The Flip is Complete!

We finished the flip! (and have the pictures to show for it)

I’m so excited I’m not even gonna try to think of a formal introduction for this post… THE FLIP IS DONE!!! We put it up for sale 4 days ago and as of yesterday, it’s officially under contract!!! Picture me (and Lucius) with all the jazz hands!

Okay, now that that’s out of my system, I’ll take a step back and think of a more formal introduction… Oh yeah, here we go….

In early March, Lucius and I took the leap we’d been talking about for years and bought a house to flip! We had invested in flips previously and weren’t completely flying solo on this flip either, but this is the first flip that we took on as the primary party. From project management to design, it was all us, with a little financial backing from just one other investor.

It was definitely scary, but we’re so happy with how everything came together! I’m insanely excited to share the finished product with you all, so without further ado, welcome to our finished flip:

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The Exterior

When we bought this house it was… sad. That’s the best word I can think of to describe it. It came across as an afterthought - a house that you would drive right by and never even notice was there.

Well, look at her now! I think I’ll call her Claire.

Now you drive by this gorgeous girl and do a double-take because she looks THAT good.

Here’s a little comparison to remind you what we started with.

The changes to the exterior are pretty obvious, and that was the point! I’m so happy we put all the manpower we did into amping up the curb appeal because I think it makes a huge (and much needed) improvement!

Here’s a rundown of what changed: I limewashed the brick, painted the shutters and wood on either side of the door (and wrote a post about how I chose the perfect paint color scheme), replaced the light fixtures, address numbers, and the front and side doors, threw a door knocker on the front door, and added some landscaping.

Oh, we also took out that tree in the “before” picture that had half of it being held together with a tow rope! The neighbors were very appreciative.

That seems like a ton of stuff, but it pales in comparison to what we changed inside.

The Living Room/Dining Room

Now I know an empty house isn’t crazy exciting to look at, but this isn’t HGTV, and staging an empty house isn’t always practical (though I would have loved to do it anyway!). But take a look at how far this space has come!

To start, we completely removed the wall you see in the picture below. This isn’t a big house so keeping the main living areas all chopped up just wasn’t a good use of the space. Plus, when you walked in the front door before, you ran right into a closet. This is what it looked like when we bought it.

What we changed: One of the major things we did throughout the house was replace the flooring. The previous renter put laminate on top of carpet padding… then there was a leak in the kitchen. When we bought the house the floors squished as you walked on them. So out they came!

We also replaced all the trim and doors, painted, and updated the light fixtures. Here’s the light fixture in the living room - and I love this light fixture so much it’s not the first time I’ve used it. I actually put it in the kitchen of our 1927 American Foursquare!

The paint color in the main living area is Smoke Infusion by Valspar. I ended up using colors from the same swatch throughout the house (except for the bedrooms) and I think I’m in love with it. It’s sort of a blue/green/gray color. It’s definitely more blue than green overall, but in certain lighting, it does take on more of a green hue.

The Kitchen

Aside from the exterior, the kitchen definitely underwent the most dramatic changes. I can’t stop looking at this before and after comparison.

I mean… is this even the same house!?

And that’s not even the best representation of the kitchen.

I wish I personally could take more credit for this amazing space, but honestly, Lucius came up with most of the ideas for it (who knew he had so much design acumen!?). I’m definitely the more risk-averse one between us (he comes up with the crazy ideas and I reel him back in. It’s a good balance). So when Lucius suggested removing a wall and changing the entire layout of the kitchen my alarm bells started ringing. But I have to admit that he was right and now this kitchen is so much more functional than it was when we bought the house.

The new layout adds way more counter space than was previously there and even increased the number of cabinets! Not only that, but it flows so nicely with the rest of the main living area and creates a much more conversational space.

The Bathroom

This house is tiny (around 1,100 square feet) and only has one small bathroom (which is tricky to photograph!), but it needed to be completely gutted. We carried the same laminate we used in the rest of the house into the bathroom as well.

The Bedrooms

This house has 3 bedrooms that are all pretty similar in size and style so I’ll just share one of the pictures. We put new carpeting in all the bedrooms and painted them a nice cool gray color - Tempered Gray by Valspar.

Side note: I feel like I should mention that I’m not sponsored by Valspar or Lowe’s since I mention them a lot. I would LOVE to try Benjamin Moore or BEHR paint but we only have Lowe’s and they only carry Valspar and Sherwin Williams. Therefore, those are the brands you’ll see me reference in a lot of my posts.

We also have new closet doors on the way but I couldn’t wait to share this post so they aren’t installed yet in this picture.

The Bonus Room

This house had a garage once upon a time, but at one point it was turned into a bonus room. It started out (like the rest of the house) in pretty rough shape.

But MAN does she clean up nice!

I love how the flooring brings some warmth to this house and I think it pairs really nicely with the calming paint tones. In this room, I used Paris in Winter everywhere except for the accent wall, which has Seafoam Storm, both by Valspar.

I wasn’t able to find a digital swatch of SeafoAm storm :(

We also replaced the french doors with a new sliding glass door. Normally I love french doors, but the ones in this room were failing and the sliding glass door brings in so much more light!

Lastly, we turned the closet back into a closet (it seemed like it was previously used as an entertainment center). This house has very little storage so we figured a closet would be more functional.

All the other things

Now that you’ve seen all the pretty stuff, I think it’s important to note that there are definitely parts to flipping a house that need attention that don’t have that “WOW!” factor but still gotta get done.

Water Heater

The biggest “hidden” item that we replaced was the water heater. We switched the old at-the-end-of-its-life traditional water heater to a tankless water heater. We installed one in our last house and we loved it! They’re not only much more energy efficient because they’re heating the water up as it’s being used (rather than continuously heating a tank full of water), but you don’t have to worry about running out of hot water AND they’re about the same price as a traditional water heater. Win-win-win!

Light Switches

First of all, I think one of the most simple and inexpensive ways to update a space is to switch out those old off-white light switches, outlets, and covers to white. Of course, we made that change throughout the house, but Lucius took it a step further. He’s a technology nerd and is really jumping on the “smart switch” train. He’s been changing all the light switches in our house to smart switches and was really excited to put them in the flip too!

In both our house and the flip we used Lutron Caseta switches and I have to admit they’re pretty cool. I think the best part is that they work with Google and Alexa so they’re great when you have little kids who a) leave the lights on all the time or b) can’t reach the lights yet to turn them on/off. Instead of walking around the house flipping switches all the time, you can just tell Google/Alexa to do it and you don’t even have to leave your seat.

Thermostat

Lastly, Lucius the technology nerd just HAD to replace the thermostat with a NEST thermostat. We’ve actually put one of these in our last three houses because we love them so much. As with the smart switches, I love that I can change the thermostat from wherever I’m at (I think technology is making me lazy…), but it’s also great because they learn your habits and recognize when you’re typically at home or away and adjusts the temperature so you’re not unnecessarily heating or cooling your house. Yay for energy efficiency!

And there you have it, the crisp, clean, COMPLETE tour of the flip!

Our goal during this flip (and what we will continue to strive for during future flips because, come on, there will definitely be future flips) wasn’t to earn the most profit. Our primary goal was to take a sad, neglected house and show its full potential. We of course still had a budget to stick to, but we weren’t concerned with using cheap flooring and finishes just to make a profit. We made sure we chose items that looked and felt good - like laminate with some padding, nice bathroom fixtures, and sweet, homey details like a door knocker.

Obviously, we wanted the end product to be beautiful, but it was also so important for us to make sure it was safe and didn’t have any hidden issues. That seems like a no-brainer, but you’d be surprised how many people flip houses and just touch the cosmetic stuff. Overall, we wanted this house to do the neighborhood (and the neighbors) justice.

I think best of all is that we had FUN doing it! The real estate market is a little nuts right now and there isn’t much inventory, but once we get our hands on another one of these babies you better believe I’ll be writing all about it! In the meantime, I guess I have some time to work on my own house. I have a dining room that has had three different paint samples up for a few weeks now that is calling my name….

Related Flip House Posts:

• We Bought Another House - Our Flip House Kick-off

• How I Limewashed Our Flip

• Picking Exterior Paint Colors

• How (Not) to Stain Butcher Block

The flip is now officially complete!

How to: DIY Nursery Mobile on the Cheap

How to Make a Nursery Mobile

When I was pregnant with my second daughter and couldn’t continue with my normal home renovations, I had to redirect my energy somewhere else. I spent some time reupholstering our dining room chairs, painting, and creating curtains for our front door and sidelights. Then I got the idea to create a mobile for her room. Today I’d like to share my process with you so you can create one of your very own at little to no cost!

As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases. This post may contain affiliate links, meaning I receive commissions for purchases made through those links, at no cost to you.

Materials:

• Paint chips
• Several heavy books
• Glue
• Thin string/thread
• Twine
• A branch
• Scissors
• Command hooks or Cup hooks

Step 1: Collect paint chips - lots of them!

