And, another peek ...

More updates from the iPhone!

I'm back into trying to make some progress with our house. Targeted in the near(ish) future: Master Bedroom, Dining Room, Back Yard. Eeeepppps.

This is not an exciting picture, but just in case you're looking: we ordered a king memory foam mattress from Costco, platform/frame included, that was shipped to our house in parts and set up in our room. It was a grand experiment that I think has turned out well.

The mattress comes all rolled up!

We are unfortunately dealing with this back yard issue, something you can't even see, before we get to the good stuff. Suggestions (and donations) welcome.

We used to join our friends for Friday night dinners pretty frequently when the weather was nice. Then, I guess life got in the way (aka Georgia). We did make it happen on a recent pretty evening.

And juuuusst before we were about to leave, Ellen rode her bike up the street, was tempted by the 6-year-old neighbor boy and his super fast riding, and she got going too fast, turned a corner and wiped out. I watched it happen, saw her face hit the pavement and cringed. Nothing I could do to stop it. She was wearing her helmet, of course, but could have really used a dental guard! Her front left tooth got quite a bruise and our good friend, a dentist, pulled a Doc Hollywood and stopped by the house between golf and dinner to take a look. Again, not much to do about it and she fortunately seems to have healed up just fine.

Georgia and Ellen both love to spend time outside and Georgia tests the boundaries in a way that I don't remember Ellen doing. This is typical: her taking a bee-line for the street and one of us grabbing her back.

And some other fun ...

One lap is not enough.

Aarrgghhh!!

Ellen likes to shower now. It requires a lot (LOTS) of coaching, but is funny as hell.

Typical bedtime.

Just your average day at the optometrist office. Thankfully, good vision. She was sorely disappointed and I really lectured her about telling the truth, afraid she would lie just to get glasses!

Springtime art fair = face painting.

We clean up pretty good. This was a friend's wedding, probably the last of our bunch!

Ice cream BEFORE dinner. As my wise friends suggested later, Opposite Day!

Summer: popsicle, PJs

Little Girl Room

Room is ready ... just missing the little girl! No rush on that, by the way.

Ellen moved into this room last summer, but it was really just her furniture. We never did anything to make it hers, knowing that she would be moving rooms and hoping that we would have another occupant for this one.

A before picture:

And, of course, lots of projects. I already had black-out roller shades in the windows (critical), but wanted a nicer looking window treatment. There are tons of tutorials on Pinterest and the like for roman shades, but they are all inside mount and I needed outside mount. With some assistance from Martha Stewart and some old instructions my mom had, I made these "easy" balloon shades. Turns out, not so easy. I fully intended to do a detailed write up on these, which I will be skipping.

Basically there was fabric purchasing, liner purchasing, ring tape purchasing, more measuring than I care to admit, mediocre sewing and then quite a bit of cursing.

 I also made the crib skirt, inspired by this one at Urban Grace Interiors. The way the crib is set up in the room, you can really only see the skirt on the front side, so I didn't want to invest the money or effort in making a full crib skirt (and heaven forbid I use the perfectly good one we had). I got a nice full size flat sheet at Tuesday Morning. It is pre-hemmed and just the right width for a ruffled panel.

I cut another rectangle from the sheet and hemmed all the edges. This top portion is the exact length of the crib / springs. Then I pinned the full width of the sheet to the skinny rectangle as evenly as possible, building in the pleats / ruffles, and sewed it all together.

The bottom of the crib skirt is the top portion of the sheet that would show if you made a bed with it. 

I embellished it with grosgrain ribbon in a coral color that I just glued on with fabric glue. In retrospect I wish I would have sewed it, but I was ALL DONE with the sewing. I also sewed some ribbon ties on the top to attach it to the crib springs.

Raise the crib springs to the highest position and just tie the panel on. Easy!

 

And then realize that when the spring is raised to the highest position that you can see through the end of the crib, necessitating another small panel. I just hemmed this one and added ties - it won't be visible for long. 

 The baby furniture only fits in this room in one way and I really needed a side table next to the rocker, but it had to be a very specific size. Ideally, it would also have some storage capability, but as I searched (and searched and searched) online, I just couldn't find anything that I thought was worth the money.

Enter ... the Mission Road Antique Mall! My mom helped me scout out this table and the floral lamp you'll see in a minute. Very affordable, maybe $100 for both. This table is nothing fine, but the perfect size and has some interesting details. It got a good coat (several, actually) of spray paint (lemongrass color by Rustoleum), then a couple of coats of polyurethane and I had a new piece of glass cut for the top at Westport Mirror and Glass.

