I am sure you all are sick of me going on and on about how excited I am to have a dining room, but I couldn't resist throwing in one more inspiration board about this room.
What would the world of design do without Pinterest? This handy tool has helped me narrow down the look I am going for: neutral with a hint of blue, French-inspired, with a gigantic crystal chandelier and rustic accents. Here are my favorite inspiring dining rooms. I hope one day our's looks as good as any of these. :)
We *finally* found bar stools last night that will work in the condo. In this hunt, we were up against some specific obstacles.
The greatest part is that they were the below the budget at $60 for the set. Score. Not a perfect match to the chairs we have, but close enough!
I painted the above chairs in the Mellow Spring (shown below) and plan on painting the stools to match. We went with this color because it matches the existing couch perfectly and helped to make the space more cohesive. Now it is on to the fun part of accenting with more color! Here are my favorites from Valspar.
Brian and I picked up these fun accessories from HomeGoods to help tie everything in. We are so close!
As a method of helping Brian and I stay on track, I am going to start posting monthly goals for us. We find ourselves traveling almost every weekend to either the Myrtle House or Sea Spray Condo recently, so having a place to post our goals will help keep us organized and accountable. :)
TASKS/BUDGET
Luckily (I guess), manual labor is free when you do it yourself, so this month shouldn't be too expensive. The paneling is almost (finally) gone - poor Brian worked so hard on this the past weekend. His grandfather did a fan-freaking-tastic job putting this stuff up; we have had some trouble getting it down! See the pile of not even half of what we took down below. That is going to be fun trying to get to the dump!
We are getting so close to having the Sea Spray Condo living/kitchen done, and I can't wait to show the final before/after. :)
Happy April, friends!
I really disliked our 1950s flat-panel kitchen cabinets when we bought the Brooklyn House. A lot. For one, the two sets of cabinets didn't match (the sink base cabinet was newer and had a completely different door/drawer style), and they were the flattest, most boring cabinets in the history of kitchen cabinets. Okay, I am being a bit dramatic, but they had to go.
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I think a lot of people would have ripped them out. To each their own, but I wanted to save them. The cabinets are well-made, solid wood, and fit the layout well. Plus, we needed a budget friendly cabinet update as new cabinets were not an option. So they stay and get a DIY cabinet makeover instead. The great thing about the cabinets being flat is that it makes adding trim a lot easier.
We purchased 2" x .25" trim from HomeDepot for the doors. (In store, it is located in the decorative trim aisle.) On the drawers, we used a 1.5" trim to accommodate the satin nickel cup pulls. Make sure to measure the needed length of trim at least twice before purchasing. I think we made about three trips to the store. :)
Brian cut the trim to size at a 45 degree angle. In retrospect, we should have just cut a straight line. That is how most Shaker cabinets seem to look, and it is a lot easier to measure that way. Oh well, learned for next time. To attach, we used small finishing nails like these. At first we tried glue, but it was messy and we didn't have enough clamps to make this an efficient way to attach the trims. The nails seemed to be adequate. When we removed the existing hardware, it left these ugly holes, so we filled those with wood filler. We also filled the corner seams for a more polished look. Brian likes buying wood filler in a tub instead of a tube because he says it is easier to use.
We did the same treatment on all of the drawers. Same process here, except we didn't fill the old hardware holes since we were putting in the same size drawer pulls. Allow all of the wood filler to dry for at least 24 hours, and then come back and sand it smooth. I would recommend using a little palm sander on the trim. If you have to sand hardware holes inside the trim, you may need to sand it by hand.
One thing we did not do (but should have) is caulk the gap between the original drawer front and new trim. Duh. Make sure the caulk you use is paintable caulk. Some of the bathroom caulks can't be painted over and your cabinets will look messy. I would also recommend caulking any little nail holes so that they don't show through when paint is applied.
After drying for a day or two, we moved on to paint! To be honest, this was more time-consuming than putting on the trim. We used the oil based paint that the cabinets were already painted in, but we had to do two thick coats on all of the new trim to get the old and new wood to match. If my cabinets had not been painted yet and I was working with unfinished wood, I would use an adhesive primer (we love this one) and then a semi or high gloss enamel paint.
I think this easy DIY trim makes a world of difference! So much cheaper than replacing all of those cabinets. Also, a little hardware goes a long way. I splurged a little on these pretty glass knobs, and polished nickel pulls (discontinued, similar here) but I have no regrets. Here is the before and after side by side.
And here is the kitchen all done when we moved out. :)
**UPDATE 8/12/2016 - Curious to see how these have held up? Check out this new blog post after nearly five years of use! Thank you for all of your comments and questions on this post. I am so happy this had been helpful!**
I am so glad you found this little blog of mine. Before you go, I thought you may also like to check out some other popular posts:
I don't know when or why talking about money became so taboo. To me, it is a very important topic in today's society that I think should be talked about often, especially with young adults (but that is a whole other blog post). One thing I was always curious about is how people afford and pay for restoring an old home. You have to purchase the home first, which is usually a hefty expense, and then you have to consider the costs to fix the place up (materials, labor, fees, etc.). I think one of the worst things that can happen is for people to buy a fixer-upper, and then underestimate the cost of restoring it. So today, I would like to share a bit of budget background for the Myrtle House.
It is important to note that we were fortunate enough to inherit the house from Brian's family. The only expense with the actual house is paying yearly property taxes. To be honest, if we had had to purchase a house, it probably would have been out of reach for us right now. I have broken down each task and *estimated* based on web research/forums. I then set up a rough timeline for when these items should be complete. I have Phase I and Phase II broken out - the first phase needs to be complete in order for move in.
I came up with this knowing that WE will be doing almost all of the labor. Please do not use this as a guide for your project as areas and houses vary so much. Our house is relatively small and we are trying to re-use most of the existing items in the house. It helps to get a local contractor to give you an estimate.
As you can see, we are already behind! I have a feeling I am going to look back on this original draft and laugh at myself when we end up spending $1000x more than this.
No, we do not have 50 grand laying around for a rainy day. Brian and I were very opposed to taking out any kind of loan for this project (our goal is to be debt free in the next two years) so we have made some sacrifices in order to save up. I am so lucky to have gracious parents who allow us to live with them during this renovation. We rarely eat out, are not planning any lavish vacations, and also run a side business to supplement our day jobs income.
So there we have a little bit of the money side of this reno. Is this something that interests any of you? I actually love talking about money (and how to save it), so I would be happy to continue posts like this. :)
I used to hate fake flowers. To me, they looked cheap and tacky. If I was going to have anything resembling flowers in my house, they were going to be real ones. Then I grew up, got a job, and realized that having fresh flowers ALL of the time is pretty freaking expensive. And sometimes, you just want a little resemblance of nature in your house without breaking the piggy bank. One way to do this without going the fake route is to have a cutting garden in your yard. Camellias, hydrangeas, roses, peonies, and gardenias are great options. But, if you lack a green thumb or green space, here is a quick and easy arrangement that will only set you back four bucks.
I feel a little silly even writing a "tutorial" on this, so I will keep it brief. I hit up the Dollar Tree for three fake stems (two were the same flower), and then a simple, round glass vase. I cut them down so that the stems were only about an inch taller than the vase. This will make sure the arrangement looks to be nice and full.
That is it! I like these types of faux flowers near a sink, on a nightstand, or mantle. Just a place where you need a little sum'in-sum'in.