Matter of Trust is Collecting Hair Clippings for a Great Cause

About a week ago I was in need of background noise while editing my manuscript and I came across a marathon of Tabitha’s Salon Take Over. I mean no offense to the show but it was the perfect thing as I truly just needed something I could ignore. Of course a few episodes in my ears perked up at the mention of Matter of Trust and I had to immediately put my editing aside for a few minutes of research.

The organization collects the scraps of hair that are cut off and swept up into a garbage can then they take them and fashion them into mats.

Now, before I hear a ton of comments like ‘eeew, I don’t want a hair mat!’ let me explain what these mats are used for and why.

Turns out that human hair is quite adept at retaining grease and oil and it, combined with other fibers such as feathers, furs and wools that were all headed for the landfill, can be fashioned into hand held mats that are used to clean up oil spills all along waterways. Cool!

As their website indicates there are upwards of 370,000 pounds of hair thrown away by just the hair salons in the United States every day, that’s a lot of hair that could be turned into mats.

Phil McCoy is the inventor of the hair mat and he is asking for every salon in the US to sign up to send in their hair clippings to help assist in cleaning up the 2,600+ oil spills that happen in and around our waterways every year. They even suggest reusing the boxes that salon product was shipped in to do it. What a fantastic environmental idea!

The only snag is that right now the old warehouse location is no longer adequate and they are seeking a new space for donations to be sent in but they strongly urge salons to sign up anyway with an email address as they will contact you as soon as they are ready to begin accepting the boxes again.

Sometimes the best way to discover something new is diversion. I was really excited to discover this organization and I hope all my salon friends (including my own hair dresser who I will be alerting about this program when I next see her in a couple weeks!) take full advantage of this way to turn waste into treasure and help our water ways!

It’s Curtains for the Door Project!

The project to install doors is complete; I couldn’t be more pleased with the final look and functionality of them. Yesterday I posted this photo as a tease for how the before looked:


The opening on the nook that we call our bedroom is approximately 62” wide by 77” high and as you can see in the lower right corner there is a piece of furniture rather close to the opening so the traffic path is just wide enough for passing ability. This means we could not have a standard swing style hinged door so Matt and I began brainstorming a better solution.

Our final decision was to use bi-fold doors. There were a few reasons for this:

1. They are a cost effective solution (since this isn’t our permanent residence that is key).
2. Installation is relatively easy.
3. They will block light & noise as well as provide a greater sense of security.
4. They can come with us when we go if the landlord doesn’t want to keep them.
5. Minimal damage done to the homeowner’s doorway is easily fixable later.

We headed up to tax free New Hampshire for a day of shopping last weekend and picked up all the supplies we needed. Because the brown and copper leafed desk was going to be residing in this space, and also that I was intending to exchange the cranberry velvet curtains with a pair of green striped panels from another room, we decided on sage green paint and oil rubbed copper pulls.

Including the trim on the inside to finish the look and block the light from coming into the sides, the entire project cost us about five days to completely finish and in the ball park of $225 for materials. Here are the finished doors installed and functional! Only bit left is to paint the interior trim which I will finish up this week.

The look is much more streamlined than the curtains were and when left open, they don’t impact the traffic path at all.

These pretty pulls bring the look together well.

So what did I do with those cranberry colored velvet curtains?

Well they were the perfect compliment to our movie themed living room!

They instantly warm up the space, both visually and physically, by providing another much needed punch of color in a room which we are not allowed to paint.

The posters and movie themed pictures include: The Goonies, Memphis Belle, School Ties, Honeymoon In Vegas, Aladdin, Cinderella and Spice World (oh you better believe it!) plus around the space are tons of movie related items such as a Lord of the Rings statue, scene markers, movies and a copy of The Hobbit plus much more.

Repurposing, Recycling, Refinishing, and More Projects

Good morning friends! I do greatly apologize for my time away but there have been quite a few projects going on over here and now that everything is done I’m really excited to share the final photos and stories with all of you!

I have never been a person to just toss a piece of furniture, in fact, most of the time I tend to keep pieces long past their intended life cycle. I recently refinished a desk where this was most definitely the case but it came out so well that it probably just gained another five years at least!

When I was a very young kid, about seven or eight, my dad made me a desk. It was a simple piece made of pine, with an interestingly shaped top that fit right into a corner, one large drawer in the center and three legs which screwed into the bottom. I have been carrying it around with me for all of these years because of its versatility.

About five years ago I painted it and a side chair (which I had acquired from my grandparents years before and was likely already twenty some odd years old) in fire engine red and spray painted the white ceramic pull with brushed silver then used it in my funky colored craft room. The color was good but the paint wasn’t and over the past couple years it had started to peel or chip off, including the pull. In addition to that I had a small table in there that I got for free out of the trash somewhere that was originally fake wood sticker over particle board. Here are all three pieces in my old sewing room (table in lower left corner just a glimpse of it):

With my experience painting, plus the desire to freshen up these pieces I decided to pick through some paint we had lying around and a project was born! I decided to utilize the chocolate brown left over from the free entertainment center project from last year so everything would come together much more cohesively.

I scuffed them all, wiped them down and brushed on two coats (no primer needed as there was already paint on all the pieces).

Then before applying the antique flat, water based, top coat varnish I got inspired to do a little leafing with some left over copper leaf I had from a previous client. I used a simple but decorative stencil to apply the leafing adhesive to three of the corners, around the pull and on the pull itself.

For the side table I purchased a piece of $0.98 hardware and Matt drilled the hole to install it. For the chair I utilized a piece of fabric that I already had to reupholster the seat (which goes perfectly with the palm tree area rug we have in our living room, score!). Here’s the final look of the other two finished pieces:

But these were not the really big project that we both took on over the past week. The biggie was finally putting a door up on the entrance to our bedroom. I’ll give you a little teaser with a before photo but come on back tomorrow for the full story!

Ever Wonder What Can Be Done With Old Tires?

Yesterday, a friend of mine and fellow blogger Dennis, sent an email asking that exact question and I was curious what I might find within. Turns out there are some seriously creative people out there making use of this medium to create not only functional pieces like playground equipment but lasting impression art as well! I hope you enjoy this random sampling of amazing pieces and if anyone happens to know the artists of these very cool sculptures please let me know in comments, thanks & enjoy!

“Have You Heard of Jason Castro?”

The other day a friend of mine emailed me one question: “Have you heard of Jason Castro?” Being who I am, I immediately Googled the name and discovered a singer with a pretty groovy vibe. Jason Castro was on American Idol season seven and hails from the Dallas, Texas area which is where my friend is currently living.

Now I have to admit, I never watch the show. Most reality television is not my scene and even though this show is about music, something I truly enjoy, the two night a week commitment is far more television than I am willing to dedicate myself to most of the time. But, listening to him on You Tube, I can see why this Texan gained recognition.

His voice is sweet and he plays a string instrument, plus he has one of those smiles that girls dig and he’s an unconventional pop star with extra long dreadlocks. The boy has a very easy going sense about him as well. In essence, he’s got that “something”. That something is an album to be released early this year and the following is a single, released last year and due to be featured on the album, Let's Just Fall In Love Again. I think you’ll enjoy its lighthearted vibe as much as I did. Thanks for introducing me to his music Dianna!