What I"m working on right now

I have 2 coats of primer on the chairs, sanded in between the coats, two coats of paint on and also put the fabric on the seat cushions! Just waiting to see if they need yet another coat and also trying to decide if I'm going to distress the chairs or not. Here is one chair, she's sitting pretty now:

Remember the before, well technically this isn't her before picture but it's a picture of her and her friends gathered around the table:

While I was busy with painting the chairs, my children were busy doing this:

and this:

They actually built a fort under the table yesterday and two of the three girls slept under it last night. We are on Spring Break and so they've been playing together all day really well which is awesome! The side effect of that is a tornado like aftermath in the playroom. Which isn't that what a playroom is for? But when you can't play in the playroom because there is no space, it then spills out into other rooms. They have a lot of cleaning to do today!
We are surprising our children tomorrow with a waterpark getaway, I can't wait! They have no idea so this will be so fun! Hopefully the dining room will be finished soon! What are you working on this week?

Chair Fabric and Inspiration

I went to the fabric store today and tried to pick out some fabric for my chairs in the dining room. This is a bad idea for someone who has decorating ADD. I love so many different styles of decorating that it's tricky not to get caught up in changing out the whole house after picking something that doesn't jive with the what I already have. Does that happen to you?
Anyways, here are the two I picked out today, I was feeling geometric patters today. I am not sure I'll go with either but I'd love to hear your thoughts on them! And what the stink do you do for curtains with the black and white fabric?

Here is one lovely dining room with black and white chairs and botanical/fruit pictures which I love and was thinking I would like in my dining room too. Or I would love an old map framed in a few different frames.  Here are a few pictures I love from Houzz.  If you haven't check out Houzz  yet, go now!  It's great, you sign up for free and get to store all the photos of rooms you love on their in your ideabook.  There are a gazillion and one photos in so many different styles.

eclectic dining room design by media and blogs Dreamy Whites

eclectic home office design by media and blogs French Larkspur

eclectic dining room design by los angeles interior designer megan arquette c/o beachbungalow8

eclectic dining room design by media and blogs French Larkspur

So what's your vote?  Black, Blue or back to the drawing board?

This is what I"m working on

I decided to paint the dining room chairs and table legs/apron heirloom white. I didn't want to sand them because well I don't want to do anymore work than I need to. So I purchased some oil based primer and I've primed all 6 chairs, the table and unfortunately, my fingers, arms and hair as well. I will be scheduling my hair color appointment ASAP! I think I could qualify for world's messiest painter. And it looks much worse in person, the camera didn't quite capture the total effect.

Moving on. Here's a chair in all it's primed glory!! I already love it and they aren't even close to being done yet! I'm still on the lookout for fabric for the seat covers, so hopefully I find something soon!

Anyone else painting anything right now?

Dining Room Update & the project grows bigger

So I didn't really have a clear vision for my dining room but I knew that I wanted to recover my chairs and change it up a bit. I have debated painting the dining room set, painting the corner hutches a color besides white, picking some bright funky colors or just keeping it all the same and installing the hutches.
So here is what has become my inspiration, I've been in love with this blog post post and also this post.  So, the dining room makeover is flowing into the entryway and down the back hallway so stay tuned!
Here is the front entryway hall to the left of this is the living room:

I really need to paint the ceiling.....adding to the looonnnnnngggg project list right now.

There is actual trim around the front door now, it looks so much better!  I was thinking of doing the board and batten on the left side of this hallway.

I would do some board and batten on the right side of the stairs so it would wrap around from the dining room which is to the right of the stairs.  I wish I could rip off the ugly/dirty disgusting carpet off of the stairs but with 4 children and one of them less than two  years old, I don't think it's a good idea.  But as soon as I can, I will have that off in record time!

If you continue down the front hall with the picture frames it goes back to this hallway which was ugly tan paneling when we first moved in.  I have painted it but it would look so much cuter if it was board and batten!  The closet doors at the end of the hall would be where the new "office closet" would be.  To the right is the kitchen and to the left is the playroom.  Confused yet?

Moving on, here is a sneak peak at what I've done so far in the dining room, during naptime I painted the brown that was on the bottom half of the wall. 

Before:

Add caption

During (the balloons are up from our Birthday party week and the table is really long because we needed room to play Pit):

I bought this fabric back in November and returned it because I just wasn't sure if it was what I was looking for.  On Sunday I bought the same fabric, again.  I really like it, I wish it was maybe a bit brighter but I think it flows with the kitchen, front entry and living room colors.  Not sure if I'll repaint the blue/green color or not yet, it matches but I might try and pull some of the gray/green out instead. 

What do you think?  Is the fabric too dull for the chairs or will it look good?

Would love any feedback you have or better yet if you have a picture of some board and batten or other trim work you've done in your house, I would love to see it!



Thanks,

2011 House Goals or Wishful Thinking?

The Nester just posted on her blog 2011 Home Goals for her home. It's so nice to see other bloggers who have beautiful homes still have those spaces that aren't perfect and have places that they would like to work on.
Mr.A and I sat down last night to decide what project we were going to tackle next so we could figure out the budget and all the boring stuff that I don't like figuring out.   If it was up to me, we'd just dive right in and figure all that out later. Good thing Mr.A is around to keep me somewhat grounded.
So I am going to post our goals for our home this year as well and hopefully by December 2011 I can look back and see some of these accomplished!

