Our Grace Filled Life
Category Archives: Our Home
Jul 9 2012

Weekend finds

by Amanda

We had another crazy-busy Saturday here, which including roofing, painting & then a little more painting & a little more roofing.  Both projects are coming along nicely, they just always seem to take much longer than anticipated.  I’d say I’ve got one more day of painting in the hallway/stairway to finish things up there.  Who new painting all those spindles on the stairway banister could be so much fun?!;)  {In case you don’t know me well, that’s complete sarcasm.  As much as I love to paint, trim work is a little too tedious for my liking.}

Caleb’s about 2/3 of the way done on the roof, so maybe by next weekend {depending on weather & schedules}, he’ll have things wrapped up on the house portion of the shingling.  It’s looking like the garage portion may have to wait until Fall, after my garden is done, because it runs all along the West side of the garage & there’s really no way to tear off the old shingles without damaging things there.  Oh well, I’m sure we can find another project to occupy us in the meantime.

In between feeding the boys on the roof {we had a couple helpers Saturday, SUCH a blessing} & running to every hardware/building supply store in town looking for a hard-to-find box of staples, I managed to escape for about 15 minutes to check out the garage sales around town.  {I’ve learned to be pretty quick, it’s a get-in, get-out operation for me;).}

I’d been kind of disappointed with the garage sales so far this year when it came to furniture or potential refurb projects so I was super pumped to find these fun little tables Saturday morning!

They both are a little wobbly & need some beautification, but they have good potential so I’m thrilled.  I’ll be sure to share before-and-afters of both of these when they’re refurb’d!

I’m kicking myself today when I think about a few of the pieces I walked away from Saturday, but that just has me more excited for the next round of garage sales next weekend!  I’ve got a bunch of ideas buzzing around in my head, both for pieces for our home & reselling, so stay tuned!

PS- I’m on the lookout for a local-ish shop that would work with me on displaying/selling some of my refurbished pieces.  If you have any ideas for me, I’m all ears!

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May 7 2012

Kitchen Tour – part 2

by Amanda

So sorry, our home tour took a bit of a break!  {if you’ve missed the last couple stops of the home tour, be sure to check them out here}

I have been meaning to finish up the tour of the kitchen for the past few weeks, but was waiting until I had a few pictures of how it looks today.  I was waiting for that magical moment when the counter tops were impeccably clean & clear, until there were absolutely no dirty dishes & it all just looked perfect!  Well, then I realized that almost never happens in my kitchen because I’m always using it!  Approximately 5 minutes & 32 seconds after I get every single dish, pot & utensil cleaned & put away, I start making something else!

So, today I decided I was just going to make it happen & that anyone who looks at these pictures would understand that we live here & nothing is ever perfect. :)

{Full disclosure- I did tidy things up just a bit before snapping the most recent pics of the kitchen, I couldn’t help myself:)}

Alright, here we go.  This is how the kitchen looked the day we bought the house…

Yep, that’s how long it took for us to start tearing things apart!  I’m pretty sure the ink was still wet on our closing papers when we starting ripping into the kitchen.  {That’s my lovely mother-in-law helping get the cabinets ready to paint.}

More ivy!

Once we had the cabinets all disassembled {doors removed & hardware removed & discarded} the painting began!

They all got painted, inside & out!  If you’re going to paint cabinets, it’s so worth it to take the time to paint the insides!  I know it seems like a lot of extra work but it’s so much more pleasant to have nice, bright cabinet interiors.  There’s something about a fresh coat of paint that makes everything feel so clean too.

Thank heavens my mom came out to help with all this painting!  It would have taken me weeks instead of a couple days!

This is only one of two rooms that I had setup with cabinet doors like this.  This is way easier than trying to paint while they are still up!  It’s hard to see, but under the saw horses we have all of the hinges laid out on styrofoam so we could give them a few coats of spray paint too.

