Operation Backyard Awesome : Private Parts

Normal people usually understand that someone's backyard is private property, for whatever reason there are a number of people in Lucan who are not normal; and don't understand this concept of private property. They apparently believe that all property belongs to them. Our backyard backs on to the back of a number of shops on main street, with apartments over them. Here's an old picture from last spring, before we took out the overgrown, useless raised garden bed pretty much smack-dab in the middle of our yard.

 It's come in pretty handy, since we basically back on to the only bar in Lucan, so it makes for a quick and easy walk home. Sometimes the neighbours cut through too, which we don't really care about. What we do care about are the crazy asses who come into our yard to steal our patio chairs after we only had them for three days. Or walk their dog around and through our yard, letting them crap wherever they want and not pick it up. Or my personal favourite (which happened the other day) biking through our yard. I was sitting in the van on the street, about to pull in the driveway when this lady on her bicycle came down it. For once, I was stunned into silence, although apparently the neighbour gave her an earful. She apparently thought there was a path there. Ok crazy, I can totally get how the vast green grass looks like a path, often people have dogs tied up to an umbrella stand, next to a garage, on a path; you're right. We're beyond frustrated with all these people. I suggested putting in landmines, but Jason says that's taking it a bit too far - really, it just comes down to we don't know where to get them. So we'll settle for a fence.
   That chain link fence on the right is the only fence we have, it's clearly open to the back, and it's open to our other neighbours as well. We get along splendidly with both sets of neighbours, so we never really cared about fencing in the yard. Until we got Kai. She wouldn't go anywhere, she's a great listener and stays when you tell her, but if she sees a squirrel she has been know to chase them...far. So last summer we started talking about fencing the yard. But then we discovered if we used the heavy, cast iron patio umbrella stand and some old random tools from the shed (like a mini pitch fork and a large spade and some railway ties) to secure it to the ground, then tie a long rope to it, it was sufficient enough to keep her in place. (Even when she's trying to kill Cujo, the neighbour dog) We almost won an award for most redneck pet corral, but the dog who lives in an old dryer won.

So now that we're actually having to be serious about putting a fence up (at least at the back) I've been searching for some nice looking options. I don't want the basic wood slat fence, if we're going to have to put one up, we might as well make it look as nice as possible. We're not sure if we're going to put a gate in or not. Here's some of my favourite "modern" fence ideas I've come across...

(1)

 (2)

(3)

 (4)

 

(5)

(6)

(7)

2, 3, and 7 are our favourites, although number 6 is pretty freakin' awesome! 2 and 7 are pretty similar, and would be the easiest to build. Regardless of what we're going to do, we're planning on doing some landscaping back there too. We've got to get a move on with this fence because we've put our awesome sectional outside, and we really don't want that stolen.

Which options do you like best? Have you ever had any issues with people coming through your backyard, or people stealing your things?

Operation Backyard Awesome : The Initial Plans

So, I mentioned that we were planning on tackling (at least part of) the back patio this year, and we're hoping to get started now that the weather's nice. We already ripped out the big bush, and cleared away a lot of other dead or dying plant life that would be in our way, so we're ready to think about the layout, and finalize a few things so we can dig the gas lines. This was my initial (super rough) idea that I came up with last year, more of a way to play with sizing. How, long and wide could we go, and all that jazz.

This idea doesn't work for a few reasons, but mainly it's just too small, and cramped. Here's a reminder of what the area looks like now. (minus Bertha the bush)

There are only four main things we're looking for with the patio:

1. No more brick. We really don't like the brick. It's got copious amounts of weeds growing in between them, they're oil stained, and have massive dips in them from where the previous owners parked their cars. We'll be keeping the brick for the driveway for now, but it is our goal to eventually get rid of it, to put in something else.
2. A dining area big enough to seat at least 8 off the back door.
3. A designated "cooking" area close to the eating area. An outdoor kitchen if you will. (Since we plan on upgrading to a bigger badder gas BBQ down the line we'd like to run the gas line for it now so we don't have to make a mess of our pretty patio later)
4. A lounge area with patio flame. We have a large outdoor sectional that will go around the patio flame making it like a conversation area.
5. Must be made of wood, and must be pretty.

