Four Seasons Room

When we first bought our house the four seasons room was bright! The previous owners had painted the walls a very bright yellow. This is a picture from our original walk through the house.

I didn't really know how we would use the space except as a pass thru from our garage into the house. I came across some curtains for $1 each at JCPenney's and it was all the inspiration I needed.
I painted the walls the color of the tan stripe in the curtains. At the time we had two dining room sets, a black high top table and an oak standard sized table. I decided to put the high top table in this room as it was not very practical to use it on a daily basis with 2 small children. As a result, the room became a formal dining room.


As you can tell from the pictures, the table was really big for the space. It worked for a few months as we pretty much just walked past it to get into the house from the garage. We had a few parties and the extra seating was nice, but otherwise the room did not get used.
In the spring, my mom's dining room chairs finally bit the dust. The backs had been falling off of the chairs for quite some time and they were no longer repairable. Since she had gotten me the oak set we were using in our dining room, I felt that she could use it more than we could since we had 2 full sets. I tore down the oak dining table and took it to my mom's to set up.

I then moved the counter height table into the dining room. It fit in the room so much better and once we got my son a booster seat to use in his chair, it actually worked well with the kids.

I was then stuck with the dilemma of what to put in the four seasons room. We needed some extra seating when we had all of our family over and we also used the room to store our shoes, coats and bags. Taking this into consideration, I decided to put a wicker patio set into the room. We were not using the set because the previous owners had left all of their patio furniture. This arrangement left plenty of room to be able to walk thru from the garage and still have space to put a shoe organizer/bench.


I love that our sunroom has a very sophisticated look that is also very functional.

Changing things around

We had a brown leather chair and ottoman in our master bedroom for the past 7 months. The chair was great for lounging in the room, but did not get used that often.

Recently we have been looking for a place to put an office for my husband. We threw around a couple of different areas in the house where we could put a desk, but none of them were in a place where he could close a door and have peace and quiet. Finally, I asked him if we could put something in the bedroom in place of the chair and he agreed that that would be the perfect place. I started stalking craigslist and found this beautiful computer armoire that matched our bedroom set.

With the computer armoire, we no longer had room for the chair in the bedroom. I had been looking for an armchair to put in an empty spot in our living room


and the chair and ottoman were a perfect fit!

The chair (a find at a Flexsteel auction, where my mom works, was only $25) is now the favorite chair in the room!

Finished Laundry Room

About 3 months ago, we tore out the carpet in the main part of the basement laundry room/bathroom. The ugly carpet came up easily enough, it was the "padding" that was awful. This black padding was glued directly to the concrete and had to be scraped off of the floor.


Though it was a lot of preparation work, actually laying down the laminated adhesive tiles was so easy! And affordable. We spent a total of $60 for 3 boxes of the tile which covered this large room and left a few extras in case there is reason to replace one in the future.
For areas like the drain hole in the floor, I used the backing paper from a tile I had already used and traced around the drain. I then used that as a template to cut the tile that I would actually be using. For the most part though, I just used full tiles and didn't have to do much cutting. The tiles that I used had arrows on the back that showed the direction to put the tiles so that they lined up right. You just lay the tiles so that the arrows point the same direction, if you do not they will get out of line and not be exactly square.

After finishing the main part of the bathroom, I was satisfied, for awhile. This past weekend, I decided to attack the small corner that housed our laundry area. I put this off mainly because it required moving the washer and dryer, but I couldn't stand the ugly carpet any longer. I had to move one appliance at a time, tear out the carpet (cutting the carpet out in small chunks), scrap up the padding, sweep away the debris and lay down the laminate tiles. Though it took almost as much time as the rest of the room, it is nice to have all signs of the ugly carpet gone and the project crossed off of my to do list.


I am absolutely in love with my bright, clean and beautiful laundry room! (Not enough that I enjoy actually doing the laundry though!)

Reese's Big Girl Room

A few weeks ago I realized that the 3 in 1 toddler bed/changing table combo that Reese was using, was actually one of the recalled cribs. I called the store where we purchased it and found out that without our receipt (couldn't find it anywhere!)they would give us an in store credit for a certain amount. Considering that the store is over an hour away and did not have anything that we were willing to purchase there to replace her bed, we decided to throw out the metal support bars and use the bed as a queen headboard and separate dresser. We had purchased a princess comforter for the bed when we had our previous house listed for sale so that we did not have 2 cribs in the house. We decided to set the bed back up as a toddler bed in the new house, because Reese did not sleep so well in the larger queen sized bed. The first night in her new bed, Reese slept later than she had been and woke up to tell me that she loved her new bed! I still want to paint the room, but for now it is on the way to being a beautiful big girl's room!

A Birthday Wreath

I got the idea for this wreath from the girls over at "How Does She". It was super easy and only cost about $25 for all of the materials. I am so excited to hang this on the door for Reese's 3rd birthday party this weekend!

You can find the tutorial on how to make this wreath at http://www.howdoesshe.com/birthday-wreath. I put the bigger part of the ballon towards the top and bottom of the wreath and then placed one sideways in the middle which seemed to help keep all of the pins out of sight.

DIY Curtains

I have been searching for a decent priced curtain to match my daughters room and have had difficulty finding anything that darkened the room enough and was still pretty. On a recent trip through the clearance aisle at WalMart, I came upon a khaki colored curtain panel for $5. Though the panel by itself did help darken the room, it definitely was not very pretty!


I decided to add some ribbons in the colors of her room and also double the curtain up to make it even darker (we are serious about having dark rooms to nap in!) I pinned the ribbons to the front of the panel and then pinned the bottom of the curtain to the top, right sides (fronts)together. I sewed along an exisiting seam so that it would not be visible. I considered leaving the ribbons floating freely at the bottom, but even if I cut them to the same length it would not have looked finished.


So I turned the curtain inside out again, pinned the ribbons along the bottom and then pinned the front and back together to keep it from slipping while I sewed. I sewed a seam as close to the bottom to keep the length. Then I removed all the pins and turned it right side out. I think that it looks a lot more finished with the ribbons sewed to the top and bottom.


Now I have a curtain that not only looks pretty, but keeps her room nice and dark! The first night she slept until 8am and she has been getting up at 6!

3 projects out of 1 curtain panel

When I got the bedding set for our new master bedroom, I desperately wanted to buy one of the matching decorative pillows, but the things were about $20 each! Way more than I wanted to spend after having $130 stuck in the comforter, skirt and shams (I bought the set on sale at Kohls while they were running Kohl's cash special, so it was like getting it for $110). I had bought three curtain panels that matched on clearance at Target for about $20 each. We used 2 of the panels on the patio door and I had one left. I considered taking it back, but decided that I could use it above the bed, so I bought another curtain rod and hung it up. I love that it gives you something to look at.

After hanging it up, I realized that there was a lot of fabric behind the bed that you would never see, so I hacked the curtain off just below the headboard. I then framed some of the fabric and hung it up in the master bathroom to tie in the color schemes.

After that I still had fabric left, so decided to make myself a decorative pillow. I folded the fabric in half and then sewed the bottom and sides to fit a pillow off of our couch (there are 9 pillows on our couch, don't think I will miss one!) leaving the bottom open a little to stuff my pillow in. I then hand sewed the bottom shut and voila, I had 2 pieces of "art" and a decorative pillow for the cost of one matching pillow from the store!