Guess who's coming for the weekend? {Guestroom makeover}

My mom!  Deb is so wonderful (yes, I call her Deb about 50% of the time.  We're best buddies as well as mother/daughter, so I figure I'm entitled to call her thus) and so much fun.  We usually end up exploring downtown Madison and eating ourselves silly at home and around town.  And since Deb qualifies as company (and it's her birthday weekend)....our guest room needed to be cleaned up STAT!  Remember last time you saw it?  Bah!  Disgusting, embarrassing etc ect! 

The toilet was moved back to his home in the newly remodeled bathroom.  And most of the other supplies were moved into storage in the garage and basement.  Just to refresh your memory, we started with this:

We definitely had our work cut out for ourselves.  Matt moved all of the bathroom supplies into storage and I originally was going to have this room painted by the time Deb came a calling, but decided that since we have company about 3 times a year, it wasn't super high up on the priority list.  And with the updated bedding I will tell you about in the next paragraph, the yellow actually worked.

I decided the guestroom needed quite the make over.  The baby yellow walls, red rug, and turquoise comforter were just not cutting it (No way, really?  Yellow, turquoise, and red don't work together?)  After thinking about painting (and just not being in the mood) I realized that if I used an already owned duvet cover, I wouldn't have to change the wall color if I wanted the room to come across as non-hillbillyish.  Sooo, after washing an already owned (aka old) down-alternative comforter (Matt is allergic to down) and stuffing it into a recycled (from the master bedroom) white duvet cover, paired with some super cute green striped sheets (which I bought and used once), I made the bed and fell in love with the Springy vibe the room gave off!  Check it out:

I unrolled the old rug from the living room and which immediately looked 50 times better than the red striped one.  Another apartment move-out cast off from a resident was a block of wood with three hooks on it....that sounded a bit homemade as I typed it, but I think it's actually from Target.  The wood is stained a dark espresso color and the hooks are a black color.  Anyway, I hung it on the wall for coats or towels, or whatever guests may not want laying on the ground.  I also brought in a small side table (from the living room before it was moved around) and put it under the hooks...you know in case guests need some table space.  I put a couple books of short stories down there too, in case Deb gets bored with me. (View from standing on the bed):

My far off in the distance plan is to refinish and move the dresser from this room and into the master bedroom, but for now I like it in the guest room.  I used some extra decor I had laying around for the top of it...and added a picture of Deb's 2 favorite kids :)  I also used a small glass tray for some lotions, room spray, and tissues (We in the Kendall house do not use tissues...we use toilet paper to wipe our noses, but I know Deb enjoys a nice tissue), to make the momma lady feel at home.  But seriously, how gorgeous is this dresser?  I never really appreciated it until now.  Growing up it was just there and when I moved to Madison (waaaay back in 2006) I took it with me since Matt and I had a bed and a chair to our names and then just shoved it into a closet everytime we moved.  Pretty amazing what a little Pledge and a couple decorations can do to open your eyes. 

Here are a couple more pics....you know, for your enjoyment :)

Fiona gave the room 4 paws up (wow, I am a huge dork).  We definatly still need to find some art for the walls, but I don't think Deb will be too offended with what we came up with for her.  

Cost of this guestroom make over: $0.00!  Everything I used we already had...even the little travel-size tissue package.  So put that in your pipe and smoke it.

~S~

"Ahhh my back!"

So, I haven't put laundry away since early January.  Yes, you heard me correctly.  As I told you here, I HATE putting laundry away.  So, all of our clean clothes end up in piles on the floor right in front of our closets.  My crazy organizing mania was flowing full force this last weekend, so I thought I should tackle the clothes and my closet while I was motivated enough to do it. 

Step one:  Refold and organize all clean clothes into piles, according to how they will be put away.  (As in separate piles for everything: undies, bras, bath towels, sweatshirts, sheets, socks, etc...).  This may look chaotic, but it's actually organized:

Step two:  Closet shelf and hanging bar fall on top of me.  Now, I did not plan for this step to happen, but it did.  The shelf/bar brackets were not all attached to walls using studs, so when I bumped the bracket wrong, it all came crashing down...on my back and head.  Luckily my closet only looked like this when it happened:

Yeah, that's all the clothes I had hanging up.  So, I grabbed the stud finder (my stud {aka Matthew} was napping in the basement) and rehung the brackets correctly.

