Light me Up

Now that the nursery isn't looking like this any more...

(I apparently sneezed while taking this picture? And it's the only before)

It's time to update that old square cover. In all honesty, that came down when I was painting, and I have no idea where it went, so we currently rocked the exposed bulbs for a while in there. (as well as most other places) Beautiful, I know, hence why we needed to update. I found a light I really liked, for a good price, except it was a table lamp...

It's by Allen & Roth, form Lowes, and at $74 it's within budget. It's not too difficult to hard-wire a lamp as an overhead fixture, so I figured we could do it. I made Jason come to the store to look at it, and he said he liked it, and agreed that it would be no big deal to throw it up on the ceiling. I saw somewhere a little while ago a similar fixture that the person had painted blue, which got my wheels spinning. To paint it, or leave it ORB. I was originally leaning more towards paint it, but once we got it in there, I really like the look of the oil rubbed bronze. It matches the new door handle and hinges, as well as the vent covers, and it also ties in to the dark patches in the floor. So I believe she'll be staying ORB.

It was super easy to do. All I had to do was take it apart - take the weighted base off, and the longer extension rod, and screw the shorted rod into the cover plate. Then we had to buy some bigger bolts and washers so the rod would be a bit more secure, and one of those chandelier, long screw thingies...

They're super cheap, but essential. This little baby is what is taking all the weight of the light, taking the pressure off the wiring. I don't have any pictures of the process, because Jason got a little chop happy when he was cutting the excess cord, and barely left enough room to wire it in, so it took four sets of hands haha. It's so nice to have a nice looking fixture up in at least one of the rooms hehe.

Tada! And look at that...a bonus sneak peek at the ceiling fun! I love it, and Jason really likes it too...and as an added bonus he keeps telling people I made it hehe.

Listy McGhee

Since our last assessment got pushed back yet again (this time it wasn't our fault) we have more time to get rooms actually finished. (Well at least get finishes done, even if the rooms won't be completely done.) So I did what comes naturally for a crazy person, and wrote out about 6 different lists of what we have to do before that time. So here's the list of what we're hoping going to get done by July 21.

 BLUE ROOM

o   Clean out

o   Rip up carpet

o   Remove wallpaper

o   Paint

o   Install floor

o   Cut out bigger closet

o   Make closet doors

o   Get dresser for change table

o   Upholster chair

DINING ROOM

o   3^rd coat of paint

o   get picture ledge up and painted

o   picture moulds

o   base/window and door casing

o   pick up buffet

o   get electrical sorted out

o   Install Octa

o   Finish hutch project

KITCHEN

o   Case and base

o   Make sure all outlets and switches are in working order

o   Mud holes

o   Touch up paint

o   Bottle storage shelf

o   Coffee/tea shelf

o   Open shelving by stove

o   Finish toe kick

o   Counters on peninsula cabinets

BEIGE ROOM/LAUNDRY

o   Tidy

o   Remove  electrical wires

o   Cut out “step”

o   Organize closet

  (how is it I still have no pictures of our living room?!)

LIVING ROOM

o   Get rid of shower

o   Take out built-in

o   Move TV

o   Get rid of couches

o   Bring brown couch over

o   Put switches at doors

o   Organize

o   Pick up chest for shoe storage

UPSTAIRS

o   Finish painting hall

o   Base in bath

o   Shelf in bath

o   Curtains (dye & install)

o   Paint closet

o   Install closet organizer

o   Put up canvas in bathroom

o   Art in hallway

Some Small Improvements

There have been a few small things taking place here lately, small, but very exciting things! Each big stage we hit in the kitchen is exciting. I remember when the fridge got moved in there, and the stove hooked up, it was like Christmas morning so I promptly cooked a most delicious roast beef. Then came the the instal of the cabinets, and sink, and I was actually able to do dishes, so I celebrated by doing the worlds largest stock pile of dirty dishes. And we were relatively good about keeping up to date with our dishes. The thing that I wanted most of all in there for a while were lights! We had one floor lamp in there that we'd switch between two different outlets depending if we were cooking or washing dishes. I was more than ready for lights, even if it was just the one over the sink. Thankfully I got more than that. (Sorry for the crappy pictures, I still have to use my phone, and it's really hard to get pictures of pot lights haha)

 Hello gorgeous illumination, where have you been all my life. We've had overhead lighting in here for a couple weeks now, and I still get all giddy and smile bigger than is necessary every time I flick them on. You can actually cook at night now, without getting the lamp cord caught in the oven door. Success! As if getting lights up in here wasn't enough excitement for me to handle Jason came home with this bad boy the other day.

