Friday, January 29, 2016

Room Re-Do #1 Entry & DIY Ballard Design Orb Chandelier!

First on the list of rooms that have been re-done since moving in is the Entry!
Let's start with a good before and after shall we?!?  This photo was taken before we moved in (seller touching up paint)... **just a disclaimer...EVERY room in our entire house has been repainted by me since we moved in... and the vast majority of lighting fixtures have been replaced...but we'll cover those as we do these makeovers.



Here's the room after:


You may recognize that little half moon table from the Entry Makeover from our previous home.  And...before you scratch your head in confusion...yes, it was Fall when this picture was taken, and yes, that's a chair on my living room table because I was painting it.

Here's the DIY Ballard Design Orb Chandelier... I'd been eyeing these forever, and knew when we moved, I wanted to get one.  I couldn't get myself to stomach the price tag though...$299?!?!? Woah! I decided to try to make my own.  You can too, here's what you'll need...

Materials list....
Old light
Spraypaint
Macrame rings (I used 4)
JB Weld
Patience


Here's the light I started with...$10 from Habitat.



First, disassemble the light to get to the middle.  Then, you'll need to pull your macrame rings apart...loop them through the top of the light fixture, and use JB Kwik Weld to secure the rings to each other, and to repair where you had to separate them...

I used clamps to get them to stay where I wanted them while I was waiting for the the KwikWeld to dry....and yes...those are containers of spare lighting parts.



Then, spraypaint with your choice of spraypaint...replace your light fixture with the one you just made...sit back, and relax...or start making something new!




This project total cost less than $30!!!  Score!

See ya next week for the next room makeover!


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Tuesday, January 19, 2016

So....We bought This House....

....We bought this house almost 2 years ago.  February 28, 2014 was our closing date.  But before we go there...I want to start with the story of the old house, because knowing the situation in its entirety will help you understand.

So, October 2014-Mr. A2B and I decide it's time.  It's time to start those last minute projects OR-finish those million projects so we can begin to consider, or at least look into putting our house on the market.  **DISCLAIMER: IF you're thinking of doing this...get a storage unit or three.  Just sayin.

First-We contacted a Realtor who ended up being the BEST Realtor we could have ever dreamed of.  She came, she saw, she commented, and we shat ourselves.  Just kidding...but she was a realist.  We told her what we wanted to list the house for, she recommended against it, and my husband said, well, we aren't planning on listing it like this...we're planning on doing stuff first. (She probably shat herself thinking how are these people going to do everything I recommended in a couple of months?!?!)  Nonetheless-if you've been here before or if you know me, you know I have issues... OCD (in multiple forms) one of those being Obsessive Christmas Disorder.  We thought our best chance to sell the condo would be while she's decorated in her Christmas Glory!  My father and mother in-laws said-put this house on the market when it's like this...(they said that in 2013)...so that's what we wanted to do.  Thinking to ourselves...The market is down right now, so we'll have about 6-10 months to find something, so we'll do all of this stuff, list it, and start high-so eventually the price will fall, etc....Baaaahahahahaha-wishful thinking...

Anywho-we painted the entire house inside, replaced fixtures, shampooed carpets until the cows came home, and packed up about 75% of our belongings and hauled them to another storage unit. While we unloaded about 50% of the other unit so we could decorate for Christmas. Yes, this was the second storage unit...full-sized-as big as you can rent round here...packed to the ceiling!  So, the day came...our Realtor came over, took pictures, put the sign in the yard and told us the house would officially be "live on the market" two days later.  I will say-she was impressed by our Awesomeness (AKA-ability to bust A$$ and get everything here done...including renting scaffolding and painting 28' walls and the entire ceiling in the place).

The day it was live, we received 3 requests for showings, to be the following day...yes, all of them...and the next day, we had an offer...a cash one-naturally we took it. Luckily-they knew we had little ones and since it was December 13th-and we had about 2-3 feet of snow that winter beginning in November-and since we didn't have a place picked out yet, they offered us closing at the end of February.

WAIT-yes, you read that correctly...had a cash offer...3 days after our house was on the market...and we had no place to live.  Talk about STRESS!!!  Not to mention the fact that I bawled my eyes out the night she put that little Keller Williams sign in our little front yard.  So before I get to the part about how we ended up here...let me take you through an emotional journey.




