Monthly Archives: February 2013
Our House: Altoids Anyone??
I have just completed phase 1 of overhauling the lower level hallway and family room at ‘Our House’! And I’m thrilled with the results. I have tons to show you, but this post is about just a little corner in the hallway that leads to the two bedrooms that are in lower level.
We found this vintage Altoid dispenser at a click here to read the rest of the story…
Someone Else’s House… Antique Craftsman Style Home’s Dining Room: Chandelier
This is the dining room that belongs to the young couple of the home which I’ve already shown you the Master Bedroom, with the Wallpapered Dressers ReDo, the Anthropologie Styled Bathroom, the Creatively Numbered Stairway, and the Amazing DIY Wall Pot Rack, and now here is a brief introduction of this gorgeous dining room, starting with the light fixture.
The dining room has, through the decades, retained click here to read the rest of the story…
Someone Else’s House… Amazing Pot Rack!
This is something I’ve been so excited to share with you… this is only one part of the kitchen that belongs to the young couple that just restored their antique craftsman bungalow style house this winter.
Of all the rooms in this house when they bought it, the kitchen was for sure the worse. It had unfortunately been re-done in the 1980’s and had the lack of character and details to prove it… well that is except for a few really questionable things, like this for instance:
This set of very shallow cabinets with lights, and glass doors. We can’t figure out what the previous owners would have stored in them… they’re only about 4” deep… perfect for a soup can, but that’s a lot of soup cans, and would you really want them on display like that? Honestly, to me it sort of looked like something in a doctor’s office. Whatever its intended use was, it wasn’t working so well for our couple.
I will do more posts to show the whole kitchen later, but today I’m going to show you the amazing transformation they did to this display cabinet. click here to read the rest of the story
Burlap and Jute Give Wonderful Texture to this Table Re-Do
Let’s just start out right away with the before:
Here are the things I like about this table… I like that it has storage, I like the shape, I even like the wood graining technique on the brown part. But I do not like and never have liked the green panels with the flowers. They just aren’t painted in my favorite style or something…
I’ve been debating with myself ever since I bought this little table/cabinet from HomeGoods several years ago, why did I buy it if I didn’t like the way the green part looked… but since I did buy it that way, didn’t I need to ‘live with it’? I typically would have no problem selling it, but the size and shape and storage have been so darn useful, that I haven’t wanted to totally part with it.
But guess what? I finally came up with what I think is a great way to re-do it… well just the green panel parts… I decided to use click here to read the rest of the story…
Someone Else’s House: Creative Stairway Design Solves Many Problems
The past few weeks I’ve introduced you to a young couple’s first house and their creative decorating touches to it.
Their house is a vintage craftsman style bungalow style. It has almost all the original trim throughout, (except the bathroom and kitchen)
The trim on the main level is the original dark oak finish… gorgeous!
The upstairs is all painted white… beautiful and fresh!
So that leaves the stairway as the segue between dark oak trim on the main level and painted white trim on the 2nd level.
Before they started any work on this house, both landings and stairway totally click here to read the rest of the story
Simple Cleverness… How to Hang a Wall Mounted Lamp on Sheetrock Wall
Here’s a super simple tute on hanging a wall mounted lamp on a sheetrock wall.
First, let’s start with the dark corner:
Here is a dark corner in the family room at ‘Our House’ with a sad little lamp sitting in the chair just waiting to be used to it’s full potential. I have been busy actually doing tons and tons of changes to the family room and I’m still in the midst of the projects, but let’s get this swing arm lamp up on the wall so it can feel better about life.
So here is the simple cleverness tute. click here to read the rest of the story…
Why a Roman Shade with Cafe Panels was the Right Choice
The other day I showed you the ‘Anthropologie’ inspired bathroom. In that room we made a roman shade with coordinating café panels.
By cleverly mounting the roman shade way above the actual top of the window trim, it instantly tricks the eye into believing the window is larger! (I am always amazed with that trick!) click here to read the rest of the story
Why I Think Quadra-Fire Pellet Stoves Are Awesome!
This is a Sponsored post written by me on behalf of QuadraFire for SocialSpark. All opinions are 100% mine.
First, I want to encourage you to comment below telling us why you like Quadra-Fire and one of you will be selected to win a Quadra-Fire notebook! (deadline: Feb. 24, 2013)
I shared with you a few weeks ago that I’m a big fan of wood heat. At ‘Our House‘ we have an outdoor wood burner, and it easily heats our house.
We own an antique house in town though, that we are hoping to call our home one day, but being in town, an outdoor wood burner would not be allowed. There is a old, inefficient open fireplace in that home that we hope to install a more efficient stove of some sort in. Learning about the QuadraFire Pellet Stoves has me very intrigued to say the least.
In case you missed it last time, here’s a picture of the way the fireplace is in this antique house now:
Someone Else’s House: Bungalow Bathroom, Almost Anthropologie Style?
Continuing the tour of the refreshed and somewhat renovated c. 1916 bungalow, (or there abouts,) our young couple has purchased, the bathroom is the room to see today. (If you missed it, click here to see their bedroom/projects)
This room started in pretty good condition:
The walls, however, were a shocking yellow. I think the previous homeowner was trying to coordinate with the floor tile, but instead the result was quite harsh.
Although the mechanics of the room was fairly solid, our young couple really didn’t care for some things in the bathroom.
First, as what so frequently happens in older homes over the years, the bathrooms and kitchens during the ‘updating process’ lose their original trim and character. Which is exactly what happened to this room, it had, at some time in the past, been updated, and in that process, the original trim was removed and replaced with ranch molding.
Another thing our couple just wasn’t sure about, was the floor tile. Although it was in excellent condition, it just seemed to scream a little too loud.
After considering ripping out the tile, but given the budget, and encouragement from others to keep it because it had an ‘Anthropologie’ look to it, the new homeowners instead decided to add back in some of the missing character and see if then the tiles would feel more at home in the new setting.
And here are the results of their hard work and creativity: click here to read the rest of the story
Our House: Family Room Changes, Starting with Re-Doing Window Treatment
A little bit ago I shared with you, over several posts, how I had ‘lightened up’ the living room on our main level. Well, now it’s the lower level’s turn for some lightening up and neutralizing!
In case you missed it, I started with the hallway that leads to this family room by making this fun faux zinc lettered sign for it.
Now, moving into the family room, I’ll show you how the valance was…
Cute and colorful, but I’m ready for a little more neutral in my life…
For the past several years the family room has been very colorfully decorated with bright cottage colors, but as we’re preparing to sell our house, I’m trying to tone down anything that may appear a little too specialized and open it up for ‘the masses’. Ha!
Part of the family room walls are papered with a yellow background paisley print, it is a very nice paper, and I’m thinking that with everything else now being changed to mostly neutrals, that the wallpaper with just a tiny pop of color on the other side of the family room will be a fun accent.
This window treatment is one of the first changes to the family room, it’s an upholstered board valance above the 8’ sliding door that leads out to the screen porch and beyond to the patio, grill etc.
Here’s a before and after pic: click here to read the rest of the story
