Bedroom Reveal

Ready? Before...

and after!

Again! Before...

and after!

I am so excited to share this room with you all. This is the first room in our house that I have been able to redo from top to bottom. Every surface had to be repainted/rewired/torn out all together. I am so happy with the results. I must put in a disclaimer though...all photography in this blog has been produced by an iphone 4s/5s camera, so the colors are a lot more subdued in real life than they look in these photos. You get the basic idea though. Anyways... ONWARD!

One of my favorite things about this bedroom update is the ceiling fan. It took me forever to find the one I wanted, but even more frustrating was the installation. This room previously had knob and tube wiring. This project was way beyond my know-how, so I asked by dad (who pretty much knows everything) to 'help me out'. And when I say 'help me out' I really mean have him do all the hard stuff and I can hand him tools or something. I can't thank my dad enough for his hard work, its perfect.

My second favorite feature of the new bedroom is the herringbone accent on the walls. I've always thought of herringbone as chevron's cool older cousin. I painted this using painters tape, keeping the pattern loose and fun (perfection is my enemy).

Besides retouching the ceiling, walls and trim, this room also gave me my first opportunity to experiment with painting floors. As I have mentioned in previous posts, I would love to someday refinish all of the floors in our home, but right now is just not the time. These floors have been damaged pretty badly over the last century and my skill level/budget isn't were it should be for a project of that magnitude. So I painted. It wasn't all that difficult, but definitely time consuming as I chose to sand and paint by hand (no rollers here!).

So far its holding up nicely, with the exception of one bad scratch from trying to move furniture by myself. Not very bright of me. Fortunately floor paint goes a long way and I still have almost have half a gallon left for repairs and starting in on the next room.

Because this was my first time decorating a room from top to bottom, I wanted to avoid setting a budget for myself. Instead I took my time and purchased things like paint on a week to week basis as the project progressed. Because I saved money on simple things like spray painting the old floor grate and borrowing items from other rooms, I was able to spend a little more on decorative items that really make the room shine.

Save:

Rather than replacing hodgepodge closet shelving, I pulled off the mismatched contact paper, cleaned the boards thoroughly and then covered them with a coat of paint that unified the whole closet. The full length mirror was leftover from my dorm room days. I gave the cheap mirror a coat of spray paint and now it doesn't look so bad.

Splurge:

Mounted antler necklace holder. How could I resist. (From Marshall's. I don't feel that guilty)

BTW, this phoot is more representative of the paint color in real life.  Hosta, Martha Stewart.

Save:

Runner to cover damaged floors. Nuff said.

Splurge:

The bedding. Yes, I knowingly bought an egregiously overpriced bedding set from Target. But I love it. And doesn't true love conquer all? I just hope it holds up in the wash.

Save: 

Pretty much everything else. Furniture is all hand-me-down. I broke the mirror on the dresser trying to move it by myself (hence the only scratch on the newly painted floors), but besides replacing that, they were completely free. Half of the artwork was thrifted/gifted. The beautiful watercolor prints were purchased several years ago at Art on the Green in Coeur d 'Alene and are by Dean Crouser from Mt. Hood.

Needless to say, the room isn't quite done. The lava lamp doesn't really work for the space does it? I'll be sharing a tutorial on the herringbone accent walls soon.

What? I have a blog?

So, it has been about a year since my last post (I know, shameful). I have been keeping busy working on my prerequisites for nursing school, so I really haven't had a lot of time for anything besides work and study. But I'm done for about six months (assuming I get accepted into the program). Literally right after my last final on Thursday I got back in the saddle and started up again. My current project: The guest bedroom.

We have three rooms upstairs. Two bedrooms, and a smaller room that is probably better suited as an office or craft room. We don't have kids yet, so the plan for now is to use one room as a guest room and have the other smaller one ready to convert into a nursery when the time comes. 

So here is a kind of before picture. I sort of forgot to get a real before picture because I wasn't even thinking about blogging. So this is just after I pulled the carpet up. Note the super awesome pink/purple walls and busted blinds. Yeah. We're that classy.

I was a little disappointed when I pulled up the carpet. The wood is in relatively good shape except two large rectangles that have been replaced with plywood. We aren't planning on refinishing the floors for a few more years, so after we do our "in the mean time" paint job I'm hoping we can cover them with furniture/area rugs.

The lighting is also going to be a bit of an issue. Our house still has a lot of old knob and tube wiring, and this room is no exception. For the most part I try to be respectful of things that are original to the house (for instance, we will never be painting over the dark wood trim downstairs) but this old fixture had to go. Our upstairs bedrooms get extremely hot during the summer and really stuffy and gross during the winter. We have a small ceiling fan picked out and I will update on how horrible the installation turns out to be.

I'm over half way done with the paint job (trust me it looks so much better!). In the mean time I'll leave you with a cute picture of my dog right after he got to open his nautical themed Bark Box. Here's to six more months of home improvement blogging!

How to Remove Old Paint from Hardware

 I think this is possibly my favorite household cheat that I have found on Pinterest so far. Its super easy, nontoxic and even relatively quick.