Honestly, this step is kind of misleading off the bat - you don’t necessarily have to use paint chips for this project. You could really use anything that’s a similar thickness, like colored cardstock. Oooo… or you could draw a pattern on cardstock and use that! The world is your oyster.

For me, paint chips were the most logical choice because for some reason I never get rid of them when I grab them from the store, so I had a whole box full of paint chips for no reason. Until now!

Most of the paint chips in the box were colors I had used around our house, but I find it sweet that the bright colored paint chips are ones that my older daughter picked out. She’s also a paint chip hoarder, but can only reach certain colors at the store… which usually end up being the brightest ones. I like that she was able to have a part in this project for her sister.

There are two big benefits I see to using paint chips for this project:

1. You have soooo many colors to choose from!

2. They’re free!

Step 2: Cut paint chips into shapes

For this step, I found 3 different sizes of circular-shaped items and spent my free time tracing and cutting circles while watching TV.

Apparently, there are punches in different sizes of circles that you can buy, but by the time I realized that was an option I was already in the process of tracing my circles and didn’t want to start over.

As with Step 1, you don’t have to follow my process exactly. I chose to cut my shapes into circles to keep the design from getting too crazy, but that’s just my preference. Really you could use any shape or shape combo you want!

Step 3: Pair your shapes up

No, you’re not seeing double. Yes, this is the same picture from Step 2. I created this mobile over a year ago when starting a blog wasn’t even on my radar. Luckily I took some random pictures of the process that are certainly coming in handy now!

This step is where you should actually follow my rules a little more closely. Because we’re going to be stringing the shapes up in Step 4, it’s important to lay out your design before you break out your glue.

First, pair each shape up with another shape of the same size. Then, lay out your design how you want it strung together.

Step 4: String your shapes together

This is where I experimented a little with some of the shapes from my discard pile.

As you’ll see, the two strands on the left are hung with the string pressed between two shapes, where the string on the right is hung with the string thread (threaded?) through the middle of the shapes after they’ve been glued back to back. Either way works (this is YOUR mobile, after all), but I will warn you that the process on the right was MUCH more difficult. But I’ll give you the steps for both processes and let you decide which route you want to take.

For both processes, I cut a long piece of white sewing thread to begin - make sure it’s plenty long so you can string all your shapes and have room to tie it to your stick. You can always cut some of it off, but you can’t add more.

I used white sewing thread because I knew I wanted something thin and not super obvious. Also, it was something I already had around the house so it was virtually free! You could use other types of string or thread, but I recommend not using anything too thick or your shapes won’t be able to be glued together.

For the process on the left I put glue on the back of one circle, placed the string in the center, and placed the other circle on top. I did this for the whole strand, being sure to leave space between each circle. Then put a book on top of the entire strand as I worked on the other strands. Each time I finished a strand I placed a book on top of it and let it dry like that for about an hour.

For the process on the right I glued two circles back to back and put a heavy book on top of them and let them dry. Once dry, I took a needle and poked a hole in the center of each pair. Then, I strung the circles, tying a knot after threading each one so it didn’t slide down the thread.

Not only does the second process take more time, but you also need a lot more shapes because you’re hanging them horizontally. If you’re really committed though, you could end up with something awesome like this:

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Step 5: Tie your strands to your support

I love wood tones, so for my mobile, I found a really cool branch to use as my support (note: branches are also free) that I cut down on my miter saw. If you wanted a circular mobile you could use an embroidery hoop instead, or a dowel rod for something less “natural”.

I love wood tones, so for my mobile, I found a really cool branch to use as my support (note: branches are also free) that I cut down on my miter saw. If you wanted a circular mobile you could use an embroidery hoop instead, or a dowel rod for something less “natural”.

Step 6: Hang your mobile, sit back, and enjoy

Okay, this is where I actually had to buy a couple of things.

To hang my mobile, I bought some twine and cut two pieces of the same length (one for each side). Then I looped it around each end of my branch several times until it hung at the height I wanted. Finally, I used a couple Command Strip hooks and hung the mobile from the ceiling. You could also use cup hooks, but I prefer Command Strips because I don’t have to patch a hole if I want to take them down later.

I love how the mobile turned out (and so does my little one!). I really enjoy sitting in her rocking chair with her and watching her watch the mobile as the strands slowly spin and sway with even the slightest breeze, revealing lots of different colors. Additionally, it brings me immense joy knowing I made something beautiful without breaking the bank!

The possibilities with this project are really expansive and you can put your own spin on it in so many different ways. I hope some of you will create your own mobiles while loosely following my steps and share your projects with me!

For more DIYs, check out these posts:

• DIY Spooky Halloween Wreath

• Build Your Own Trellis

• Easy Ways to Make Your Faux Plants Look Real

• DIY Cardboard House Luminaries

DIY Mobile with Paint Chips

5 Home Decor Trends I'm Loving in 2020

Hey all you cool cats and kittens!

Ya know… my brain told me not to say that and I should have listened. I regret my decision. I’m sorry.

ANYWAY, I’ve been spending a lot of time on Pinterest lately. Like, a lot more than usual. And I’m noticing some design trends that are really catching my eye. It’s very possible I’m behind the curve on these and most everyone already knows about them. But for those of you that don’t, in this post I’m going to talk about 5 trends I’m seeing a ton of right now that I’m really digging. Ready. Set. GO!

Cane/Rattan Furniture

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Caning is making a comeback, ya’ll!

You may not realize it at first glance, but furniture using caning fabric has been around for a loooong time. If you think way back, you may remember your parents and grandparents probably had furniture with caning in their homes. And this trend is even older than that!

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Look familiar?

But these days I’m seeing caning being used on more than just chairs. It’s popping up on the fronts of sideboards, on end tables, and even on headboards. And I’m really getting into it.

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As I mentioned in my post about designing my home office, I’m being drawn more toward lighter wood tones, and I’m seeing a lot of that paired with caned furniture lately. I love the airiness and the more casual feel the cane fabric brings to the pieces it’s incorporated into.

The problem I see with all the popularity springing up with caning? It’s not exactly cheap. However beautiful, much of this trendy furniture can be pricey. Luckily, there are tons of tutorials popping up that teach you how to DIY your own cane furniture. And I’m totally on board!

Another trend stemming from the same family that isn’t DIY-able is rattan. Similar to caning, rattan is a natural, plant-based product that brings the earthy/airy/bohemian vibes straight into your home.

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Rattan may even be more versatile than caning as I’m seeing it appear in even more places - headboards, light fixtures, chairs, daybeds, and this basket that I saw at IKEA and briefly considered putting on my head and running out of the store with.

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Velvet

Mmmm… velvet…

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While some folks don’t appreciate velvet (coughLUCIUScough), I think it’s a luxurious fabric and texture that can really step up a room’s game.

I’m noticing velvet more and more on couches and chairs (heck - I even bought a velvet chair for my office!), but it can also be used to add some drama and weight as curtains, or for a punch of color as a throw pillow. I’m really drawn to saturated jewel toned velvet fabric, but it’s versatile enough that you can easily find velvet items in more neutral tones too if you want to incorporate it more subtly.

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While velvet can seem like a weighty and dramatic textile, pairing it with lighter elements can help bring it down a notch and make it more casual. Don’t believe me? Just check out the juxtaposition of that beautiful emerald green velvet couch with the light and airy rattan coffee table below.

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Green Cabinetry

In recent years we’ve seen several varieties of kitchen cabinet styles, most popular being the classic all white, the formal tuxedo, and the more flirty pop of color on the island.

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But lately I’m seeing a more daring use of color where people are using various shades of earthy green tones on all their cabinets - and I love it so much I’m tempted to do it in my own home!

Yes, I know that hearing “green cabinets” sounds a little crazy but just check out these beauties:

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The green cabinet trend ranges from tones of soft greeny gray all the way to the other end of the spectrum to deep forest green and from the look of it you can’t go wrong with any shade.

Brass

In case you didn’t catch it, many of the cabinetry examples in the trend above feature brass hardware - because green and brass might just be a match made in heaven. But brass isn’t just appearing on cabinet pulls and knobs - it’s everywhere and it’s beautiful!

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I know brass was big back in the day and got pushed aside for more “trendy” finishes like brushed nickel or oil rubbed bronze. And don’t get me wrong, you can still incorporate those other metals into your home, but give brass a chance! It’s not the outdated finish you’re picturing from the 80’s anymore.

The brass of today is being used in everything from light fixtures, to curtain rods, to the legs of chairs (and beyond!) in updated and fresh ways. It’s even being combined with velvet!

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Unlike other metals, brass brings a warmth to the space. But don’t think it’s an “all or nothing” type of deal. You can use more than one type of metal in your home as long as you’re doing it with intention and each type of metal appears more than once in a space.

With that being said - give it a whirl! Buy a brass lamp or an end table with brass legs and see how you can make it work for you. I’ve already incorporated a little bit into our living room in my curtain rod and Lucius doesn’t know it yet but I’m not stopping there.