Once done, I went through alllllllll of the organized and fallen clothes and filled EIGHT Target bags full of clothes to donate.  I do this every couple months, but never weed out out the "Oh, I'll be that size again one days" completely....this time I showed my belly no mercy and was honest with myself about the too smalls.  (I'll mention too, that I found 4 empty Target bags tumble-weeding around our bedroom when I started this project...).

{Cute puppy not to be donated}

I also went through the entry closet and threw out 7 pairs of shoes (making myself be honest here too) and then brought all the keepers up to my closet and put them into the rack.  I left a pair of flip flops, 2 pairs of winter boots, and my runners downstairs.


Step three:  Hang said organized clothes....according to sleeve length ( I always do this one first) and color.  (2 baskets of dirty clothes were being washed still...hopefully they make it to the hangers)

Step four: Be giddy and enjoy the fact that my closet looks like this, even if it is only for one day, but love every second of it. :)

Here was my hard working assistant during all of this.  She was a huge help when the closet came crashing down...by running away to safety.

~S~

Does the rug match the drapes?

Bahaha...ok slightly inappropriate.  But I had to share some exciting news!!!

Soooo, I have been wanting a giant 8x10 rug for our living room since about day one in the house.  We started off with a cream colored 5x7 shag rug that was soft and luxurious...but a baby Suzie decided that it was better for digging holes (literally) in than for relaxing on.  She actually dug about 4-5 silver dollar sized holes all over the rug and would rip the rug fibers out of the backing.  I'm pretty sure she teething or something.  So, needless to say, it looked awesome for about 4 days and went downhill from there.  After that, a resident from my work (I manage a apartment complex) left behind another 5x7 rug, only this time it was a cheap Berber, but I figured, hey it's a free rug.  So we cleaned it and slapped it down in the living room.  And left it there even though it looked awful/a little weird.  Since we have two crazy puppies and one crabby cat that love to chase one another around the living room (on the hardwood floors), an 8x10 rug would be a much better suited rug size for our living room.  This is what it looked like as of 6:00pm tonight with the hand me down rug:

 
 See?  Way too small of a rug for the size of the living room....BUT!......Check out the fabulousness that Mr. Sexy Pants (aka Matthew) picked out at Home Depot today!

Do you love it?!  You know, I don't really care if you do....BECAUSE I DO!  I am so in love with this rug I seriously started taking pictures and shrieking about loving it before it was even all the way unrolled.  And how ridiculously amazing is Matt?  We were a little hesitant about the flowery design, but took a risk....and am soooo happy we did since the design isn't anywhere near as flowery as we thought it would be.  (ps....please try to block out the ugly old couch...I know I am)  Here are couple more almost identical pictures for your (and my!!!) enjoyment:

{The puppies are in looove with the couch being in front of the window}

{Ty Cobb was flying through the air as this as taken...he's such a ham:)  }

I started searching Craigslist for a round (not circle....I keep calling it a circle table) coffee table, but didn't have any much luck.  I want a mini pedestal table, so it's not too bulky, especially since our couches are on the large size.  But I shall persevere...I have an exact picture in my head and am convinced I will find it....and then paint it :)

For now the old rug will go in to the guest room.  And we will get to enjoy this new sexy number everyday in the living room :)

And just a heads up....this was quite the day for projects around the house....5 blog posts will come of the going ons of today! (the first being this one).

Here is another picture for your enjoyment....this is what Matt has the pleasure/luck/curse to look forward to waking up with for the rest of his life....

Mental note to self....always take a quick look in the mirror first thing in the morning so you don't end up walking the dogs with a crazy-ass pony tail. : /  (And face...)

