ReNovAtionS & ReSoLutiOnS =)

For those of you who know me at all, know that I absolutely HATE carpet! I didn't used to...but...after having 2 young children and various "NO SPILL" sippy cups (which is a lie..I am just telling you right now...they spill, and I HAD the proof to show you!) my carpet looked like...well I can't even find adequate words to tell you what it looked like...so let's just call it was it was -GROSS, DISGUSTING, STAINED, HORRIFIC...and to sum it up, MY LEAST FAVORITE THING IN THE WORLD!!! Here is the proof of the nastiness...

***PLEASE NOT THE COLOR DIFFERENCE BETWEEN WHERE OUR DINING RUG WAS...SO EMBARRASSING***

For about the past year and a half my poor husband had to listen to me complain about this carpet almost daily...and if I wasn't using words to complain, he could surely tell by my deep sighs of frustration every single time I would look at it, or have to get the vacuum out.  At one point I seriously considered just ripping up all the carpet and going with the plywood underneath...i was certain this would have looked better....I mean of course there was the worry of splinters and such...but I was just about ready to take that risk...it was that bad friends...trust me!

My DREAM ( i have lots of those) was to put in all "unfinished" hardwood, sand it down, and paint it WHITE...yes white. I of course realized that this would be a daunting task...but it is what I wanted.  Well, this particular dream didn't quite come true, but I got CLOSE ENOUGH =)  My husband very lovingly explained that there was just no way we could rip out the hardwood that was already in our kitchen and foyer area...it would be too much work and most likely damage the kitchen cabinets that were overtop of the wood...SOOOO, that meant that if I wanted hardwood at all...we had to get it to match the existing wood already in our house.  Ok, so it's not my most favorite color, and I would never pick it on my own, BUT, it ISN'T carpet...so I agreed that this was our best bet!  So a few days before Christmas, we purchased 35 boxes of Bruce hardwood flooring that almost seamlessly matches up with our existing hardwood.  Here it is just waiting to be installed....

So after about 2 days of solid work and a lot of help from our wonderful friends, Randy, Derrick, and Ryan...my entire first floor (save our laundry room and Anthony and I's master bath) were ALL HARDWOOD FLOORS!!!  It is really like a dream come true for me  =)

BEFORE

AFTER

Doesn't it look a gazillion times better =)  So clean and airy and shiney new!!!  Anthony also built two small half walls to give a little bit of separation between our living and dining areas...and they turned out great as well!

I debated back and forth about putting the hardwood into our bedroom also...and am SO GLAD that i decided to do it...here is that finished product!

While all of this flooring stuff was going on...I had a project of my own that I was excited about!  I search Craigslist frequently...almost daily actually...you just never know what you might find!  I must say though, it is frustrating sometimes to see people trying to see 40 year old furniture for over $100...i mean when you can get something new for cheaper...than you don't understand how craigslist operates! Anyways, that is a whole other post I am sure.

THE HUTCH

So I have been wanting some sort of "hutch" to put into our dining room for a long time.  We have 2 large walls and never really had anything "neat" to fill that space with.  So...one day I struck "craigslist gold" when I saw a hutch being offered for $35.  I contacted the guy, and after a few days, I just sent my brother up to pick it up without ever seeing it in person...I didn't care, I wanted it, and it was a perfect price.  Here is the original picture of the hutch....

I was excited when Jarred delivered back to our house to see that it was in really good shape, it is actually basset furniture (which I think is kind of a big name brand..or used to be?)  It was clean and all the glass doors and drawers and such worked...I was thrilled and couldn't wait to start working on it!

First I had to wait until Anthony was done with the floors and took a few days off...then he sanded it all down for me, I primed it and painted it white.  Here is the bottom portion before I got the top finished...

In my mind I saw exactly what I wanted this thing to look like, and it actually turned out even better than I had hoped!  I knew I had wanted to do something fun behind the shelves up top, and something that would allow me to change the look of the cabinet, without too much effort...so I went with Fabric...and I LOVE it...see for yourself =)

 

Pretty nifty huh!

