Perfection

 “A house has to evolve and change.”—Furniture designer Julian Chichester

So here is a crazy thought, when Cody and I started to think about looking to buy our first house I used to think that I wanted to find a house that was completely done; aka did not need any updates or renovations. I thought that I wanted the house to be done and perfect before we moved in. Decorated, painted, everything donzo BEFORE we moved in. I was obviously crazy at the thought that could happen that I wanted that to happen. I guess I thought that if the house was perfect we could go on and live our wonderful life free of the chaos that all that can bring. So, why did I want that? Why did I think that was perfection to me? Who knows, but I loved that quote about our house evolving and changing with us. I love interior design, reading design blogs, and looking at my most coveted House Beautiful magazine every month. As beautiful as the pictures are in the magazine of those spaces that is never what our house is ever going to look like. For one, I change my mind about what I want a room to look like, or how it should feel all the time. And I never want our home to look too serious than the kind of people that we are if that makes sense. In short I want to try and have fun with all the design decisions we make and know that 2 or 3 years down the road they may not be the right choices for us at that time and that’s ok…because change is good.

The memories that Cody and I have made in our house in the 3 short months we have owned it I would never trade for a chaos free life. Have they all been happy and wonderful? Heck no. But we have realized that these are the things we have loved doing together. Maybe I’m just crazy and think about paint colors, and fabric choices way too much. Perhaps I have a problem, if that’s the case then let me introduce myself…Hi my name is Erin and I am a paint sample addict.  

Current affairs and guest room plans

I figured since were already working on about 1,000 other projects it’s time to start a new one! For anyone that cares here is what we are currently working on, bullet point style:

• Painting our front door a fun new color
• Painting all the brick on the outside of the house
• Finishing up the siding
• Planting sod
• Landscaping front yard
• Trying to pick a paint color for our family room/sunroom
• DIYing a new mirror for the entry way(I found a new idea I love even more and this one’s cheaper!)
• Hanging lights in the hallway
• Creating a gallery wall in the hallway

Those are just to name a few…

So with all the elves running around finishing up those projects for us I thought we might as well move onto the guest room. This was my thought process for choosing to do this room next. This will eventually be a nursery when we have kids. Therefore we are not going to be spending very much money in here in terms of furniture/décor items since this room could change its function in a year or two. As much as I think the bed is too big for the room I don’t want to spend the money on a new one or even a new headboard. I am trying to work with what I got people! So here is my crazy mock up of what it will look like.

Ok let me break it down for you. The dark teal color is what I am going to paint the headboard and footboard. The colorful shams I have and they are from pottery barn. That is where I am pulling all my colors from. The yellow pillows I have and I think I may sew a fun green pom-pom accent pillow. I wanted to keep all the bedding white since I am doing some crazy colors everywhere else. All I need to pick up is a ruffled bed skirt.  The one thing I did want to buy was a new side table. I wanted something with open shelving in a fun color and something that I could potentially use in the future. Enter Pottery Barn Teen. That’s where that cute blue nightstand is from! Since the room doesn’t have an overhead light I wanted to add some sconces on either side of the bed for more light. These are plug-in sconces that I found on sale for $39 a piece. The green little shelf is from Home Decorators collection. They come in just about every color imaginable and in different sizes too. I wanted to add some storage to the room and this will work out perfect. Right now they are on sale for under $40 plus I have $10 off coupon.

As far as curtains and blinds go, this room gets a ton of light in the mornings so I want something that will block that out and maybe some kind of fun print curtains. But before we do all that….we still have to get all the wallpaper off the walls and get new carpet! Just a minor detail. I think the worst part will be moving the furniture out of the room!

Done and Done

Well folks, our bedroom is officially done. Do you realize what that means? It means we have one room in our house that is actually completed. And it only took us 2 1/2 months:) Ok, so do you remember the before pictures?

Oh man, those are bad. I kinda forgot how bad it actually was! Ok, so now that your eyeballs are burned to the core because of all that blue, here are the afters!

Our bed is from Overstock. It looks exactly like the Colette bed from Crate & Barrel which is like $2,000! We got ours for around $500. All of our bedding I got on sale from Serena and Lilly.



The white curtains are from IKEA, and the bamboo blinds are from overstock.

Our nightstands are from IKEA. They come unfinished in a blond hardwood. All we did was refinish them. We stained the outside and painted the drawers white and added some new knobs. Those puppies were under $30 each!

This dresser we had. It was in a lighter wood finish. We lightly sanded it, primed it, and did 3 coats of paint on it. It is an icy blue color.

The painting above our dresser is something I made for Cody for our anniversary. It's the song that was sung at our wedding. I had seen this idea on a  blog and loved it! All I did was go to Lowes and find a piece of already cut to size wood that I liked. I put a few coats of stain on it, let it dry a day or two then used a small paintbrush to write out the lyrics of the song. You could defiantly do this with just about anything, a quote, song or poem. You could also take it one step further and sand it to give it a really cool distressed look.

Our carpet is from Home Depot and it is the Martha Stewart brand. We loooooove our carpet, it feel like pillows when your walking on it. We got the best pad to go under it and I think that makes all the difference with carpet. And it has a lifetime guarantee on it!

Ok, on to the bathroom and closet! We still have a few updates to do in the bathroom like new faucets and a new light fixture.

These cabinets were obviously blue before. We sanded them. Primed them. And I did about 4 or 5 coats of paint on them!



The tile was done by Cody and my Dad. They did a great job on it. It was Cody's first tiling experience and since he is now a rock star in the tile department he can now do the tile in the kitchen, laundry room, and bathroom. I know he is anxiously awaiting his next tile project :)

The mirrors are built in medicine cabinets so we knew we wanted to keep those! All they needed was a coat of primer and a few coats of white paint and they were set!

