Renovate, Remodel, and Restore

This weekend I had the rare opportunity to get away by myself for a couple days and travel to my sister's house in Louisiana. They are in the midst of a remodel that has unfortunately gone on for more than a year because their contractor bailed on them with the job less than halfway finished and ALL the money spent. My sister had this to say.....

"We started this project May 5, 2009 with the anticipation of being done in September 2009. We now know that our former contractor has a history of purposely underbidding jobs. He bailed on us August 15th (prior to that we went for one month without anyone coming to the “site”). At this point we were on our own. Ah, the pay as you go plan. Living on sub floor in a literal construction zone. It is now June 2010. We hope to be done with the interior soon and will then build our deck and do landscaping.Though we had a tumultuous remodel ride and I thought about calling HGTV’s Holmes on Homes a couple of times, the lessons of patience, perseverance, and what is really important (not stuff!) were definitely humbling and great learning and growing experiences for us."

I seriously admire her attitude and resilience! I was honored to be able to go and help them with some finish work. I'm pretty sure we caulked and puttied at least 2897 nail holes on the trim throughout the house. We had a blast and laughed and talked the entire day. They have a lovely home in the historical district that is 113 years old. Their mission was to maintain the historical integrity of the house while also modernizing it. Today I want to share with you some before and afters and a few pretty details.

I am in LOVE with this fridge in their new pantry. It is classic vintage with a swanky coat of cherry red appliance paint! They left the original Bakelite handle as is.

This is the before shot of the front of the house after the siding had been ripped off. Notice they did not have a front door on the FRONT of the house....only a side and back door.

And here is the after. Isn't it lovely? Every single detail is swoon worthy.......the door is beyond beautiful, the light fixture, the mailbox, even the house numbers are ultra fab.


Simple elegance!
(my sister wanted me to stress that the house is still unfinished and many of the pics show that)

The master bath is a complete addition to the house. It is dreamy!

When we stayed over recently, my girls wanted to take baths in this tub all.day.long. Seriously,that's pretty much all they wanted to do.

I am lusting after this light fixture!

And the sconces to match. Can you believe she found those mirrors for $22 each clearanced at Target?

My absolute favorite part of this spa-like bathroom are the gorgeous granite countertops. Wouldn't this color granite be fantastic in a kitchen with a white subway tile backsplash?

This is the guest bath. Now imagine with me if you will, a dark cabin like bathroom with carpeted floors, dark wood plank walls, and a low ceiling. Unfortunately my sister lost many of her before pics when her hard drive crashed, so you'll have to use your imagination on this one. Needless to say, it is a complete and utter transformation!

This former dresser was repurposed as a vanity. They bought a scrap piece of granite and had it cut to fit. They tried really hard to repurpose as many items as they could. The rest they donated to good homes to serve as someone elses treasure! I got some gorgeous old windows and my other sister got a pink claw foot tub.

I love how they mix the old with the new and make it all work beautifully.

This is the before shot of their back porch.

And this is the after. AMAZING.....huh? This space became a new mudroom/hallway/entry.

This is the view when you walk in the back door. After finishing all those pesky nail holes, we even had a little time to do some staging and take some pretty pictures......my favorite part!

Cute little Pottery Barn splurge to hold keys and mail.

This chippy white bench was a $5 yard sale find and the wire baskets were another Target clearance score at just $6.24. What a perfect spot to sit and take off your muddy shoes and throw them in the basket!

Again, I love the mix of the old with the new. My sister has such a knack for this. I hope y'all enjoyed our little tour filled with inspiration. I had a fantastic time helping out. I love you both Beth and Ronnie. Thanks for a good time, some satisfying work, the best company, and some rocking eats! When can I come back and help again?

Out With the Dark...In With with the Light

It all started with this gorgeous piece of linen I found on clearance at Hobby Lobby. We all know I am a sucker for anything aqua/seafoam related, and this beautiful damask print was no exception. It was marked down from $30 a yard to just $10 a yard. I could not pass that deal up...it was perfect timing. Remember those toast colored lampshades that blended right into the toast colored walls in my kitchen? Well.....this fabulous fabric was the perfect solution for my drab to fab lamp makeover.

I started by tracing one of the side panels of the lampshade onto the back of the fabric. I did this 8 times. Then I cut them all out and applied fray check to the edges to keep them from looking messy with stray threads. Once the fray check was dry, I used spray adhesive to apply the fabric panels I'd cut out to each side of the lamp. To cover the seam where each piece of fabric met, I hot glued a strip of bias tape down each side.





Here are my toast colored walls with my toast colored lampshades. And my $1 shutters.
BORING!




And here they are now......boring no more! The damask linen on the shades and a fresh coat of spray paint on the shutters have transformed this space from dark and boring to light, fresh, and airy. If you want to know more about the sunburst mirror off to the side, you can read about it here. It's made out of free paint sticks from the hardware store!





Add some glassware into the mix with a bit of shine from the silver tray....and it's good to go. I feel my mood brightening as we speak. All that dark mixed with too many neutrals was totally bringing me down. I shopped my house for everything on this sideboard. The only thing I purchased was 1 yard of $10 fabric. I feel like I have all new stuff now. THAT is why I love shopping the house!





Soft and pretty with the lamps on.








Light and bright and cheery with the lamps off!




One more thing.....I want opinions on this. Should I paint the shutters and sideboard a creamy distressed white or leave them like they are???

Fireflies & Jellybeans - http://firefliesandjellybeans.blogspot.com/


The Shabby Chic Cottage - http://www.theshabbychiccottage.net/


House of Hepworths - http://www.houseofhepworths.com/

DIY Starburst Mirror

In honor of our weekly theme, "hardware store", over at The CSI Project.....I decided to fashion a starburst mirror out of paint sticks. Did you know they will happily give you a bag full of them if you ask??? I went in prepared to pay for them, but they were so nice and happy to help me out. I proceeded to skip out the front door, smiling all the way to my car! I could hardly wait to get started.

First, I lined them all up outside and gave them a coat of black spray paint. Then I painstakingly silver leafed each and every one of those blasted sticks. It was not as easy as they make it look. I googled and you tubed and read all the tutorials....I thought I was soooooooo prepared. HA! That stuff is tricky. These are the first few I did. I wanted them a bit distressed, but not quite this much. I eventually got the hang of it.....thankfully. I decided to use silver leaf because I like the look it gives. I was going for a faux antiqued mirrored look. But, really I think you could achieve something similar with spray paint.




As you can see, I am not a patient woman. Instead of cutting the sticks like a normal person would do, I decided to just go ahead and break them with my man hands. Seriously. Then I used hot glue to attach the sticks to the back of the mirror. I used an epoxy, E-6000, to attach the hanger.





The mirror is actually a candle mirror from the craft store. They were half off last week, so this whole project cost me $3.50. The paint sticks were free and the silver leaf sheets and spray paint I already had on hand. I LOVE a really cool, really cheap DIY project!





I really like the way it brightens up this space. Now I need to work on recovering the lampshades that blend right into the walls. And the shutters definitely need some sanding and a bit of glaze to tone them down. As soon as I start one project...I always find at least 10 more mini projects within that project that need attention too! My list is never ending. But actually I like it that way. I would be lost without my LIST of things to do.......and really BORED!