And just so I don't leave you on a terrified/scary/I'm-never-coming-back-here-again note....some cute puppies waiting for their post walk treat :)

Seriously, try not to love them, I dare you. :)

~S~

What I do when Matt is out of town

Sooo, for the past week Matt has been working in Milwaukee on a project that the Milwaukee shop needed help with.  And when he isn't home, I suddenly get super motivated and start cleaning and organizing all over the house.  Case in point.  On Tuesday night I decided that the guest room needed to be cleaned out and rearranged.  For no particular reason at all.  Granted, my mom is coming to visit next weekend (yay!) and the room will for sure be ready for her by then, but I figured there was no time like the present.  Wednesday night I got sucked into a book for the whole evening and stayed up way too late in order to finish it (you remember I am a dorky English major, right?).  And then last night (for whatever reason) I decided that our living room needed to be moved around.

This is a very old picture, but I'll explain the differences between then (2009) and early last night (since I was too impulsive to take a picture before starting....hmmm wasn't I supposed to be working on that?...):

Ok, so this was from December 2009.  The Christmas tree is obviously gone now.  The purple curtains have been replaced with white ones.  The coffee table is now the TV stand (next to the 1/2 wall on the right hand side of the picture).  The photos on the wall are different now (and being changed again soon).  The green chair on the left was moved into the office and the old couch from Matt's parents (right side of top picture) has replaced it.  Oh, and the window wall, half wall, and the wall behind the green chair are blue.....ok, wrap your head around all of that. :)

Annnnyway, I walked in the door last night, and those crazy wheels in my head started turning.  After walking the puppies, I dove into rearranging head first.  Our living room is long and narrow (maybe only 10-12 feet wide, by about 20 feet long) so creating a "conversation area" has always been a challenge.  With the couches in their current places, the old couch couldn't have any part of the coffee table (well, bench) and we were always dragging the new couch forward 5 feet so we could both eat off of the coffee table (we're classy like that).  Soooo, I moved the old couch to the opposite wall, in front of the windows and then pushed the new couch over towards the dining room about 3 feet.  Now the couches made an "L" shape, perfect for conversation. 

The side tables had always been a bit too small for our couch size, so I tucked them into the office and grabbed a spare side table my grandma had given me (that had been in the guest room looking awkward) and stuck that into the corner with a lamp on it.

Then I decided that the writing desk (from Matt's Grandma Dottie) which had been in the entry way since we got it (I wasn't sure where it would go in the house yet and didn't want to be moving it all over the place until a spot was found) and realized it would work nicely in the living room, on the wall where the old couch had been.  So I verrry carefully carried it upstairs into the living room (I'm a nut like that...I never wait to move furniture when Matt can help.  I beast it up and carry it myself), placed the 2nd lamp and some books on it.  The decor will change at some point, but I was running out of creative steam at this point.

Ok, here's a couple photos I snapped on my way out the door this morning.  First order of things....get a bigger area rug (this weekend probably) and scavenge Craigslist for a circle coffee table (which I will probably paint), hang different wall art, and search Etsy for throw pillows...Also painting the whole room grey.

Ok, so a quick explanation.  Ty Cobb (It's his 3rd birthday today!) has a bad habit of digging in the old couch (or the bed, or the backseat of the car) when he gets frustrated...so one side of each of the couch cushions have huge rips in them from him.  And of course the sides with rips in them are on opposite sides, so there will always be one showing, even when we flip and switch them around. : /  Sooo, that is why there is a sheet on the couch until we get a cover for it...or a new couch.  And how awkward does that bench/coffee table look?  :)  My search for a new one begins today.  Here's the writing desk:

The table decor definately needs some work, but it will do for now.  I tucked that little bench underneath for an extra seat for company.  But how gorgeous is that desk?!  I love the diamond detail on the front of it.  The diamond panel actually opens up and half of the top folds open with lots of cubbies and storage inside it.  I'll show it off another time. :)

So anyway, that was my Thursday night.  Oh, I also moved the dining room table around and did about 4 loads of laundry......I need a hobby.  Tonight will be better spent...It's my littl guy's birthday, so K9 custard (ice cream) and new puppie toys are in order for the dogs....and Matt just called to let me know he'll be home tonight....Dilly Bars for the humans!! :)  Yeah, we get pretty crazy in the Kendall household.

