Phone Dump

The usual. Dumping everything I don’t want to forget. All that fluff that will end up in my blog book one of these days.

Moosey Goosey snuggle girl.

My little Babushka.

My handsome boy.

This picture of Moose reminds me of her first picture with me…

Renee and I have a running joke. Sometimes I post a picture in the morning and a few minutes later she texts/comments saying Copy Cat!

Case in point:

I wear a polka dotted green scarf and she is in a similar sweater the same day.

I curl my hair, she curled her hair.

Then this morning she had posted a picture and I posted one not long after and I realized we were both in blue stripes! Crazyness!

Great minds just think alike!  

Wee house updates. Making it Home.

My friend Lauren shared these mason jar tumblers on Facebook that she’d found. I was going to have her order me one and then lo and behold that exact night David and I were at Bed Bath and Beyond and they had them in store for $10! Snatched this baby up quicker than you can say Southern Sweet Tea!

I hope our babies get these beautiful baby blues!

 

Often I come out of my cave and this is what I find. Everyone crashed on the couch.

I promise this isn’t staged, and David is out. Moose is seriously like a cat and this is how I find her night after night.

We went to Tallahassee Nurseries and finally got some plants for the front of the house. It’s going to be a project that evolves as we add stuff but consider this phase I.

For this I photo shopped what we were thinking.

Then after it was planted.

Same plan, although it’s going to take a little while for the plants to mature. Also we are probably going to put a hydrangea bush on the front right corner instead of an ornamental tree because our sewer access is smack dab where a beautiful tree could be planted. Oh and we bought and planted two little pencil-like trees on each side of the garage.

David planted everything while I ran back to the nursery for one more purple and one more green.

The purples are Purple Diamond Loropetalums and the greens are Harland Boxwoods.

Grow baby plants, grow!

Foyer Facelift

Update! I've decided to submit this to the Pinterest challenge after all. Even though I did this merely days before YHL even announced what they were doing. So for once, I did not copy them! Although I did get a little giddy at the thought that I did a project first and they did the same shortly after. Virtual nail gun clinks all 'round! :)

via

Ladies and gentleman may I introduce you to my favorite project to date! I’m pretty sure I say that with each project but there’s nothing wrong with them all being my favorite!

And by favorite project I should specify that its my favorite end result. By no means was this my favorite project to actually do. In fact it was kind of not fun, but that’s besides the point!

So, David was out of town a few weekends ago for one of his best friend’s bachelor party. All the guys rented a cabin in Blairsville, GA. They got to see a little bit of snow! I was jealous. Not of being stuck in a cabin with a bunch of boys, but I’ve been hankering for a snowy/cabin/mountain trip for a while now. But I’m glad my babe had fun!
 
Anywho, what did that mean for me? Project time!

Earlier that week we bought stuff to do board and batten for the laundry room.

Then, the afternoon before I was to get started on the project, I had a lightbulb moment!

Why am I doing this in the laundry room where no one but us will ever see it…I know! Let’s do it in the foyer where everyone will see it and we can enjoy it!

So, a call to the hubs indicating I’d (as expected) changed my mind, and he was on board.

“Whatever you want to do my love”
(He’s finally learned the right answer)

He was heading out of town early the next morning and I needed a few more boards to do the now expanded project. It was never planned that I would do this project alone, but it worked out that way because I was way too impatient to wait for him to get back from the mountains!

Mom had a minor surgery that Friday so she came to stay with us Friday night while my Dad was at work. David left Saturday morning and my Dad ended up having overtime Saturday night, so she ended staying all weekend. It was fabulous! She has her own room and bathroom at our house that she has now stocked with supplies so she doesn’t have to pack anything but clothes when she comes.

The guest room has now been deemed Weezer’s Room. (Her future Grandma name FYI!)

Anywho, we were great company for each other because she laid on the couch all weekend recovering, watching movies and watching me work. She was an excellent assistant decision maker when I couldn’t decide what I wanted so it was great having her there!

Alright so this project took me an entire weekend starting around 11:00 on Saturday and ended about 5:00 Sunday. Not too shabby for a one woman operation!

It’s perfectly imperfect and I absolutely LOVE it. It’s pet-worthy.

It could have been sanded and filled better, but I did what I could with the tools (and patience) I had.
 
Before and After

Light switch plates have since been added after some custom fittings because I measured wrong…thank you Dad!
 
Hooks were added to the right side more recently!

Don’t mind the “finished” photos from the phone…sigh…

There are tutorials everywhere for this so you can Google around for exact directions, but I based mine off of a pin from Being Brook’s Tutorial.

Gorgeous right?

The only thing I really changed was that I did a 1x3 on the top instead of a 1x6. I also added shoe molding and put my lower 1x6 more in the top third versus the middle.

I cut everything with David’s battery operated saw and some sawhorses. I nailed everything with my Dad’s battery operated nail gun.

First of all I did a super quick & easy rendition in Paint to get an idea of what it would look like visually. In the practice picture I brought it around the corner but Mom helped me decide that wasn’t best. I totally agree!
   

I primed the walls first.



Then I cut. And cut. Oh, and then I cut some more.

 

And I nailed everything together. Piece by piece. It came together like a puzzle.
 
Then I caulked, puttied and was ready to paint!

I didn’t want to do anything with changing out the (brand new) baseboards so I angled the bottoms at a 45 degree so the vertical pieces did not hang over the base board.

I then painted two coats and called it a day!

I haven’t done much decorating yet as far as wall stuff, but I’ll share when I do.

I am in love and SO happy I did this in the foyer. I stare at it every day!

And with this free makeover to some baskets I had, I now have a super cute decorated foyer table!



Oh and check out Katie, Megan and Michelle to see their awesome projects too!

Stripe, Stripe, Stripe it Up!

We all know I have an obsession with stripes – they’re fabulous!

When we were building, I was trying to mentally eyeball where I’d want my future stripe wall. I’ve been drooling over them for a long time but of course I couldn’t do it in the rental.

I always thought I’d do a Chevron wall, but 1) those are super hard and tedious 2) I get worried about trends.

On a shirt or pillow? No biggie. Hours of labor and on a prominent wall in my house? I’m a little skeptical.

I still can’t get enough of Chevron, just figured I shouldn’t put it on the wall!

A few that inspired me…

  

[click photo for source]

Well, behold!

Sorry, these are all phone pictures…

Tape.

Paint edges with original wall color.

Paint your new color. I used Behr “Beluga” matched to Valspar (I believe).

Peel. It’s important you do this while the paint is still wet!

Last step, decorate after letting it dry!

Recipe for perfectly painted stripes:

1. Paint the edges of the frog tape with the existing wall color. This will seal the tape and any seepage under the tape will match the wall color. Wait about an hour before going to step two.
2. Paint your new color over the wall color.
3. Immediately after painting the second coat, slowly peel the tape off at an angle.

Voila! No leaks, no touch ups, just perfectly crisp lines.