The Kitchen

The kitchen in our new house has seen better days. Basically, it's dated.

It's weird in a lot of ways and beautiful in a lot more. It holds a HUGE picture window above the sink that I absolutely fell in love with when we first toured the house and a super cute (but not utilized well) kitchen eating nook.

If we had the money we'd completely demo the countertops and backsplash, re-situate where the oven is right now, and add a real pantry and new stove. Since we don't have an unlimited amount of funds and we've already had to purchase a new fridge and dishwasher our plan is to update our little cooking haven with as many cosmetic changes as we can and start stashing away cash for those bigger dreams!

We have a list of projects to accomplish and I thought it would be fun to document them here! These are in no particular order. :)

1. Decide on new lighting for above the kitchen island.
2. Repaint walls. The yellow is A to the AWFUL!
3. Repaint kitchen island.
4. Something new for the existing stools. I've got some ideas in mind!!!
5. Cushions for eating nook.
6. New window treatments for window by eating nook.
7. DIY sign for above huge window.
8. Growth chart! :) *giddy about this one!!!
9. Style bookshelves
10. Accent wall....still deciding what to do here. Thinking of something like this:

Source: A Thoughtful Place Blog

11. Rugs
12. Figure out a way to hide the weird open small appliances cabinet.

As you can see the painting is already getting started. Lots of touch up when the walls are bright yellow and haven't been cared for in years.

A sort of hard to see sneak peak at the colors we are thinking of. Actually, we've already bought the paint...now it is just deciding if we like it!

This is one of our current pendant lights. I'm happy to report I've ordered our new beauties and we are waiting impatiently patiently for them to arrive. They will be so happy here!!!

Here you can see both the hard bench seating (cushions, anyone!) as well as the bookshelves in desperate need of some love. Right now they just hold toys and Bibles. We have a lot of Bibles. I sort of have a thing with them. Just ask my hubby.

We have a lot of work ahead of us, but I think we can make it cute! I am so anxious to see the end product, but I am going to try really hard to enjoy the process! With two little ones under foot it should be interesting!

A Wonderful Case of the Stripes!

I've had a dream for our entryway for a while now. But, it took a lot of persuading (and quite a few pictures on Pinterest) to get Shawn on board! :) I wanted....

Here are the before pictures. We used Sherwin Williams Accessible Beige for the base. I absolutely LOVE this color and plan on using it through most of the downstairs. I'm a big neutral wall with pops of accent color kinda girl. ;)

We taped it off. Well, actually Shawn did the measuring and taping for the most part. I helped a little. :) One of the best tips we used was to actually get out our original base color and paint over the tape a bit to sort of seal the tape down and also not allow any of the lighter color to bleed through. It worked perfectly...not a single area needed touch up!!!! (You can see the right side was where I had already painted over the tape and the right side hadn't been done yet.

We went with a 12" wide stripe and I LOVE it!!!! The lighter color is Sherwin Williams Aesthetic White.

We are only doing the entry with the stripes to make it more of an accent wall. I already have plans for the wall by the coat closet. I see lots of frames and fun pieces that hold great memories for us there.

Still see the awful wallpaper in the dining room? And the tiny peek of bright gag-me yellow from our kitchen?!?! I am seriously itching to get my hands all over those rooms. But, I've got to be patient!!!! :)

The entry now feels SO like us and it literally makes me smile every single time I walk by it. So glad Shawn trusted me! And, I'm super thankful he is so particular...the stripes are perfectly spaced and painted. Couldn't have done it without my man!!!