Success!

First off, the most exciting news of the weekend - the ladder has left the family room!

Second exciting news, I found the most AMAZING hutch and table.  The lady that I bought the mirror from on Friday had an ENTIRE shop full of furniture half way refurbished and refurbished. 

She took it from a brown looking turd (her words) to this lovely white piece! We bought it from her mid-paint so we have to do some touch up and sanding, but we were stoked.  The hutch also has glass doors on the right and left upper cabinets.  You can see them in the below picture leaning against our new dining table!

I am in LOVE with this table.  It has a leaf too so it will end up seating a giant group.  It's in decent shape, minus the painted rectangle on the top.  We are going to sand it down and stain it darker.

And just for the record, I did not need a dining room table.  I have one that I bought at Ikea that I liked just fine.  It wasn't anything special...just some particle board.  But it served it's purpose.  Unfortunately, Scott used the opportunity to snag a new dining table.  And since the table was FREE, how could I say no to an extra table?  The genius behind his thinking? He now has given himself permission to steal the glass top off my kitchen nook table that I LOVE.  Scott seems to think that I can move the Ikea table in the there and be just fine.  He has a drag race tire and wants the glass top to turn the tire into a table top in his basement.  I will keep you updated on who wins this battle. 

We also painted the bedroom light gray and upholstered the headboard. 

Here is the headboard in all it's glory! The room isn't painted yet in the above picture.  The bed is in the middle of the room right now while the walls dry so it wasn't quite ready to be photographed.  The last step for the room is hanging the curtains (which I made) and refinishing the night stand that we bought at Goodwill.  Might I say, I am SO proud of the headboard.  Why pay $500ish that stores are charging when the most expensive part of this project was the $9 spray adhesive?

My goal of the week is to hang the curtains, refinish the nightstand, and get that hutch done and in the dining room! Then I can FINALLY unpack that room.

I think I'm in Over My Head

Today is the first time I think the house we bought was too big.

Coming from 600 something square feet of a condo, we knew when we were looking at houses we wanted something that we could grow in to.  Hence, the 3,600 something square foot mansion.  And when I say mansion, I'm comparing to the condo.  I don't actually think I live in a mansion.  Though, wouldn't that be nice ;-)

But everyday, I have a new project idea.  And everyday, I go home and am exhausted from work and don't do anything house related.  But the next day, another project.  Or another 12 project ideas.

On the plus side, I did score some awesome Craigslist/thrift store finds today.

When I started night stand shopping for our guest bedroom, I was HORRIFIED at how much a simple piece of wood furniture would cost.  And, considering I can't seem to buy a piece of furniture (new or used) without tearing it apart and changing it's appearance, thrift stores seem to be a lot more economical on the budget.

I blame Pinterest. Maybe I should have given that up for Lent instead of clothes shopping...

I found this great table for $5 -- solid wood and everything is sturdy. And refinished I think it will serve a purpose. 

$5

I also found these candle sticks for $1.99 each.  I am thinking they would look great painted teal and possibly even turned into lamps.

$2 each

Since our guest bedroom is navy, yellow and white themed, I couldn't turn down these navy blue frames for under $2 each.  They are darker than the picture looks.

$2 each

And for my final thrift store find, I found this lovely little statue.  So far, no one that I've shown seems to like him but I just adore him.

$2

Then for my splurge of the day, I found this great mirror on Craigslist.  I'm picking it up from the lady tomorrow evening.  I'm thinking this will look great over my future buffet in the dining room.

$65



All for less than $85?  I'm stoked.

Small Changes

I am QUITE proud of the small amounts of progress I made this weekend.  Our I should say we made this weekend.  Most of Saturday was spent trying to get the husband's garage in a somewhat usable order.   The power tools are in place, the tool box has a home and the totes are all labeled and up on the shelves.  It's quite a nice change.

I also took advantage of the President's Day sales going on and got some items needed for my projects.

This is what our lovely guest room looked when the previous owner's lived in our house.  I really don't want to know what those doll heads were doing in that bedroom, especially since no females lived in the house...

