Shortest post in history of blogs.

What once was dead red.....

.....is now alive brown!

This baby went from being our junior to being our master!

ox- tiff

Big changes in the dining room!!!

Since some painting and moulding projects will be tackled in the coming days weeks, I wanted to celebrate how far our dining room has come so far.

I would like to introduce you to the three stages of my dining room table:

TA-DONE!

I sanded with my handy little sander and used a semi-gloss paint on the table.

No primer, no sealer. That's how I roll.

Here's a sneak peek of another addition to the dining room......

Two of those bad boys...

Go ahead and cue the choir singing "Hallelujah"....

and yet another addition.....

two of thoooose bad boys

...annnnnnd there may be a little bit of this:

It's a Christmas miracle!!!!!!!

ox - tiff

How much fun can you have in a coat closet.....

I'm talking about PAINTING in a closet. What did you think? Get your mind out of the gutter.

After replacing our foyer floor recently, I decided our coat closet was not quite up to par. Since I don't let moss grow under my tush too often, I got the job done.

Let's take a look at the before, shall we:

Of course I forgot to take a before shot. Once I realized my mistake, I took a picture of the one unpainted wall that was left. I removed the wire rack that you hang coats and things on before I started. I carefully taped around the hardware that supports the thing that supports the coats...that support our body temperature. Too much? Okay. Moving on. I love me a good progress shot:

Once it was painted, I searched through my closets and closets full of decorations my single decor bin for something that would be JUUUUUUUUST right for this little nook.

I think I found it!

TA-DONE!

Of course my tiffany blue teal Dyson belongs in this closet, but I didn't want you to know that.

ox - tiff

My big girl laundry room!

As you are aware, my house, adorned with its brass doorknobs and other various demon fixtures of the 90's, was lacking any sense of style. One of the most depressing rooms to me was always the laundry room. I am lucky enough to have a tiny laundry room, period. I am pretty darn lucky to have a laundry room on the first floor, which is where our master bedroom is located. Last but not least, I am SUPER lucky to have a laundry room located in such a place that visitors could mistake it as the powder room. NOT.

After a few minutes months and months of trying to convince my husband that he would have clean underwear more often if he allowed me to indulge myself and fix what was broken in the laundry room, I sat down and pondered. I thought of every gaudy, naked detail of that room and made a list of what I would like to see in that room. It looked something like this:

1. less white

2. less oak

3. less space above cabinets

4. less white

5. stripes

4. less white

You get the picture :  )

So...after visiting the miniature Lowe's that I stack on the basement steps happily organized in the basement, I settled on the appropriate paint colors and the taping/measuring torture fun started. There's something you should know about me, I'm a closet "eyeballer." Yes, it's a very technical term. I was diagnosed at a young age. Luckily, it's treatable. Medication ranges from liquid nails to paintable latex caulk. Thank God there is a cure! Seriously, thank you, Jesus. Luckily, it usually works out in my favor...tee hee. Love you, Justin.

So once I got started eyeballing meticulously measuring the stripes, it was easy peasy!

one stripe...

two stripes...

(notice the old parquet in the foyer/hallway - more to come on that soon)

three stripes...

FOUR! (DISCLAIMER: I have yet to finish the fourth and final stripe. I know, I'm horrible. I'm the worst kind of horrible, I'm an eyeballin' project hopper. Gah.

After my stripes were unfinished finished, I glanced at my list and saw that I mentioned something about less oak....Hm, I can't remember why I would write such a thing like that. Then it hit me...it hit me hard.

I used the same semi gloss paint on the cabinets that I used for the lighter of the stripes. I soon realized after the first coat and addition of new hardware, I was falling in love...

And the big picture...complete with tiffany blue jar to hold love notes from your husband reminding you why you wash his underwear dog biscuits.

That's all folks.

Let's see that before one more time.

Yeah, I think I'll keep her....

I was inspired by many of the beautiful laundry rooms out there in Blogland, but are you aware there are still many a laundry room suffering from uglyitis?  Do what you can to help by posting your laundry room redo today! You never know when you'll inspire someone :  )

All of the paint for this project was on hand. I spent a couple of dollars on the milk glass and blue jar at a consignment shop. The new hardware was on sale for pennies, PENNIES, I tell you.

Is this thing on? I call this... "Mini board & batten remix."

Before I proceed, I would like to thank my lone follower: Amy Storm from Storm Cloud Nine. She's my girl! And a big shout out to her blog-editing husband, Mike. It is my dream to have three or four followers in the next 5 years, but my dreams aren't important here. We're here to talk about my head case of a house.

Moving on....

A long, long time ago in a world where people adored brass fixtures and fake wood, there was a guest bathroom that completely lacked any and all design elements. Said bathroom was filled with dingy walls, equally dingy flooring, a builder grade vanity and those horrible round lights. Yes, some of you feel or have felt my pain at one time or another. So without really telling my husband what I was doing, because we all know gaining his permission could have slowed production, I began my first room makeover.
DISCLAIMER: Fake wood can work, but trust me, this vanity wasn't workin. Uh-uh. Nope.

Okay. So I guess from now on I can't use pictures from my iphone. They are dwarfed. Anywho, what better time to learn how to hang wallpaper than the present? Those people who say it is hard, yeah, they're crazy. Anyone can do this. Right? Well, kinda right. My prepasted bead board wallpaper hung the right way once a friend gave me some paste activator. Who knew you needed that? Not me. Luckily, I planned on covering the seams so I didn't have to freak out about being able to see them.

After I FINALLY had all of the wallpaper hung, my husband and I hung the chair rail cap. I liked the thin chair rail look in this room so the cap worked by itself, plus I'm cheap. Did I mention that before my husband decided to help me, I had the chair rail on the wall with regular nails?  Ooppsiee

Needless to say, he insisted on helping me remove it from the wall and do it the right way.

The color I used on the wall is Oyster Shell by Olympic. I likey, but wait till you see how it turned out on my vanity. Not thrilled with it. It looks better than it did, but I have my eye on a vanity at Home Depot if it sounds like we'll ever have guests again. We hung lattice strips over the wallpaper seams. It was super easy. We used liquid nails and a finish nail or two

I added shoe trim to the top of my base moulding. Weird, I know, but it adds a little something. Don't you think?

After everything was up and painted, I moved all of the extras back in and I'm pretty happy with the outcome. I spray painted my chrome towel holder and two towel bars oil rubbed bronze. Couldn't be happier with my low budget revamp. I used a semi gloss trim paint on the wallpaper and moulding and a satin paint on the wall above. I was pretty set on the white part being glossier than the top section so satin was the right choice for me. Yeah, yeah, satin paint in a bathroom, get over it!

 

Here's a photo of the vanity that didn't exactly turn out like I had hoped:

It almost has a green color to it.

COSTS:

The inspiration for this room came from a $4 shower curtain from a local thrift store.

I spent $20 on decor, including the towels and hardware.

Paint and moulding cost $40 for this project.

Well, this marks the end of my first post, but the beginning of my blogging! Have a great weekend Amy and Mike :  )

ox - tiff