Macrame Plant Hangers

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Maybe it’s because everyone has been stuck in quarantine with nothing else to do or maybe this has been going on longer than I realize, but I’m noticing a major uptick in the amount of macrame plant hangers lately. Whatever the reason, I’m glad it’s happening.

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For someone who has little kids and cats, both of which like to eat and/or destroy plants, getting my plants out of reachable territory is a huge plus. Honestly, I don’t even have very many plants but seeing the beautiful designs made from these macrame hangers makes me want to fill every window.

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Aside from the gorgeousness of the hangers themselves, plants are so beautiful and add such a sense of warmth to your home - how could you not want a reason to add more?

Final Thoughts

So there you have it - a post full of home decor eye candy that makes me want to blow my savings and BUY ALL THE THINGS! I hope you enjoy oogling these trends as much as I do because thinking about these beauties and how to incorporate them into my home is the reason I can’t sleep at night, and misery loves company.

Related Home Decor Trend Posts

• Green Kitchen Cabinet Inspiration

• Color Blocking in Interior Design

Picking Exterior Paint Colors

The Easy, No Mess Way to Choose Exterior Paint Colors

I posted last week about how we majorly changed the appearance of the exterior of the flip house by limewashing it. While the outcome is a huge improvement from what we started with, it left the house pretty monochromatic and kinda blah. Well, now it’s time to shake things up by adding some color!

In this week’s post I’ll walk you through the different color options and combinations we considered, how we tried them out without actually painting a thing, and what we decided on in the end!

Testing paint colors without painting anything

Let me tell you, picking exterior paint colors is intimidating.

With interior paint you can at least limit the number of people that see if you pick a hideous color, but exterior paint isn’t so easy to hide.

Painting a flip added another layer of complexity because I couldn’t follow my normal loooooooong paint color choosing process of trying several different samples and staring at them at different times of the day. I work full-time and have two little kids so finding time to go to the flip can be tricky. Not only that, but we’re in the home stretch of wrapping this flip up and are trying to stay on schedule, so I didn’t have my normal “ho hum” thinking time.

All these factors got me to thinking, “How can I test colors without actually testing colors?” The answer was simple - photo editing software!

I haven’t used Photoshop in years and my skillz are definitely lacking. I didn’t want to waste time relearning how to use it, so I researched some other resources. One option I considered was the Sherwin-Williams Visualizer, which allows you to upload a photo and outline certain areas that you want to test colors on. It’s a good concept, but it was a little clunky. What I ended up using was Canva, which is a free graphic design software platform that I was already familiar with - yay!

To test different colors I simply took the “final” picture I posted last week of the limewashed house and pulled it into Canva. I then drew blocks over the areas we plan on painting, resized them, and went to town picking out tons of different color combinations.

The great big world of color possibilities

Before I jump into showing you all the colors we tried out, let’s refresh our memories of what the house looked like before and after the limewash…

Pretty big improvement, but as you can see, the house was looking a little flat so adding color was a MUST.

Here’s what the house looked like with our different tests:

My initial idea was to paint the front door coral, but painting the shutters to match was too intense. To tone it down I changed the colors to charcoal gray in one example and white in another. When Lucius saw the gray and the white options with the coral door he thought the house was still looking too monochrome. What a buzzkill.

But mark my words, I WILL get my coral door one day! You just wait….

Before I share the next color combo, let’s just take a moment to laugh at those ridiculous bushes. If you squint a little they look real-ish… right? This method of picking paint cracks me up with the combination of color blocking on top of real-life photos, but hey, it served its purpose and saved us time and money! Plus, it gave me some laughs.

In the next example, the pink door with blue was kinda fun, but I just wasn’t feeling it 100% for this house. I could see it working on a different house though!

I was pretty drawn to the red door below, but again, Lucius thought the white was too monochrome. Seriously guys. Buzz. Kill. I’m tellin’ ya.

Side note, in case you didn’t notice, I tested out some different, and equally realistic looking, landscaping below.

I actually really liked black/yellow/white combination in this picture, but I felt like it was a little busy with the other factors going on on the exterior of this house (the texture of the brick, the 3 different types of windows that unfortunately aren’t in the budget to replace) so I kept on testing!

I love teal so I couldn’t help but try a few combos with a couple of different shades of teal in the next few pictures.

So many options, and I didn’t even share all of them!

At this point I felt like I had enough examples so I ran them past Lucius and there was one mock-up that stood out from the rest for both of us.

And the winner is….

…..the example in the very last picture! But before we set anything in stone we continued to bounce some ideas off each other and made a few tweaks to get it juuuuuust right. Or, as right as it could be with color blocking.

First off, we decided to paint the door white and the things next to it (they’re not really sidelights - just pieces of wood) teal instead of the other way around. We also color blocked the window sills and liked how much it made them pop, so we’ll be painting those.

To make take it a step further and get it as close to the real thing as possible (plus, let’s get real, I was having fun playing around), I added some makeshift lights on either side of the door and updated the address numbers to something more modern.

Lastly, I made the doorknob and knocker oil rubbed bronze because apparently I didn’t get the memo that the doorknob wasn’t going to stay brass. The disgusted face Lucius gave me when I thought he was going to leave the brass doorknob was priceless though.

Testing the paint colors in this way wouldn’t work for every scenario. For instance, if you were using a picture with a bunch of stuff in the way or needed to color block a ton of areas it’d be a bit of a pain. But for this project it was the perfect way to sample lots of options.

Because I only had a few areas I’m painting and they’re simple shapes to outline, this method was really simple and it gave me the ability to let my mind run wild and try out tons of different possibilities that I would never have considered if I were testing the paint old school style.

I’ve actually started painting it already and IT LOOKS AMAZING!!! I want to share a sneak peek SO BAD, but I’m not going to juuuuuuuust yet.

We’re crazy close to being done with this property and when it’s complete (we’re shooting for a couple of weeks from now) I’ll be sure to post tons of pictures of the inside and out and even throw in a budget breakdown of what it all cost. Until then, I’m gonna go find something else to color block…

Related House Flipping Posts:

• We Bought Another House…

• How I Limewashed our Flip

• The Flip is Complete!

How to Choose Exterior Paint Colors Without Paint

How To Limewash Your Brick House

How I Limewashed our Flip

If you’ve read some of my previous posts, you may have come across the post where I wrote about the flip that we bought. In that post, I talked about painting our little brick flip house white. Well, I’m excited to say that now it IS white! But I didn’t end up painting it - I limewashed it!

What is limewash?

You may be asking yourself, “What the heck is limewash!?” Well, I’m here to fill you in!

At a high level, limewash is essentially crushed limestone that is combined with water to make a wash. It’s a method that’s been around for centuries. When applied to a porous surface (like brick), it creates a chalky, matte finish. In the picture above I’ve only applied one coat, but you can apply multiple coats for a more opaque finish.

How is that different from whitewash?

There are actually lots of differences between limewash and whitewash. Allow me to break it down for you.

• Going Green: First of all, limewash is environmentally friendly. In fact, it’s also mold-resistant, so once applied you shouldn’t have to worry about power washing that green fungus off the side of your house! On the flip side, whitewash is made with diluted water-based paint, which is pretty chemically and not so great for the environment.

• Permeability: Limewash penetrates the brick, which means it won’t peel with time whereas paint never truly soaks in and can peel and flake after a couple of years. Limewash will erode eventually, but it takes much longer and can actually end up making the brick look antique and even better. But if you don’t like how it looks once the limewash starts to wear off, you can always apply more on top.

• COST!: The ingredients for limewash are incredibly inexpensive. One 50-lb bag of hydrated lime cost us around $8. The only other ingredient is water.

• Color: Limewash really only comes in one color - white. You can add pigment, but I didn’t explore that option for our house and didn’t see a lot of “how to’s” out there so I’m not sure how tricky it is. Whitewash on the other hand can technically be done with any color of paint.

• Safety: Limewash is highly caustic and will burn you if it touches your bare skin. Paint on the other hand is… paint. No big deal.

Why did we choose limewashing over whitewashing?

Obviously, there are pros and cons to both limewashing and whitewashing. But how do you choose one method over the other? I think it’s really up to personal opinion. After hours of research, there were several big reasons that pushed me to give limewashing a try.

1. I knew I wanted the brick to be white, so color wasn’t an issue.

2. I really like the matte finish of limewashing. However, it’s worth noting that you can get a matte finish if you were to use flat paint for whitewashing.

3. I had never tried this method before, so it was definitely intriguing to try something new.

4. COST! Since this is a flip, we’re always focused on the budget. But even if it were my own house it’s just my nature to be sensitive to how much things cost.

5. And the biggest factor: permeability. Knowing that the limewash would stay on the surface of the brick for longer, and may even look better over time, was a big plus. Even though I won’t be living in this house, I want to do right by the person who eventually buys it, so the option with the proven longer-lasting result felt like the right way to go.

How did you do it?

