Dessert, Bedrooms, and UPS

Lets have dessert first, shall we? Thats kind of how I roll anyways.

I'm in the midst of redoing our master disaster, but I'm just too excited not to go ahead and jump right to the best part (the dessert if you will).

How "in the midst of this redo am I" you ask? Well I have 3 walls painted and one of two windows dressed. Guess whats on my to do list for today. 

So lets talk about dessert. I've had my eye on Ana White's farmhouse bed since Christmas. Adam even gave me a pink tool belt for Christmas to dive into this project. Woot! The only problem was, I've never built anything. 

Well...thats not true, in 7th grade I built a model suspension bridge out of scraps. 

Don't be impressed...it sucked.

My parents came out from Boston last week to visit (read:came to see the kids) and my Dad came with his work boots and back belt (how many of you just read that as BLACK belt and not BACK belt? Yeah...he is a ninja, but he's also prone to throwing out is back). Its almost like he knows me or something. So I showed him the plans and we were off! 

Shweet pink tool belt huh? I pretty much used it to hold my cell phone and nails because thats still how I roll.

Project total came in around $170. Not too bad considering its a SOLID.WOOD.BED. This thing is a beast. And I love it!

Shout out to my Momma too for sewing the bolster pillow cover for the new bed while we were working.

The before shot of our bed is ridiculous. It reminds me of UPS, "what can brown do for you?"

Well, brown can show us some detail on that bed finish...take it away UPS!

Two coats of primer + one of white semigloss + sanding + chocolate brown glaze + one coat of Minwax polycoat = love

There is still more to come, nightstands to refinish, walls to decorate (including some jewelry storage ideas and photo displays) and....painting the other 1.5 walls.

Foyer Reveal!

Remember when I talked about the hideousness that was our foyer?

Well hideous no more! 

I teased you a few posts ago about the big reveal to come.

Well today is the day! (Mostly because the sun FINALLY came out so I could get some decent shots)

Lucky you huh?

(Maybe its lucky me because I'm pretty sure I'm beginning to suffer from Seasonal Affective Disorder...along with 75% of the country!)

Lets travel back in time and look at what we started out with.

Yes, this was started Once Upon A Time ago in December. Hence the garland. Love Christmas and all, but come Dec 26th....that stuff is dooooown!

One of my concerns in knocking down the spindles that served no purpose, was wondering if the pattern on our textured ceiling was continued under the wood on the ceiling.

But my friend Travis was not as concerned. He had an idea. And I was in "go with the flow" mode!

See that GIANT plank o' wood!? That was the plan. We got that to put up on the ceiling just incase it was smooth in those two spots where the spindles connected. 

Guess what...we didn't need to, but we did it anyways. 

Mostly because we worked our butts off trying to fit that piece of wood in my minivan!

I love it.

Then we started hanging thin sheets of plywood on the top half of the paneling. I had toyed with the idea of filling in the grooves, but I wasn't confident in a solution that wouldn't shrink and eventually crack.

For those of you wondering why I didn't take the paneling down: there was no drywall behind it.

Fabulous.

I'm not a drywaller...thus liquid and finishing nails are now holding plywood up in my foyer!

Next step was to sand. I guess it would've been much more tedious without the palm sander.

I love tools.

Then some chair rail to make it look....well...nice

See!? Nice?

Then I primed, and primed, and primed some more.

(note: I seriously considered not putting this photo in. The priming didn't start til the next morning. Straight out of bed, straight to work. Thank you 5 year old for snapping this photo) 

But I'm a team player....and this is the only photo I have of the primed foyer.

Then, I painted

Ack! I hated it. Its not a terrible color, but it just looked too nursery. See the plate on the wall to the right? That was more what I had envisioned. And believe it or not, more what the paint chip I chose looked like!? How the heck does that happen!?!?

So I started playing around with paint that I already had on hand. I loooove the color so much now! Unfortunately, since it was a mix, I have no recipe for it. (I did, however, paint an index card to use as reference for future purposes. I keep it in my wallet....because in a locket around my neck would probably be too weird.)

Muuuch better!

  

It changes from a blue to a grey color in the evening. Shnazzy!

The closet looks a million times better. The white porcelain knobs came from Hobby Lobby.

This is my favorite spot. The key bowl, window photo frame, and topiary. All on top of my made over cabinet. (Be on the lookout for that post!)

Love them all!

Lets see a side by side, shall we?

So there we have it. For about $100 I now have a foyer that I love.

And no longer crop out of photos.