Bedroom door makeover

You guys, it's October! Lily will be 3 months old this month and I start planning Gracie's 6th birthday. Unreal how fast time flies right by! Anyway, over the weekend I finally said to myself enough is enough and decided to paint my bedroom door. I had been thinking about painting it yellow for months and months but while I was pregnant I was so busy doing so many other things that I just never got to it. So, since Hubs was off work all weekend, which btw is very rare, I decided to get that mini project done!

Here it is before. It used to be painted in chalkboard paint but being that this door (like all my doors) have panels it really was pointless and a waste of paint to make it chalkboard. But of course I didn't think about that until after I painted it. Figures, right?



Annnd after! Yellow is bliss. :) I used the same yellow paint from Lily's nursery.



I took this wider shot on a different day then the first picture, so the lighting is different.



I'm much happier with it now and it really adds some more happy to my kitchen! :) My next project for the house is to refinish this chest/coffee table in my living room. I'm going to either do it black like the rest of the wood in my living room or a very dark wood color. I haven't decided yet. I'll be working on this project next week!



Other than that, I'll be back later this week with some product reviews from the Mama Vox Box I got from Influenster! Stay tuned! Happy October! :)

Can't stop, won't stop

I feel like I haven't stopped going since my last post. Ok I lied. I didn't do anything today except the basics (yanno, sweep, wipe counters, etc) but other than that I haven't stopped doing things in the Nursery or just around the house in general. For the past year or two I've wanted to paint a little cabinet/shelf I got from my grandmother after she passed away. It sat in my living room and then my hallway holding dvd's for years. It stayed boring and beaten up for as long as I can remember. This past weekend I decided to tackle that project head on. I don't know what got into me but I just felt like painting... and sanding and lots of painting. Here he is before, all sad and whatnot...



So dusty and sad. Poor little guy! First I sanded lightly around all of the edges to get all of the pointy parts off. You have to understand this shelf is pretty old so it has had lots of ware and tare over the years. Even the bottom piece of wood that goes across the bottom in the front had fallen off so I had to get new nails and nail it back in place. After that, I painted, giving time to dry between each coat for about 30 - 45 minutes. Then I'd add another coat. Four coats total. Yeah, FOUR. I used Behr's Paint & Primer in Wildflower Honey, actually the same yellow as I used in Baby L's nursery! I loved it that much! Plus hey, free paint! Here she is all happy and pretty! I also moved around decor to add to her beauty and freshened up my front door area in my Living Room. :)



Since then, Paul, Gracie & I headed to IKEA to buy furniture for Baby L's nursery. We picked up her crib, dresser, picture frames, crib mattress & a drawer organizer. I've now crossed off 6 things of my 31 thing to do list. We have SO MUCH stuff to get still. I feel like I'm falling behind. Anyway, we got the crib built as well as the dresser. We moved the crib into the room and with our luck, it was too wide! Which kind blew my mind because, when we measured the room it was perfect for the dimensions of the crib. I told you, this room is tiny! So, we gotta be EXACT. After huffing and puffing and trying to figure out what the issue was, it hit me that the crib didn't fit because we always measured the room WITHOUT the floor molding in mind. I called my parents in a panic and explained the situation. My dad came over a day or so later and worked his magic and removed parts of the molding so the crib would now fit. Yay, now it fits! So, after we got everything in place, I got to work putting the bedding together (after washing & ironing it, of course) and then started to put away all of the clothes we've gotten so far. It felt good to start getting things done in there.

This past week Gracie made her art for Baby L's nursery. It turned out so cute. The image you see is just a sneak peak. She added a couple more things to it since I took that picture. She is so excited to see her baby sister and to be a big sister! I think she's really going to be great at it. Speaking of seeing Baby L, I scheduled my 3D/4D ultrasound for this coming Thursday. I can't wait to see a good look at her face and see how she's growing. Because I can sure feel her. Her kicks are so violent at times! I swear there is a little ninja in my belly taking me as it's hostage! Paul's eyes got so big one night when he felt her kick because of how strong and hard it was. It was pretty fantastic to see! I also went to my last monthly ob/gyn appointment on Friday. I'm now going to bi-weekly appointments & in my third trimester! Time is really flying by. My doctor said he thinks she might come early, as in anytime around 36-38 weeks. Which of course made me think, 'OH CRAP, I HAVE EVEN LESS TIME TO GET EVERYTHING FOR HER DONE!' so, it's now crunch time. Time is flying & before you know it, Baby L will be here!

Progress!