 It's my favourite kind of dishwasher...FREE! That's right, that gorgeous beaut that matches the rest of our appliances was free! Jason switched it out at this guys house who got a new one, because this one didn't match the new fridge and stove he got. Jason called me to see if I wanted a free stainless dishwasher, I thought about it for a microsecond, then questioned why he even bothered to ask because what kind of person says no to a free dishwasher. I was thinking we'd take it as a temporary thing until we could get one that would fit better with our appliances. I didn't realize it was only a year old, and was super nice looking at fits in perfectly with his other appliance friends. We've already put two loads through, and he works like a charm. We feel like we're real grown ups now that we have a dishwasher haha.

Moving over a room, to the ever forgotten dining room, We've primed and painted (the top part), and the floor has been scraped clean of all the drywall mud slops and nails and other crud that was there, and it's ready for floor!

The floor is an engineered hardwood from Armstrong that we got from an auction before we even closed on the house, they've got a great reclaimed wood look to them. We're super glad we took every piece out of every box, because there was a ton of variation to them. There was a warmer more reddy/orange tone, and a lighter, blonder tone, then there were darker pieces to each tone. We sorted them into three piles, and decided to use the warmer toned ones in the nursery

It's even pretty in this poorly lit, night time phone picture. It should be going down Wednesday, then hopefully Thursday/Friday - or part of the weekend, will be devoted to putting down the kitchen floor so we can get this final home assessment done. I'm really looking forward to having the floor down in there so we can actually walk in that room without getting drywall dust all over our feet and traipsing it around the house. Just have to get my but in gear to do a few of the projects I've got for in there.

Spring has Sprung & Minor Tweaks

Before monsoon season hit, we were able to get a few things done outside in preparation for the patio, and it was pretty evident that spring had sprung. There were adorable little shoots popping up all over the place, and while I am by no means a gardener, I certainly can get excited about little signs of life growing from the gross, dead looking earth. A number of the bulbs and plants we planted last year in the front garden were coming up.

Aww, look at that cute little sedum guy. Still have to trim the dead stuff...have to wait for it to stop raining for more than five minutes though, which clearly doesn't look like it's going to happen.

 No clue what these little sprouts are...how I labeled things was stick a fork in the ground and trust that my elephant memory would do the rest. Alas, I can't even remember anything we planted in the fall (other than tulips haha)

Speaking of the tulips. The random friends growing in the backyard get more sun so they were a little more advanced. The older teenage siblings if you will.

Those tulips and this (hyacynth I believe) were growing where the myrtle was last year, so I'm not sure how long they were there, if maybe we just never saw them through the myrtle jungle.
 

Or perhaps it was those dastardly squirrels thinking that when I told them to "stay the *@#$ away from my bulbs" I actually meant, "take what you'd like, and disperse at your leisure". Either way, pretty colours should be on their way.


On a completely unrelated note. I thought I'd share the progress made on some dining room features. Remember Octa, the octopus chandelier?

 Well, she got a bit of a makeover...

Woot! She doesn't even look like the same Octa, eh? We're not 100% sure if she'll stay the glossy white, or if she'll change to a matte black, depends how nicely she plays with all the other pieces in the room. Her shades have jumped ship and she'll just sport a fun round filament bulb.
   The other update came in the form of some butt comfort. Here's what our dining chairs looked like before.

Brown with a pink velvety seat cushion. Now, there was nothing particularly wrong with the wood tone, it just didn't really go with the rest of the wood tones that are going to be in the room, we were going to have to re-stain them anyway, so since they needed to be sanded down regardless I decided to go with that I really wanted. And the best part is, my Nana wasn't even really upset that I decided to paint them. Thumbs up for previous owners approval.

 

Cool lines eh? (please disregard all the crap in the background, judging by the patio furniture I'd say this picture was taking about September/October haha)

Wabam! Looky looky...and this is only with primer, haven't even given them their final coats yet, then they'll look all glossy and beautiful.

And a detail shot of the new bum padding.

I love them. Jason thinks they look pretty good too. Not too bad for $7 a chair.

