Seeing green

We've been super busy this week getting ready for Sunday's house tour. Who knew getting your house ready to show was so. much. work? I'm fairly certain this is the most clean & organized our place is ever going to be. Or at least until we sell it one day!

At any rate, I wanted to take a quick break to share an update to the entryway....a little change that's made this space complete! When this picture showed up on Janice's blog, I was super embarrassed. Sure, the focus was on the floors, but would you get a load of that cabinet?

 

It was my $35 faux painted, missing a back & has no shelves find. A beaut, right? This thing has been hanging out in our front entryway for the better half of 5 months and really needed a paint job. Unfortunately, I was too busy sleeping during my first trimester. And when I woke up I wasn't able to work with oil based paint. So I enlisted the help of my mom who painstakingly primed for me.

The original plan was to strip the paint....but that just sounded too exhausting and time consuming. So we went the oil based adhering primer & a whole lot of sanding route instead. It didn't produce the most professional of results (what do you want...this cabinet was a $35 dinged up mess), but I must say I'm super happy with the end results!



I styled and re-styled the top of this chest over & over, but nothing was clicking with me. I worked with what I had on hand, but ultimately it was these peonies from Michael's that did the trick. I'm not normally a fake flower person, but these I liked. I paired them with an old vase that we were using to collect wine corks. Voila--styling complete! 



 

The color is Lime Twist by Valspar--thanks to the green March issue of House Beautiful for that suggestion! But oh my god, this thing was a huge pain in the ass to paint. It required 1 coat of primer & 3 coats of paint. I think it speaks to the quality of the paint (I'm not a huge Valspar fan, unless it comes in the form of spray paint), and the fact that this chest is way more detailed than it looks! All the nooks, crannies, twists and turns...this baby has me longing for a quality spray painter. One of these days...

Anyway, there's no rest for the weary...I'm back to getting this house into shape! Hope to see some of you on Sunday!

I resolve...

While February was busy sneaking up on me, I was still thinking about January. What can I say, I'm a day late & a dollar short around here. But did I make nice on those resolutions? I'm happy to report that...

We're consistently eating cleaner

I'm flossing more than before

I'm fairly certain I've narrowed my choices for a new blog design

I've finally navigated Pinterest (check me out with my one pin...go me!)

I'm finally tackling that master bedroom makeover

Okay, so I'm lying...the flossing isn't going so well. But I felt the need to say it, in the off-chance that my dentist might happen to be reading this (although, if we're getting technical here 'flossing more than before' is actually true, considering it's something that I rarely did before). So eh, 4 out of 5 ain't too bad.  

The last time you joined me, I complained mentioned that I couldn't find a small console table for the real, real entryway to save.my.life. And then like magic, this appeared...

Okay, so it didn't magically appear. But the day I wrote my last post, I found this little gem for $35 at a local antique store. The piece itself was missing the back of the unit, which is why it was such a deal. But that didn't phase me since this is really more of a decorative piece. The doors stick, the inside is covered in awful contact paper, and the painted faux wood finish isn't so hot either. So to sum things up, this is definitely not what I'd envisioned for the space. But it works. Sometimes thinking outside the box isn't such a bad thing. Which is why going into a space with a well laid out plan isn't always the best idea. You never know when the unexpected will fit the bill!

Obviously I have plans to paint it. I was originally thinking that whatever found it's way into this space would be painted green, ala this great piece from Emily Clark...



via



But now I can't help but wonder if something this large would be like the big green elephant in the room. I'm all for adding an unexpected color to a space, but I may have to mull this one over.

And again, that's what we like to call deviating from the original plan, my friends. TGIF!

I've been so busy, I forgot I had a blog.

Or the other appropriate title would be 'Our house got robbed & in addition to life, I've just been waaaay too busy dealing with insurance, detectives & security systems to think about this here little blog'. But that would be too long of a title, now wouldn't it?

So yes, I've been an absentee blogger these days. In one of those "it will never happen to me" moments, our house was robbed last week. It's not fun, it's not glamorous, and I sure as hell find myself a little (okay a lot) nervous to come home alone most days. We were lucky in that the intruder made off with mostly jewelry (some of which were family pieces, that sadly, we'll never see again) and the sister's netbook & ipod. Ironically, said intruder was relatively respectful of our property, with the exception of this....

They kicked in our side door, taking the interior moldings & half of the wall with it. Lovely, eh? As upset as we were about the robbery itself, this door nearly put me over the edge. What a freaking mess. Luckily, the husband's contractor friend showed up bright & early the next morning to repair the door (we'll replace it as soon as the insurance settles, whenever that may be....), and we were able to rid ourselves of those projection screen stands that temporarily secured our door.

Ironically, the bulk of the mess came from the police & their fingerprinting dust....

Area rug....ruined. I crossed my fingers that the insurance adjusters would have sympathy & tell me to purchase a new rug ASAP. But instead, they told me to call a cleaning service to remedy this little issue. Which isn't so bad, I suppose. But it's certainly not the West Elm or Crate & Barrel replacement I had in mind...

But onward & upward! It's time to move on & get to some stuff I meant to talk about earlier this week. We finally got around to replacing the light in the real, real entryway. Remember when I dabbled with the idea of having a professional come & install overhead lighting? Well guess what...a $29.99 sconce from Home Depot won.

I begged the husband to replace the light right away. Afterall, I'd be welcoming my book club friends through these doors in a matter of days & people generally like to be able to see where they're going when it's dark. Which ended up being just one big LIE, since the real reason we needed a light was to welcome our friends to the husband's surprise, "Yay! You have an MBA!" party (I got really good at lying that week....).