With the doors back on & new hardware! {The paint was still a bit tacky so we left the doors hanging open for a day or two.}

And, here’s how it looks today…

Like most everything in our house, it’s a work in progress & we’re okay with that.  At some point in the future, we hope to rearrange a few things in this space {mostly concerning the oddly shaped, low island} which will add even more counter space, upgrade to wood flooring, new counters & backsplash & who knows what else yet! :)

If you’re contemplating a fresh coat of paint for your kitchen cabinets, I hope I’ve encouraged you a bit.  It’s certainly not a project for the faint of heart, {I can’t lie, it’s a LOT of work} but in the end it’s so worth it!  It can breathe new life into your kitchen like you wouldn’t believe & for so much less than all new cabinetry!

Categories: Our Home | 2 Comments »

Mar 28 2012

Kitchen Tour – part 1

by Amanda

As I started going through my house pictures, I realized they’re not very complete.  I love it when I have pictures that show the process each step of the way.  I’m pretty sure I just want to be able to show everyone how much work we put into something!:-)

So, this is one of those rooms where the pictures don’t tell the complete story, but it’s still a pretty dramatic change…to me anyhow!

Our kitchen is a long room with the actual kitchen area at one end and the eating area at the other.

Today, we’re touring the eating area.

To start, here are some pictures of the space when we first bought the house…

Before it became our eating area it had to put in it’s time as a painting space for the kitchen cabinets.

If you stood in this room long enough, ivy would begin growing on your shoulders, it was weird.

Our original plan when buying the house was to first tackle some bathroom overhauls, redo the front living room/dining room, paint some bedrooms, etc.  We really thought this space could wait.  But, the ivy only lasted about a week, it had to go!

So, out went the furniture & down came the wallpaper.  Only, the wallpaper had no intentions of leaving us quietly & without a scene (as wallpaper has a tendency of doing).  For the majority of the room, the wallpaper was put up directly on the drywall (it hadn’t been primed or painted at all).

If you’ve never experienced this before, what happens then is that part of the drywall wants to come down with the wallpaper.  It’s a big mess!  I really wish I had some pictures of that so I could show you how much work we did!:-)

So, once the wallpaper was down, my dear, sweet hubby began the tedious task of skim-coating the entire room to repair all of the drywall damage.

We also decided to scape down the popcorn ceilings to clean things up a bit, another extremely messy job my hubby did.

Here’s how this area looks today…

Most recently for this space I made roman shades, which I plan on sharing more about at a later date.

Our vision for this space still includes new wood flooring & several other projects that tie into the kitchen area which I hope to show you here, soon!

Categories: Our Home | 2 Comments »

Mar 27 2012

Let’s start a home tour!

by Amanda

I’ve just added an “Our Home” category to the site & my goal is to have a complete tour posted there eventually.  So, little by little, I’ll be blogging about different rooms/areas of our home & updating the “Our Home” section as I go.

As I’m sure you’ll figure out by looking at our house pics, we’re not professional designers, builders, decorators or really professional anything at all!  We just love our home, & enjoy taking on new projects ourselves.  And besides, the professional-look isn’t really our thing.:-)

I can’t really say any room in our house is “complete”.  It’s all a work in progress, which I’m sure anyone that has tackled home improvement projects before can’t relate with!

So, without further ado, here’s an outside look at our house!

First, here are some pictures from when we first bought our home in 2009.

This past Fall we decided it was time to paint.  As groovy as this peachy-pink color is, we weren’t feeling it.

And, as you can see from the post-pressure washing photos…

It was time for a new paint job.

Now, I’d love to tell you we tackled this project ourselves.  Sadly, as enthusiastic & DIY-minded as we are, we just couldn’t foresee being able to take this one on ourselves.  I’m no stranger to a paintbrush, but I hate being more than, oh, 3 feet off the ground!  Also, Speedy Gonzalez I am not!  At the speed I paint, this would have been a 4 year project for sure!

Caleb on the other hand has no fear of heights.  Strangely though, we can’t find a paintbrush that fits his hand, hmmm.

So, we decided to call in a pro on this one.  He did an awesome job!  I’d certainly recommend his work to anyone!  See for yourself:

On our project list for outside yet we have:

New roof (slated for this Spring)

Landscaping

Painting front door & porch swing

New windows throughout the house (kind of indoor/outdoor I guess but it will improve the curb appeal for sure)

Hope you enjoyed the first stop on our home tour!

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