maybe I needed a different brush, or maybe it just needs more coats. In the end though…I kind of like it.
The rest of the apartment better watch out though because just about everything looks prettier with some gold paint on it. Tuvia would look nice in gold….#goldcrazywifeontheloose
Anyone else going crazy for gold lately? It might be all the holiday decor I’m seeing everywhere, but sparkly=happy Gilit. Thanks for stopping by!
P.S. Check out this post by the ever fab Emily Henderson on disguising your TV
Shoes Off, Please 