Ah yes, the the fun part, where I give you a step-by-step first-hand experience as to how I limewashed our house! Here’s what you’ll need to get your limewashing on -

Materials

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• Hydrated lime
• Large paintbrush (mine was 4 inches)
• 5-gallon bucket
• Hose w/ spray nozzle
• Gloves
• Long sleeves
• Mask
• Safety goggles
• Long stir stick or drill with mixing paddle
• Nice weather - I know this isn’t really a “material”, but it’s super important for a nice finished product! Avoid weather that is too cold or too hot. You should also try to avoid applying your wash in direct sunlight (especially on hot days) as it can dry out too fast, or on overly humid days (which will slow down the drying process).

Step 1 - Preparation

When preparing to do any finish on the exterior of a home it’s important to get rid of any grime or dirt that could cause a barrier between your exterior surface and your paint/wash. Several days before I limewashed the house, Lucius took some time to power wash the exterior to get it so fresh and so clean, clean.

It would have been smart to remove the shutters before the power washing but, meh. You live, you learn (and now you have Alanis Morissette stuck in your head). Above is my father-in-law helping me with a tricky screw on the shutters before I got started limewashing.

Step 2 - Mixing your wash

The main ingredient for this project is hydrated lime. Everything I read makes it sound like this is available at any hardware store, but in my experience, it was crazy hard to find! I was thisclose to buying a bag off Amazon for a lot more when we finally found a store that carried the brand above.

When I say this project is cheap, I mean it. The entire 50 lb bag cost us less than $8! And although only the front facade of our house is brick, we barely made a dent in the bag.

As previously mentioned, lime is really caustic. The hydrated lime comes in a fine powder that gets EVERYWHERE so before you start mixing your wash cover yourself up! Throw on some pants, long sleeves, gloves, goggles, and a mask.

I don’t know why i felt the need to smile in this picture.

To mix your wash you need an 80/20 ratio - 80% water, 20% hydrated lime. I poured water and the hydrated lime in the correct proportions into a 5-gallon bucket until it was pretty full, then took my drill with the mixing paddle and mixed it up.

If you’re limewashing a whole house, several of the sources that I read talked about how it’s worthwhile to mix all your wash at once in a wheelbarrow so you have a consistent batch. You can mix batches as needed, but you run the risk of one batch being more opaque or transparent than the next. Since our house is small and only the front is brick, I didn’t think I’d need more than one small batch.

I don’t know why but I was anticipating it to be MUCH more difficult to mix. It was actually very easy and could be done with a long stir stick if needed. The most commonly used comparison I found when researching this process was that your final product should be the consistency of whole milk.

Step 3- Application

Changing the exterior of your house is pretty terrifying, especially with a process you’ve never done first-hand and that isn’t easily reversible if you dislike the end product. But let me tell you that limewash is insanely easy to apply!

To begin, wet the brick down with your hose. I recommend wetting it down in sections as you work your way around the house so it doesn’t dry before you get to it. Then, start at the top and work your way down in sections.

You can apply your limewash liberally, just take care not to drip a ton on any concrete or porous surfaces below that you don’t want limewashed. Depending on the look you’re going for, it’s not necessary to get in every nook and cranny.

Below is a quick little video I shot as I was applying the wash so you can see first-hand how easy this is.

As you can see, I wasn’t shy about loading up my brush and just slapping it on. I did try to avoid big drips on the lower bricks because I didn’t want them to dry before I could smooth them out, but even the inevitable drip here and there ended up being a nonissue.

Something good to know ahead of time - the wash goes on very transparent. Don’t let this scare you! I only did one coat on the whole house and as you can see in the picture below, as the wash dries it gets more opaque.

In fact, you can do multiple coats of the wash to create a completely opaque look.

This project is not only inexpensive and easy, but it’s pretty fast! Because you don’t have to be super precise with your wash (and if you’re going for an uneven look it’s even less important to apply wash to every square inch), this project only took me around 3 hours! Granted, only the front of our house is brick, an entirely brick house could be limewashed in a day or two, especially if multiple people were taking part in the limewashing party.

Admittedly, the house is looking pretty monotone right now, but have no fear! I’m deep in the brainstorming process of adding some pops of color and landscaping, which this house desperately needs.

We hope to finish up this flip in the next few weeks and I most definitely plan on sharing lots of photos when it’s all complete. Keep checking in so you can check out the final product!

Related Flip House Posts:

• We Bought Another House - Our Flip Kick-off Post

• Picking Exterior Paint Colors

• How (Not) to Stain Butcher Block

• The Flip is Complete!

How To Limewash Your Brick House

Mini mantel makeover

By now you’ve seen the lay of the land house and you’ve probably noticed the massive mantel we have on the brick wall in the living room. What you may have not noticed is that since we’ve moved in, we’ve actually made some updates to it.

When we moved in, we were greeted with this:

The picture above is from the listing so the furniture wasn’t actually there when we moved in, but it’s the only one I have with the shelves still there since we knocked them out the next day. I considered keeping them for about 5 seconds, then I thought about having to dust them and about little kids taking everything and anything off them and decided that taking them out would be better for our family, and for my sanity.

If there’s anything I’ve learned renovating our past houses, it’s that our family certainly favors function over form. There are tons of great décor ideas out there, and I can certainly appreciate the aesthetic, but if it’s going to require me to dust more stuff or constantly worry that a kid is going to destroy it, it’s not for me. These shelves just weren’t functional for us, so out they came! Not only that, but I also felt like they were pretty busy considering they were in front of a brick wall.

Once we removed the shelves, we realized there was a charming little wood storage area built into the brick that was previously boarded up. WHO IN THEIR RIGHT MIND WOULD COVER THAT UP!?

Once we got settled, we lived with the mantel as shown above for a few months, but during that time Lucius was spending most of his freetime walking around the room convinced he could feel a draft. Seriously, he would be in the middle of talking, stop, and run his hands over the mantel and exclaim, “Come here, don’t you feel a draft!?” I thought he was a little nuts.

Okay, I might have felt a little draft too, but he still looked crazy.

To stop the insanity, I went along with Lucius’ plan to take the mantel apart and try to seal whatever was letting in a draft. And what we found when we popped the front of the mantel off was…

…another mantel!

It’s hard to tell in the picture above, but the mantel underneath was a little rough and definitely uneven. It also wasn’t as deep as the old mantel, so putting things on it would have been tricky. Therefore, once we filled the gaps (yes, there were actually some gaps seeping cold air), we opted to put the mantel back together.

However, if you scroll up a couple of photos you’ll notice the narrow strips of wood on the old mantel facade. I felt like these were a little busy (like the shelves), unnecessary, and more farmhouse chic than I could handle, so I was happy to take them off for good.

Sidenote, in the picture above you’ll also notice that the previous owners didn’t carry the German smear to the brick behind their TV! I’m not quite sure how to update that area so it blends nicely yet, but it haunts me daily.

Once we put the solid piece of wood back on the face of the mantel, I had to fill nail holes, prime and paint. Then I put all my decor back.

After living with the mantel as seen above for several months it was starting to feel a little busy, like all the decor items from the ends of the mantel were creeping towards the TV. Plus, I really needed to dust up there so that was good incentive by itself to pull everything down.

I started by taking everything I could off the mantel - but there were a couple of items that had to stay. The Google Home lives up there and luckily is inconspicuous enough for me not to mind too much. The lamp unfortunately also has to stay on the mantel for now. I plan to replace it with a floor lamp when I start focusing more on this room but we have (many) other areas of the house we’re working on at the moment.

Next, I shopped around my own house and gathered all my decor items from the mantel and the haphazardly designed bookshelves in the playroom.

I call this look: Unpack all the boxes and put stuff wherever it fits

Actually, that’s a good tip - if you ever want to refresh your decor, shopping around your own house is a great way to start. Sometimes taking something from one room and putting it in another can completely transform how the space/the item looks or feels. Also, it’s a good activity to keep yourself busy during quarantine that doesn’t involve spending any money or leaving the house! #winwin

Since I knew I had to keep the lamp on the mantel, I needed to find a way to balance it on the opposite end with something with the same visual height and weight. Here was my first attempt:

I felt like I was on the right track, but it still seemed a little more cluttered than what I was hoping for. I did, however, really like the introduction of the plants on either end of the mantel so I knew I wanted to work those into the end product. One note - if you don’t have identical items to put on either end of your mantel, don’t stress! It’s certainly not a requirement for each end to be symmetrical and would actually be kind of boring.

I realize the change from the previous set up is pretty subtle, and that’s because I didn’t change a whole lot. Really this is just an experiment in seeing what works and what feels the best to you. I was still feeling a little bit of that creep going on with this set up, so I tweaked it one more time.

And this is the set-up I ultimately landed on, except I switched the tan colored items at a day or so later. I like this one the most in how the larger picture echoes the height and the contrasting colors of the lamp. Obviously I have my little plants up there and then I threw in a rock and a box in a similar tone/shape to mirror one another. Lastly, I put a small candle on the left-hand side of the mantel to balance out the Google Home.

As for the leftover decor items…

The bookshelves in the playroom got a little makeover too!