{Holy long hair!!}

{haha this was last weekend after a bath...he got a haircut 2 days later :)  }

Happy Birthday Ty Cobb!!! (Since he obviously reads this blog)

~S~

Kinda, sorta, but not really done

So, the bathroom is done!  Well, kinda, sorta, but not really.  The floor is now done!  The toilet is back in place!  And the bathtub fixtures are in place and working!  So, it is a usable bathroom again!  (Though I can't seem to remember this....I still walk all the way down two flights of stairs to go to the bathroom every morning).  So technically it's done, but there are still a few items on the to-do list.

• Paint the vanity.  I picked up a bunch of paint swatches last night at The Depot, and will be looking them over with Matt sometime this week.
• Paint the walls and ceiling.  I decided to paint the walls and ceiling the same color.  Because the rest of the room is so white, I think it will look better with grey on the walls/ceiling.  It's Martha Stewart Living paint from Home Depot in Chinchilla.  I actually have the exact color waiting to be painted onto the master bedroom walls (only in Eggshell...the bathroom will be Semi-Gloss, to ward off against Dementors....I mean mold).  Since we don't have an official master bathroom, I liked the idea of painting both rooms the same color to make them feel a bit more connected.
• Replace and paint the baseboards
• Build a frame for the bathroom mirror
• Add new light fixtures (probably down the road)

I stopped and bought the bathroom paint on the way home from work last night, fully intending to paint when I got home.  But then I realized that we needed to add texture to one of the walls (when we added the new drywall) before I could start painting.

{Side note.....Our ENTIRE house has textured walls.  It looks and feels like stucco.  Which apparently is kind of a hip thing right now....but it's soooo annoying.  Not only was it done poorly, but I happen to like smooth walls.}

So, I guess the bathroom isn't exactly done, but it's usable and that is a big step from where it was a week ago.  Here's a teaser shot of the gorgeous floors Matt did!

Ahhhhh!  I looooove it!  Ok, here's a couple more revealing shots, so you can actually picture it....

{Taken at night, so the tile looks darker/more tan than it's actual white/grey color}

{Taken during the day, actual color}

{Against the tub and shower walls}

So, as you can see in the above picture, we have one small tile to add onto the wall still.  And the vertical stripe of green sheet rock (between the closet and tub) is what needs to be textured.

I just love how all the different pieces of tile are all so unique from one another, yet go together all at once.  I'm sure you're thinking "That is one white bathroom."  And well, you wouldn't be wrong.  That's why I chose a medium grey color for the walls and to paint the vanity an espresso color.  The mirror will also most likely have a matching espresso frame around it too.  The little bits of contrast will keep it from looking too sterile.  I'm also planning on painting the closet walls to match the glass tile:

Check out those fixtures!!!!  I actually told Matt I was more excited to see those done than anything else in the bathroom so far (Nice, huh?)  We attached the overflow (horizontal rectangle below tub spout) Monday night, so once I clean the tub and put up the shower curtain, we can take showers!  And Matt can take a shower-bath!  Ohhh very happy day :)

~S~

Weekend Project: Operation Organization

Friday night Matt and I dropped the kids off at Puppy Camp and zipped down to Chicago to visit my friend Laura and her boyfriend Brandon.  After inhaling 20 lbs of pizza and drinking ourselves a little bit silly Friday night, we went out to breakfast at Orange which has THE most amazing orange flavored coffee.  I bought a pound of it to bring home with me afterwards. :)  We skipped going downtown for all the St. Paddy's activities because of our aversions to crowds, but had an amazing time with our good buddies :)

Anyway, once we got home, I had a serious mission to accomplish: Operation Organization.  We are very lucky to have three linen closets on our upper level, all within 6 feet of one another.  One in the bathroom, which is getting it's own make over (We have never used this one for anything...mainly because you had to close the bathroom door, then open this closet door to even use it...and we very rarely close the bathroom door...we've know each other for too long to be shy).  But the two closets in the hallway we use daily.  One holds all of our linens and the other houses our bathroom necessities (hair supplies, paper towels, toilet paper, first aid, medicines, and a bit of throw stuff in here space).  Here is what the linen abomination looked like before:

