Punch List Time!

Leave a comment November 7, 2016 Christine

Remodel in Progress: Kitchen backsplash is in!!

Finally Finishing Our New House!

It’s hard to believe it’s possible at this point… but we are moving into the house on Saturday! It feels like there are a million little things left to do between now and then. As I begin to see the light at the end of the tunnel, I am stunned by the realization that it feels like time has flown by. Despite the fact that we have spent the last 3 1/2 months on the remodel for this house, the last 3 weeks have been a dramatic transformation. It seems like overnight things have started coming together.

All The Things Happened This Week!

We are officially finished with ALL the tiling in the house. And let me tell you… IT WAS A LOT! Holy cow. We tiled 3 full bathrooms, a 1/2 bathroom, the kitchen and Laundry room floor, the backsplash in the kitchen, 2 fireplaces and 2 stone accent walls. Yikes. It feels like a ton just writing it all out. BUT IT IS FINALLY FINISHED. The Painting was a beast in and of itself. This house is 3600 sq ft. and every wall, cabinet and piece of trim has needed to be painted. My hands hurt. My brain hurts and I don’t want to even look at another paint brush. But alas, we’re not 100% finished with that yet. Still need to finish repainting the game room tonight, plus the trim in the Laundry room and 2 bathrooms and touchups. Ugh. So close.

Remodel in progress: The hardwoods are stained!! YAY!

To say this house has been a lot of work would be a huge understatement. We have been there every weekend until midnight every night for the last 6 weeks, we have worked every night during the week (My husband has been there until 4am some days). Huge shout out to him. Thanks, honey. (You overachiever you) And we’ve made all these sacrifices so we could be in the house by Thanksgiving. Now that it is close, I am so ecstatic!

New This Week:

This week has been BUSY, BUSY! The floors were sanded and stained, the stairs were stained and painted and the balusters were put in, and the front door was replaced!! We spent all day Saturday finishing tiling. We tiled the 2 fireplaces, the backsplash in the kitchen and the stone accent walls. Sunday, Brandon finished grouting the tile while I painted my life away. (Seriously… the ENTIRE day and I’m still not done.)

There were also lots of mishaps this week

Even though lots of great things happened, and things worked out (mostly). There were still some pretty stressful moment. These are the behind the scenes things that they don’t show on TV. And these are the things that make me thankful that we are done dealing with contractors for a while!

Our original front door hinge was broken – not a simple fix because it is a solid Iron Door – so we had to find a new door and new installer because our original installer was booked for the next week.
The floors were supposed to be an easy match to a color I had picked – but turned out to be a custom blend that the installer had to search everywhere to find. – And he ended up being there until midnight several nights.
The master bathroom vanity arrived with a cracked marble top – and I’m still trying to find a replacement- Sad times.

Even when things don’t go as planned, I know that they will get done eventually. Maybe I’m just getting used to doing this, but the more we go through these things, the more they roll off my back. On our first house I would have freaked out several times by now. Thus far I’ve only had one minor meltdown. I would consider that an improvement. Haha!

14976872_10208993895019447_6533687064012805839_o

Formal living room fireplace! New marble tile, stained wood floors, and new paint on the mantle!

So, what’s left? – The Punch List – Finishing up the Remodel

Baseboards – everywhere.
Paint Touchups
Paint the gameroom
Hang mirrors
Install Lights
Plumbing Fixtures
Glass Shower enclosures
Put the bathrooms back together
Cleaning! All the things. (I can’t wait though, because then I can take some pretty pictures!!)

Will we get it all done?! Only time will tell. Either way… moving day is fast approaching and I can’t wait!!

Reno is hard, y’all!

Leave a comment October 24, 2016 Christine

Oh my gosh, this weekend started out with such high hopes. We were going to accomplish all this painting, get the master bathroom & closet tiled and grouted, install the freestanding tub and vanity in the master and install the vanity upstairs. Nope. Just nope. Reality slapped me in the face a lot this weekend.

Listen, things go wrong on renovation projects. If you aren’t emotionally equipped to handle that, just don’t. I have no other words of wisdom. Renovating is physically and emotionally draining. Now, I’m not a complainer… but I am a realist and this weekend was HARD! There will be weekends when you want to give up.

Here are some of the mishaps that happened to us this weekend. Needless to say we’re off schedule now. Blah.