Most of the windows and doors in our home have been painted countless times and unfortunately from the looks of it, people who were doing said painting rarely took the time to remove any of the hardware before going at it. 

Since I was doing some painting in the kitchen, and would have to remove the hardware anyways, I thought I would give this a try. You can see that the locking mechanism and handle to our kitchen window were in rough shape.

Pretty nasty, huh?

Using my small snack sized crock-pot, I heated up enough water to submerge each of the parts. Once the water was good and hot, I threw in all of the pieces and let them soak for about a half an hour.

When I fished out each of the parts they looked about the same but when I went to rinse them off the old paint came away easily with just a little rubbing. I used a steel brush to get the stubborn bits out of any tight crevices...and tada!

They look almost new! I am so glad I found this as most of the hardware upstairs has the same problem. Here's the original link for the pin, or you could just follow me on Pinterest  :)

That Moment When You RealizeYou Painted the Window Shut

Ever have one of those Charlie Brown moments? The kind where you really put yourself out there, you try your best, and then at the last minute someone pulls the football out from under you? Yup. That's how I was feeling on Monday when I repainted the trim of our kitchen window. I'll save the one bright spot in this anecdote for later. For now, lets just concentrate on how I totally tried to F up our kitchen window.

Having successfully painted the kitchen ceiling in one day, I wanted to move onto the trim. I wasn't sure how far I could get in a day (I have a tendency to stretch a single paint job over several months) so I decided to start with the area that was most visible while using the kitchen.

Before...

I don't have a full shot of the window. But you probably get the idea. Peeling paint, discoloration, nail holes and chips.

Not to mention hardware that was carelessly painted over, one of my pet peeves.

I taped off the window and began painting with what was leftover of the ceiling paint (some of you may have spotted one of my mistakes already). As I painted I tried to move the window open and closed, letting it dry in the different positions before moving on. I ended with the window shut, then pulled off the blue painters tape and marveled at another job well done.

After...

Beautiful, right? Look at how the white pops against the grey. Then, about fifteen minutes after finishing, I found out that using flat for a trim is a big No No. Whoops.....

It looks okay, but because flat paint is more porous than any of the glosses, it won't clean up very well and will probably end up showing dirt and scuff marks. It should work for now though. I figure that I can repaint it in the spring along with the rest of the trim and windows.

Now for the really good mistake.

My husband got home from work and I wanted to show him what a good job I had done. I went to display how the window looked open....and to my surprise it wouldn't budge. I climbed up onto the counter to get some leverage...still, not an inch. Insert obscenities of your choice here.

I spent the better part of an hour that night cutting along the seams with my box cutting knife and prying it open with a paint scraper. When I finally got it to open again, the new paint job was ruined. It now has cut marks, scrapes and chips along the edges. It still looks better than it did before, but lets just say its a good thing that it needs repainting in the spring. Lesson learned.

A Painted Ceiling

I know I've been talking about it for ages, but I finally went and painted the kitchen ceiling. It was a lot less difficult than I thought, and I'm hoping this little project will propel me out of my mid-winter rut.


Before pictures...

Note all of the water damage, greasy residue, and my personal favorite- about 13 putty filled holes I made when I was trying to figure out how to hang our three tiered basket.
 

I tried my hardest to take it nice and slow with the painters tape. Both the ceiling and walls are textured so I wanted to make sure that they adhered properly.

I shouldn't admit this, but I didn't use a drop cloth except for directly under the paint can and tray. I removed everything from the shelf above the pans and just tried to be as careful as possible. What can I say? I like to live dangerously.  :)

I finished after a good afternoon of painting with minimal dripping and just a few corrections. Taking my time with the painters tape really payed off.

After pictures!

So much better! The pictures don't really show much difference between the white and grey, but its there when you see it in person. This is definitely my proudest achievement with painters tape. Not only did it come off cleanly without very many touch-ups, but it also pulled away from the walls in two giants strips so I didn't have to scoot my ladder all along the whole perimeter of the kitchen.

I was going to tackle the trim today too, but that didn't quite work out. Grrrr. I have words about that I'll share later on this week.

All in all I'm so happy with how this turned out. I can officially say that I am not embarrassed of my kitchen anymore. Well, besides the state of our dishwasher (but that doesn't count). Now I just have to make the rest of the house look as nice....

Painting the Kitchen

I finished painting the kitchen yesterday. My plan for the day was to clean out the refrigerator. My husband helped out by moving it away from the wall and when I saw all the dust and grime behind it I got completely sidetracked. I cleaned and painted the bit of wall behind the fridge as well as the ledges that had been blocked by our cabinet doors.

Don't judge me by the insides of my cabinets.

I went around and touched up spots from the last time I painted as well. I even brought out the chalkboard paint to finish the second door of my built-in cabinet. I'll post pictures later this week when its safe to write on.

I really scrubbed behind the refrigerator. Its a very serene feeling knowing that the backside of you fridge is spotless.

Much better. All that is left to paint is the trim and ceiling! I never got around to cleaning the inside of the fridge. No wonder I never get anything done. I get distracted way too easily. Oh, well. Next weekend.