How ungrateful for this space am I?  We have this huuuge linen closet, which we throw whatever into....and hardly ever put our linens into.  I love doing laundry, except the last part: putting it away.  I love the sorting, the folding, and the good smellingness of it....but LOATHE putting it where it belongs afterwards.  So, our towels end up being folded and left on top of the dryer (in the basement) and our clean sheets are left wherever I end up setting them down...usually somewhere in the bedroom (so, I can bring them all the way upstairs, only to walk right past the linen closet to put them in the bedroom...hmmm).  I avoid opening this closet door because I don't want to see the mess in there....Well, Sunday was the day to fix it.  Before I show you the after....here are some weird things I found inside the linen closet:

• A huge stack of our wedding programs.  Yeah, we were married in 2008.
• A plastic bag of Christmas ornaments
• The wonderfully romantic card that Matt gave me the morning of our wedding
• Spackle for the walls...which I used on our old apartment
• Two different clocks
• A bag full of camping supplies
• Wrapping paper

So, nothing too outrageous.  Check out the much better after shot (Oh, and I guess we found a cat in the closet too):

I was still doing laundry, so there are a few sheet sets missing, but isn't it so much better?

We have another closet about two feet away from the above one...Which looked like this:


The lighter wood goes from the floor up to the slightly orangery wood is slanted at a 45 degree angle from the stairs below it (going to the living room).  The more orange wood is the bottom shelf.  Now, mind you, this closet was to hold hair products, cold medicine, first aid supplies, and paper toiletry stuff.  Here are the weird things I found in this one:

• Wine fridge.  We don't have a lot of counter top space in our kitchen, so obviously the upstairs closet is the best place for a wine fridge.
• Glass vase full of Christmas Hershey Kisses... from our holiday party...in December.
• 2 empty 1-800-Contacts boxes
• 4 empty jewelry boxes
• 4 bottles of pickles from my grandma (My grandma makes the best homemade pickles)
• A note Matt had written me when we first started seeing each other waaaay back in 2003.  He had stopped by my dorm room to say hi, but missed me. :)
• House plans....for some other house.  They are the detailed plans from the architect....for a house on the far east side of Madison.  Hmmmm.  At some point we're going to drive over there and give them to the home owners.

Ok, here is the after:

Ahhhhhh, so much better for my sanity!  After cleaning out both hallway closets, I had two bulging bags of trash to take out.  I can't even believe how much junk we had collected.  After doing these two closets, my crazy brain wheels started turning about going through the closet in the office (which is our "junk closet." We put everything in there that we don't know where else to put) and the two closets in our guest room.

Operation Organization = SUCCESS! :)

~S~

Psst...Want to know a secret?

No we're not pregnant, though I'm sure my mom jumped to that conclusion right away (Am I right, Deb?).

When you redo an entire room, you have to relocate the stuff that is kept in the room you're re-doing.  And if you need supplies for that remodel, well they have to go somewhere too.  For us, this relocation spot has been our guest bedroom.  It's right across the hall from the remodel zone, so the most convenient location for supplies and things that we had to move out of the bathroom.  And we haven't had company in quite a while, so we haven't had to clean things up or make space for visitors.  In short, it has gotten a bit out of control.

  Here is the wreck/tornado/secret shame remodeling status of our guest room right now....

Yes, that is a toilet in our guestroom.  Since we're retiling the floor, we had to temporarily remove the toilet.  Here's a picture showing the missing toilet:

Here's Matt being a great sport and sitting on the toilet in the guest room when I asked him to :)

Hahaha what a great guy.  We may have company coming in 2 weeks, so this room needs to be cleaned up stat.  Well, and Matt is almost done with the bathroom anyway....so, yay!

~S~

Flooow

Have you ever had an "Ah-ha" moment?  Or as we sophisticated English majors (ha! sophisticated, right) like to call an epiphany?  I'm going to call it a "well, duh" moment.  See? Sophisticated.

