K's Room

Well I gone and dun it!  I'm checking off some things on my to-do list and K's room is done! (for now)

This was BEFORE we moved in:

And here is now:


The green striped comforter cover is fabric from Ikea.  The orange pillow came from Ikea as well.  The grey patterned sheets and blue blanket are from Target.


This tool chest I found at an antique store for $40.  My friend just got the exact same one last weekend at a garage sale.  For $5.  Boo.  The sock monkey quilt was a gift from my sister when he was born.  I loved the vibrant colors and have always wanted to incorporate them into his room.


We bought this dresser when I was pregnant with my first.  We were sure it would be a boy.  8 yrs later we were right!


The K's I spent a year (plus!) collecting or making.  And the bed was free from a neighbor.  Score!


 Everything is pretty much the same since his room in our last house, except for these road signs.  They used to be above my fireplace.  They look much better in a little boys room I think.  I can't even imagine them above a fireplace now!

One room down.  5 to go!

Dining room Progress

Here's a look at my entry and dining BEFORE we moved in:

Nice.  Little too Tuscan and dark for me.

Here's the light fixture that was in the dining room.  Pretty.  And formal.  Not me.

                             

Here is the new light fixture:



My newly striped walls:



The photos of my parents when they were little, both on horses.  I love these photos.....


The light fixture was another overstock purchase and I loved the price!  You can find it here.  Total pain to install in my opinion.  Definitely need two people.  You have to shove the 3 wires through 40'' of metal rod.  Surely the worst part.  TIP:  Measure how long it will hang before you order this.  It was going to be about 7.5 feet high with my 12foot ceilings.  Lame for a dining room.  We fortunately had matching left over rods from our entry way light and were able to extend it  or we would've been in trouble.

Left to do in this room:
-Look into drapes. (Can you do drapes with shutters?)
-Recover chair seats in fun fabric. (What color should I do.  I need some POP!)
-Buy fun upholstered chairs for the end and head of table.
-Need a buffet.  (Fun color maybe?)
-Rug or no rug?
-A huge horse photo on opposite wall maybe?
-Centerpiece. (I stink at centerpieces)

I'm looking into some horse photographs for the opposite wall from my parents photos.  Here's some ideas.  Which one do you like?


Option 1)

via

Option 2)

via

Or Option 3)

via

I don't know why, but horse art is on my mind.  I guess I'm living out the whole "I want a pony and I want it right now!" phase.  Whatever I do, I need to go big.  Huge art/photos are another obsession of mine.....  Which one do you like?  Or am I crazy?  You can tell me if I'm crazy.  I promise I won't be mad.  I probably won't change though, cause that's the thing about crazy people.  They can't change crazy!

navy obsession

Navy blue.  I feel like I'm looking at my closet from 1996.  It was all about navy and brown & gold.  Well it's back baby.  And OH! how I've missed you!  My sista is busy ripping off wall paper and re-texturing two bathrooms.  I was excited to hear about her navy bathroom (and possibly bedroom) walls!  I can't wait to see how it turns out.  But until then, I've been collecting navy wall ideas just to ensure how purrrty they will be!  And I've got to say, you can't go wrong with navy.  It's stunning!

 Looks fantastic with white trim and accessories.

 Looks amazing paired with orange and lime green!

 Beautiful with dark brown furniture....

 Love it with the chartreuse towel.....

 I've had my eye on this bathroom for awhile.  Gold stenciled ceiling say what?!

So navy walls work in a living room, powder bathrooms, nursery, dining rooms and bedrooms.  Um, so they work anywhere?  Exactly what I thought!

progress

I'm impatient.  I want what I want and I want it now.  Snap my fingers and my room to be complete.  If I don't lose a pound a day, I want a new diet.  So you can imagine how this "life changing happiness project" and "new house to decorate" scenarios are about putting me over the edge.  I'm about a  half box of Sees chocolates away from a mental break down.  (oh how those pineapple truffles and marzipan can solve problems!)  So with the paint completed, now comes the fun part.  Decorating.  Haven't figured out the details yet but here is stage one of morgan's room....  Photo's ala phone aka: lame photos.

Paint:  Color is Adriatic Mist from Behr



I am loving this color. So much, that I painted another bedroom this color!



 

See what I mean?  Needs some work on the finishing touches.  Curtains are stumping me.  Black & white?  Turquoise?  Plain white?  Hot pink?  More pattern?  Less pattern?  And of course my windows are too tall for store bought drapes, so sewing will be involved.  Boo.




I'm thinking maybe these curtains from ikea.  But I'll have to add about 12'' of another fabric to make them long enough.  Plain black fabric and add some ruffles?

 Or these are some fabrics from my favorite online store and maker.  Fabrics.com and Premier Prints.