We poured so much $$, blood, sweat, and tears into this home.  We spent our Wedding night in this home. I started my blog in this home, we brought our children home from the hospital to this home, the monsters said their first words in this home...now, it's time to just up and leave it?!?!?  Over the course of 6 years there, virtually every single square inch of that place had our mark on it...and the kids' too. (thank God Sherwin Williams covers crayon).  Even the tiny inches of that house didn't exist were created into something; whether that was a playhouse under the stairs, or a tiny space that couldn't be wasted for storage.  It was small, but it was open and we were always together...even doing laundry, or while preparing dinner...it was cozy and it had grown on us.  All of us.  What was once a bachelor pad...actually THE Bachelor Pad had now become home.  Our Neighbors were family, they house sat for us, knew our pets' names (all of them), gathered our UPS packages if we needed them to, called 911 for me because I was sure the "suspicious" vehicle that belonged to another neighbor's grandchild was a serial killer's.  True story...more on that later.  But, now we had to say bye?!?  It was bittersweet to say the least.  And of course-when you know you must relocate for more space, but also don't in your heart of hearts want to leave, house hunting is not as fun.  So it began, we searched...and searched...and searched.  Nothing.  There was always something about the houses we went thru that just didn't do it for me.  Which is shocking because I typically find the silver lining in everything, and can see the potential of houses.  Not this time.  I was very petulant.  Looking back, I do feel sorry for everything I put our poor realtor and Mr. A2B through.


It was time to say good bye. Eventually-I settled.  I was outnumbered.  The realtor, by this time my closest friend, Mr. A2B, my parents, and in-laws all voted against me.  I wanted a basement, cathedral ceiling (because of my Christmas tree of course), and some land...yadayadayada.  I didn't even entertain the thought of this house until the last minute because it didn't have a basement...or cathedral ceiling down stairs.  But I lost, and two years later with a whole lot left on my "To-Do-to make this my dream house without a basement" list-I couldn't be happier that I did.  We have completed a lot of projects.  There are even more than we've done to go, so why not get this blog going again?  First I'll share the before pictures with you...and we'll journey together through all these projects like we did at the old house.  Here she is in her real estate photo glory...

 Front of the House
Back Yard and Patio
 
Woods 
Office 
Living Room 
Kitchen (looking towards Laundry Room)
Kitchen (looking towards Living Room)
Laundry/Mudroom
Half Bath 
 
Master Bedroom
Master Bath
Loft
Little Man's Room  
Little Princess' Room
Kid's Bath
4th Room (Craft Room) 

Don't go away yet...the journey is just beginning....I thought the same thing...she's just not me.  But almost 2 years into it, and she's starting to become my dream home.  So, grab some popcorn, maybe some tissues, check back tomorrow or the next day, and join me as she goes from A to Being!




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Monday, October 13, 2014

Half-Bath Pallet Renovation Reveal!


This project is one that I helped my dad visualize.  I didn't do much of the work.  Long story short...Mom and Dad decided to move. (kept the house we grew up in for a rental) The new house is bigger, AND...an extremely well-built full brick ranch with a walk-out basement.  Their dream home.  Actually-mine too!  It's perfect and we all love it!  It's still close to where we are, where my older brother and his family are, and the old house.  It's great for holiday gatherings, has an open floor plan, and the basement is my dad's dream.  The old house had a basement but it was not functional.  More like a cellar to store canned goods and hide in when a tornado came.  It was frightful to say the least.  So, like I said, My dad did most of the work.  I just got the project going.  They moved last summer.  After having lived in one house for 25 years, you begin to acquire a bunch of crap!  So, Dad kept telling all of us that he wanted absolutely NOTHING!  He was a little burnt out if you catch my drift.  So, since his "man-cave" half bath in the basement boasted a pink sink and toilet, I decided to get him a faucet and a galvanized bucket for the sink.  And, yes, I meant to type that.  I was inspired by this...
Source
PERFECT!!!  So, for the "rustic" look, I went with this faucet from Home Depot.  It's expensive but it was his Christmas gift.  For the sink....I got him a bucket similar to the picturebbelow..  And we went through two of them.  On the first one when we drilled the hole, we cracked the bottom.  No worries, it's now the trash can.  We were more careful on the second one. We got the bucket from Rural King.  Be sure if you're doing this to use silicon to seal the bottom to prevent any leaks.













I had some left over river rock tile that we used for the sink top and back splash.  So, I did that.  He came up with the ideas for everything else.  Here are some before pics.

















And, here are some after pics... that's the same vanity that was there.  Dad just used more pallets to redesign over it.  And he ripped out the adhesive tiles and put in a new ceramic tile floor!  I did the back splash and "vanity top".  And we did replace the pink toilet with a white one. :)  Dad completed the toilet by adding a deer seat for the man cave.  The TP and towel holders are antlers dad had laying around...and yes, there are lots and lots more of them!









The layout of that area is different.  Here are my "best" sketches to show you what he did.  And yes, he even used pallets on the ceiling and added a motion activated (outdoor) light to the man-cave outhouse!  My dad is amazing!  Wait until I show you what he did in our new house!!!


He spent days breaking pallets up...if you're going to do this...or something like this, be patient!!!
We are waiting on the picture to go in the window behind the toilet, and I'm in the process of making the mirror.  But I couldn't want to share.