I was reading a new favorite blog of mine House*Tweaking and the author, Dana, wrote a series of posts about open floor plans and how to create good "flow" with them (and your entire house in general too).  And the number one rule is to have cohesive design throughout the house.  And you accomplish this with color.  Well, duh.  I have been reading about this everywhere, for a very long time, yet I continue to want a bright blue living room and a moody chocolate brown kitchen and an elegant, yet casual grey bedroom. 

Bright blue + mood brown + elegant/casual grey does not equal a cohesive home.  Well, duh.  I was looking around our house last night and thinking about all the ideas I have already done and still want to do and came to the realization that I do not think things through very well when it comes to decorating (or most things in life now that I think about it).  I am impulsive and love instant gratification.  If I order something online, I am watching the mail that same afternoon for it to arrive.  If I see a cute haircut somewhere, I will call that day to make an appointment.  I think of a dramatic paint color and I paint a wall.  Over the years I have continued to work on myself in this area and have had to force myself to calm down...and think about a decision for a bit before acting on it.  Though this makes me frustrated, it seems to work since 90% of the time will cancel my hair appointment when it's made for a later date.

Anyway, back to the house.  All the different colors, are just not creating good flow.  On our main level (which is open floorplan style) is our kitchen, dining area, and living room.  They open into one another....and yet I have 4 different wall colors going on.  Here, check it out:


Blue living room, with tan wall leading into the dining area, brown kitchen/dining area, and white hutch.  Not flowing well at all.  I always jump to bright or dramatic colors for the walls, though when I look at magazines, I am always drawn to the neutral rooms, with pops of bright colors from pillows, art, and accessories.  Maybe I like the risk in the dramatic colors, who knows.

Having a cohesive color design plan, will make the entire house flooow better.  I like to think that if you go from one room to another, you won't feel as though you are entering an entirely different home because of the drastic color changes.  Sooo, my first step in making flooow throughout the house will be to pick a more neutral color palate for the walls.....since I love to paint (as shown here) I don't mind the challenge of painting every room in the house (ughh, though as I wrote that I felt a little tired).  As of right now I am thinking various shades of light grey (seriously, I have an addiction to this color idea) since I had already planned on painting a couple rooms a grey color.  All of our three couches are different shades of tan, I don't want them to become "lost" in the paint in the walls (if we went with the always classic tan) and I think grey will make our white trim and dark floors look oh so elegant and casual all at once.

Now some of you may be thinking, "Wait a minute, you nut job.  You have oak-y looking cabinets in your kitchen, along with dark counter tops and black hole appliances!  And you think grey will look good?!"

Well, back off me for a second, will ya?!  Please allow me to explain.  Matt and I have gone back and forth and back and forth about what to do with our kitchen cabinets.  Their color doesn't match anything else in the house, and they are cheap.  Probably the cheapest option from where ever our seller bought them from.  That being said, we have thrown the idea of painting our kitchen cabinets around since we bought the house.  I have always wanted a white kitchen, and though I think white kitchens are a bit of a fad right now, I think white cabinets would be the best color for our us.  All of our trim and all the doors are white throughout the house and if the cabinets were white it will help the kitchen feel more like it belongs with the rest of the house.  And though the black hole appliances would stick out like crazy with white cabinets, we plan on replacing them for newer, more energy efficient ones anyway (in stainless steel).  Some of you may be cringing with the thought of painting cabinets, but we don't have an extra $4,000 laying around to throw into brand new cabinets (Owning a home is expensive! We need that $4,000 in case 50 other things break).  And if done patiently and correctly, you won't be able to tell they're painted unless you look really closely.

So, that is the updated and current plan for the house....I am forcing myself to think about it for a couple weeks before doing any painting, just to make sure it is what is best for the house.  But here is a clue as to what I will be doing in the bedroom this weekend (that came out wrong...):

Not very vague I guess...But just the first step of many towards the flooow :)

~S~

"Well, we could paint it..."

