Traditional Hawaiian Nursery: Complete!

Aloha DIYers! So I dropped off the face of the bloggerworld for a while but decided that this post was deserving of my resurrection. A lot has happened in the last year, namely I got pregnant and we're prepping to add a little dude to the mix in the Metzner household in approx. 3 weeks! That being said, we've been crunching designs out of our ears to try and get "THE NURSERY" done in time. I say it like that because it's literally been the topic of discussion and effort for the last month and a half (with planning stretching months back), what seems like non-stop. But we're DONE! And the reason I thought it necessary to share with the interwebs is because when I originally thought in my head, "hmmmm this is what I want for a nursery" there was NOTHING online. Like literally, I couldn't find a single nursery like the one I envisioned to glean inspiration from. Now I'm very much one of those people who sees something, thinks, "oh pretty, I'll copy it" and I do. This nursery had to come from scratch which was incredibly stressful but actually turned out being really fun and both Jason and I are stoked about our vision coming to fruition:

Alrighty, now for some nitty-gritty details for those of you interested in perhaps creating a Traditional Hawaiian Nursery and you like what you see. Let's start off with the "K" (for Kai) gallery wall over the crib:

It all started with a paddle. While in Hawaii earlier this summer we fell in love with the mini koa wood paddle you see featured in the middle of the wall. Instead of having just one lonely paddle over the crib we decided to make a showcase of some different kinds of artwork from the islands (or inspired by), some fabrics, some art pieces:

Martin & MacArthur Solid Koa Paddle 32" 

Tiffany Wong Art Monstera Leaf Watercolor Print

Granny Panty Designs Kohola Hawaiian Humpback Whale

Joanne and Company Surfboard Hawaiian Petroglyph Design on Tapa

We wanted the room to have a cozy feel that showcased different textures and wood variations. We tried to accomplish this by mixing up the frames used throughout the room to add a lot of different color variety. Instead of sticking with traditional closet doors, we decided to go with something a little different and tried out curtain panels. This sounds like, "oh yeah easy decision, boom" but it so wasn't. I think I stressed out for about two weeks about what we should do since all that was there originally were these horrid, ugly, honey oak, flimsy doors that just wouldn't do. Throughout our house we have louvered doors which I'm a huge fan of but we had a really hard time finding some to fit the closet space in the nursery that weren't going to cost a fortune. When I found the woven curtain panels, we were both a little skeptical at first (Jason especially) but once we saw them and installed them, we loved how much natural texture they brought to the room:

Chicology Double Rail Sliding Panel System in French Oolong 

On to the bookcases. Jason custom built these guys so they would fit snuggly around the crib and give us precious room for all the books I plan to fill them with! He used simple pine and we stained them with a mixture of Minwax "Cognac" and "Golden Mahogany" to get the Koa-esque color. 

As for some of the artwork around the bookcases, some of my favorite pieces came from a gorgeous book "Pele: The Fire Goddess" by Dietrich Varez and Pua Kanaka'ole Kanahele. 

To add some more variety and textures we also hung a traditional Maile-Style Ti lei (with a more modern Uke ;) to match the small dried Ti lei hanging over the crib. The Hawaiian Ti plant (Cordyline terminalis) is thought to bring good luck!

Lei from Frond Custom Leis

Moving over the other side of the room, you start off by seeing our beautiful NAKED Pottery Barn chair. OOOOhhhh lawd, don't even get me started on this one. I'll start by saying that I love this chair, the Pottery Barn Kids Comfort Swivel Rocker...would I buy it again? Probably not. We've had a plethora of problems with Pottery Barn since buying this chair which has majorly scared me away from buying any large furniture pieces from them again. As you can see, we have the chair with it's padding and all but we've been waiting four months for the slipcover. It was delivered with a completely wrong slipcover (not sure how you get denim blue and white stripes from cream twill...) and since then we've been waiting and waiting and waiting for the new, correct slipcover. We've been told that the fabric is on indefinite back order now and they are hoping they'll eventually get it in October...you know, like after my due date. Anywho, the chair is great, but maybe stay away from Pottery Barn furniture (I've heard a number of other similar horror stories so I guess we aren't just an anomaly) especially if you've got a specific time in mind to get the furniture. Moving on, the artwork you see hanging is a complete mixed bag, from some beautiful Heather Browns to Jason's custom wooden spears. 

Heather Brown Surf Art

We wanted to stick with the very traditional Hawaiian spear design for this piece and I think they turned out fantastic. Jason crafted them out of Hemlock and used the Minwax "Golden Mahogany" tint to get them that lovely Koa-esque shade.