Install the dining room corner cabinets
Paint the cabinets
Paint over the brown on the bottom and possibly a new color on the top as well
Reupholster the dining room chairs.
I'm still not sure if I'm going to keep the table cherry or repaint it, possibly white.
Another thought is adding some board and batten to the wall but that might be too much with the cabinets, we'll have to see as we go!

Next on the list is the hall closet/playroom.

With four children we have a lot of games, puzzles, coloring books, craft type stuff.  This closet is usually a little more organized but with Christmas presents combined with Christmas break and a toddler that loves to get into stuff, the closet is looking less than stellar.  I'm embarrassed to put this picture out there but I'm just keeping it real.

We hope to turn this closet into an office, like this one from Country Living:




Which leads to the playroom and all it's glory.  We have two closets, one is pictured below, looking a mite bit scary.  Again, just keeping it real, it's 11pm and I don't have the energy to make it look pretty right now. 

Install shelving units in the two closets for toys, games and playroom crap stuff
Move the bookcase/shelving units out of the playroom
Replace the carpeting with some type of flooring that is not carpeting  as the dog thinks it's fun to pee on carpet
Paint the doors white or replace them with white doors
Install window trim and paint the trim around both windows, a project left over from this summer when we replaced the windows in the playroom
Repaint the playroom and get rid of the curbside couch, make it have more of a hang out/kid friendly feel to it

Rip out the desk between the two closets and make a cute little bench seat

 

On a side note, I think I clean this desk off about once a week but really it's just a catchall and the kids' computer area which doesn't get a lot of love during the week.  Don't judge me, k? 
Moving on from that scary mess......

When we bought this house, it came with a lovely white and green diamond patterned tile entryway floor.  It was as slick as ice and if you made the mistake of stepping on it with wet shoes, you were in for a wild ride!
One day while using my floormate I hit the tile and a little green diamond popped up off the floor.  I was able to pick up almost all the tiles by hand without any effort.  A few actually were grouted to the hardwood floor but about 80% came up with ease.  The floor has remained like this for about a year and a half now.

I would love to refinish this but that might have to wait until we refinish the living room and dining room floor as well.  So, not sure what we'll do right here but I'd like something done so it doesn't look so unfinished.

This is it for now, I have a ton of landscaping that I would like to accomplish this summer as well but it's kind of hard to show pictures of what I'd like to redo because everything is covered in snow!

There are more things I could put on here, like both bathrooms needing makeovers,  main floor laundry, figuring out what we are doing with our bedroom sitation (3 girls in one bedroom is just the beginning), knocking out the wall between the kitchen and the playroom which then would mean no office closet, refinishing the hardwood floors on the main floor, I could keep going but I'll just stop there!

I love my home but sometimes I feel like I"m always trying to improve it without stopping and just letting things be for a while.  I don't have a Country Living worthy house nor will I probably ever.  What I want most is a home that is safe, comfortable, inviting, warm, welcoming and inspiring.  A place for my family to think back on fondly when they are grown.   A place where they bring their teenage friends to hang out, their children to visit in and where they will always call HOME!  Unless of course I get the bug to move in a few years.  ;)

Thanks for checking it out and I'd love to hear from you!

I'm linking up at The Nesting Place.

Dining Room redo in the works

Here is what my dining room currently looks like.....

I had Mr.A haul up one of the corner cabinets from the dungeon basement and hopefully we will bring the other one up tonight!  Here it is, waiting to be installed.....

I am also hoping to maybe use some of this fabric to redo the chairs and curtains but I'm still thinking on it.  I am going to be repainting the walls for sure and maybe my dining room chairs and the bottom of the table, I  just need some time to get this all going.  I am hoping to actually put the check curtains in my living room and make some drop cloth curtains for the dining room.

Stay tuned to see what happens next!  I am still trying to figure out how to put the linky on the bottom of the post so bear with me.  I'd love to see your dining rooms as well so if you have one to show off, leave a comment! 

Corner Cabinets in the Dining Room?

The same wonderful neighbor that donated his front door to me, also gave me these beauties pictured below. I have had them for 2 years now and they are still not in my dining room!    Sorry for the scary pictures but these are in the basement and we don't use our basement except to store things, it's really a mess down there and on our to do list.  I think it's more of a winter project because who wants to be in the dark cold basement in the summer when it's sunny and warm outside?  We'll save this for the blustery winter days ahead!

What do you think? Are they cool or too grandma like? What color would you paint them? Should I take off the urns on the doors? I'd love to hear your ideas on this one!!!  I'm thinking of maybe doing a greenish gray paint color for them, like this color at TheInspiredRoom.    I would paint the bottom half of my dining room white and add some square style trim like these at Thrifty Decor Chick.  I haven't decided on a color palette yet for the dining room which would also lead into the living room.  Anyways, I'd love feedback from anyone!  thanks!