The closet might be my favorite room. Since everything in here was blue, the walls, cabinets and floor; this tiny little space needed a lot of paint! The first step was to sand all the cabinets, inside and out. Then we primed the cabinets and the walls. Next up was 2 coats of paint. We used the same color for the cabinets and walls that is in our bedroom. 



 The light is from Home Depot and the cute little Mr. & Mrs. letters are from an etsy seller.

The little bench we found at an antique mall for 2$. We painted the legs, and recovered the cushion.

So let's talk about shoes. I knew I wanted built in shoe storage on either side of the closet. I basically built these babies by myself. I bought some wood from Lowes and a few pieces of trim. All we did was measure the space and built them to fit in there perfect. Of course we primed and painted them. I kept changing my mind about what color I wanted. I couldn't decide between the green which is the same color as the bathroom cabinets, white or a light grey (the color of the walls). I'm glad I went with the green. I think If I would have done white it would have shown the dirt a lot more!

The rest are just fun little detail shots of our closet!

I think that about does it! I have been working on our entry way table over the weekend! Here's a little teaser...these are the color I'm using. I should have it done hopefully tonight!

 

My Home Depot Debacle

So My quest to find the materials and make a cheapo but stylish mirror started on Tuesday. I headed over to home depot with a print out of the materials I needed. I found this original idea on Home Depots OWN WEBSITE mind you. The materials that were listed were in stock pine scrollwork, clear silicone, and a mirror.

So into Home Depot I went back to the wood trim and molding section . After not seeing any scrollwork there I went to the Door and Window counter to ask about where to find it. After the employee walked up and down the same isles I did he looked at me and said “Hmm we must not have any.” This is how the following conversation went:

Me: Well, I found this tutorial on your website. (Showed him the picture) It says that it is in-stock pine scrollwork.

HD guy: What’s a tutorial?

Me: Um, it’s like directions on how to make something.

HD: Oh, like a project?

Me: Yes

HD: So you said you found this on our website huh?

Me: Yes

HD: Where at on our website?

Me: Under the DIY section

HD: What’s DIY??

Me: Do it yourself

HD: Ohhh ok.

Me: Do you know if you carry these online and maybe I could purchase them online?

HD: Maybe, you could probably get online and check when you got home.

Me: Ok, so you don’t have a computer here where you could do that for me since I don’t really know what I’m looking for?

HD: Yea, I guess I could

*This is where I should have just turned around and walked out of the store and threw my dreams away of a cheap DIY mirror!

HD: (After looking several minutes on their website) I don’t see anything like that on our website. What type of wood did you say it was made out of?

Me: Pine

HD: You or your husband doesn’t happen to be a whittler?

Me: You mean someone who carves wood?

HD: Yes. Because if you were this project would be very easy. I can show you where our jigsaws are and you could use that to make these.

Me: Since my husband and I are not whittlers what would you suggest I do to make this project?

HD: Find someone who is.

And at that I turned around and walked away. Sad and upset that I did not have the whittling skills I needed to create this project. I have also vowed to never return to Home Depot again, I am now scorned. I’ve always been a Lowe’s girl anyway, I feel more at home there. They also know who I am…no joke. These guys in the lumber and paint section know my name because Cody and I basically go there every weekend for something.  I feel like there is a silent debate on this. Home Depot or Lowes. Choose your poison…which is it?

Weekend Update...

Speaking of weekend update (the SNL kind), I just finished Tina Feys book Bossy Pants. Has anyone else read this? If you want a quick light funny read I highly recommend this. I read it when I traveling for work and I have never found myself laughing out loud more then I did while reading this book. I'm sure the people next to me on the plane thought I was a little strange...I even had to bookmark a few pages so I could read them to Cody when I got home because I thought for sure he find them hilarious. I would say this is a book for females:)

Anyway on to the real weekend update. So here was my list of things I wanted to get accomplished:

• Spray paint mats
• Sew a curtain for bedroom
• Oversee my Mom paint trim :)
• Sand and paint entry table
• Make mirror

So my spray painting idea did not go according to plan. I was all set to spray paint the mats. I did about 4 or 5 even coats on them, or tried too at least. For some reason the spray paint would not stick to the mats. They must have had some kind of weird finish on them.

At least I tried...So then my journey began to find new mats for our pictures. I need two 5x7, two 8x10, and one 12x14. First I tried Jeffrey Allen's which did not have white in stock just off white. Boo! Next I hit up Hobby Lobby which didn't have any 12x14 sizes. Another BOO! Then I went to Michael's. They had every size I needed in the right color and I even had a coupon! Success!

Did you notice we have a supermodel in our house??!



It's true, I mean I deal with a lot of insecurities issues living with him and all but I seem to manage:) So mark that item of my list! Next was painting the trim! My Mom came over Friday evening and put a coat of paint on all the trim in the hallway. She is too good to me! All it needs is one more and the hallway is done. Next up was the curtain. So, in our bedroom we have a walk in bathroom/closet. There isn't a door between the sink area and bedroom area. But there is a door between the sink and the toilet. So you can imagine that every morning when I get up and my supermodel husband is getting his beauty sleep that he needs for his next runway show I am not able to turn the light on in the bathroom to get ready because it's too bright and wakes up Cindy Crawford. So I used some black out lining my Mom had and some fabric I had to make a curtain.

All I did was make a large panel the size of the door and attach it to a rod and clips I bought from Walmart.

And let me say that I'm sure I look a whole better every day since I can now turn the light on !

And that's about all I got done this weekend! I am planning on hitting up Home Depot tonight to start to work on the mirror and get some paint for my entry way table. Sorry I don't have more jokes for my weekend update like Seth Meyers and Tina Fey...I'll work on that.