The showstopper of the room though really is the beautiful Japanese Sashiko Manta my Mom hand-stitched:

Jason also built the simple frame for this out of the same Hemlock and stain mixture as the spears. Other bits of the room you can copy are the ottoman we purchased (there was no way I was dropping $500 on the matching Pottery Barn Kids Ottoman) so instead found this awesome, unique one from Target: Kelsey Round Pouf Ottoman. The little side table you see next to the chair actually are two small bathroom tables we found from Home Goods that Jason just drilled together. We also found the Tommy Bahama Lamp from Home Goods. 

Below the window we placed this woven toy chest we found at Home Goods along with this guy who we've affectionately named "Pono" (Melissa & Doug Giant Plush Sea Turtle) along with the gorgeous wooden Monstera nightlight (From Rob Whitemore on Etsy).

Last but not least! The lighting!! And paint!! These two elements (along with the closet doors debacle) were probably the most frustrating, hand-wringing parts of this room because for the life of us, we just couldn't agree. Jason hadn't been too much a fan of drum lights but there was an awful, dim, nipple light in the nursery that just wasn't going to fly but we couldn't agree on what to change it out with. Because we have fairly low ceilings, it really cut back our options and I finally talked him into trying a four-bulb drum light, which once installed, did the trick. It provides plenty of lighting and he even liked it so much we installed the same light in two other rooms! Bronze with Off White Shade 18" Wide Ceiling Light Fixture. 

And finally, what paint color is the room you ask? Sherman William's Sands of Time. We probably went through about 10 different samples and just couldn't figure it out. They were either too light, too dark, clashed with the carpet, clashed with the furniture etc. To be honest, Jason was sold on Sands of Time from the get go. I really think the main reason for this was because "Sands of Time" happen to be items in World of Warcraft, Prince of Persia, and a plethora of other nerdy games which I think really got him stoked on the color. I was afraid it would be too dark but after painting a whole wall, he had me convinced.

In closing, if you want that Traditional Hawaiian, Hawaiian Plantation, etc vibe for your nursery (or room, or house, or whatever) don't be afraid of all the loud surfboard, grass skirt, hibiscus, inspired rooms you're bound to find online. I'm a big fan of neutrals, and unisex design so this was perfect for a room that I hope to use for a while in the future. However, if Kai decides he wants a Frozen, Seahawks, or Pirate room, *le sigh* fortunately we can use almost every decoration from this nursery somewhere else in the house! 

Belated Bastille Day Celebrations Begin!

Bonjour DIYers! So I know that Bastille Day was officially on Monday but we didn't have much time until this weekend to begin the festivities. Jason and I are already prepping for a major French-o feast tomorrow but that post will come after the bazillion calories have been prepared and consumed. I wanted to start the festivities off with a project I did a while back but is very appropriate for the holiday. Originally, I saw the most adorable towel at Anthropologie; you might have seen it before:

freaking adorable

Welp, I wasn't about to pay $42 for a tea towel, plus I wasn't even sure how I would decorate a room with a tea towel so going off of the original idea I decided to create a fun wall canvas for our guest bedroom (that just happens to be francais-themed). I had a largish square canvas laying around so I started by painting it red, white, and blue in the order of the French flag:

not too much talent necessary for this step

Because I wanted to give the room a bit more of a "rustic" French theme I white-washed the canvas after letting it dry. To do this you add some water to a bit of white paint and mix. How white-washed you want it is up to you but try with more water at first and see how you like the look. You can always paint over it with the red or blue:

white-washing gives the canvas a little more of a distressed look

Now comes to the part that you might need a little more painting prowess (or just be good at copying things like me!) I don't trust myself on the first go so I decided to paint the Frenchie Bulldog on separate sheets of canvas. I used tear out sheets of thin canvas pictured below:

Comes with 10 sheets, plenty for screw-ups

I found a generic picture of a Frenchie that I liked the pose of and decided to start with the head first. This is really where you can artsy and add whatever details you'd like. I started by drawing in pencil and once I got the head shape that I liked, I added French details and painted the face:

scary!

wouldn't be complete without a mustache!

While I set the head aside the dry, I started on the body. Again, I just drew by hand in pencil going off of the original picture, then added the French details:

Now for the easy part!! All I did was cut out the body and the head and modge podged the whole thing to the French flag canvas! Easy Peasy!!! I apologize for not taking pictures of the lettering in progress but I just printed a font that I liked the look of in the same size that it would be on canvas and copied it by hand as best I could, then followed in black paint. Voila! A custom art piece for a fraction of the cost of a towel!

