It's about time...

The common biological need to declutter after New Year’s sent me web-crawling for tips and ideas. That’s when I discovered the awesome (and extensive) online community of super creative bloggers sharing their adventures and inspiration in decorating, crafting, cooking and every diy you can imagine. It really inspired me to want my own blog, if not just as a space to keep track of my own projects and ideas. Besides, how could I not want to be part of that fun?

Unfortunately, I’m prone to nasty little buggers like perfectionitis and procrastinoma, so for the past seven months I’ve just been stalking. Meanwhile, I have projects being started and finished, ideas and new inspiration being born all the time, and they’re totally missing out on their shot at online fame. So, today is the day, my friends. The blog starts here. No, everything’s not perfectly in place yet, (nor do I have any clue what I’m doing). Yes, I still consider myself to be…some would say whimsical, some might call it flighty...let’s just say my interest shifts a lot. But ya know? I could wait for all my neuroses to work themselves out and NOT have a blog, or have an imperfect blog I inconsistently post to. Mmm, blog.

So, I thought since I’m feeling all ‘seize the moment,’ I’ll keep in the spirit with my first project post: time zone clocks. I always thought this was such a cool element...

Photo: Pottery Barn

Photo: Wal-Mart

My home office has been a work in progress for, like, ever. It was super slow going for a while (read: it turned into the junk room we never went into except to stash more junk), but it's made some pretty big strides over the past couple of months and it’s finally ready for me to steal this idea. Here’s how I did it.

First, I found clocks at Wal-mart for $4 each. They're plastic but, it's totally fine by me. No one who ever sees them will know. They have a classic enough look and they totally fit the budget­. Sold!



Because I'm finicky about making holes in my walls, (and also a little bit neurotic about things like "level" and "straight"), I let my Hero measure and hang them evenly, I believe about 15" apart, but obviously this varies depending on the size of your clocks (I said CLOCKS) and personal preference. Then they stayed like that while I obsessed about which method I should employ to get my cities underneath them. Thanks to the lovely ladies who have gone before me to world of stenciling being so kind to share their techniques, like this and this and this, I went out and bought myself a bottle of black paint to go to it.

I found the font I wanted to use, printed my words out on cardstock and cut out the letters with an exacto knife. When I trimmed the stencils apart, I made sure I left even space between the top of the letters and the edge of the paper so when it was time to place them on the wall I could measure my distance down from the clock more easily.



I don’t know if this step was necessary, but this was the easiest way I came up with to get the cities all centered. I found some kite string, painters tape and a few heavy washers, and I hung them even with the sides of the clocks (those babies are EVEN; go Hero).

Then, I laid a ruler across the strings, marked center, and lined the center of each stencil up with that. Since my ruler’s a level, it was easy enough to get the stencils straight all in one step, and I secured them to the wall with painter’s tape.


I was worried that sponge painting would seep under the stencil since the walls are slightly textured, so I did a test between a sponge brush and a simple craft paintbrush. The paintbrush left a cleaner line, but I decided to leave the stencil on the wall rather than trace the letters and paint them in freehand.

I have to say it was a little addictive, and it was a little like a free yoga class stretching and twisting over the stencils. It took, maybe, an hour or two. After I removed the stencils (do this while the paint is still wet to easily fix any mistakes), I went back with a tiny brush and straightened out any lines that needed it, and voila! I love this! The project, including the clocks, cost less than $15. And I LOVE this!