A Splash of Color

Let me start by saying the most offensive thing about our house, to me, is all the dull paint colors and panelling.  I specifically detested the pink colors used throughout the master bedroom and bathroom by the previous owner.  I am not a pink girl.  Pink is my least favorite color and if I could abolish it I would (sorry if you love it).   

For the past two weeks, Husband and I have been slaving away at our bathroom/vanity area to rectify this situation.  There was also a good deal of handiwork that had to be done to tear out the vanity lighting and replace the mirror, etc. Husband really led the charge on painting, dry wall patching and general electrical wiring in these areas, so big thanks if he is reading this!

Just a reminder, this is what that vanity area looked like before we finished tearing it out:

And this is what it looked like after the mirror and lighting was torn out and everything was patched up.

Of course, I thought I took pictures of the master bathroom before we tore it up, but I didn't.

The vanity was made up of three 8-bulb light fixtures separately placed around a mirror screwed into the wall.  We decided to put a much bigger mirror into this space and to only keep one of the fixtures at the top.   Husband lifted the wire a considerable amount and cut a new hole for the top light in the drywall.  We also threw out the old mirror (good riddance).  We clipped off the wiring for the two side lights and dry walled over it.  This took a long time and a lot of dry wall.  The one thing we both wish we had realized before we did this was that there is no electrical socket in this room.  We made this realization at about 1 a.m. on a Saturday morning and by that time, neither of us even considered the idea of cutting back into the wall an option.

This is the vanity area midway through the project:

While Husband worked on drywall and began prepping for paint, I worked on spray painting the light fixture we were keeping.  I had never spray painted before and was a little nervous about how this would turn out.  I see people doing this kind of stuff on pinterest all the time, so I gave everything a good wash, taped up the bulb sockets and went for it.

TA DA!  I was fairly impressed with myself, not going to lie.

I also worked on painting closet shelves, drawers and wall covers to be installed.  That was exhausting work and my back may never be the same again.  Side Note:  Thanks to the TV in our studio, I did get to watch most of Beverly Hills Cop for the first time.

We had to put an old sheet up while Husband sanded, patched and drilled into the dry wall.

More proof Husband is undertaking physical labor per request.

And here are the after pictures for the Vanity area, before we loaded our closets back in:

We painted the vanity/closet area Parakeet from Sherwin Williams HGTV collection.   I love it!  I also think it compliments the blue really well in the master bedroom/bathroom.  I am seriously considering painting our den this color, so speak now or forever hold your peace if you think its too bold for a casual living area.  The only thing left to do in this room is paint the closet doors and we are doing all the doors in the house, at the end of the painting, at one time.

I wish I had before pictures, and pictures from while we were in progress of the bathroom, but the space was so small and cramped with all the equipment, that I really couldn't fit in there.  Husband pretty much lived in here for about a week. Here are pics of the completed bathroom:

Sorry for the information dump!  Now that Internet is up and working, I am going to post as frequently as I can so that I don't forget things that we did.  I feel like there was so much more to capture in the work of the past two weeks and that we should have more pictures!   

Home Ownership Week One

Sorry for the delay in posts!  We aren't getting our cable and Internet hooked up until August 15th so I am posting from work during my lunch break!

The first week of home ownership has definitely had its ups and downs.  Husband and I started our first weekend of home renovation on Friday night at where else:

The shopping trip was daunting, from start to finish.  I had no idea how many supplies we had to buy and things we had to consider in this first round of painting.  We were also fairly stressed because we were trying to get as much painting down above the old carpet that was in our house prior to the installation of new carpet on Monday (which is a whole other story). I will also say that we went to a local location of the Home Depot and were less than thrilled with the customer service provided.  I think for future excursions we will either be going to Lowes or making the trek to Madison.