Not too big of a list of must haves. The first idea kind covered some of those needs, but not all of them, and it just seemed too small. We have a large back yard, so we want to patio to look like it belongs, and not be dwarfed. Here's what we  have in mind now...

It's got a little more oomph, and seems to hold it's weight better. See what I mean by we have a big backyard haha. And the blue spruce by the house is the only tree we have in our South facing backyard, so there's not much shade goin' on back there. You can also see, that this is why we need the help of a landscaper. We have a vast open space and no idea what to do with it. We need to put a fence up at the bottom of our yard to stop the crazy people from the stores and apartments above them walking through our yard. And we want to plant a few trees (we plan on planting one for every child we have) Anywho...lets take a closer look shall we?

 

Talk about a deck! This is definitely more of a statement, and definitely more our style and taste. Since we spend as much time as possible outside this idea covers our wants and needs better. It takes care of getting rid of the brick, it has a large eating area, under a pergola to provide some shade so our pasty necks won't get burnt (who am I kidding, we'll still get burnt - true story I got one of the worst burns of my life while sitting under a tree in the shade...I'm cool like that!) The pergola is attached to concrete pillars one of which turns into a bit of a bar area beside the barbeque. It's got a built in area for the BBQ, which is our designated cooking area. This area of the patio will come directly off the house, which means it'll be just over a foot off the ground, then we'll have a step down to our lounge area. This area has our sectional and the patio flame, and makes me want to sit there and roast marshmallows haha (and I don't even like marshmallows). We pulled this area away from the house so we're not blocking the basement windows, which we'll have to egress when we get to the finishing of it. It definitely covers our last point...it's pretty and made of wood! I think this is a winning idea for us, Jason is wholeheartedly on board with it, so I look forward to getting started.

  Just for comparison sake, the first mockup I came up with was 29' x 9' (although I suggested bumping it up to 11') whereas this one is 36' x 27' considerably bigger. We're not sure how much we're going to be able to get done this year, since we still have a bunch of things inside to finish, and we're hoping to get a baby by the fall. We plan on starting with the lounge area, since we already have everything for that, so we'll run the line, and set up a temporary situation, and we'll likely stake everything out, and plan our all our materials so we can have a budget in mind. We'll set things up where they would go, to play with size and layout, and make sure it does work well, because we learned the hard way that things don't always fit as nicely in real life as they do online or on paper. The best part of having a giant backyard, is you can decide to build a 900sq.ft. patio and it doesn't cut into where your imaginary massive pool is, so we can still go pretend swimming. I look forward to hearing what the landscaping company I talked to has to say about what kind of plants and trees to plant and where.

Inspired By: Nursery Spaces

I've been having so much fun taking in all the different fabulous nurseries there are out there, in preparation of what we will do in our own house. I've put together a bunch of moodboards of different looks that I think are fun, but it's just not quite as fun as seeing a completed space. I've had these nurseries pinned for quite some time, they're all so fantastic. Even Jason thought a few of them were pretty cool, and that's saying something.

This fabulous small space nursery featured on apartment therapy shows off how to get the most out of a small footprint. I've seen that giant pelican poster used in a bunch of different rooms, but I like it the best in this nursery. Jason liked it too, it reminded us both of our honeymoon to Peru, where we had a run in with a few pelicans.

I love the that this is a giraffe themed nursery, but is so subtle, you'd hardly tell, it's so light and airy feeling. Not at all a cliche space. It also features a great chalkboard wall area (we're thinking of incorporating a chalk wall or area in ours), and an awesome newspaper elephant mount.

