Miss B's New Room...In Progress

Not the best pics, but all I managed to snap on the Iphone before calling it a night. I got B's dressage photos up, waiting for our goodies from the Pottery Barn Emily & Meritt collection to get in (design board here & collection here).

Recycled frames from the old house, from Michael's I believe. Picked these because they've got a slight gold hue around the edges and center. Ignore the Buccaneers football chair below, B borrowed from her brothers room, because the matching chair is still at the other house. 

And a quick peek of the living room....our furniture actually fits this house better than the last I think :) Allot of that is because we went with a brown undertone paint color in lieu of grey. Checkout our awesome rug I mentioned here from PB, loving this thing!!

Living Room Paint In Progress

We're closing in just a couple hours, yay, let the moving begin, boo!

In the meanwhile, here's a little sneak peak of the living room paint job in progress from yesterday morning, they finished up yesterday afternoon. I took these so you could see the difference in our light "Sidewalk" and the pinkish tan color they had. Also, I had been hesitant on forking out the money to paint the ceiling, but whoa! It really made it look so much cleaner, fresher and newer, money well spent!

And G's room in progress, it's Lowe's Valspar Signature in "Zannia" and yes it is VERY orange, but I'm giving up some of my control freak-ness, and let him pic his color, I think with the white trim and eventually white plantation shutters, it will look really great and cheery, if not, then we have a mac-n-cheese colored room, which,by no coincidence I think, is G's favorite food, lol.

We're moving...again!

Hey there! No I haven't disappeared, I just took a long break from blogging. As the kids get older, life just seems to get busier and busier, in a good way, but free time to blog has become non existent.

Now back to the title, we're moving, to the country! 

Silly me has a habit of getting on the MLS listings all the time, just to check out what's available, and see how home prices are going in our neighborhood. About three weeks ago I came across 4 acres about 5 minutes from our current house. I showed the hub and said looks go look at it for grins & giggles. And then our whole world flipped. We fell in love and were hooked. Fast forward to today, our current house has been on the market for 13 days, has had 11 showings, and we close on this new house tomorrow, craziness right?

That just means get ready for a whole bunch of blogging, cuz I've got a whole new house to decorate ;) Here's the pics from the MLS listing.

Home Sweet Home

Its 2300 sf, and a 3 bed/2 bath, so it's a downsize from our current 3200 sf 5 bed/3 bath, but our house previous to that one was 2100 sf, so I think we can manage ;) And down the road we plan to add on to the right side, with two larger bedrooms and a game room upstairs, baby steps though....plus we're going from .7 acres to 4.1 acres, so we have tons of room outside to entertain.

The previous owners moved out a bit ago into their new home, so I can't wait to get the hedge trimmers on all those bushes, it's got great landscaping, just needs a little grooming

The back porch....fireplace, check...Jacuzzi, check, cool fall evenings to enjoy, hurry up please! 

The adjoining property is a horse pasture ♥♥♥ and now that Baylor has started horse back riding, I only imagine our time is limited until we're building our own barn....

Walking in the front door, mantel is definitely getting a face lift in nice glossy white, I hoping that will make me like the marble surround more, we shall see. Walls are getting lightened up, I'm using Lowe's Valspar Signature in Sidewalk, and we're also going to get a fresh coat of white on the ceilings.

The whole living, dining, kitchen, breakfast nook is one open area, which I usually don't like, but it really works in this house....I'm envisioning some great parties in this space, so much room with this GIGANTIC bar top ♥ 

No words need, I ♥♥♥ this kitchen! 

(okay actually I wish the cabinets had slightly less red tone, and I'm loosing my awesome walk-in pantry and island, but I love the granite, the appliance are super nice, and the cabinets are all wood custom made, so I can deal ;) 

That front dormer is actually a window above the front door, so it lets in lots of great natural light. This little front office is super tiny, so it will be a little play area for the kiddos 

Master bedroom 

Master bath 

The shower wraps around that corner and has a rain head and about 8 jets that shoot from different sides, I was sold once I saw this and the deep tub! 

Little miss B's room, love the colors in here and the master, both from Restoration Hardware, I think we'll leave these two rooms as is 

Kids shared bath. For the record I do no like sliding glass shower doors. That being said, this one is custom cut with a little tile seat at the end of the bath, so it's super functional and nicely done, and I will learn to live with it, because it make sense in this space. 

Laundry room, I lost my pantry, but I got a deep sink, yay!! I hope to pop up this laminate in the near future and get some really cool piece of granite or quartz in here since it's such a small area I figure we can splurge :) I also want to put in a large industrial looking faucet.

What do you think? We are super excited. The painters have been working since Tuesday on the main living, kitchen, dining area. We usually paint ourselves, but because of the sheer size and the height of the ceilings, we bit the bullet and hired the pros to take care of that big space. The Hubby has the next couple of days off and it tackling G's room and the kiddos bathroom. Check back soon for our progress!

Oh, I almost forgot, the all important "man cave." This detached garage and storage room already has power to it, so we're going to add AC and  the cable company is running lines out to it Saturday and voila, the hubby can escape for his all day football binges ;) Eventually it will get a pool table, and we'll move the bar in here since there';s no room in the main house, it will be the ultimate "man's" hangout!