The vanity we ordered for the master bath was supposed to be white. We picked it up a month ago. Did we check it then? Nope. Did I expect it to be what I ordered? Yep. We open up the box… it’s BLACK! No bueno. So, we’re supposed to have the marble template done today… time for plan B. Return the vanity, reorder a new one with a prefab marble top and sinks attached. Problem solved. Nothing wasted but time.
Tile. Oh man tile. Saturday went smoothly, except we started 2 hours later than we were supposed to… Sunday was another beast. We go to get started on tiling the shower, only to realize the tile order was incorrect. They gave us too much of the guest bath tile and not enough master bath tile. I guess they switched my numbers. Ugh. Easy fix… run to the store and buy more. Nothing wasted but more time.

Anyway, moral of the story. Throw your schedule out the window. ALL THE THINGS will go wrong. If it can, it will.

So… we’re a couple days behind. Not a big deal in the grand scheme of things. I’m trying to stay focused on the positive. We have this gorgeous house. It is about 90% done AND we are going to be in it by Thanksgiving…. I don’t care if it’s not even done by then. Haha!

Anyway, if this is your first time renovating be sure to go into it thinking that things will go awry. Your budget won’t be big enough. You won’t stay on schedule. You will find problems and there will be mistakes that must be fixed.

BUT, in the end it WILL get done. And, if you stay focused, it WILL be beautiful.

Before the craziness, I WAS going to do a tutorial on how to tile. But I will save that for another day.

Instead, here are some photos of the progress on our house!!

Formal Living IN PROGRESS. Gray paint, White trim and crown, hardwood floors, New marble fireplace surround being installed soon.

Formal Living room before – this room was just very vanilla. Also, carpet. Yuck.

Kitchen and Family In Progress. Painted cabinets, gray walls and paneling. Trim is painted, floors are in.

Kitchen and Family BEFORE. Green Tile, green marble fireplace. Light oak EVERYWHERE!

How I Decide on Design

Leave a comment October 21, 2016 Christine

I get asked a lot how I decide what to put in my houses, or how I make sure everything goes together. Many people don’t have the “vision.” But for me, I honestly just choose things that I like. I love watching DIY and HGTV, flipping through “Better Homes & Gardens” or browsing Pintrest and Houzz in my free time. I spend so much time looking at ideas, that when I see a space, I can pretty quickly tell what would look great in it.

In this room, I knew I wanted to make it light and bright, but also wanted a pop of drama. We went with hardwood floors, but chose to lay tile where there was the most foot traffic (for both durability and style). I also wanted to play off the beautiful fireplace and draw your focus to that wall so we painted it a deep tan that paired well with the other colors in the room. Sheer curtains and oil rubbed bronze light fixtures add a feeling of whimsy to the room.

For me, it’s less about doing everything in a certain color scheme or style, and more about choosing things that are welcoming and make my house feel like home. You can accomplish this in any style or with any color scheme. In our last house we chose to do earthy tones, tan paints, dark brown hardwood and light tan travertine floors, tan and white granite and white cabinets. I loved the look that we achieved, and most importantly it fit the architectural style of the house.

The house we just bought is an incredibly traditional space. And lately I’ve been falling in love with modern and contemporary interiors. But a true contemporary feel just won’t work for this space with its 8 inch crown molding and decorative paneling in multiple rooms. So I’ve opted to blend modern and traditional and we’re going for a transitional feel. We’re accomplishing this with cool grey colors, touches of modern (like lighting and sleek stainless appliances), bright white trim and cabinets and light white and grey quartz countertops. We’re maintaining the character and charm of the house by painting the paneling, adding a wood accent wall, sliding barn door and all the original trim work. We’ve highlighted the beautiful gas burning fireplaces with quartzite and marble and are doing stacked stone accents around the kitchen island and wet bar. We’re three weeks away from finish out and I simply can’t wait to share our finished product.

This was one of only two bathrooms in our first house. I knew all of my guests would see it and so I wanted it to be beautiful. I chose a pretty glass tile pattern that played off the light travertine floors and shower. The light gold framed mirror and Sea-Blue accents make this room feel calming and spa-like.

So, the bottom line is, you need to look at several factors before you jump in with both feet on a design path:

What is the architectural style of the house?
What do you REALLY LOVE? Because you’re probably going to live there a while.
What finishes are important to you? Is it flooring, paint, fixtures, granite/quartz/marble? Do you want Chrome, bronze, gold, brushed nickel fixtures?

And then… use your money wisely. We’ve never had a project come in on budget. Ever. But that’s another post in and of its self. Choose to update things that will make the most impact. Lighting, flooring, PAINT, Kitchens and bathrooms. These all give you great bang for your buck.

Happy renovating.