I love the pallet focal wall in this room. I know it's super trendy right now, and while I would love to put a wall like this in, Jason wouldn't be on board. I like to think I was ahead of the whole pallet trend, when I used them in wedding decor and some apartment decor. The giant D above the bed is also pretty great, I'm not sure how it's made, but you could totally DIY with a piece of plywood and a bunch of paint chip samples.

I love the chevron focal wall, here it looks like they used some sort of wall paper, or panel to achieve the look, but it wouldn't be at all hard to accomplish with some tape and paint. We are also thinking of including some sort of geometric focal wall. Yet another room that features Sharon Montrose prints, it's funny that after I came across her work, I realized that a large number of my inspiration pictures also include them.

 A different view of another beautiful, calm nursery. I like the art and the mirror above the dresser change table. We're planning on using a dresser as a change table (with a bit of a twist), I think it's a great use of space, if you need a dresser in the room, why not make it do double duty? A dresser's also much easier to grown along with the child than a change table.

 

Look. At. That. Ceiling. It's fabulous isn't it? I love the juxtaposition of the black wall, and white; it's like night and day. Did I mention how great that ceiling is? It's fantastic! I've been tossing around the idea of doing a fun ceiling for quite some time, spurred on of course, but this picture.

I can't wait to get on with the nursery in our house, and bring an adorable little bambino to live in it. There's so much to do before then though, I wish finishing a room was as simple as looking at a picture you like, and POOF, there it is! We should have the gross blue floor ripped out this week though, and then we'll be putting in the nice new hardwood next week. Woot to the woot!

Inspired By...Black

Too much black is bad right? No one likes black, it's cold, and dark, and goth, and shouldn't even have that prominent a role in your closet, let alone your home right? Why haters gonna hate on black so much? Embrace it, black isn't so bad. Here's some inspiration that just goes to show that black (or a really dark colour) can still be warm and inviting and doesn't scream devil worship.

Like this open, airy and inviting laundry room. Hello gorgeous shelves and counter - not really sure why you'd need a tv in your laundry room though.

This living room shows does a different spin on the classic black and white look.

 

 OK, so technically this house isn't black, just a dark grey, but I seriously want to go inside and check it out. It's also an inspiration for a possible colour choice for our house when we paint it. Pulls us toward the dark side.

Julia and Chris show that black in a living room can be warm and cozy and not scary (even with a skull chillin' out on the credenza)

Aside from the anxiety inducing neon pink table, I'd love to pull a book off that wall and curl up in this dark room.

Maybe you don't want to paint a whole room, or even a whole wall with a bold, dark colour, but that's no reason you can't throw in some fun black accessories, like this origami pillow. It'd look great in just about any room.

I love this black and white bathroom, because it's still really dark, and also because we're planning on doing dark walls in our bathroom when we redo it this year. 

Yum! The dark painted brick is the perfect back drop for adding in these bright splashes of colour. Plus, those chairs kind of remind me of the kitchen chairs I grew up with, and tulips are my fav!

Black, it's not for everyone, but it certainly can add a significant amount of drama to any space, and is a great neutral for throwing in greats pops of colour. Black has definitely been inspiring me lately.

Pinterest Challenge Time

It's that time of year again. The Pinterest Challenge that Katie and Sherri put on, and I always say I'll partake in, then totally drop the ball and feel all guilty. Well not this time! I do proclaim that I will finish at least one thing that I've pinned that I've been meaning to do for ever.

I've been on Pinterest almost since it's inception so I've amassed quite a significant amount of ideas, and projects I want to accomplish. Here's some things I want to get done for this challenge.

Some fun, bright, string art for the art area above the new dresser that's going in our bedroom as soon as I finish refinishing it.

A fun geometric pendant also for the bedroom, to replace the standard ugly one in there.

There's also a bunch of different art that needs to be hung in various places, it's just a matter of deciding how we'd want to do it...