Admittedly, these bookshelves don’t look how I would ideally want them to, but I’m definitely restricted with how much I can put on each shelf since they’re glass. Plus, there’s still those stupid mirrors on the back that make them look busier than they are. Once we update the built-ins and remove the glass I’ll be able to add some books and really style these the way I’d like. But at least for now they’re looking better than they did before.

So here we are, after a pretty quick, easy, inexpensive update we have our updated and, more importantly, SIMPLIFIED mantel so we can focus more on all that glorious, glorious brick and that amazing fireplace.

Related Mantel Decor Posts

• Halloween Mantel Decor on a Budget

• DIY Bunting - an Easy, No-Sew Tutorial

• How to Reuse Your Halloween Decor for Fall

• DIY Cardboard House Luminaries - Perfect for Mantel Decor!

Designing a Home Office

How I Designed My Home Office

I mentioned in our house tour that I, like many people these days, have been working from home. During this time, the living room has been my office. (Picture me sitting on the couch in my sweatpants with a cozy blanket and my laptop.)

Well, before COVID-19 when I was only working from home a couple days a week, the couch worked just fine. But once I got the call that I’d be working from home consistently for who knows how long, Lucius suggested I get a desk and set up an office in our previously empty spare room. I was on board right away. Not only because by the end of the day working from the couch I usually feel pretty gross and lazy, but Lucius telling me to buy house stuff? Okay!

I’m the type of person who likes to do lots of research before I commit to anything. I like to know what I’m getting myself into and I like to avoid the unexpected when at all possible. So I figured since I’m starting at ground zero for this project, why not take you guys along as I plan out my home office?

In this post (and subsequent posts on this subject, since I’m just in the beginning stages of this room makeover) I’ll give you a sense of how I tackle a room and walk you through my overall design thought process start to finish.

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Finding your inspiration

I never really thought I’d need a home office, so until recently I hadn’t given much consideration as to how I would want it to look if I were to create one. But now that it was actually happening, my mind was buzzing with possibilities.

One of the biggest pieces of advice I can give is when you’re starting to design a room, don’t overthink it. This can be hard advice to follow, especially if you’re like me and tend to overthink just about everything. But when designing a room I try to force myself to let one thing be my inspiration and build on that, otherwise you can get really overwhelmed really fast.

For this room, the biggest necessity was of course a desk and a chair, so that’s where I started, but really ANYTHING can be your inspiration - it doesn’t have to be a big piece of furniture or the color you plan to paint your room. It CAN be those things, but your inspiration could also be something as simple as a vase or a painting that you like.

Since this room was empty to begin with, using the immediate necessities as my inspiration was the most logical choice for me.

I knew my minimum requirements were to have a desk that fit my computer and all my stuff and a chair that I could comfortably curl up in. (Even when I work in the office at work I tend to sit cross-legged in my chair, so I certainly wouldn’t expect anything different at home.)

Being the cheap budget-conscious person that I am, I started looking at desks and chairs on Facebook Marketplace. I use Marketplace a lot like I use Pinterest to organize my thoughts. I saved everything that was intriguing and then looked at them as a group. This helped me figure out the style I was most attracted to for these staple items and I highly recommend using this technique to figure out your style, too.

Here’s how you do it: hop on Pinterest, search for the item you’re after, and pin anything that looks even remotely interesting to the same board. Once you’re done pinning, look at your board as a whole and you should start to notice some recurring themes/trends. You can take it a step further and either delete anything that doesn’t fit into the general theme or create a second board and pin your favorite items to that. Then go searching in real life for items similar to what you were most drawn to!

When I looked at all my saved items, I noticed I was saving a lot of light colored desks and velvet jewel-toned desk chairs so I figured that was where my head was at and I ran with it.

Because I have commitment issues, I continued to brainstorm options to make sure I was buying exactly what I wanted. We ended up taking a trip to IKEA to see what they had available too. This trip was a great way to also figure out what size desk felt best by sitting down and “testing” out several options.

I was most drawn to the Hilver desk and I was really considering pairing it with the Ekero armchair.

We almost bought them, except we didn’t have enough room in the car with both kids. We figured Lucius would just have to take a quick trip back the next day.

This was actually a blessing in disguise because I wasn’t 100% sold on either of those items. The desk felt a little too much like a table and I was concerned with the chair being difficult to move in and out since it didn’t have wheels. There were actual desk chairs at IKEA, but I wasn’t really in love with the look of any of them.

As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases. This post may contain affiliate links, meaning I receive commissions for purchases made through those links, at no cost to you.

When we got home I hopped online and started shopping some more, ya know, just to see what was out there. Now that I had a pretty good idea of what I should expect to spend, I ended up finding a desk and chair that I liked the look and feel of a lot more than what I found elsewhere.

One of the most exciting things about designing this room is that the only person I have to think of is myself! Normally I’m trying to design a room with Lucius in mind too so I have to be a little more thoughtful in some of my choices. It’s not very often that I get to run uninhibited with my ideas. With that being said, I totally bought a pink velvet chair AND I LOVE HOW IT LOOKS!

Building on your inspiration

For the past month or so (I’m losing track of my days at this point so it could be longer) I’ve been working in my new office. It’s still lacking quite a bit considering all I’ve done so far is bought the necessary furniture, stole a lamp from our bedroom, threw down an area rug, and hung a mirror I had lying around.

But of course I’ve been daydreaming and planning like crazy! Now that I have my staple items, my wheels are really turning.

My next tip: once you have your main source of inspiration, use that to drive your design. You can pull colors or patterns from your inspiration piece and use them elsewhere in the room. You can look on Pinterest for rooms with similar items as your inspiration piece(s) and create a board to pin images that get you excited and pull ideas from there. You might even realize that what you thought was your original inspiration shifts to something else once you start building up some reference images.

Here are my thoughts for this room…

Maybe it was the trip to IKEA, but I picture this room being somewhat Scandinavian design inspired: bright and airy, small bursts of color, natural wood tones, clean lines. I already had the desk with wood tones and the chair with my burst of color, so I was on the right track. Below are examples of some inspiration photos.

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But I also want a little more dimension and excitement in the room than what you see above. I considered doing wallpaper in here but I’d like to save that for the nursery once I get to updating that room. And if you haven’t noticed, I really like trying new/different wall treatments so in this room I’m going to draw a pattern with Sharpie paint pens!

I’ve been obsessed with the pattern below lately. It’s a little bit art-deco but I think I can make it work with the Scandinavian-inspired elements.

My plan as of right now is to paint the walls a light gray/off-white color and draw the pattern on the wall that my desk is facing using a gold paint pen. The design could end up being too in your face if it were black or high contrast compared to the wall color, so I think the gold paint pen with the light colored paint will help make the pattern more subtle.

Below is an awesome example of a Sharpie paint pen wall using the gold pen and a really cool design.

I have a strange addiction to mindless, tedious tasks (painting rooms, peeling wallpaper), so this undertaking doesn’t scare me in the least. In college I even created a conceptual art piece where I made a tally on a piece of wood for every dollar I owed in student loans!

This represents one student loan. I actually made one for each of my loans! Apologies for the terrible photo. And yes, it currently lives in my garage because I graduated college years ago and don’t know what to do with it but can’t seem to throw it away.

The point being, if I’m feeling really crazy I might even draw on all the walls! We’ll see how difficult it is and how much I like the design.

Since the desk has some strong lines in it and the wall pattern is very geometric, I’d like to switch out the current mirror with a simple round mirror. I’ve been stalking this one at IKEA for a while now.

I whisper sweet nothings to it every time I pass it in the store.

I think the circular shape of the mirror will really help soften up some of those hard lines and tie in nicely with the softness of the chair. Plus, it has more of the wood that I’d like to pull into the room.

I’ll also need a new desk lamp so I can put the one I’m currently using back in our bedroom. Here I might introduce some more natural materials like stone or at least go with a softer, rounder silhouette for the lamp. Here are a few ideas:

Rounding out the room

Now that I have my office space somewhat planned out, there’s a whole other two-thirds of the room to consider! We planned on turning this into a guest room originally and I’m confident this space can still serve that purpose. It’s just a matter of working it into the overall design.

Obviously to make this into a guest room we’ll need a bed.

The natural wall where you’d place the bed is actually where I’m setting up my desk area. I could put my desk elsewhere in the room, but I figured since this will primarily be used as my office I should make it the most inviting space possible for me - and this wall gets the most light and has the best view. With that being determined, I have to rethink the bedroom portion of the room.

I think a normal bed might be a little awkward in the space available, but a daybed or stylish sofa bed could work! Apparently I’m pretty into jewel-toned velvet right now in general, because I’m really feeling this sofa bed:

I’ll also likely bring some end tables, maybe a footstool, and a dresser into this room. I’ve been thinking about stealing the dresser from the nursery and putting it in this room instead too.

I picked this dresser up from a thrift store years ago and refurbished it. I love it, but it can be difficult to open and I figure once our younger daughter will want to start dressing herself she’s going to have a heck of a time getting to her clothes. Plus, I think this dresser will fit nicely in the spare room both in style and function.

