Tuesday, December 25, 2012

A tip on Tuesday!

My friend Tammy (http://tam-sense.blogspot.com/) says I have lots of awesome ideas and tips on how to make life easier/more efficient. I thought I would share some of them here. I did not come up with any of these, they have been picked up along the way from my family, friends, magazines, blogs, etc.

Tip on Tuesday: Have a Merry Christmas!!!

Tuesday, December 18, 2012

A tip on Tuesday!

My friend Tammy (http://tam-sense.blogspot.com/) says I have lots of awesome ideas and tips on how to make life easier/more efficient. I thought I would share some of them here. I did not come up with any of these, they have been picked up along the way from my family, friends, magazines, blogs, etc.

Tip on Tuesday:Wash the produce as soon as you get home from the store. It makes cooking, packing lunches, grabbing a quick snack, so much easier when everything is ready to go. Scrub the carrots, wash and tear up the lettuce/kale/spinach, wash the apples, etc. I will even wash half a bunch of grapes, saving the other half for later in the week. It helps them stay fresh longer if they aren't washed. Don't wash berries until ready to use, that helps them stay fresh longer too.

Tuesday, December 11, 2012

A tip on Tuesday!

My friend Tammy (http://tam-sense.blogspot.com/) says I have lots of awesome ideas and tips on how to make life easier/more efficient. I thought I would share some of them here. I did not come up with any of these, they have been picked up along the way from my family, friends, magazines, blogs, etc.

Tip on Tuesday: Wipe down the bathroom sink every night. It takes 10 seconds and makes the room look cleaner and the next morning less irritating (especially if you are married to a toothpaste slobber-er). I keep a sponge under the sink and while I am brushing my teeth, I wet the sponge, wipe down the counter and the bowl so everything looks nice for the next day.

Thursday, December 6, 2012

Fail: I didn't buy mirrors for the bathroom!

Although they are beautiful, they are way too big for the space. So I had to cancel the order. Sad me.

Tuesday, December 4, 2012

A tip on Tuesday!

My friend Tammy (http://tam-sense.blogspot.com/) says I have lots of awesome ideas and tips on how to make life easier/more efficient. I thought I would share some of them here. I did not come up with any of these, they have been picked up along the way from my family, friends, magazines, blogs, etc.

Tip on Tuesday: Sort all your mail, magazines, flyers, random paper as soon as you walk in the door. Throw all the stuff you don't need, including junk mail and the envelopes, inserts, etc for real mail into the recycle bin, put credit card offers in the shredder (or make a pile on top until you have time to shred) and save just the important pieces to deal with. AND if the 'deal with' part will take 2 minutes or less, try to complete that task right then. Write the check, fill out the wedding RSVP card, send the baby shower RSVP email, put all dates on your calendar right then and there. You won't have to think about it or touch that piece of paper again. Maybe it can even go in the recycle bin! But don't recycle it if you need the address to the baby shower. Just sayin'.

Monday, December 3, 2012

I bought bathroom mirrors today!

I bought 2 mirrors for the bathroom today. I sure hope they look pretty when they get here!

Tuesday, November 27, 2012

A tip on Tuesday!

My friend Tammy (http://tam-sense.blogspot.com/) says I have lots of awesome ideas and tips on how to make life easier/more efficient. I thought I would share some of them here. I did not come up with any of these, they have been picked up along the way from my family, friends, magazines, blogs, etc.

Tip on Tuesday: save the wrappers from sticks of butter. Stick them in the freezer and use them to grease baking pans instead of cooking spray.

Here is a photo of my stash.


Monday, November 26, 2012

Bathroom Faucets?

Kevin has decided we are doing polished nickel faucets with cross handles. I get to pick the faucet (as long as I stay within his parameters).

Do you like the low arc?

Or the high arc?



Monday, November 12, 2012

Beadboard: Fancy or simple?

We are planning to do a beadboard wainscoting in the bathroom. I am debating if it should be fancy and framed out like this:






Or simple, just beadboard, a baseboard and a top edge, like this:





Which one do you like better?

Thursday, October 4, 2012

Floor Tile Options

Here are some of the options I am considering for floor tile in the bathroom. We haven't done any real shopping yet, I found all of these online.


 Basketweave
 Lantern
 Octagon
 Spiral
Penny

I am torn between the basketweave and the spiral. Although I do love penny tile!

Friday, September 21, 2012

Bathroom Inspiration

I will be swiping ideas for new upstairs bathroom from these pretty, pretty pictures.

The navy grasscloth and the chevron beadboard (need help convincing Kevin on these). And the toilet.


Love the beadboard wainscoting, the basketweave floor, the sconces and the mirror.


Love the dark upper wall, white lower wall. If you get tired of pink, you could swap out the towels and rug for another fun color!


Our shower will be similar to this one and I like the double vanity and 2 separate mirrors, although I am planning to do a white vanity.


Again with the contrast between the upper and lower wall and the bright accent!


Any thoughts?

Wednesday, September 19, 2012

Attic Addition

We are getting ready to start work on our attic addition. We are adding a second bathroom, a bedroom, a closet and a lounge space. Well, technically the bedroom and the closet already exist, but they are a little scary right now. Check out the before photos.

Here are the current plans. We have a few minor tweaks to make but it's pretty close! I am getting excited about this project!

Friday, July 13, 2012

New Kitchen Table

My dad made us a new kitchen table. The beautiful butcher block top was donated by a family friend. It was part of a display at a retailer where he works. They were throwing it away, but my dad trashed picked it. So classy!

We were inspired by this table from Crate and Barrel.


 
Our table is regular height, for chairs, not bar stools. The base is painted BM Black Satin and the top has a coat of Danish oil in natural on it. We love it, wings up or wings down!


Sunday, July 8, 2012

Living Room Update

Since I got married and my husband lives here now, we needed to do some furniture rearranging in the living room so both of us could watch TV comfortably. Priorities!

As a reminder, this is what the room looked like before:


That turquoise pillow you see on the couch is now in the guest room. We moved the couch to face the TV, booted the tree to the dining room, shifted one of the red chairs to the corner where the tree was and added some new tables.


I got the coffee table off Craiglist. It's a little too big for the space, but I haven't found anything that I like better, so it is sticking around for right now. The console table under the orchid painting, I built last winter. We needed something both skinny and not-that-long and I couldn't find any tables available that fit our space. I used plans from Ana White (http://ana-white.com/) and modified them to our dimensions.

I won the white and black pillows on a giveaway on From the Right Bank (http://www.fromtherightbank.com/) and the yellow ones are from Crate and Barrel.  The quilt on the red chair was a wedding gift, it's beautiful!

Once we finish the upstairs, this room will probably change again, so we didn't want to invest a lot of money in a temporary solution.

An Update!

It's been a while! For most of 2011, I was busy getting married. Planning the wedding was very time consuming because I did a lot of craft projects myself. But it was a lot of fun!

I finally paint the guest room nightstand. I went with grey to coordinate with the file cabinet that serves as the nightstand on the other side of the bed.


I made the shams out of the fabric I mentioned before. I definitely should have put interfacing in the edge, they are way too floppy. Oh well, I am not motivated to take them apart and start over. The turquoise pillow moved in here from the living room.

I got the lamps off Craigslist. I added a grey ribbon to the top and bottom edge of the shades to dress them up a bit. The knobs on the new nightstand are glass, from Target. I also added a design to the top of the nightstand for a little bit of interest.

Not too bad for a couple of bucks! Now my mom has somewhere to put her glasses when she comes to visit!