Before & After

I've been trying to come out of hibernation. Its been difficult when the weather goes from the 70s right back to the 30s in a matter of days.  I'm so ready for Spring, how about you?

We have been remodeling our house off & on for the past 3 years. When I say "we," I really mean my dad. He installed hard wood floors. 4 windows & wainscoting, replaced trim in our entire house,  painted almost every single room, redid a bathroom, & in the near future, will be building us a sun room, like he did for my parent's house (ha, ha, just kidding dad).  He's been absolutely incredible - thanks so much Dad!

We also hired some contractors to do major renovations, like dry-wall & a complete overhaul of our fireplace. I wanted to share the fireplace redo in our family room with you because I think its amazing.

This is the before. Dark wood, dirty soot stained bricks.

 AND....drum roll please....



This is the after - white clean shelves, marble, a mantel...

Now that the majority of the renovations are wrapping up, we've been spending our weekends furniture shopping. I thought it would be more fun than it is, but I've been feeling overwhelmed by all the options & a little frustrated that some things jump out at me & some things don't. I think part of the problem is that I'm in a rush too. I'm ready to be done with all of this & to be able to just enjoy the fruits of other's labor. I'm really excited though that our house is actually becoming a home & a reflection of us.

Hope you're having a lovely Sunday & thanks for stopping by.

Life Interrupted

This week we're having our family room dry-walled. The previous owners decorated, in what I can only describe as an Americana-Patriotic style. The room was covered in wall paper with the coordinating border containing hearts written with God Bless America and lyrics from the Star Spangled Banner. Upon moving in, we quickly removed all of the wall paper in that room (and all throughout the house) and repainted.

The problem with the family room walls was that there was paneling underneath the paper and it wasn't suitable for repainting. So our two options were to re-paper (not our style) or have drywall installed.

Thankfully, my parents only live 10 minutes away and we were able to load up the dogs (the cats had free reign of the basement) and relocate for the past 2 days. Since I'm a creature of habit/routine, this was a minor inconvenience. And it still is, as we have 3 more days of people coming for little bits of time to tape, apply mud, sand and texturize.  I won't bore you with the little ways that having the family room blocked off has interrupted our manner of doing things. Especially because they are trivial and you would probably roll your eyes.  A little shake-up to the norm is always good, right?

Next up: custom-made shelves delivered and installed this Friday, hopefully.  And following soon, the installation of a mantel and complete makeover of a fireplace that is currently brick.