In a perfect world this room would have hardwood floors and I would have an awesome area rug in place of the carpet that’s in there currently. Replacing the flooring in the house is pretty far down the line, so for now I’ll just keep dreaming of what’s to come. I’m picturing a natural fiber rug, but I could be swayed for something with a design…. don’t even get me started on rugs. I’ll go down a rabbit hole I might never come out of.

Finishing touches

Of course the room wouldn’t be complete without some artwork on the walls and just some general decor items so I’ll be sure to add those once I get to that point. In the meantime, I have one last piece of advice: be comfortable changing your plans.

I find that a lot of times when I’m updating a room I’ll think I’m in love with an item I’m planning on buying or an idea I’d like to run with but once I make other updates it just doesn’t make sense in the space anymore. And that’s okay!

We’re not perfect and you can’t expect to get it right on the first try. I’m sure some of the things I’ve shared in this post won’t make it in the final room. Flexibility is key to winding up with an end product that flows. And at the end of the day, the point is to make yourself happy and to create a space that you love.

Related Office Design Posts

• DIY Sharpie Accent Wall Tutorial

• How to Choose the Right Size Lamp (Every Time!)

• Tropical-Inspired Office Redesign

How I Designed My Home Office

The 1927 American Foursquare

How We Modernized Our 100-year-old Home

As I’ve mentioned before, we’ve only lived in our current house since October 2019. Our move was pretty sudden and unexpected.

We actually hadn’t planned on moving from our previous house… ever. Seriously. A couple of months after we decided to make our former house our “forever home”, we had to majorly shift gears and start looking for a new house.

The decision to list our house was made on a Sunday night and we had it listed the following Wednesday. The first day our house was on the market we had 10 showings and 3 offers! I barely had time to clean, let alone style and declutter the house the way I would have preferred.

We put our house on the market and moved so quickly after announcing to our family and friends that we were going to make that our forever home, that I think we left many of them baffled as to the sudden change. Most people didn’t get a chance to even see the listing – let alone how the house looked when it was complete. So I’d like to take the opportunity now to show the before and afters and give those who know us personally, and those who don’t, a peek at how we modernized our 1927 American Foursquare, while still keeping its charm.

As a side note - if you love checking out old houses like I do, I highly recommend the Instagram account Cheap Old Houses where they highlight old houses across the country, typically for sale under $100k. I also wrote a post where I got the opportunity to tour a gorgeous historical Victorian mansion (built in 1901!). Now, let’s get into this house tour!

The exterior

We actually didn’t do much to the exterior of our old house. I would never paint the brick on a historic house like this, but we did want/need to repaint the shutters and window sills.

I love the symmetry and functionality of the exterior of this house. On all four sides of the house, there’s an exterior door leading to some sort of functional outside area. For instance, the front door leads to that amazing porch. Unfortunately, it took me almost two years to buy a porch swing because I’m cheap… and then we moved a few months later. It got a lot of use during that time, though!

In the driveway the side door leads to a carport, on the back of the house the door leads to a patio, and on the opposite side of the house from the driveway there’s a screened-in sun porch. There’s even a balcony over the sun porch which you get to through the master bedroom!

If you’ll notice in the pictures above, the last one is taken from the balcony overlooking some sad looking grass (and a pretty awesome sunset). Here, I’ll post it below so don’t have to go searching:

When we bought the house, our property ended at the treeline you see above. About a week after we moved in, the house that once lived in that empty space of land beyond the treeline was demolished and by today’s standards it was too small to build a new structure. It just so happened that the next door neighbor of that house owned it.

So last summer when we decided to make this our forever home we bought it from him, planning on putting up a retaining wall, a fence, adding a pool, and pretty much making the yard into an oasis. Obviously those plans didn’t work out, but we did sell the land with the house so at least we don’t still own a random plot of land!

The foyer

Check out all that sweet, sweet wallpaper. And it didn’t stop here! There was wallpaper in every single room of this house (bathrooms and kitchen included) when we moved in with the exception of ONE bedroom. Also, apologies for the creepy looking child in the picture of the stairs.

By the time we left, I had removed all the wallpaper! So I definitely meant it when I said I’ve had my fair share of stripping wallpaper. This house was a doozy!

Aside from stripping wallpaper in the foyer and painting it with my favorite neutral (Villa Grey by Valspar), we pulled the carpet off the stairs. I planned on refinishing them, and actually started experimenting with how much effort they would be to sand down to the bare wood, but soon after I got pregnant with our younger daughter and had to put that project on hold. And then we moved a few months after she was born.

While I was on maternity leave with her I did manage to paint all the trim in the foyer and the upstairs hallway though.

The half bath

I debated not sharing this room because it didn’t have any sort of real transformation, but decided to go ahead and show it anyway because, why not?

I liked to call this the Harry Potter bathroom because it’s under the staircase on the main floor. It’s super tiny and Lucius, being a rather large fella at 6’1’’, could barely fit.

I had big dreams for this tiny space that I would have loved to see to fruition. I pictured doing something bold and unexpected in here, like painting it a strong jewel-toned color. I even considered (gasp) WALLPAPER. Hey - just because I tend to strip wallpaper in every house I live in doesn’t mean I don’t like it. It just needs to be the right pattern and style.

I also planned on replacing pretty much everything else in this room - the vanity, mirror, toilet, light fixture. All of it.

Unfortunately, the most I was able to tackle in this room was stripping the wallpaper and potty training a toddler. Hence the M&M’s & Reese’s Pieces (for bribery, of course).

The living room

We were so excited after we closed on this house that we drove straight from the closing to the house and ripped up the carpet in the living room. Aside from removing the carpet, we also stripped the wallpaper/painted, replaced the sun porch door, replaced three windows, and whitewashed the fireplace.

Thankfully this was the easiest room in the whole house to de-wallpaper because it’s also the biggest. The wallpaper actually came off in full-sized floor-to-ceiling sheets. We literally just pulled them off by hand (no steamer, no wallpaper goo) in about an hour.

The sun porch door was old and drafty so we replaced that pretty early on. The windows throughout the whole house were original and also so, so drafty and noisy so we started replacing some of those before we moved. We ended up replacing 6 windows in the whole house. Three of them happened to be in this room.

Since this house is by a pretty busy intersection, every time someone playing loud music would stop at the stoplight nearby we’d hear the windows vibrate. Also, most of them didn’t open so strategically replacing them gave us the ability to let some fresh air flow through the house! Also, you know, fire safety…

Lucius taught himself how to install windows and reframed the windows in the first picture above at least 3 times… without consulting with me first. Seriously. I walked downstairs one day and there was a gaping hole in my living room. And no, that isn’t the first time something like that has happened (and I’m sure it won’t be the last).

The dining room

Oddly enough, the dining room ended up being one of my favorite finished rooms in the house by the time we left.

In this room we, once again, stripped the wallpaper and painted the trim. We also removed the chair rail and I took my first stab at scraping a popcorn ceiling (which is actually really easy)!

Lucius really hated the light fixture, but once I redecorated the room I felt like it actually fit in the space pretty well and I managed to procrastinate replacing it until it was too late and we moved. Luckily, the new owners like it too!

You know how they say styles always come back around? The light fixture in this room is a great example of this. The use of gold tones are really popular right now, and I’m seeing sputnik lights pop up all over the place. In a way this light has kind of a sputnik-style to it, while still being pretty traditional. If you don’t know what a sputnik light is - check out the picture below.

The story of the dining room table is actually pretty interesting, too. The previous owner was elderly and was moving to a retirement home, so his family was auctioning off all of the furniture in the house. Someone at the auction was bidding up the table just for fun, then decided at the end of it all they didn’t want it.

The owner’s children, who showed us the house, remembered me commenting on the table during our showing and called Lucius to see if we wanted to buy it. They sold it to us really really cheap, considering that it’s such a large table (it has SIX leaves!). And we learned that the table is actually older than the house, which I thought was pretty cool.

It didn’t feel right to take the table with us since it had lived there for so long, so we sold it with the house and I have no regrets. It just belongs there.

You can also see the buffet table I talked about in our dining room renovation kick-off post and how it just doesn’t work in our current house. Maybe I should have just left that, too.

The kitchen

Whyyyyy with the carpet!? Seriously.

And the surprising thing is, this isn’t the first house I’ve lived in with carpet in the kitchen. Gross.

In this room I, you guessed it, stripped the wallpaper! I also painted the trim, the ceiling, and the walls. Can we just assume that’s a given from here on out? Because I made those updates in just about every room.

Aside from the above, we tore out the carpet in here and replaced it with some rolled laminate. It definitely wasn’t the nicest or most expensive stuff, but we assumed it was going to be a temporary fix that would be replaced with something nicer, like tile, down the road. It at least got us through a couple of carpet-free years and gave the new owners a cleaner slate to start with.