 

 (source)

 

 (source)

 (source)

There's a bunch of other things that I'd love to try and get done for this challenge, but that's been my problem in the past. I start too many projects, then never get any done, and end up with a ton of barely started, or half finished projects lying around forever. So my goal is that by narrowing it down to only a few things (none of which I should have to go buy anything for) I should be able to get at least one thing done haha.
And if by some grace of God I manage to get everything done I'll be that much closer to a completed bedroom, which makes me happy!

   So, hopefully next Tuesday I'll have some more fun, completed projects to show off.

Sinking

I had a dream last night I was sinking, in a giant puddle of hot caramel sauce, and instead of trying to save me, Jason kept dipping his giant pretzel stick in the sauce and laughing at me. (eat your heart out with that one Freud)  What I think it means, is that I've had to suffer far too long without a kitchen sink, while my plumber husband does nothing about it. We have had the most gorgeous farm house sink, just sitting around taking up space, waiting for its moment to shine since February! Now that we have that row of cabinets in, there's no excuse for it to not be there. We didn't buy a cabinet for the sink from Ikea for a few reasons. The sink we have is much heavier than any of the styles Ikea sells, and doesn't have any addition "lip" support like the Ikea ones do - we have a true farmhouse style sink. Also, and probably the biggest reason, they didn't have the right size, since they were mostly made for their sinks. So, good thing for us, Jason knows and works with a cabinet maker who could hook us up with a custom, super sturdy cabinet for my beautiful baby. So, I had been harassing Jason for what seemed like eternity (to both of us) to contact this guy, and get it done. So finally he did, and that's another part of the reason we finally got around to doing the rest of the base cabinets, because he wanted/needed to take a look at everything all set up so he knew what he was working with, and what he needed to match. 
   So now the great debate comes in, since we're having a cabinet custom made, what kind of style do we want. 

(via)

 Something like this, which has the cabinet kind of hugging the sink, and two cabinet doors...

(via)

Where the sink looks like it's just resting on the cabinet, and is snug up to the cabinets flanking it. (which I like better than the first, and would go better with the style of cabinets we have.)

Or...

(via)

The drawer style. This is my favourite, and although this sink isn't an apron front sink, we could still get a drawer with ours, it'd just be one large drawer. I like this idea the best, because a lot of the time drawers are just more functional, especially under the sink - you don't have to go rootin' around on your knees smashing your face to get whatever's at the very back. And this way, we could just make a faux drawer with the support piece. So we'll have to talk it over with Mr. Cabinet whenever he gets here to take a look at what needs to be done. Hopefully, it'll be sooner rather than later so I can actually wash dishes in a kitchen sink, as opposed to lugging them all downstairs to wash them in the crappy sink that smells like poop.

Thoughts on the Water Closet

Here's our upstairs "master bath" when we moved in...

Not too bad in the grand scheme of terrible bathrooms. A creamy coloured square tile, and a basket weave pattern wallpaper that was pretty much the same fleshy colour as the bedroom. Since we're planning a huge overhaul for the bathroom and bedroom, to make a better master "suite", I wanted to do simple updates to tide us over for a couple years until we're ready to do the big stuff. I ripped off the wallpaper pretty the same time I took off the stuff in the kitchen - this stuff came off WAY easier. I was just going to paint the part where the wallpaper was, (and maybe probably the tiles), and we were going to replace the sink and faucet, because Jase would be able to get them for practically free (if not free). 
 Then (back at the beginning of the year) Jason says, "it's not that hard to take these tiles off, watch, they probably just like, fall off". Umm, yeah, that wasn't the case. He broke about three tiles, and the wall behind look terrible haha. We weren't able to chip out the rest of the tiles, they all seemed to cascade out in groups haha. So, down the tiles came - all thanks to my awesome little sister Mer! 
   And so we've been living with this God-aweful looking room for a while now...