Is there anything better than progress? At the end of my last post I mentioned that we had started on the nursery. Well, I can finally report that the building of the room is completely finished. I have some molding to touch up paint at this point, to be done when Gracie goes in for her nap. But otherwise? Finished! In the next couple of weeks we'll be buying all of the furniture and decor for the room. I also started on the mobile I mentioned I'd be attempting to make and the good news is, so far so good! The next step on that is to sew and stuff the felt elephants and then to hang it. But all in due time! First up, I thought I'd share some of the before pictures of the room as in how it looked when we started the renovations.

As mentioned here, this room was originally supposed to be transformed into a half bathroom/half laundry. But long story short, we got screwed by the guy who was supposed to do it so it sat this way for years. I knew in the back of my head I'd want it to be a nursery if baby came before a bathroom and now that it's finished, it's exactly how I imagined it. My dad & I did such a great job on it! Anywho, here we go...

(right mouse click view image for larger views)

This is the far side of the room. As mentioned here the room is very tiny. The walls were so ugly and dirty and just ugh. Pipes exposed. Not cool, man!

This is the opposite side of the room, of the images you see above. The washer/dryer area. Another ugly eye sore.

This is the window wall. After we started to frame out the wall & then add in the insulation. Because the room is so small it's kinda hard to share exact to scale images.

Same wall, you get the idea. Adding sheet rock. Goodbye yucky walls!

After we got the walls up it was time to spackle the seems and make everything look smooth! And this second image is of the frame (sorta) that we built for the washer/dryer to go into. So you wouldn't see it anymore!

After we added the sheet rock to the frame around the washer/dryer. We didn't get a full shot. Epic fail. And the door that covers it all up! Looks like a closet.

And lastly, this is the floor we put in. I'm so happy with it!

I'm not going to share complete after pictures until I have all of the furniture in and decor on the walls. Only a couple more weeks and I promise as soon as I'm done I'll make a post! Stay turned. Oh and pssst, new layout! :)

The Kitchen Reveal!

I'm back, I'm back!! :) First, thanks to those of you who tweeted, emailed, commented telling me I shouldn't give up on my blog as well as all of the sweet comments you sent along. It was much appreciated! And because of you, I'm back! :)

Before I went on hiatus, we finished the kitchen. Although we still need to add the floor to ceiling cabinets and window seat... more on that later. But for now, here are the befores (somewhat) and afters. I don't have any original before shots of the kitchen before we started this entire project due to my computer crashing and losing everything on my hard drive. But here is the basic idea, from an earlier post.
B Everything was white. Green counter tops.


The original back splash was OLD OLD tile from when Paul's parents lived here. A few years ago I decided I'd just paint it red (that was the theme). Then when I knew I was going to be redoing my kitchen this time, I ripped them off the wall.

(Once again, sorry for the awful quality. These were taken on my Nokia.)

After.

After we installed the beadboard backsplash, before the paint. See that spot above the cabinets that is spackled? It was a corner that served no purpose, so we closed it in.






Annd after everything was painted!







This is the area above my sink. It used to be a ugly mirror with glass shelves. Awful! My dad built this for me & I love it so much! This picture was taken before I moved the honeypot to the shelf above the oven.


Also, a couple weekends ago we were out doing our Sunday thrifting and I found this amazing mail sorter, something I've been looking for forever! This is the before.

And after I painted it yellow and hung it up. I love it so much!



So, that's the kitchen! I'm so happy with it. As for the floor to ceiling cabinets I mentioned above, they will look something like this...



Mine will be blue like the bottom half of my cabinets. And I'll probably add a coffee table in front of the window bench to make it more welcoming to sit on and be a little coffee break/socializing area. The problem right now is trying to find used cabinets like these. I've looked everywhere and sadly I haven't been lucky, but I'm not giving up. I'll continue my hunt until the day I have them!

Welp, that's all for now. Until next time! ;)

I've got it covered!

What do I have covered, you ask?! Ok, you probably didn't ask but I'll just tell you anyway. Today, my dad & I hit up Home Depot (my current home away from home) for some ideas on fan covers for above the stove/oven. We looked up and down two different isles that offer different types of covers for the fans but nothing that really caught my eye. Plus the fact that most of them were nearly $60 to $100 bucks. Yeah, no bueno. I don't have money to just throw away on a brand new fan, plus I only need the cover, which all came in the wrong size.

Our home, like many homes is pretty old. It was built a long time ago, I couldn't even tell you when, so trying to find things that fit just right on something that has been in the same spot for generations, just doesn't happen that often. So, my dad being the brains of this operation said to me, 'why don't you just spray paint it?' Um, duh! Why didn't I think of that? Because he's the brains. Like I said. ;)

I quickly put together a before & after collage of pictures on my Nokia and emailed it to myself. So, bare with me on the not so high quality photos.