 Ta-da!
The glider is exactly what it was in Ellen's nursery. The rug is Dash and Albert from the great August sale at Stuff in Brookside. 

 

 These little prints are cards from Rifle Paper Co. that I've had for quite awhile, just waiting for the right spot. "Custom framed" (as in, I did it myself) with little frames from Target.

 Orange basket peeking through is another strapping basket from Land of Nod, yet again corralling stuffed animals. You can't really see the crib sheet, but it's a brown diamond pattern that I got on super sale from the Dwell Studio outlet sale (follow them on Twitter!).

 And these acrylic shelves are really great for book storage, as there was no room for a bookcase in here. I got the idea from the Effortless Style Blog and I even emailed her and she said they had held up really well in her son's nursery. Very easy to install and certainly sturdy enough to hold kid books.

I'm really happy with how it came together, and really happy it's DONE. Pretty soon you'll be able to find me and Baby Sister here most hours of the day. And night. Stop by for a visit!

Big Girl Room

Ellen gets to go first, I think, because her room has taken the longest to come together (over 12 months, truly). And, if it wasn't for the pending arrival of Baby Sister, it might still not be done. 

You've seen a few peeks of her room before in my posts on Pelmet Boxes and the Custom Headboard.

Here is another "before" with evidence of the teenage boy who lived here: 

And some before pictures of Ellen's new dresser. She is just now getting to the age where many of her clothes are hung up in the closet, but it's so much easier if she can get her clothes out of her dresser and dress herself. Her old dresser is staying in the nursery, so I searched and searched for something affordable that I liked. I wanted something with some interesting details and, thank you Craigslist! My mom and I picked this up last summer (as in 2011) from a nice man in Roeland Park. It came with a matching mirror and I think was $125. It is probably from the 1950s and has been well-loved, but is all wood and sturdy. After the fact I came upon this dresser at West Elm that I think is remarkably similar!

 

The matching mirror was tall and skinny and, to avoid things being too matchy-matchy, I used this mirror instead that used to be in our Master Bedroom and was from the set of furniture my parents got when they got married. My maternal grandfather owned a furniture store - I come by this insanity naturally. 

And, the Afters!

You can't really see the detail of this art project, but I stole the idea from Pinterest (original idea from Amy Meier Design) and it is pages cut out of a Shel Silverstein book that I got at Half Price Books. The originals look great custom framed but, let's face it, HA! Not happening. So, I picked up these very inexpensive frames at Target and used leftover fabric from the pelmet box for the backing. I just trimmed the book pages with an Xacto knife and put it all together with double-sided tape. All in all, probably a $50 project or less. And, I tried to pick poems that made me think of Ellen (dancing pants, band-aid ...)

Stuffed animal tote from Land's End (of course - my favorite thing). Stuffed animals are multiplying around our house and I seriously don't think I've ever purchased one. 

Bookcase from Target that used to be in Ellen's nursery at our old house. The plastic strapping storage bins are from Land of Nod and are great for lots of uses. Santa brought them last year - thoughtful fella.The lamp that you can't see very well was a brass monstrosity I picked up at Habitat ReStore for $8. I spray painted it a watermelon pink color and got a new shade at Lowe's and trimmed it with black ribbon.

I got the rug for a great deal at Land's End - they have cute home stuff and often free shipping. The floor pillows were from Ellen's old nursery and were never used. I thought about getting her one of those overstuffed kid chairs, but decided this was about the same thing.

You can see the painted dresser and mirror here, too. I used Benjamin Moore Advance paint in a standard white. The guy at the hardware store gave me lots of tips, but there are all kinds of tutorials on Pinterest and I like Centsational Girl for that, too. In the end, I sanded and primed the mirror because it was dark wood. He assured me I didn't need to sand the dresser because it was already painted, but I really scrubbed it with TSP deglosser/degreaser and sanded the top only. My mom was a huge help. And I followed the tips from Centsational Girl to clean up the hardware with Brasso - good as new! I lined the drawers with polka-dot contact paper, which you can't see here.

The lamp is from the living room at our old house, with a new shade from Pottery Barn. The "Ellen" letters are from Land of Nod. I contemplated making them, then sent them my money instead. One of the better things in this room is the Dr. Suess print that Ellen was gifted by her Grammy and Papa Lund. I had saved it in a very special place, and was fortunately able to find that place after the move. It is a limited edition, signed lithograph (I think) of the Old Fish, New Fish scene. So special! I ordered the frame online at Emily Henderson's suggestion and it is very nice and looks custom.