I am one of those weird people who love to paint.  Not just walls, but anything and everything.  Just ask Matt.  97% of the time, my solution for something is, "Well, we could paint it...."  And then I get an eye roll.  Seriously it never fails.  We will be looking at furniture or even something around the house that I have decided is now ugly and this little spark will start up in my brain and turn into a raging bonfire with painting ideas.  Since decorating  and redecorating (and maybe redecorating again since I change my mind so often...and looove change) is so expensive (as seen here)  painting is a cheap and easy way to completely transform something. 

Our entire house was already painted when we moved in, and I haven't gone too crazy with changing things so far, but here are a few:

Black house numbers (what up 209?!) a burgundy color because they only came in black...2 coats of spray paint later, hello gorgeous! (and can I also mention: When we bought our house, it didn't have numbers on it!  WTF?!) You can see them below is you squint:

Spray painted gold curtain rod brackets an espresso brown/black because Target does not just sell curtain brackets.

Living room.  First (2009, when we first moved in) I painted one wall a dark purple which I loooved (Matt did not) but when paired with dark purple curtains (and our dark wood floors) it made the whole room way too gloomy.  Shown here (sans curtains):

But then we fell in love with a delightful little show called Modern Family.  The entry way in the show is painted a gorgeous blue color (paired with dark wood floors and white trim) which I immediately had to copy.  Here's just a quick peek at the color...I'm working on the living room this weekend.  Cute kids, no? :)  They're actually best buddies that wrestle all the time and Fiona is only giving crabby-face because Suzie wants to kiss her all the time. 

The kitchen. Umm, I have done this twice in 16 months....The walls came a pukey green color when we bought the house, which I promptly painted the first color, which I like to call "redrum red" (which looked like just that, a room of murder blood walls).  After feeling a little angry every time I cooked for a few months, I visited my Aunt Joanne and Uncle Paul....and then copied their chocolate brown kitchen walls, which is the current color:  Feel free to call me a copy-cat anytime you like.

The kitchen/dining room hutch and pantry.  They were also the pukey green color and are now a crisp white which I accidentally bought in the same exact color of all our trim is painted in...score!

A couple other walls throughout the house


Future painting projects I want to do:

Paint the bathroom we're redoing

Paint this amazing $25 find from Savers in Madison.  So excited about this!  I was crabby one afternoon and stopped at Savers on impulse (don't ask me why) and found this solid wood gem.  Yes, it looks like fleshy puke right now, but just you wait :)  I think it will go in the entry way, with a mirror above it (with new hardware too of course).

Paint the above mentioned mirror....probably white (how cute is little Suzie? :)  ).

Paint my old dresser.  I have had this since I was a little Steph (there are crayon marks on the side to prove it).  Matt and I currently do not have a dresser in our bedroom (we haven't ever had one now that I think about it) and I have always wanted one.  I saw this dresser at Ikea and fell in love with the color, which actually looks totally different online.  In person it was a smokey grey color.  I also plan to get new knobs or pulls.

Paint the master bedroom.  I have hated our bedroom wall colors since we bought the house, but have yet to do anything about them.  I initially bought a very pale sky blue color, but then changed my mind about it.  Right now Matt and I are thinking a very light slate/grey color (what's with me and grey?)  I also want to add a white duvet cover and a giant rug too (show here, remember?)

Paint the entry way.  Right now the walls are a light tan color, which would be fine, except they show every little bit of dirt.  And with Matt doing construction and coming home looking like this:

All of which then seems to end up on the walls (and everywhere else), so we definitely need a different color in there....I may bring the blue from the living room into the entry way....which would also look great with the Savers table! Win Win.

Paint the downstairs bathroom.  Matt loves the "pub" atmosphere that this bathroom gives off with it's dark green walls, but I feel like it makes the entry way and bathroom too dark and murky feeling.  Maybe a grey color (seriously, what is up with me and grey)

Two side tables we have laying around.

Our Adirondack chairs for our deck (from the in-laws....thank you!).  They need to be sanded down and painted....maybe a rich chocolate brown...Matt does not agree...so far.

Hmmm, I think I need a hobby other than wanting to paint everything I own.....

~S~