Once at Home Depot, I had my first mini panic attack which was caused by this:

I had gone into this weekend thinking I knew exactly what type of paint I wanted to use and what colors, but then I realized everything looked so very different up close and personal.  Husband and I both knew we wanted to use really good paint and after a little research we both concluded that it would be best to use Sherwin Williams.  Which, as you will see, I am so glad we did!  It is definitely a little more expensive than a Glidden or a Mystique, but the result is transformative. 

We left Home Depot with plenty of paint supplies, but no paint, and headed to Sherwin Williams.  I again was faced with a wall of color and after my second mini panic attack of the night decided to take a color wheel home before actually purchasing paint.   

So we began prepping the room.  Again, I had no idea how much prep work went into painting a room and you might not either.  Because we had a fairly dusty, unclean space to start with we had to take down all of the curtains (aka collectors of dust) and begin washing walls and baseboards.  This was by far my least favorite task.

Our new drop cloths

Then after the walls were washed we had to putty the 9,000,000 holes the previous owners put in the walls and sand them.  Then, in case washing the walls and baseboards wasn't tedious enough the first time, we had to do it again before we painted to get sanding dust cleaned off.

Below is some of my handiwork:

Unintentional photo of my mother-in-law helping me wash out closets and test paint on the wall.  Thanks Ms. Katie!  We are both very lucky that both sets of parents came down Saturday to help us.  From picking up lunch to painting ceilings to delivering boxes that had been sitting in their homes for two years, it was a huge help!  Side Note:  the entry way into our vanity/closet area used to have a swinging western style door that Husband took down.  I really wish I had a good before picture because the thing was ugly

Large guest room before we started prepping:

After prepping:

Small guest room a.k.a. the staging room

Finally it came time to paint.  I pretty easily decided to paint the Master bedroom, bath and large guest room the same color, but the small guest room, vanity/closet and hallway/entryway were a different story.  My mom basically had to step in and calm me down.  I was so afraid I was going to hate everything and then we would have wasted a ton of money on my painting whims.

Below is a sample of my color schizophrenia pre-mother intervention (I'll tell you which one I picked later):

 We spent, LITERALLY, every second of this weekend at the house working from sun up until sun down trying to get as much painting done before Monday.  Husband spent hours painting trim and ceiling.  Monday dawned and the carpet guy met us at the house.  First words out of his mouth were that the trim had been painted for nothing because the shoe molding around the bottom had to come out to put the new carpet in.  I thought husband was going to be sick and I wasn't very happy either.  Oh well, you live and you learn.  We will be sanding and repainting trim this weekend.

However, it was totally worth it because we both love the new carpet!  It makes the house feel so much more modern and updated.  We are also really glad that we paid someone to install it and did not even consider trying to do it ourselves.  They had it done in a little under one day!

TA DA!!!

Added bonus, the stairs underneath the original carpet looked great and are a very pretty oak/pine combination.  So we are going to get them sanded and stained eventually (Husband and are pretty sure we would mess stain up so I think we are going to hire somebody-we may change our mind).  For now, we have had all the nails pulled out and are going to just kinda live with them.

Before:

After:

And finally, the room we made the most progress on this weekend, the Master:

Ignore the bedding-I am getting something new in October and I plan on moving this comforter into the small guest room.  We painted this room Hazel from the Urban Organic palette in the Sherwin Williams HGTV line of paints.  I love it!  The plan is to paint the master bath and large guest room this same color.  We are also going to put blinds up and eventually replace the lamps, hang curtains, etc.  I also have some prints that I found on Etsy that I am ordering.  They are a bright, sunny yellow in white frames!  

I'll put more picture of different angles of this room up once I have the room finished.

For now, I am going to be spending some time continuing to unpack:

Fighting a nest of wasps, potentially shooting some squirrels that are clawing at our siding and working on my washing machines spin cycle.  Oh, and playing with one of these shades of green this weekend in my closet/vanity room!

As husband said to me the first full night we lived in our house-we have moved into an endless to-do list!  I'll try to keep the blog updated, but it may be a little irregular until we get Internet at the house full time!  Hope you like what we have done so far!