We've Come a LONG Way

The other day I was feeling pretty down in the dumps in terms of progress we've made on redecorating the house lately.  We have a GREAT time doing it, and it has kind of become our new weekend hobby when Evan is off of work, but I feel like our transformations are underwhelming (is that even a word?) and barely noticeable.

We still have SO many things we'd like to do to the house, but I was feeling a little unispired.  Then I looked back at the before pictures ...

And the inspiration is back!  In 3 short months, we have accomplished quite a lot in our living room, the pantry, the nursery, and the playroom (as evidenced below).  Although not one of those projects is 100% done, is a project EVER completely done?

So before we went any further, I decided to give our realtor a call.  I wanted to know if some of our possible future projects were even worth it!  I thought she would tell me I'm a crazy woman, but she told me she SO wished clients would call before doing renovations. 

She's coming over this evening and I hav esome BIG dream projects i'd like to ask her about.  It would all be DIY, of course, and I'm aware we have little time, but a girl can dream right?  And when you do it on a budget, it makes it all the more fun.  In particular, I'm going to ask her about:

(1) painting the kitchen cabinets white like this photo below (this isn't our kitchen obviously.  It's just inspiration)

(2) redoing the master bathroom (I can't even put an inspiration photo here ... because this one would be a HUGE overhaul)

and ...

(3) changing up the master bedroom (i ordered a very similar pillow off of etsy and this will be the color inspiration for the master.  We're hoping to get some work started on the master before Gloria comes along)

It's exhausting, yet exhilaring, how these projects are never ending!  I have thoughts in just about every square inch of the house.  But don't worry, I still took the time to sit down and be sorely disappointed in last nights Glee instead of worrying over this.  Some of it will get done and some of it won't.  It just depends when inspiration strikes!

Complete Living Room Transformation for $100!

Hello readers from Kelly's Korner!  We have been doing our home little by little since moving in a year ago and though we're no where near done, this is where we are now with the livingroom!  Check the "our home" tab and you'll see what else we've done! In fact, we just finished baby girl #2's nursery and the master bedroom is kinda in a state of chaos, so there's lots going on! 

Time for another installation of the ...

Three weeks ago I blogged about the start of the "Lacefield Home Renovation Project."  It has been SO much better than I expected.  I half expected us to either go totally overboard and get overwhelmed, or just to give up mid-project. 

BUT, we've taken our time.

We've made smart decisions.

Instead of jumping in to something, or putting up some random curtains, we buy 3, put them all up, and return the 2 that don't make the cut.

I've learned that taking your time saves money and headaches.

Just to help you recall, when we started with the livingroom it looked like this:

BEFORE

The walls HAD to change.  And we managed that quickly over the summer.  But things still weren't quite right ...

This was the "semi-after" that I blogged about 3 weeks ago.  The trim still needed to be done, and we wanted some curtains.  Also, turns out, we gave our carpet another look.

SEMI-AFTER

And here, for only $100 spent, we have our BIG transformation!

AFTER

So let's go through the changes:

We added a chair and a "reading area" by simply moving the love seat further away from the main seat.  In other words, we lengthened the space of the living room.  By doing this, it freed up space for the reading area.  I took the chair from our master bedroom, took the lamp from our study, and the table from Gloria's nursery because it was sitting in that room by itself.   The little "lamp" on top of the table was sitting on a shelf that was in the livingroom but we took those shelves out to make room for the curtains.

The trim is now painted!  Doesn't it look fabulous?  The husband managed to do this in his VERY little time off this month.  He doesn't much like the idea of my being on a ladder while pregnant (even though I do it anyway!) so while it took him 2 weeks to complete it, I am just so thankful he does it without complaining.  He even painted the door to the backyard and to the garage so it would all match.  The walls are "Oat Straw" from Behr and the trim is whatever color is at the TOP of the "Oat Straw" card.

The rug is NEW!  And it was free because the MIL paid for it this weekend.  While the other rug is VERY pretty, it just wasn't big enough since we moved the sofas further away and it was also kind of hard.  Considering we'll be on the floor for hours again once Gloria comes, we wanted a softer and comfier rug.  The rug was from Home Depot and is an 8 * 10 while the old 5 * 7 made its way to our master bedroom and looks gorgeous!  It's all about working with what you have!

The MAIN change?  Those curtains that make the wall so noticeable now.  We got 2 short rods instead of putting one huge rod above the windows.  Each rod cost $9 at Target.  The curtain panels are from TJ Maxx.  We bought 3 to try them all out and go figure, liked the costly ones most, but they still weren't costly ... $10 each. 