 I know eh, looking at these pictures kind of makes me wonder what we were thinking by taking down the tile - then I remember I didn't want to take it down to begin with and I feel slightly better. Since the wall behind the tile is covered with glue, and is peeling, we're clearly not going to be able to paint, so we're just going to stick up some bead board to cover up that orange nasty, (that Mer says reminds her of a jungle? we tend not to question her anymore). I'm going to paint the top part of the walls, most likely this colour...

Which is Sherwin Williams "Moody Blue". I'll just paint the vanity black, with the sample tins I got for the bedroom, and we'll replace the sink and faucet with something that hopefully looks something like these...

We want a "vessel" type sink, the top one would be good, because it would fill the large hole that removing the old sink would fill and still sit flush with the counter. Where as if we went with something similar to the second picture it'd have to have quite a large base to fit over the whole, or it would have to be partly recessed, so all depends on what Jason can snag us, what kind of sink we'll be putting in.
   As for the faucets, we want something a lot sleeker than the clunker we have now.

Something like these would hit the spot quite nicely. Something tall and elegant, you know, like we both are hehe. 
   The kitchen is still our top priority, and since I'm back to work full time now, we'll have less time to do random side projects like the bathroom, but we'll slowly keep chipping away at it, so that by the time we FINALLY get around to having our open house/house warming (which we're planning now for December as like a one year anniversary to us moving in hehe :S) the master suite, along with the kitchen will be finite! 

In things are pretty much finished news, here's the upstairs hall in all it's newly painted glory.

I still have to cut in, and try and figure out how to cut in over the stairs (if anyone has any pointers, they'd be appreciated) All we have left to do here is get rid of that ugly blue brain globe light thing (that hangs about three centimetres away from the fan) and install the fire alarm that for reasons unbeknownst to us, has a holder, but has been MIA since we moved in. The gross carpet is exceptionally gross in the hallway (especially since I seemed to have spilled many drops of the dark gray paint on it haha) and I can't wait to get rid of it! But since grody-no-one-sees-but-us-carpet isn't that high on the priority list it'll stay like that for the next while.

A Visit to The North Pole

I am SO VERY HAPPY to report that the kitchen is DONE!

HA, had you goin' there for a minute didn't I? What I mean by done, is all the crappy, messy parts - the mudding and sanding (and even the priming). Which means, paint will be going on the wall this week! We picked up our paint Saturday morning! So, there's no turning back now! No second guessing the colours I chose, it's time to get slap happy, and toss it on the walls. Can't wait to get that done...but I'm here to talk a bit more about the dining room. Another thing we did Saturday morning was go to the North Pole (trim & supplies building that is) hehe. We had to scout out (and price out) our baseboard and the moulding for the dining room (and kitchen). It was a good thing we did, because they had WAY more selection than the Home Depot, and their prices were much more agreeable. We found some great, thick baseboard for the dining room (and some equally great, but less thick for the kitchen), and we figured out what decorative moulds we like the best. The best part was, we got to take home free samples, woot! So I can actually compare and remember what they look like once we're out of the store. 
  The final thing I did (house related) this weekend, was pick up some supplies for the dining room table & chairs. See if you can notice the common theme between the next few pictures...

(from here)

(from here)

(from here)

Did you notice what they all have in common? They all have a dark table, with white chairs. I love the look, and didn't even notice that the most of my pics from the post about the moulding also have the same look goin' on. Clearly my subconscious was trying to tell me something. It took a while for me to build up the guts to decide to do this. I was worried about what my Nana would say, when she finds out I painted her old chairs white. Something had to be done though. The chairs are a light, blonde-ish wood, and the table is a few different shades of dark, so we had to bring them all together somehow. I showed Jason some of my inspiration pictures, and he liked the look too, so I decided to take the plunge!

  

For the table, we decided to go with Minwax's Ebony stain.

It's a lovely rich dark brown (as close to black as we could get, still being able to see the wood grain), the test piece looks great! So we picked up a bunch of stain, and some new pads for the sander and will be getting down to business on the table shortly. We'll also be staining the buffet (I got from Nana as well) the same colour, to unify everything. 