THE TABLE & ChAIRS

This was actually Anthony's idea....to refinish our dining room table...of course I am sure that he thought of it only after I repeatedly complained about how gross the top of the table was...but in any event. He took on the table project and I agreed to redo the chairs. I originally thought he got the raw end of the deal...but I was surely wrong. He did a fabulous job of completing resanding down the table (which was a solidly amish built shaker style type table) and restaining it an antique white color. You can see his wonderful work below...

**side note, the black chair was also a "redo" in which we found a few in our neighbors trash and spray painted them black...love a free (well almost) new look! **

 detailed look at the antiquing job!!

So after my husband did such a wonderful job with the table...I didn't want to mess up the chairs...here is a before picture of what the chair looks like...

I originally wanted the chairs a teal/aqua color...similar to that in our bedroom.  I found a good color, Anthony liked it too, so we bought a quart of paint and I sanded, primed, and painted 2 chairs this color. I loved the way they looked...

But didn't love them in our living/dining area because everything else is a greenish color....so I decided we needed a different color.  A green color...but what color green to pick??  I had the genius idea of trying to spray paint the chairs since the black ones were a piece of cake....well that didn't turn out at all as planned...and I ended up with this...

This picture doesn't even really fully show how hideous the chair looked...it was runny and a horrible greenish/yellowish color...and or course now I needed another color and option...and I needed to reprime all the other chairs too =(  At one point I had 4 different chairs...

So after spending 30 minutes looking at paint samples in different light in our rooms...i picked the color LIME GREEN...i knew it would be bright...but it was the closest to what I was "looking" for in the green color, so I went back to Lowes, got a quart of lime green, and started at it again.  By this point I had already painted and primed these chairs several times...and I knew they were going to each need 2 coats of green paint, plus at least one coat of polyurethane...see what I mean...I think I ended up with the raw end of the deal with dealing with the chairs!

So, I finally had them all painted and brought them upstairs, AND drum roll.....

I didn't like them either =(

Here is what they look like...

They are entirely too bright for me.... and now I am back to square one...but for now (because if i paint one more chair I will go insane) they are staying that way for a little bit.  In some lights they aren't too back...but I don't love them..sO eventually I will change them..again!

On other quick "decorating" sidenote...I also added these fun wall "stickers" to my laundry room

ReSoLuTioNs

I have never really been one to make "new years resolutions"... maybe it's because if I am being honest, I know I probably won't be able to keep them, so why set myself up for failure??  But this year there were definitely a few things that I wanted to do, or start doing, or do differently...or however you want to word it.  Now of course if you are making a resolution, you are pretty much admitting in a round about way that you were not doing something so great in the first place... or you could have at least been doing it better.  So here are a few of my "resolutions"  or, I guess I would rather call them "GOALS"... and the reasons behind them.

1.  I am going to attempt to read the entire Bible this year. My goal in doing this is for a couple of reasons. First, I have never done this before, in fact there are many books of the bible I probably haven't read so much as a verse from...and that is pretty bad for someone who has been a Christian for over 10 years. Second...I read A LOT of books in a year...I think I counted that I have read at least 35 in 2009...some of which were over 800 pages long.  So I basically have been convicted in the fact that I can read that many books, but can't bring myself to read the most important one...so I am changing that.  I will not be giving up reading other books, because I truly love to read, but I just am rearranging some priorities I guess you could say =)

2. I am going to attempt to do some sort of exercise at least 2 times a week.  I don't mean like hard core exercise, I am thinking more like subtle pilates or something. I really need to work on my posture, so I heard that kind of exercise is good for that kind of stuff! Plus my husband is like in totally great shape...and I...even though small and skinny is probably pretty unhealthy actually...so we will make this a goal.

3. I am going to attempt to teach my girls to memorize some simple bible verses.  We are starting with one a month and she how they do with that.

4. I am going to try to do a better job with budgeting my families money. I am the one who takes care of all of that money stuff...and I think for the most part I do a pretty good job...but I want to try to do better and keep track of exactly where our money is going...and I really want to try to do better about putting money into our savings...and our girls savings accounts.

So that's it, those are my resolutions/goals/ whatever you want to call them.  Feel free to ask me about them from time to time...keep me honest ya know!

Welp, this ranks as probably the longest post I have ever written...hope you enjoyed all the before and after pictures...I know I am am certainly enjoying the new look to my lovely home =)

I hope everyone has a wonderful year....and may all your resolutions, goals, dreams, and hopes come true!!!