Wall Art

I've been working on brightening up the living room, which is full of mostly neutral colors. Nate has these geometric sound dampening panels hanging on the walls... which I am not the biggest fan of. I would prefer to take them down and replace them with something pretty and personal, like wedding photos or bookshelves or something. But he wants to keep them because sound quality is a very important part of his life. He compromised by allowing me to cover them with pretty fabric.

Here there are before, in all their boring glory:

Not too bad, but I knew I could make them better. I went to Hobby Lobby and bought some fabric that I've been drooling over for a long time. All I needed was a staple gun and I could put the new fabric right over the old. Unfortunately mine has gone missing, but I have some great friends that let me borrow theirs! 

So my friend Ashley and I had a little craft day. I worked on my sound panels and she worked on a new piece of art to hang in her crafting room. 

Ashley is quite the seamstress. She taught me to waste as little fabric as is necessary. So we wrapped the panels tightly and cut off the extra to use for another project. At first I was nervous to use the electric staple gun, but it worked so well and I got the hang of it quickly.

We wrapped up the corners like a present!

Finishing up stapling the first panel

Here's what they look like before and after:

There's a set on the wall on both sides of the tv. Look how pretty they are! I just love this fabric so much.

I went ahead and hung them on the wall, but I really need to cover the black rectangular ones behind them. I want them to be dark brown to match the small flowers in the fabric. But they still brighten up the room a bunch!

I do like them a lot, but I will be happier when the black ones are brown! 

We actually had quite a bit of leftover fabric when we were done, and we put it to great use on another project. I'll show you the amazing results soon!

But for now, here's what Ashley made while I covered my sound dampening panels. Isn't it adorable?

She got an old painting from Goodwill, put down the letters with contact paper, then spray-painted white over all of it. So peeling off the letters let the painting shine through! So cute. You can see her whole process over on her blog at Quilted Affair!

We had so much fun on our crafting afternoon. Ashley is great with fabric and taught me a lot about sewing. I hope we get to be creative together again sometime soon!