Kids Bathroom Re-Do: Before

I decided a couple of weeks ago that I needed to give the kids bathroom a little revamp. It's been in it's current state for two years  since we moved into the new house, and being as G will be ten this year, and is all boy, blue and pink hippos and elephants, just don't cut it when friends are over. It's difficult finding a middle ground for a brother and sister shared bathroom. The finished redo actually turned out quite nicely and should be able to stay for several years to come. But, before we can get to that...here are the before shots:  

Embroidered Towels: Pottery Barn

Shower Curtain, Vase with Flowers & Mats: Target

"B" & "G" Canvas Print: Artwork by Moi :)

Shell Soap Dish: Home Goods

Nutcracker Soap: DUH

Check back early next week for the After shots, have a lovely weekend!

Backporch Revamp

Our backyard is in the process of getting a makeover, at least the area right off of our back porch. Due to our dogs inability to walk calmly down the steps, their constant leaping from four or five steps up, has created an unfixable mud hole at the bottom of our stairs. That problem is getting fixed in about two weeks with some pavers. In preparation for that though, I wanted to get the covered patio concrete cleaned and stained/painted/sealed, as it was covered in muddy paw prints and tracks from the aforementioned mud hole :)

before
(click here to see with furniture)

BLAH, BLEH, BLUH!!  :(

After scouring over the shelves at Lowe's, I decided to use a solid textured paint in lieu of a stain, A. Because I've used the stain before and it didn't hold up well to lots of foot traffic, and B. its about a third of the cost :)

Here's the rundown of materials & tools needed:

1). Etching Powder: I could find a link for this, we had some leftover from our Garage Floor kit

2). A Bucket and stiff Bristle broom/brush

3). Paint Roller with long handle and rolls, I found the Wooster Microfiber rolls worked best

4). Floor-Tex Decorative Texture Coating, we had ours tinted to Tobacco

5). Floor-Tex Topcoat, we choose ours in the Satin finish, but they've got a high-gloss option as well

So here's the steps:

• Rinse down and clean any residue spots on your concrete
• Mix etching powder with water in bucket (one bag gets mixed with two gallons water)
• Working on an area of 10x10 at a time, use stiff bristle brush to apply etching solution

• Rinse each section as you complete, until entire area is done
• Let concrete thoroughly dry, we let our dry an entire 24 hours
• Apply Floor-Tex paint, I first used a 3 inch brush to cut in all the corners and go around all of the edges with a thick coat, before starting with the roller. I found it was easier to pour the paint directly onto the concrete and then use the roller to spread out, when I used the paint tray, it seemed like a lot of the texture was being wasted in the tray and not making it onto the floor
• Let each coat dry 4 hours as suggested, I ended up laying 3 coats, as this porch sees ALOT of foot traffic, and I want it to hold up really well
• We let the final paint coat dry 24 hours, and then came back and rolled on the sealer, using the same method as before, just pouring it directly on the floor and rolling out,don't worry, this will look cloudy, but it dries clear.
• Let dry and cure for a good day or two and then move back your furniture.

after

Me and the hub both really love how this turned out, it picks up with the tones in our brick, and really warms up the space, no more blah concrete :) We rearranged the furniture, it looked like this before, to give the kids more room to play right out of the back porch when it's rainy.

Now I just have to paint the railings, we decided to paint them black with the same paint from our front door, and I just have to hold out a bit longer for pavers down below, and we will be ready for some barbecuing!

 

Bar Art

As we are slowing sifting through the things in my Nina's condo, it has been almost an adventure looking though all the old photos and treasures we come upon when opening each new drawer and cabinet. In a dresser I found a stack of wine labels.

For those that don';t know, I'm a complete Wino, it runs in the family ;) They had a great aged look to them, and automatically my mind started whirling what I could do with them. I wanted something larger behind the bar in our man room, and these fit the bill.

PS..before we get started, I know the photos are kind of awful, once again the Nikon is dead and I have placed the charger in a handy place, I just can't seem to remember where that is...

I'd already purchased these 12x12 square frames from Michael's with 8x8 white mats included, and wasn't really happy with how they looked with family pics, I wanted something with more of an "art" look. 

I looked through all of my craft closet trying to figure out how to actually display the labels, and found in my scrap booking paper loads of the leftover 12x12 cardboard sheets they put in the packs to keep the paper from being bent, perfect!! I felt such validation from hanging on to them and now being able to use them, lol!

A paint brush and the big ole bottle of Collage Pauge in matte, and I was in business... 

I used 3m Velcro hanging strips, and just used a level for spacing, so much simpler then measuring and nails, I just don't have that kind of patience! 

Michael's had only had 8 of the same frame, they were a bronze color with a simple concave frame, but the had the same color and style, only with a convex frame, so I used this for the middle square, and put in this old sepia photo we took up in Gatlinburg with my mom and brother several years back, and it fits perfectly for behind a bar, look at little Miss B and Grier, sooo cute and too funny!!

The finished product...

What do you think, I love it. It fits the space much better, it's something that reminds me of my Nina, and it's involves wine, what not to love ;) And yes, they are a little crooked, I've got to  get those little rubber pads to put under to keep them from slipping to different sides,but at least there not scattered on the floor anymore :)