  As for the chairs, they'll just be getting a few coats of high gloss white, before I reupholster them with that Ikea cushion cover. Since I'm off this week, I plan to get as much done as possible. Monday I'll order all the trim & moulding, I can start painting the kitchen Tuesday, and in between coats, head outside and do some chairs. Hopefully Wednesday I can at least get the priming in the dining room done (Jase still has to sand in there). Then Thursday, Friday can be for hanging the decorative mould & painting in the dining room, and possibly staining the table. It'll be a busy week, but I'm happy it'll be bringing us a few steps closer to completed eating spaces.

Big Backyard Dreams

Since the weather has been nicer and we’ve been spending more and more time outside, BBQing and puttering, and what not, we’ve been thinking more and more about what we’d like to do with the back yard. Remember back from this post, where I showed a bunch of eye candy, and some rough ideas of what we wanted...well now that it’s hotter, the weeds are attacking us with a vengeance, my love for all things backyard pretty has been renewed. Our driveway (which turns into our “patio”) is bricked; now, not only are the bricks ugly, but they’re being overrun with weeds, and we just can’t keep up with them. I have a few plans kickin’ around inside my head that I wish we could do out back, but we both decided that we’d wait until our second spring/summer here before we do anything too major. That way we have time to figure out exactly everything we want and need, and what a good size will be.

   Then something happened that sort of jump started our plans. We won this!

After winning this bad boy from Mike & Steph's stag & doe (donated by Patio Palace) we legitimately had to start thinking about the back patio. We won a natural gas "Patio Flame" which is basically a fire pit that no one can yell at us for having because it's a controlled flame. Since it's natural gas, we have to run a dedicated line for it, so we need to know exactly where we want it so we can have the line run. Here's what the yard looks like now...

A back yard shot from the side of the house 

Again from the side of the house, this is about where the patio would span.

Overgrown myrtle and clematis...you can almost see a basement window trying to peek out in the middle of the jungle.

From the other side of the house. You may notice the pile of bricks leaning up against the garage that we still need to stack back out along the front garden boarder...someday.

We need to remove that giant bush...which is pretty much where the fire pit will go. It's a monster, it probably has an almost 5ft diameter. So we're going to have to do some digging, and some pulling with the truck to get it out. Our lawn is already filled with holes, so what's one more gigantic one eh?

 

I know you're all jealous of our amazing "patio eating" set up, it's pretty pimpin' I'm not gonna lie! You may also be jealous of all the weeds, and this picture doesn't even show how many there really are. 
   So now we've got our thinking caps on, for all the amazing things we could/can do with the back patio. There are a few things that are must have's for us, and the rest is just fun "make it look pretty" 
The things we have to have are pretty simple:
   1. No more brick - we'll keep the bricks on the driveway portion for now, until we figure out what we want to do to the drive.  
   2. An eating area (enough to sit at least 8) - which will probably go roughly where our pathetic one is now
   3. A "conversation" area, or just more of a loungy area - that's where we'll be putting the patio flame
   4. A designated "cooking" area, most likely close to the eating area - because in the future we plan to upgrade to a natural gas BBQ, and it's                   just easier to plan for it now, than try to figure out where to put it in the future.


Those are pretty much our only stipulations at this point, I'm sure as we get the ball rollin' there will be more that crop up. But for now, our goal to spruce things up is to rip out that bohemouth bush & put the patio flame in, and power wash the bricks to clean them up (which will hopefully also help get rid of the weeds). I heard that baking soda is supposed to work well for killing weeds because of it's pH level...so we'll have to give that a try, see how it pans out. 
  Here's my "had-way-too-much-fun-screwing-around" computer rendition of what it'll look like when all is planned, said and done.

Isn't it just so pretty! Hooray, I know it's going to be a while before it actually looks like this, but it's exciting to just look at this, plus it helps me get a good idea of what a good size is. (this is 9ft by 29ft) It looks like maybe 11ft would be a bit better, no?