We also replaced the hardware on the cabinets, the appliances, the two side-by-side windows, updated the light fixture, made a chalkboard area, and exposed the brick chimney, because I love me some exposed brick. And Lucius loves destroying things.

The upstairs hallway

Unfortunately the only “after” picture I have of the upstairs hallway is from one end, but I think you get the gist.

Oddly enough, the foyer and this upstairs hallway are what really sold me on the house. I was actually on the fence when Lucius started talking seriously about wanting to buy it, but there was something about these spaces that really drew me in.

In the picture above, the little bench at the end of the hallway is actually one of my favorite elements to this house - a laundry chute to the basement! Man, that definitely came in handy. Though we often joked about adding a pulley system to bring the laundry back up two flights of stairs that never did happen.

Aside from the aforementioned list of updates, we also replaced all the door knobs to the bedrooms after I got trapped in the master bedroom one day.

And just for fun, here’s a not-scary-at-all shot of me stripping wallpaper over the staircase:

Cool as a cucumber…

The bathroom

Like the half bath on the first floor, I considered not sharing this bathroom either because it wasn’t even a little bit close to the finished product when we moved. But, I’d like to be honest and transparent in this blog and sometimes things just don’t work out the way you want them to in the end.

For a long time we called this bathroom “The Smoker’s Lounge” because of its beige and burgundy color scheme. It just felt old and dingy like someone back in the day spent a lot of time smoking cigars in there.

We started to remodel this room little by little, first replacing the shower with a bathtub. We moved into this house with an 1.5 year old and bathing her in a portable baby tub just wasn’t cutting it. That update required us to replace the cupboards next to the shower stall because the tub wasn’t the same proportions as the shower stall.

After we stripped the wallpaper, popped off the tiles on the bottom 2/3rds of the wall, and painted, we ran into a ton of issues with the plaster cracking. We were so sick of trying to patch and smooth this room that we decided (before we made the decision to move) that we would gut this room and start from scratch during the coming winter… then of course we moved and none of that happened and when we left the bathroom looked like this:

It was certainly an improvement from where we started, but definitely a far cry from where we wanted it to be.

The office

Let’s start the tour of the bedrooms with the least exciting one: the office. This was the only room in the house we didn’t really touch before we moved, aside from removing the carpet and the shutters.

Fun note: this was also the only room in the house that didn’t have any wallpaper.

The master bedroom

This room was pretty overwhelming to look at when we moved in, but it was surprisingly easy to update, even with two layers of wallpaper.

Can you imagine how it used to look with that green/yellow wallpaper!?

In the end, the updates made the room feel so much lighter and airier.

Our older daughter’s room

I actually didn’t mind the wallpaper in this room - most likely because we knew it was going to be our daughter’s room and the floral wallpaper was dainty and cute. But I got the itch about a year after we moved in to do something fun in here so I took a week off work and tackled this room and the nursery, because that’s my idea of a good time.

The area rugs were actually left by the previous owners and fit perfectly into the color scheme so I kept them. I wish I had a chance to switch out the light fixture before we moved, but whaddyagonnado?

The nursery

This is another room that we ripped the carpet out of as soon as we closed on the house, so in the pictures above it’s already gone. For being one of the smallest rooms in the house, this one took the most time to de-wallpaper. There were two stubborn layers of wallpaper on the walls and even some sort of wallpaper backing under the popcorn ceiling! By the end of it, my shoulders were lookin’ gooooood.

The color inspiration for this room stemmed from the fact that Lucius told me I was being a wimp using so many light colors in the house, which caused me to have an “I’ll show you!” moment. And I’m so glad I did because I loved the dark teal so much I want to paint it everywhere now.

There’s a lot of fear in using dark colors, and although I’m still choosy on where I use them, painting this room a dark color gave me a lot of confidence. It didn’t make the space feel small at all and brought a neat kind of drama to the space.

What you can’t see

Although I showed a majority of the house, it also has a full basement and a walk-up attic that I, unfortunately, don’t have pictures of.

When we moved in, the basement was finished but old, dark, and musty. It had dark paneling everywhere and forest green carpet. We ended up tearing everything out and it’s a good thing we did because we discovered that there was water gradually seeping in every time it rained. Interestingly, we also uncovered an old root cellar behind the paneling that we turned into an unfinished storage area. The previous owners had no idea it was there!

The attic is actually a pretty cool space with a lot of potential. Most of it is usable space, though unfinished, with enough headroom for even Lucius to walk around. It’s a walk-up attic that you access through a door in the upstairs hallway. I had visions of turning it into the ultimate kids’ playroom someday, but again, the whole moving thing got in the way.

Lastly, one major renovation you can’t really see is the HVAC. We ended up replacing the furnace and air conditioner and having the venting rerouted for efficiency. Spending money on those types of updates is always a little hard to swallow because you don’t get that visual gratification, but it was definitely worth it when temperatures dipped or soared.

A happy ending

Lucius and I had a blast renovating this house and we learned so much along the way. A super common reaction I heard when word got out that we were moving was along the lines of, “But you put so much work into it!”

Yes, we did put a ton of work into the house, but when we bought it, and for much of the time we lived there, we didn’t expect to stay long-term. We renovated it because it’s what we enjoy doing.

In the end, I definitely ended up falling in love with the house and it was hard to leave. But finding the silver lining: moving to a new house is giving us an opportunity to flex our reno muscles again on a new project and gave me the motivation to start this blog!

Related Posts With Before and After Pictures

• 8 Big Projects We Worked on in 2020

• The Flip is Complete!

• Target Accent Cabinet Makeover - with Cane Webbing!

• Tropical-Inspired Office Redesign

Historic House Tour: Before and After

How to Paint an Ombre Wall in 5 Easy Steps

Unlike most people, I love painting. I love it so much I got my BFA in painting - true story! Not only do I love painting paintings, I also love painting rooms. I love the process of turning my mind off, getting in the zone, and drastically changing the look of a room in just a few hours with a gallon or two of paint. Let’s be honest - some of that might be the paint fumes talking.

Although it’s not appropriate in all rooms, I love trying new things with paint. Whether it’s adding a simple accent wall that’s a couple shades darker than the main color or painting a room a bold, dark, moody teal to creating a stencil to make a design or (in my most recent room makeover) painting an ombre wall.

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As I mentioned in this post, once I got sucked into the world of ombre walls on Pinterest, I knew I had to give it a try. Ombre walls are definitely trending right now, and as with any trend there’s always the fear that it’ll go out of style. You know another thing I love about paint? It’s SO easy to change if that happens! Plus, I figured if I could pull it off, it would look amazing. So off I went!

I was so excited to work on our daughter’s room and take it from the dark, light-sucking blue/gray we inherited to something bright and girly.

This is our daughter’s room from the listing photo. It worked for the teenage boy who resided here, but for a four-year-old girl? No way.

Picking a color

For some reason I couldn’t shake the idea of using pink and teal in this room, so then it was just a matter of picking the exact paint colors.

I love to hang out in the paint section at Lowe’s. I take so many paint chips that I might just single-handedly keep someone in a job constantly restocking them. I actually created our younger daughter’s mobile with paint chips I collected over time and for some reason felt the need to keep. (You can check out how I made the mobile HERE.)

This project was no different. I headed over to Lowe’s and grabbed a whole bunch of colors in the family I was thinking of and taped them to the wall.

Then I let them hang out there until I got a chance to paint a few weeks later. Sometimes my paint chips only stay up for a day or two, but typically it’s much longer. I’ve had paint swatches on our living room wall for a few months, with no real timeline of taking them down. I actually like to leave them up so I can see how they look in all different sorts of light.

In the end, for this project, I went with the lightest shade of blue on the first blue swatch on the left (Tame Teal by Sherwin Williams) and the middle shade of coral in the first swatch in the second row (Coral Mist by Valspar).

Usually, once I decide on a color, I get a sample container of paint and paint big swatches on several different walls. Then I let it hang out for at least a couple of days to once again see how it looks in different light. I can be very indecisive, and paint colors can change drastically during different times of day, so I feel like these steps help me to be sure in my decision and not waste money on paint.

A gallon of paint isn’t that expensive, but it can definitely add up if you keep repainting because you don’t like the color you chose! Those little sample paint containers are only around $5 each and are well worth it if it helps you commit to a color. I know I said I love painting, but that doesn’t mean I want to paint the same wall over and over again.

In this room, I actually felt confident in my paint choice just by looking at the paint chips and didn’t end up following my own rules. I just grabbed a couple of gallons and went to town!

The Process

I painted all the solid walls first since those were run-of-the-mill and straightforward. Then it was a matter of painting the ombre wall.

I researched a lot of different tutorials and used the steps that I thought would work best. The step-by-step process is below including what I wish I had done differently.

One quick note - if you want a smooth transition from color to color, you have to work FAST. This can be intimidating. I pictured myself breaking a nervous sweat trying not to mess up the wall, but honestly, once I got started I just went with the flow and I love how it turned out.