Not too shabby! I'm pretty happy with it and the best part? Didn't cost me a penny since I already had the paint (and the fan cover!) for a different project. That's what we in the biz call a win/win! ;)

In other kitchen news, we finished putting all the backsplash beadboard in the kitchen. Like it's DONE. Next step? Painting! That is the plan for Saturday. You can kind of get a sneak peek in the pictures above of the area behind the fridge & oven. Once it's allllll finished I'll have before, during the process and after pictures for you! Next week. Promise!

Little improvements

I know, I've been totally slacking lately with the updates. Sorry! Huge sorry! I guess time just gets away from me. What are ya gonna do? Yanno? It happens.

Warning: Before viewing the pictures below, be aware that I still don't have access to a good working camera. These were taken with my Nokia. View at your own risk. haha ;P

Anyway, enough excuses. I've been pretty busy around here doing things here and there. I recently took down the big ugly fluorescent light that was in between my kitchen & living room. I had been asking Paul to do it since.. I don't know, February to take it down but you know if you want something done right, you might as well just do it yourself. So after months of looking at it, I finally just got it done.

Before... (from when it was Easter time)


And after... from the kitchen side.


& the living room side.


So much better.

We also took a trip to Ikea last week to pick up the dishes I have been impatiently waiting for. I also picked up these Vivan curtains for the front window since we needed something a little more private. If you stand at end of our driveway and look at the front window at night, you could see right in & that is a problem, until now! These curtains are a tad bit thicker & worked perfectly on the privacy issue. I got gray of course, they match my walls perfectly!



I took this picture at night, so it's super dark, but during the day they make the room much darker which is really good for summer because it is hot as hell outside! Keeps the room much cooler.



So you can see how they are hung... behind the pretty sheer curtains. So from the outside, you only see gray, which is fine with me.



My mom and I are going to hem them so that they reach just below the window. I only want the pretty blue & white curtains to be long and flowing. I'm sure months will go by before we actually get this done tho. lol.

Back to the kitchen for a moment. These are the dishes I got. White. Simple. Perfect.



And here they are all cleaned & put away... at the top you can see yellow bowls. I got those two for $1.99 at Ikea. I mean COME ON. I heart Ikea.

I also got yellow place mats for the kitchen table. I love pops of yellow in a room! These were .99 a piece I believe. I'm going to be painting the table black, top of it in chalkboard paint & the bench I'm gonna do a chevron print on. I'm excited to get started on this project VERY soon!



I've also been holding on to these E. A. T. letters since February. Well, I finally got on this project too.



I painted them yellow too! See a trend going here?



Then I picked a place in the kitchen to hang them. Hello lonely wall!



Goodbye lonely wall! Hello happy yellow letters! :)



And a wide shot of everything.



Overall I'm happy about the little improvements made in the last week or so. Doing little things really does make a big impact. I hope to share the finished kitchen within the new month or so. This kitchen redo has taken a lot longer than I'd planned but isn't that always the way it goes? Until next time! <3

finishin' the kitchen

I'll finally have some pictures of the finished kitchen for you guys in the next couple weeks. We're going tomorrow to buy the bead board for the back splash from Home Depot. Then we'll work on getting it put into place.

But to hold you over until the final reveal of the kitchen being completely finished (on one side! still gotta work on the floor to ceiling cabinets and window seat as mentioned here) I figured I'd go ahead and show you the process of painting the cabinets from white to navy blue.

This is what they looked like originally, before the paint. You can also see the old countertops in this picture too.



One thing I learned thanks to internet searching is to put a pushpin at all four corners of the cabinet doors before painting so that they don't stick to whatever you lay them on, for example news paper or plastic sheets or whatever you choose to use.






First I primed them with KILZ primer. I did two coats of primer, after cleaning them. Most people use a special cleaner before painting cabinets but I didn't have anything like that, so I just used Windex and paper towels. This is after two coats of primer.



It says on the can to let it dry for 30 minutes in between each coat but I waited about an hour in between, just to be sure it was dry. Then I started painting with the color I picked Deep Blue Sea by Behr. This is after one coat I think. I did three.



This is after I finished painting the final coat of the blue. It was still wet in this picture, which is why it's so shiny.



Annnd this is the finished product. I figured I'd go ahead and show you the new counter tops too. If you look at the walls behind the sink area, under the top cabinets, which I also painted a light grey color & the wall behind the stove, that is where the bead board will be going. I'll probably be painting that white.



Here is a wider view of the kitchen. The bead board will be behind the fridge & oven as well.



We got the counter at Ikea, of course. You can check it out on their website here. The countertops are also a greyish silver color. They match everything so perfectly. I was originally going to do a dark wood countertop but once I saw these, I changed my mind instantly because the color was perfect! I'm really happy with these countertops. They are SO EASY to keep clean!! I'm very happy with them.

If you have any questions about this process at all, feel free to ask me about it!