So there's my progress report.  I need to at least get drapes in here.  Got any suggestions?   My daughter hasn't slept in this room since we've moved in.  But on a plus note- it sure stays cleaner without her in it!

Who put the pain in painting?

It's happening.  Paint is up.  Rooms are torn apart.  And I don't know where to begin.  Oh, and the money tree dried up.  (You know how people say paint is cheap?  Um, they lied.  Not so cheap when you're doing 5 rooms)  Good thing I'm a color genius or that would be disastrous!  (insert sarcasm)  So my next projects will have to be high dollar wannabe's on a DIY budget.

Here's my torn apart house- don't judge!



The office:  Untouched since we moved in.  Don't know what to do with these dark doors and moldings and dark shutters.  It seems too pretty to paint and too formal for a crazy girl like me.  But that's my new dining room light peeking out of that box.  It's 4ft of awesome!




What the cheese balls?  This is where I found "the boy" when it had been too quiet for too long.  He does have shorts on.  FYI.  I was impressed that he had any clothes on and the sink wasn't full of water.    But the rest?  There's just no words for it.....



And with those last two photos of my chaos I'd like to leave you with a little sneak peek of the stripes....  Excuse me while I do a happy dance........ You know how I love me some stripes!

It only took 5 trips to Home Depot to buy paint.  Apparently my walls are paint thirsty!  I can't wait to get my new light fixture up an going.  But I've got to leave that to "the hubs".  I'm pretty sure I don't have the skill-set or patience to install a light, since I just blew a GF switch in the kids bathroom and hallway and now the painter is painting with flashlights. (Crossing my fingers it looks ok and I won't have a lot of paint touch ups to do)   I do know how to switch a breaker and it still ain't working.  Um, yeah, that's my life today.  

cha cha changes!

Super excited.  Color.  Gettin' me some color.  And stripes.  Lots of stripes.  And black.  Those are my clues for right now.  And if you're an owner in Home Depot, you are very welcome.  I'm super excited to give you penny I have.  Should I just sign over every future pay check now?  Do you want the shirt off my back and my shoes too?  It's pathetic how much I spend at Home Depot.  It's got to be 10 times what I spend on clothes.  That makes me sad.  waaaah.

Here's some of my inspiration:

image found here

image found here

image found here

Metallic silver dresser

My sister Renee had a great idea for a wedding gift for my brother.  What newly wed has too much furniture? Um, none!  So with the help of my parents- (we live about 15 states away from my parents/ brother/ new SIL) they found a dresser from someone local and when she came up for the wedding she got to work on it.  You'll have to excuse the phone photography.  Not our best work- but it's how we roll!
               

 Not too shabby eh? If you like the really distressed look it would be fine just like this. I'm dying over the price tag. $10. Insane right? Wish I could score some awesome deals that didn't require Craigslist creepies- going to treacherous basement apartments with creepy guys smoking something questionable and haggling a price for something that doesn't even resemble the posted picture. Eww. Not worth it. My parents just happened to stumble upon this find and had a very nice experience. No questionable smells either. Win win peeps! But now for the after pictures. If you're impatient like me, you've already scrolled down to the after pictures and aren't even bothering to read my boring post.... impatient society. "That's the problem with kids these day!" (insert grandma shaking fist in air)

 

So cute right?  I wanna get married again and have a beautiful wedding again (but really- I would just like to fit in my original wedding dress again!)  and then have an awesome sister paint me a dresser and make it look all gorgeous!  Ooh and while I'm at it, I want all new fun house-y stuff.  Change everything and be like super hip again.  Cause after 15yrs the hunter green and maroon towels I registered for aren't so hip.  Lets face it, the classic winnie the pooh dishes were never hip.  (Me like winnie the pooh?  Never!)

So because I don't really think you need another tute on furniture painting I'll just tell you the basics.  They first painted the dresser black, then painted it metallic grey.  Then did the stencil and then distressed it with sand paper.  See how the black shows through after they sanded it a bit?



 Did you see the paper lined drawers? They went all out!  Gorgeous!  Absolutely love it right down to the cute little glass knobs!  I may just steal it.  Good thing I live so far away or I would've already!


Linking to these fabulous sites:

Chevron and Turquoise and Owls, Oh My!

It's times like this when I begin to wonder if I'm really related to my sisters..... How is it possible that they (and my mom) are sewing geniuses when I can't sew a straight line? I kid you not! I'm super awesome at using the ripper to unstitch every single thread that I've EVER sewn. Then I re-sew, then I re-rip it out, til there's very little fabric left that is unscathed. It's beyond ridiculous. I'm beginning to think that I'm allergic to sewing....