So for a run down of the price:

- 1 gallon of trim paint: $30

- 1 gallon of wall paint: $30

- 2 rods above windows: $20

- 2 curtain panels: $20

TOTAL LIVING ROOM TRANSFORMATION: $100!!! 

Shall we take another look at what $100 did?

BEFORE

AFTER!

Next up: PLAYROOM!  We painted yesterday ... I'll have a "semi-after" look soon!

Linking to Serenity Now and Design Dazzle.

Linking up to:

Living Room Transformation for $32.50!

You might remember that I found myself in a home funk on Friday.  I went home and the funk continued.  I walked through the home feeling unhappy with it.  Some sweet blog readers hit the nail on the head:

I AM NESTING. 

And apparently, it's a big time kind of nesting.

I didn't go through this with Liliana so I'm really weirded out by this feeling of panic and "I'm not prepared to bring another life in to the world in a few short months when my whole house feels out of place!"

I realize I'm being ENTIRELY overdramatic.  Really and truly, our house is gorgeous and most would be happy with it.  But apparently this nesting bug takes over you and makes you see CRAZY things.

Fortunately for me, instead of Evan saying "woman, you're crazy!" he was just patient.  PATIENT.  That is Evan's word.  He is the most patient husband you could imagine.

This weekend we started the "One Room at a Time Lacefield Home Renovation Project."  This will be done on OUR budget (which equals CHEAP) and in OUR time frame (which equals, probably over a couple years). 

I want to have a PLAN for each area instead of just jumping in to it.  It's easy to get sucked in to the renovating bug and not really thinking "what do I want out of this space."

We started on the living room ... and our living room, while no means done, is in the "in progress" stage and looks SO much better for just $30 dollars!

In July, after we had lived in the home for about 6 weeks, the livingroom looked like this:

BEFORE

Truly, this isn't a BEFORE picture like it says.  I had already made some changes by this point: those cushions were new and I absolutely love them (still do).  The rug is also new from Overstock (not my favorite purchase b/c it's not very soft and we like laying on the floor in our home). 

The wall color still got to me.  It looked like mud.  The ENTIRE house was this color when we moved in.  I wish I was kidding.  The ENTIRE thing.  Ugh.

So on Father's Day, Evan and I worked (sorry honey!).

We lightened up the walls.  You don't realize how dark your walls are until you take a picture like this.  The color we chose is "Oat Straw" from Behr.  It's a pretty safe neutral and goes really well with the red couches.

Once those walls were painted the living room stayed in that state until, oh, Friday night when my "nesting" commenced.

Before you knew it, I was up off the couches and moving them.  Moving the couches, moving the media console, moving the rug, etc.  Fortunately, the husband NEVER laughed at me or called me crazy.  He just helped me move things!  And we tried one thing, and then tried another until we got ...

SEMI-AFTER

Here is the living room today.  We moved the couches out and realized that we had things to tightly spaced in the room.  This freed up room for a chair, table, and lamp which looks like it's own reading nook.  LOVELY.

How did this all cost $30 you ask?

Well the paint was $30. 

The chair?  Do you see it in this picture?

I took the chair from our master bedroom, I took the lamp from our study, I took the table from the future baby nursery because it has been sitting in that room all by itself for over 6 months.  I took the little decor from shelves I had in the living room but took down once the reading nook area was made.  As for that gorgeous mirro above the fire place?  Our realtor got us a giftcard to a store called IO Metro and we bought it with that.  FREE mirror?  Yes please!

We are still in PROGRESS though...our next plans for the room?

When I zoom out you can see that the trim looks well ... unfinished.  That's another one of the kicks I got on this weekend.  Our trim needed to look like, well, a trim!  So off we went to Home Depot.  We spent $2.50 buying a sample and I started trying out how it would look.  The verdict is in and we LOVE it.

Slowly and surely, over time, we are going to pain this trim.  Sure it will take time since I'm pregnant and Evan doesn't like the idea of my standing on a ladder.  And since Evan's always working, the two of us don't exactly have time on our hands.  But it will get done.

We also plan on putting up curtains to the side of the big window.  They'll be light to help brighten the room even more.  I don't want to cover the windows AT ALL because the best part of our house is the view in to our backyard (tons of TALL and GORGEOUS trees).  We would still like to do something on the fireplace wall, but we're not too sure where to move with that just yet.  For now, our plan for this room is aobut 33% achieved, and 75% planned.  But, I'm happy with that. 

This nesting pregnant Momma is more than happy with that. For $32.50, I think we're doing pretty darn good!

Linking to:

http://evolutionofstyleblog.blogspot.com/search/label/Room%20Evolutions