1. Start by making light marks on the wall where you want your colors to transition.

2. Grab 3 paint trays and 3 rollers. Pour one color into one paint tray and the other color into another. In the third paint tray, pour equal amounts of both colors.

   Make sure you mix enough of the combined color so you don’t have to mix more partway through (working quickly is the name of the game here), and so you don’t risk your new mixture mismatching the original.

3. Then, paint your color of choice on the bottom and the top. Since the goal is to have a smooth transition from one color to the next, don’t worry about taping anything off or painting a harsh line where the colors change.

4. Apply the mixed paint to the middle section of your wall, blurring the dividing line of color.

5. Using the roller you applied your mixed paint with, lightly dip your roller into the color on the top of the wall and start to soften the transition. Now do the same with the color on the bottom of the wall.

The most difficult part of this project, that no tutorial seemed to talk about, was what to do with the edges of the wall. Since your roller can’t get all the way to the edge, I used a brush to blend as well as I could. If you’re not good at cutting-in edges, apply painter’s tape to the adjoining walls before you begin.

And there you have it - how to paint an ombre wall. If you’d like to paint one in your house, I say, give it a try! It’s only paint, after all. If it turns out poorly, you can always paint over it. Easy peasy. Below is a list of supplies to help you get your ombre on. Enjoy!

Supply list

• 3 paint trays

• 3 rollers

• 1 paint brush

• painter’s tape

• 2 gallons of paint (1 of each color) - this should be more than enough for one wall and you’ll have a lot of extra, but a quart won’t quite be enough.

Let the dining room renovation begin!

Now that you’ve seen the house tour, you probably noticed our bright, froofy (I think I made that word up, but it fits so I’m sticking with it), and out of place dining room.

By itself, this room admittedly didn’t look terrible. With the right decor (and some squinting) I could see it working. However, it certainly wasn’t our style.

Before we moved in I was bound and determined to tackle this room first because it felt so out of place with the rest of the house. But then we moved in and other rooms took priority, like repainting the loft, repainting the foyer/upstairs landing, and making over our daughter’s room.

Stripping wallpaper and patching walls

Over the last couple of weeks I’ve been sitting on the couch in our living room while I’ve been working from home (#thankscoronavirus), which conveniently faces the doorway to the dining room. Every day I’ve been staring and glaring at that awful yellow and one day I blacked out. When I came to, I discovered someone had ripped the paint off the walls!

Who would do such a thing!? Even the T-rex is appalled.

Just kidding. It was totally me.

Now, you may be thinking, “What the heck? How did you rip the paint off the wall?” Well, let me tell you.

We originally thought the walls were painted with a yellow texture and we just had the red border above the chair rail to remove. I was pretty pumped because although I’m an odd duck and actually like stripping wallpaper, I got my fill of it in our last house where there was wallpaper in literally every room (kitchen and bathrooms included!). Buuuut a little while after moving in we noticed swirls under the paint and wallpaper seams… indicating that the previous owners had PAINTED OVER WALLPAPER. Please, for the sanity of whoever moves in after you, don’t do this.

Since by this point I had accepted the fact that the wallpaper had to go, I let my curiosity get the best of me. I found a spot where I had removed a drywall hanger that looked like I could get a grip on some of the paint, so I picked at it until this happened:

And this was where I realized I reached a point of no return and just kept on picking. Seriously. I picked and pulled and peeled almost all the paint off this wall by hand because I simply love to pick at things and couldn’t stop myself. And once I got most the paint off, I started picking at the wallpaper too. Guys, I think I have a problem.

The next day we pulled off the chair rail as well as the crown molding. The chair rail was never in my grand plan to stay, but I do want to put crown molding back up. I’ll explain why we took it down a little later.

And of course under the chair rail and the crown molding there were two more layers of wallpaper!

Right about here is where I broke out my wallpaper steamer and went to town, stupidly thinking that I could get all the wallpaper off in a few hours and have the nicks and inconsistencies on the walls patched by the end of the weekend.

Also, like the excellent blogger that I am, I completely forgot to document the process of stripping wallpaper, so I’ll write a separate post about how to do that another time. Get ready to be enthralled.

Jumping ahead, here are some pictures of the room partially stripped of wallpaper:

On the the right-hand side of the doorway in the picture above you’ll notice the wall is looking pretty rough. I discovered while trying to strip the wallpaper that it had already been removed on this part of the wall. My assumption is that the previous owners started stripping the wallpaper in this section, realized it was going to be a pain, and decided to paint over the rest of it. So essentially on this section of wall I stripped the paint off with a wallpaper steamer and ended up gouging the bajeezus out of it and pulling up big sections of the drywall paper. Whoops.

After what I’m calculating as approximately 10(!!!) hours of wallpaper removal it was all finally gone! And I was left with some seriously uneven walls that needed smoothing out. Bring on the spackle!

Quarantining like a boss.

To prep for sanding the spackle, I removed everything I could from the room and blocked it off as much as I could. If you’ve ever sanded spackle, you’ll notice that even the smallest patch can create a ton of dust that manages to get everywhere. And boy, am I glad I blocked off the doorways. Holy dust!

Post-sanding it now looks like a live in a haunted house.

And I am one of the ghosts.

On an unrelated note, I think I discovered some really good, pretty much free, dry shampoo!

My next steps are to patch any spots I missed the first time around and areas that are still uneven, and sand again. Then I can reinstall the crown molding, prime, paint, and get this room back to a presentable spot.

Inspiration and future plans

In the meantime, I’ll continue to daydream about my design plans for the space.

I’m obsessed with the wall treatment below for the large wall in this room that doesn’t have any windows or doors and I will make it happen, hence needing to remove the crown molding.

If we left the crown up, the boards for the accent wall would jut out further than the bottom of the crown molding. It’s difficult to explain without pictures, but essentially there would be a weird transition where the boards on the accent wall butted up against the crown molding. Instead, we’re going to put a thin piece of wood behind the crown molding on that wall to bump it out a little and give it some more depth to create a smoother transition with the accent wall.

I initially envisioned a really dark blue or teal on this wall, but after living here for a while I’ve noticed that unless it’s a nice day, the dining room can be pretty dark. So I’m going to opt for something lighter. Actually, the color will probably be similar to my inspiration pic above.

That’s actually a good note to consider - if time allows, before renovating a space live with it for a while to figure out how it looks and feels throughout the day, and how it functions for you and you family. If I dove right into this room as soon as we moved in it would probably feel like a black hole because I would have painted it a super dark color. Now that I know how it reacts to light throughout the day, I know I don’t want to go that route. Anywho…

I’m leaning towards painting the other three walls in the room a white tone. Not a true, bright white, but something more muted to help keep the room nice and bright and create a smooth transition to the surrounding rooms.

We plan on keeping the same dining room set that we currently own, especially since we bought it when we moved into this house and it’s really new. However, although I’m absolutely in love with the buffet table, it definitely doesn’t fit with the style of this house. I actually bought the buffet table a few years ago at a garage sale and completely refurbished it. It went so well with our last house, but this house was built in a different era and it just feels out of place. It breaks my heart to think about selling, but I think it’d be better suited in another house. I’d love to buy another dresser I could makeover for myself.

I will always love you, buffet table.

Why a new dresser instead of a new buffet table, you ask? Well, I’ve been thinking… and I might actually move my dresser from my bedroom into the dining room and buy something second-hand for the bedroom. Mid-century modern is really on trend right now, and I’m certainly not immune to falling for that style, but I don’t think it would go with our dining room table and chairs. Instead, the Ikea Malm dresser that I currently use could undergo a couple of tweaks (aka Ikea hacks) to make it more interesting and fit with the rest of the dining room decor.

At least, I hope it does. Because if Lucius takes it downstairs to the dining room, I don’t think I can convince him to take it back upstairs to the bedroom.

I also plan to replace the light fixture, because the current chandelier definitely doesn’t fit into my aesthetic. Shopping for light fixtures is one of my favorite things to do, alongside rug shopping. Sky’s the limit, but I think I’ve narrowed it down to something with a more of a circular element to break up all the straight lines going on in the room on the accent wall, the dresser/buffet table, and the dining table.

This room also needs an area rug in here to add some more dimension to the space and help break it up a little, especially with our crazy dark flooring that I’m certainly not crazy about. I’ve been swooning over oriental rugs for quite a while, and although Lucius will take some convincing, I’d love to put one in here.

I’m thinking I want to go with something with darker colors and of course some good pattern because practically thinking, it’ll be going under a dining room table. People drop things. Let’s hide those inevitable stains!

Lastly, we’ll add some artwork and general décor. I plan to put the curtains that I had in this room previously back up and hang some pictures to round it out.

And there you have it. My body is buzzing with excitement to put this room together (is that normal?), but I know there’s still a long way to go until it’s done. I can’t wait to turn this into a room I actually want to spend time in and share it with you along the way!

Pst - Check out the grid below to see all my inspiration pics in one place and dream with me about how great this room can will be!

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• Dining Room Mood Boards

• DIY Geometric Wood Accent Wall

• Modern Dining Room Reveal!