A Little Aloha with Spam Musubi

Aloha folks!! Sorry for the long post delay but I was busy stuffing my face and watching Hula in a recent trip to Hawaii. The ladies in my family like heading to the Big Island during Merrie Monarch to watch the amazeballs dancers compete in the Merrie Monarch Festival and this year we drug the boys along too. Like I said before, I basically spent the entire time drooling over the gorgeous dancing men (and women, shooot they were gorgeous) and eating everything Hawaiian food-related in sight.

somanymusclesahhhhhhh

pigging out at an all-you-can-eat Hawaiian buffet with Carly (left, yeah that's not me, close though) and Jason

So, with Hawaiian food on the mind, I bring you a tutorial on the greatest snack food of all time, aka Spam Musubi. For those of you who have been to Hawaii you'll know that these beauties are EVERYWHERE. Like pick one up in the gas station to munch on status. But they are so ridiculously easy to make that we often times make a batch to just have in the fridge to snack on throughout the week.

Of course the glorious thing about this recipe is of course the main ingredient: SPAM. Here's where I become a bit of a hypocrite. For the most part we try really hard to eat organic, non-GMO, healthy yadda yadda but Spam really is my downfall. Spam sandwiches, spam and eggs, spam just by itself, you name it, I'll probably eat it. Spam musubi is of course no exception. 

For starters, if you're thinking about making enough for a bit of a stock in the fridge, cook about 3 cups of short-grain "sticky" white rice (this yields about 12-15 musubis). Do this about 40 mins before you think you're going to want to start making the musubi so your rice will have time to cool a bit. Then, start prepping your nori (seaweed) which will be wrapped around everything to hold in all the musubi loveliness. You'll want the regular, square nori you can find in most supermarkets in the Asian isle. Once you have several slices out (you'll need one packet and have extra to make the 12-15), cut them in half and set them aside. 

cutting in half like a pro

Now it's time to slice and cook up the Spam. For the 12-15 musubis we used two cans of Spam but this depends on how thick you want to the slices to be.

you can cut it thinner if you want, but really, who doesn't want more spam??

Then cook it up. Now here's where you know Spam really is sketchy because you really don't have to cook it if you don't want to but browned Spam has a lovely salty flavor that is unparalleled in musubi.

cooked on the left, cooking on the right. mmmmmm golden Spam

Once your Spam is done cooking go ahead and set it aside and get ready for the fun, really super re-purposing part. In Hawaii they sell fancy little plastic musubi makers that you can buy at any major food store. Orrrrr you could just rinse out the Spam can and use that instead. I'll show you how to use both below:

fancy on the left, old-school on the right 

First, I'll show you how to rock it the old-school way with the Spam can (or really Jason will since his beautiful hands were doing the fancy work in the pictures). Take your rice and start pressing it into the Spam can. Put enough pressure where your're confident that the rice will stick together, and fill to the top:

It's the world's greatest hand model!

Once filled, turn that can upside down and "fwack" it out. That's really the best word I know how to describe shaking something until food comes out. I looked it up in Urban Dictionary and apparently is means to be slapped with a fish (wtf?) but really fwacking is the best way to describe getting rice out of a spam can:

Maybe a video would have been best to really appreciate "fwacking"

TADA!

Now that's a big block of rice so with a sharp knife, cut the rice into sections. Again the thickness is all based on personal preference but we cut one Spam can block of rice into three slices:

Jason loves showing off his sushi knife any chance he gets really

Now if you're lucky enough to have one of the musubi contraptions I'll show you how to use that. Pull the top off and stuff enough rice into it for one musubi. Remember with this, you'll be squishing it down with the topper so put in enough rice where you think it'll squish to give you enough for one musubi. Do this all over one piece of nori and then squish the rice down and lift the whole box up and you're set!

so fancy!

Now to make the magic happen. Choose your topping of choice:

Katsu sauce or Soy sauce? I personally prefer it traditional and stick with the soy sauce but Jason is a katsu sauce man. If you've never had katsu sauce, think like a BBQ sauce almost. Kind of sweet. I always stock up on Katsu sauce in Hawaii so I'm not sure if you can buy it in regular mainland supermarkets but if you're hankering for it, drop by an L & L and grab some to go!

Now that the hardest decision has been made for the day, pull out your halved piece of nori , place the slice of rice in the middle and top with your favorite topping:

traditional for me with soy sauce

or how Jason prefers with Katsu sauce

You're almost there!! Place a piece of cook spam on top like so:

And now it's time to seal that baby up! I usually keep a small bowl of water next to me while doing this next part because water will help seal the nori together to hold everything up. Wrap the nori on either side of your spam/rice block and tap a little bit of water along the edge to seal:

PAU!!! You can immediately saran-wrap them and store them in the fridge to enjoy over and over again or you can be like Jason and immediately eat them all. Either way, enjoy that aloha goodness!

that is one happy camper