One of These Things is Not Like The Other

What do an octopus chandelier, (ok so she's not really an octopus, but she's got 8 legs so close enough)

vinyl floor,

beadboard,

a hutch,

and dresser...

all have in common? Well if you took the bead board out of that equation they'd all be second hand - woot woot! But, really it's that they all should be getting some attention next week. We are long overdue on a number of projects, and one of the unexpected perks of going through the adoption process is it's forcing us to finish a number of house related projects, before the judgement lady comes, and gives us a gold star and tells us we can start our kid  shopping. No longer will things sit in the corner of a room, collecting dust, trying to see how much we can balance on top of them. These poor neglected children will finally get to see the light of day, and have their chance to shine. (That's right, I'm talking about you Octa and Hutch - get ready!) Octa and Hutch, will both be getting a nice crisp white makeover, and will both be residing in the dining room (that is if we ever get it paint ready in there)
   As for the vinyl floor and bead board, we're going to get slap happy with those friends, and throw um up (and down) in our master bath, so it doesn't have to look like this anymore!

it's like that hillbilly cousin you're embarrassed to admit you have. I've already painted and changed out the light fixture, so once we do the floor and bead board we can pretty much call this room "done". Or at least liveable until we can tackle the big makeover we have for it a few years down the road.

Lastly, we have the dresser. I've been searching for a low, long dresser for our bedroom since we moved in. I'd been searching kijiji, and pretty much every thrift store within a 75k radius to find one that fit the bill. I wanted either french provincial or midcentury, with at least 6 drawers, solidly built, and preferably something that was under $200. I was beginning to think that what I wanted was like the elusive flying unicorn that Jason swears exist, and was starting to lose hope. Then, he came to me. I asked Jase's mom if she could keep an eye out on the swap shop that she has access to, and a week later she sent me that picture. He's quite handsome isn't he? I will be giving him a hair cut, because we don't want the mirror attached, and a full body makeover.

So that's what my week is shaping out to contain, hopefully I'll get that, and more done, so I'll actually have things to share.
  

Over The Sink & Through The Window

Since we're making progress in the kitchen, I thought I'd take the time to discuss the lighting situation in the kitchen. Before, the entire space was lit with an old, off centred, and odd angled, florescent light, a ceiling fan, and one little globe light (if you could even call it that)

Here's what it looked like when we moved in. Man, look how tiny that kitchen was! (The pictures seriously don't to it justice, I should've taken a picture of me standing in it for reference) Don't you just love the pinkish sort of glow that's reflecting back in that little nook from the wallpaper?

 It's hard to believe that's what the kitchen used to look like...with carpet! Even the empty space we have is an improvement over that. Now that walls have been removed, paint has gone up and cabinets are (mostly) installed we can get our electrician (aka: cousin Adam) to come back and change things up in the lighting department for us. Our table and benches will be in the corner roughly where the old closet & hutch were, and benches will go all the way across the window, so we'll be moving the lighting from the fan over so we can hang a pendant over the table (instead of in front of the fridge). We're going to swap out the old globe light (that broke during demo anyway) with a pot light, and we'll be adding 5 more pot lights spaced throughout evenly. We bought those ages ago, and if memory serves have a stainless face plate. It'll be so nice to have electricity working in this room again...right now we have an old floor lamp plugged into the one working outlet, and since it gets middle of the night dark at about 4 in the bloody afternoon it gets a little difficult to work in the evening. 
  And over the sink (which is staying in the same spot it was before) we'll be hanging a pendant. I flip flopped on what I wanted there more than anything else so far. Which seems a little weird. First I flip flopped between pendant or pot light. Then once I decided on a pendant it was back and forth between various different lights. I had originally DIYed something.

  I started with a flower pot from Ikea...

Spray painted it red, drilled a hole through the bottom and strung it on a pendant cord, then held it up trying to get an idea of what it'd look like. 

It looks cute red, but the scale just wasn't right, and I wasn't 100% happy with it. I figured it was mostly due to the fact that it wasn't up and I couldn't fully appreciate it.  Then during one of my weekly ReStore perusals I found it. THE light. I'm on the lookout for a decent looking chandelier that I can revamp for the dining room, so I always make a beeline for the lighting area - like a pregnant lady for the pickles. They didn't have a chandy that stuck my fancy, but I spotted something just as good, and some slid over and scooped it up faster than a bat outta hell (not that I know for certain how fast they are - but I hear they're pretty darn speedy)

Ain't she a beaut! It's a cracked glass, bulb shaped pendant with stainless plates. And it's considerably bigger than the little pot, so it will be able to hold it's own above the hefty sink.


Here's a little comparison...

Woot woot! I got it for  $20! I've tried to find similar ones online or in store, and the cheapest comparable one I saw was $90 (or there was a $60 plastic version from Home Depot). I can't wait to get it up, it's going to make the coolest light shadows.

  Yay for the ReStore, now if only I can find the chandy, dressers, desk, and chair I'm looking for too haha.