Last wall! These built-ins required a good scrubbing, but are invaluable for all the "stuff" that accumulates up here. The mirrored area had glass shelves that were promptly removed and I turned it into a little dress-up closet with a tension rod. Ellen loves to admire her outfits and see if she is "stylish". I ordered the growth chart on Etsy after, again, deciding there was no time to make one myself. I wanted a place to document the growth of both girls and something that was remove-able if need be. Done.

And, to document for posterity, the bed has been made! Once ...

New house project: Bathrooms

Time for some potty talk, OK? (It's pretty popular with the 3-year-old set).

When we first toured our new house, the bathrooms and kitchen looked pretty good in comparison with everything else. The kitchen required some scrubbing (ok, LOTS of scrubbing) and new appliances and faucets, but otherwise we haven't touched it.  Which is huge. Our budget was tight and there just was no room for "kitchen". It isn't my "dream" kitchen (whose is?), but very workable and will benefit from a few minor-ish updates at some point.

I thought we could make the bathrooms work with some paint and scrubbing, but slowly as the rest of the house started to come together, the bathrooms seemed less and less workable. Or, I should say, I'm incredibly picky and couldn't imagine showering in either shower long term without some fixes. It was a good point in our life to have bathroom(s) out of commission (ie only 1 child who could take a shower instead of a bath), and it's really just time and money, right? HA.

Half-Bathroom

This was the most minor of the re-dos .... started with something not-too-offensive. Stripped wallpaper in here (use a spray bottle with white vinegar and water and soak it and scrape. Fun.), and kept pretty much everything else. The floors in here had to be replaced, so the toilet and vanity were removed and replaced with nice clean caulking. This is the only room in the house with oil rubbed bronze fixtures, which drives me crazy, but it's just my OCD.

I kept these sconces, also pretty inoffensive, and just painted them black with Rustoleum outdoor paint. They look fine for now. I also had to replace the shades (Dave Smith The Lampmaker) and the little tube things that make these looks like candles. How in the world do those get broken?

 

 The vanity is kind of an awkward proportion, and at one point I considered replacing it, but it is a narrow space and that just seemed unnecessary. Plus, we really needed some storage in here. There was water damage to the wood finish, so I sanded, primed and painted it. That took like over 6 weeks because I'm lazy. I used the same black semi-gloss paint I used in the master bath, which is a Martha Stewart color from Home Depot. Same on the mirror in here.

I got a new switch plate (installed so close to the sink that almost nothing fit - typical), and toilet paper holder and towel ring from Knobs and Pulls in Overland Park.  The umbrella picture is an image I saved years ago from some blog, with permission to use, and blown up on a Chic Canvas on sale.

I'm happy with the finished project for now. I would love to have some fun, impactful wallpaper in here at some point, but the search continues ...

Ellen's Bathroom

Again, this didn't seem terrible on first inspection. I planned to replace the light fixture, take off the shower doors, paint the walls white and paint the vanity a light blue to match the original wall tile. We lived with "vintage" tiles in our old house and I think they are really charming ... if clean and in decent condition.

But, there was really some obvious water damage around the shower, a plastic tub surround that creaked and was filthy and the tub was un-cleanable. And, I have the best cleaning lady of all times - if she can't make it clean, it can't be done. The thought of putting Ellen in this tub gave me the heebies.

 

So, it all came out around Thanksgiving last year. We got a good recommendation on a tile guy from our friendly plumber. (Our plumber is awesome and was probably #2 on our payroll last year). I just wanted something simple, inexpensive, and kind of fun but not "childish" - it needed to grow with our kids. The subway tile, black pencil trim and chair rail border are just basic Interceramic tile. The floor tiles and pinwheel accents are another brand that I can't remember - it all came from a tile warehouse in Lenexa with a discount from our tile guy. The pinwheel accents are actually from a 12x12 floor tile mosaic, but cut up to go in the shower and on the floor. The wall grout is whitish, but the floor grout is a dark gray for clean-ability.

 I ordered the light fixture from Faucets Direct, and in fact made a huge order from them before we moved it - faucets, light fixture, bathroom accessories. Great prices, free shipping and no tax, and good customer service. I wasn't happy with the toilet paper holders and towel rings - super hard to install, but otherwise everything worked great. This light fixture is almost exactly the same as the Restoration Hardware version for much less.