Then I found a great deal on some clearance bedding and the room looked a bit different than when the previous owner lived there. I really tried to like it.  I did.  The price made me want to like it.  Unfortunately, I just didn't like it.  At all.  Luckily, since I only made the bed with the items, I didn't feel too bad returning them to BB&B. 

Now the room looks not nearly as put together, but clean.  The bedding is all white and has a bit of a striped texture to it (not shiny stripes...actual textured stripes).  Then the dark navy will be curtains and the yellow be the upholstered headboard.  We are going to use the same light gray paint as the rest of the house is.  We have more house guests starting on March 16th so we are hoping to get the room in lovely condition by then. I found a great nightstand I thought would look cute.

Unfortunately I'm not having an easy time tracking one down as it is a discontinued item that is on a ridiculously good sale.  Story of my life.







We also started hanging our curtains! I really think that the room is looking much more finished than it did.  I scored the rods and curtains at Ikea for under $25 for both pieces.  This is what our windows look like without panels...  (side thought -- I forgot to take a picture of the actual windows that I hung the curtains on before I hung them up.

After:

And yes, that sexy ladder is STILL hanging out in our family room.  Bring it up with my husband.  I've tried.  You see how far I've made it.  The curtains could use an ironing, but other than that I am quite happy they are up.

I also hung a rod for in the dining room.  With the third set of white, cheap Ikea curtains I purchased, I am going to make some of these:

http://www.theyellowcapecod.com/2011/01/bold-striped-diy-drapes.html

I found some black, flexible paint so hopefully my curtains turn out half as nice as the inspiration.

What a Freaking Weekend

All week Scott and I had plans to go snowboarding this weekend.  But after his first week at his new job, he was BEAT.  So somehow he ended up napping and watching DIY network all weekend while I painted.   And painted.  And then painted some more.  You can catch a peak of him sleeping over yonder in that picture.  I was trying to document that absolutely demolished state that our house was in. 

On a plus side, we can finally officially say we have made some painting progress.  The family room, dining room, eating area and stairwell are all complete.  OK, I'm slightly lying on the stairwell.  We have 30 foot ceilings in the family room, living room and stairwell and my version of "done" is when it's too high for me.  So with the extender pole I went up about 3/4 of the way but the rest is up to Scott.  So where the stairwell is concerned - I am DONE!  I've done the majority of the entry and living room, but finally gave up when there were too many boxes to get around. 

Yup.  This is what my house looks like right now.  In the background, you can almost see my COMPLETED dining room! That reminds me, I need to go pull the tape!  Scott will eventually be putting in wainscotting and crown molding in there.  We also still have to hang curtains and change the light fixture.  Oh, and maybe buy some furniture.  We have a lovely circle/oval table that we love but no chairs, china cabinet or anything like that.





Now, please forgive my lack of graphic design skills - but this is an option of where we are going to place "the clock."  I think the clock may be bigger than how it looks here.  The railing will be getting a makeover as well to be white which I think will contrast nicely with the dark wood and dark clock frame.  Since the carpet is going to be ripped out (SOON!) and replaced by dark hardwoods, we will have to see what we can do about lightening the dark up with a rug.  I am  also going to have to find a way to organize the junk that lands on this table.   Since it's the first place we see when we walk in (both the front door and the garage door) it gets our keys, purses, water bottles, etc. on it.

I can't wait until we have more afters.  Many, many more afters.

Before and After

I don’t have many “afters” to post yet, but thought I’d include the only things we’ve actually sorta/mostly completed.

Now, forgive my images for their lack of attractiveness.  My lazy friend needs to beautify them but she’s far too busy running 2 businesses while working full-time to provide any assistance to my blog.  Ok, she may have created my header.  And she may be pretty much amazing. 

The fireplace mantle has been painted white from the original and hideous wood color.  Eventually, we are going to install some shelving into that large hole to the right of the fireplace.

I found a great deal on a light fixture at Home Depot and was also able to get that switched out.  Light fixtures weren’t on our hugely important to do list, but it is amazing how much one little change made.  And for $40 something, it was well worth it.  We have 2 more fixtures for the hall that are sitting on the counter waiting for my husband to get motivation to install.  He happens to hate electrical.

And I also had to include a picture of my stove in all it’s shining glory.