But sadly, the light is just decorative at this point. The wiring is all f'd up. I'd always wondered why the old light never worked? Well, there you have it. The husband was so annoyed with this fact that after a solid 30 minutes of working, everything got tossed aside in a huff. And we're no further along than when we started. But it sure does look better! 

I also finished painting the steps. Hoorah! Lack of lighting kept me from tackling this project on weeknights, so whenever a spare moment presented itself on the weekends, I was painting (scratch that...I was actually frantically painting a mere days before the husband's party....I'm the poster child for procrastination). 

Oh my. I looooove that this is complete. Amazing what some painted risers can do for your home! I'm still debating about installing a runner, but that's way down the line, if ever. Snow & salt is much easier to clean off the wood floors!

So that's about it! I'm hoping to get my house mojo back in action...enough to be posting more frequently! With Thanksgiving just around the corner (um, quite literally!), I'll be sharing my thoughts & ideas for how we'll be celebrating next week.

Hint...this year it involves a kitchen. Just sayin'.

And then there was wallpaper...

We finished wallpapering the real, real entryway!

Remember the before?

And now...the after!

Pay no mind to the dangling light fixture in the last photo. The plan is to keep it dangling while I decide if I want to replace it with another sconce, or hire an electrician to come and install an overhead light (of which, there is currently none). Right now I'm leaning towards just replacing the sconce, as we have some upcoming events at our house (yep, we're tackling Thanksgiving again this year...this time with a kitchen!), and it's just the easier route at this point.

And those ugly doorbells? Yep, we gotta do something about those too. They're never used, so I'd sort of just like to get rid of them all together. But since I'm not an electrician and don't know a thing about that stuff, I'm hoping we can just find suitable covers & the husband can work his rewiring magic (you hear that husband?).

And for those of you wondering, the wallpaper is from Sherwin Williams and the book is called Ink. I think you can also find it at Lowes, but in this case, the price at Sherwin Williams was just a bit cheaper (with more personalized service...but that could just be my store!). This pattern definitely did not jump out at me online, but in person it had me at hello. Funny how things work out that way, huh?

And now the fun stuff begins! I'm working on some wall art, and crossing my fingers to find a great console table to complete the space (easier said than done!). I'll be sharing progress photos along the way!

Happy Wednesday!

Entryway progress!

So we made some progress on the real, real entryway this weekend. And by "we" I mean, my mom. She's really, really good at this wallpapering thing. And I feared if I bothered to tackle this alone (impossible) or with the husband (hello arguments!) things just weren't going to turn out the way I originally envisioned.

Anyhoo! You may remember the entryway used to look like this...

And now, things are looking like this....

Ahhh! I love it! But it's only just progress at this point. It's kind of hard to tell, but we stopped just past the front door because we ran out of wallpaper. But this really comes as no surprise since I waltzed into Sherwin Williams with half-ass room measurements. And the poor manager had to do his best to figure out just how much I'd need. He even warned me I may not have enough. But since I like to live dangerously, I ordered only one double roll. Consider that a lesson learned....

So let me tell you, wallpapering is intense! And I would know this because I watched. This particular pattern required an identical match up, so needless to say we lost a lot of length in the process. I think my mom said something to the effect of, "you shouldn't have gone with such a detailed pattern". Second lesson learned....

We also had an issue with scratches. We don't know if it was the brush or what, but there are some noticeable dings (if you really take the time to look) where the black rubbed right off the wall. So then we resorted to using an old beach towel for a more smooth application. Third lesson learned... 

Overall, this little space should be relatively easy to finish. Another roll of wallpaper is on its way, a new light fixture needs to be installed, artwork to hang & a console table to find (which is already proving to be difficult). All in good time...which is hopefully soon!

And remember these letters I picked up at the Country Living fair?

I'll be back this week to share what I did with them! I bet you have zero clue what I spelled out...

The real, real entryway

Yes, those rumors you've heard are true.

We have a real real entryway.

Along with a million other doors that get you into & out of our house at various locations. If you've been to our home, you know. It's the house of doors! Our house was built as a dual family with maids quarters. So there are doors for the family, doors for the hired help (of which we have none, unless of course you're counting me), doors for the guests...and so on & so on. Don't you just love a house with history? Our house of doors is especially good times when the cable guy, contractor, or in-law's come over and can't figure out how they came in. It never gets old. What can I say, I'm easily amused!

Anyhoo, so here's the lowdown of what you see when you enter through the front door. Which, you'll all be using now that you can't kill yourselves on the way there (thank you new stairs, we love you).

I debated about keeping the existing wallpaper, as it's actually quite lovely. But it's old & seen better days (as have the foyer doorbells..yikes!)...

The wallpaper looks better in photos, but it's not pretty in person. It's peeling & aged in several spots (I'm all about vintage, but this is a bit much). I thought about removing the wallpaper all together and just painting, but I can tell that some areas of the original plaster walls aren't in the best shape underneath. So I've decided instead to wallpaper right over the darn thing. And as I type this, I'm awaiting a phone call from Sherwin Williams to tell me when my order has arrived! I'm super excited about this wallpaper. I'm just hoping it translates well in the space. Oh well, time will tell. Fingers crossed. I will post pics soon!

Okay, onto the floors. They're octagon/chicken wire tile, original to the home...

Yikes. They look a little dirty in these pics. But they're in great shape for the age of the home! It's probably hard to tell from my stellar photos, but the tile surround is black & burnt orange/red. I didn't necessarily need to match the wallpaper exactly to the floor colors. But my crazy coo-coo mind got the best of me, and in the quest to have everything look just right, the new wallpaper is almost an identical color match to the floor (not originally intended, honest, but it worked out that way...I love when that happens!).

Fingers crossed I can tackle some wallpapering this weekend (with the help of my mom, naturally...you didn't think I'd go this alone, did you?)! I'll be back tomorrow with a weekend recap!