I really wanted to find a vintage dresser of some sort and make a vanity by dropping a sink in the top, but we were super limited on time and energy and it just didn't happen. I did want something that appeared more "furniture" like and it had to be a very specific size. This is a big bathroom, but the doorway and closet make for an awkward entrance. I lucked upon this vanity at Home Decorators online - part of the Julia line, but I don't see it anymore. It was only like $200 with a marble top, but the shipping was $225!! I waited for free shipping and it came to my door on a huge truck - best deal ever.

The tub was in a sorry state, but we used Miracle Method and it is good as new. We did this at our old house, too, and it lasted fine for 3+ years. 

 And, the finished project! I made the pelmet box like I previously showed. I also made the shower curtain from a double sheet from Garnet Hill. I wanted something fun, but not too childish, and I wanted it to be extra long, which is surprisingly hard to find for a decent price. Plus, you know I like to make things difficult. (It really wasn't too difficult - required a bit of sewing and a grommet kit).

I picked up every orange-y / coral-y paint sample at Home Depot and ended up with this color, Behr I think. I was inspired by some orange bathroom accents on Pinterest. The mirror is from Lowes and, again, had to be a very specific size to fit under the light fixture and over the faucet. It works great for short people. The faucet is Martha Stewart from Home Depot and is great, though swivels with the potential for great mess. The wall color is a custom mix of the Martha Stewart color we used in Ellen's room - had half a can left, so just added white to lighten it up.

 

And some stuff on the walls! This cute swimsuit art was free and inspired by Pinterest. I ordered the "No Whining, No Complaining ..." print from Urban Outfitters, along with the towel hooks, but it's from our local Hammerpress. 

Master Bath

This doesn't really seem so bad in pictures, but really kind of was in person. 

 

Again with the wallpaper stripping - lots of it.

Not terrible, but also not very cleanable. We didn't intend to do anything but paint, but the tile was in bad shape and it quickly evolved into a bigger project.

I had the vanity painted black to match the black counter top and make it look more intentional. For future reference - black counter top in the bathroom? Worst.Idea.Ever. I spray painted the brass drawer pulls instead of replacing them - there are too many to make it worth replacing. 

Why, yes, this is the longest vanity ever with only one sink. We had to replace the faucet, and yes, that window is weirdly placed. 

 Yep, new light fixture here, too - from Lowes and inexpensive, but can't find it online. Strangely, I purchased the light fixture in the store and brought home the box, but didn't open it for weeks. I had our handyman install it and came upstairs later to find some crappy, old brass light fixture. Someone must have purchased this light, installed it and put the old one in the box and returned it! The nerve! Thankfully I returned it with no questions asked.

 

 And then we just bit the bullet and had our tile guy re-do our shower in the same basic subway tile. We needed a new shower pan (the old one was tan - why???) and it appeared it would have to be custom ordered from Home Depot to the tune of $$$. In a last ditch effort I asked our tile guy and his uncle has a plumbing business and had the perfect size in stock for $98. Moral of the story: it pays to ask around. We got new shower doors - chrome instead of brass, frameless in the middle, and found the best price at Gaylord Glass here locally. Also, new toilets here and in Ellen's bathroom. Can't believe how much time I spent thinking about toilets - this is the Kohler Memoirs line, same as was already in the half bath. Again, I can't explain why, but it is crazy expensive to order via Home Depot online, but I inquired about it at the store and I got 2 toilets for about $500 total with free shipping to my house. SOLD.

And, finally, our little gallery wall of our favorite family photos. No one else gets to see them, but we get to see them everyday, which makes me happy. 

And, your reward for reading this far ...

As I mentioned, potty talk is really popular with Ellen these days. "Booty" this, or "tooty" that, or "Mom, we just say butt in the bathroom, right?". Well, I was cutting tomatoes the other morning for my breakfast (tomatoes on toast - MMMM), and she said ... "Do you know some people call those to-MAH-tos? Isn't that silly??". I taught her the "to-MAY-to, to-MAH-to, po-TAY-to, po-TAH-to" song and she thought it was hilarious.

Later that day we were running errands and in the back seat I hear this nice song ...
"To-MAY-to, to-MAH-to, po-TAY-to, po-TAH-to, va-GINA, va-GENA" ....

So, there you have it .... potty talk.