Fortunately, I have very generous sisters/mom who feel sorry for my pathetic skillz and make me super awesome/ insanely cool gifts. This happy package came in the mail today & I couldn't be more thrilled to receive such an outrageously fun gift from my lil' sista Mandy! Get ready for the pics peeps. Put down your diet cokes (so you don't choke with crazy excitement), steady yourselves (so you don't fall off your chairs) and hold on to your socks, cause I'm about to fill your screen with some chevron happiness!



Squeal! Doesn't this little corner just make you happy? Who knew all it needed was turquoise chevron to make it purrrty? Let's take a closer look at the quilt my loverly sis made.... (big sigh, followed by huge smile) I mean first turquoise, but then she edged it with a fun chartreuse folks! S. T. O. P. IT! It's too good.....






As if that didn't make your heart pitter patter enough...... then come the owls!

Who00 (get it? Whoo Whoo? My jokes bring down the house with 2nd graders!) needs a boring backside of the quilt when you can have these funky little creatures to smile at! I'm super sorry Mandy I opened my birthday gift way early, but I can't possibly put it away and pretend I didn't see it! I'm just too happy! Love is not a strong enough description. More like stalker obsessed with my quilt! Don't be surprised if I find a way to wear it as an accessory. I'm thinking wrapping it around like a sweater adding a skinny yellow belt and finishing it off with ruffly flats..... perfect!

I'm linking to these fabulosa sites:
Blue Cricket -sorry can't find her button

Pinterest Project

I did it folks. I actually made something I pinned. Can you believe it? Maybe pinterest is more than just eye candy? I actually made this project back in December, but it was missing something. I needed a Spring-ier wreath on my front door so decided to pull this out from the closet. It's still missing something, can't decide what it is though. Maybe you can help? What does it need?

Needs some flair huh? Little too boring for me. I'm thinking pom poms or a banner or more flowers. My door is quite tall and wreath holders never hang at the right level. My little sister taught me this trick and maybe it's obvious to you, but in case you're as blonde as me, hang your wreath with ribbon! I used 3 flush thumb tacks at the top of the door and folded the ribbon before tacking it down. That way there were no raw edges rubbing. There's no ugly ribbon strands on the other side of the door. It was so simple- not sure why I hadn't thought of that years ago! Plus- those 3M sticky holders were gumming up my door and always falling off. Since my door was recently painted- I couldn't have that!

I'm pretty sure my pinterest to actual project completion ratio is now 1 to 813. Not too shabby! :)

selling my house

My house is on the market: I feel a mixture of complete relief to have some major projects completed and a sudden urge to vomit..... selling a house ain't pretty. It ain't for the lazy either. It is some dang hard work! But here are the online photos- sorry the quality isn't better- I didn't take them.

I hope someone loves my dark orange ceiling as much as I do.....

Seriously? I'm leaving this room just as I barely completed it? Seriously? When we painted those stripes we believed we would live here forever..... I will have to have a funky ceiling in my next home and black walls too and a funky light. Why am I leaving again?

Newly painted grey kitchen. It's official. I. Love. Grey. And I love to spell it with and E instead of A. I feel fancy.....

It took me awhile to come around to grey. It seemed cold to me. It was hard to leave brown and beige and red. But I'm ok. I'm hangin' with the cool kids now :)

This old window that hangs on this wall I've had for over 12 years. I put a James Blunt song lyric on it "there must be an angel, with a smile on her face, when she thought that I should be with you". I love it. Absolutely love it.

That chalkboard on the door is permanately attached. I will have to leave it behind. Sorry sis, it is lovely. Thank you for making it for me. Hope the next family writes love notes on it.....

We had to remove the mason jar chandelier. We definitely wanted to take it with us. Apparently, our realtor felt that others wouldn't "appreciate" it. OUCH! Some people just don't have awesome taste..... So they can have this boring fan. Have I ever told you how much I dislike fans? I feel like spiders are crawling on me as my hair wisps around. (eww, shudder)

My master bedroom/ media room/ living room. Our entire family lives here. We fold laundry, watch movies and literally spend 90% of our time in this 17x17 room. I hope that doesn't change in our new home.

I'm gonna miss Morgan's room too. It is a happy place. I still love the hot pink and polka dots and turquoise....

Taylor's room never got a makeover. It's still little girl and pink. She now hates pink. How sad! The fun swing though makes up for her room lacking in style. Not sure why the realtor wanted the mason jar chandy down and not this swing? Oh well, less work for us!

K's wall finally got finished. Just in time to sell. Nice.... (add sarcasm)

Game room- a little on the boring side.

Stair case wall gallery. What a complete pain in the tush to do..... but worth it if you ask me!
Ok- I've shown you almost every room in this house. I'm ok with moving on. Now someone come buy it- I can't keep up this ruse that I'm this clean!!!