What have we been up to?......

This post is so long overdue its embarrassing!  So I'm apologizing up front that this post may be a bit lengthy but I'm trying to fit in what should have been 5 or 6 posts all into 1......hang in there with me though and I promise you won't be disappointed as I have my most exciting project saved for last.....

I can hardly believe May is already here....not only is it already here its already almost over.  So I ask, "where's the warm weather?".  We had a couple nice days this week but with that came awful storms and a crazy amount of rain.  I know I told you all that landscaping was in our plans for this year and I am eager to jump in and get some plants planted, I just need the weather and my work schedule to finally cooperate so I can get things going.  I am determined to get some life into the outside of our house this year!!

So what have we been up to this winter?......well not as much as we had hoped but we did manage to accomplish a couple of things I'm excited to share with you.

First, my husband painted the stairway, and upstairs hall.......I LOVE IT!!  I can't believe we waited so long to get some paint on those walls.......it was a huge and drastic improvement to the flow and feel of our home. We used the same color paint we used in our entry ways, its called Jute and its made by Olympic paint.  I was afraid it would make the hall really dark since there really isn't a lot of light in that area to begin with but it didn't.  It really made it feel warm. Love it!

 So a few weeks ago we had a little issue with our dishwasher and our sprayer on the sink.  We went shopping thinking we would just give in and buy a new dishwasher.  I don't know about you but the one that came with the house isn't my favorite.....its loud and half the time it seems like it doesn't wash the dishes very well....makes me crazy!!  Well after looking around and picking out a couple we liked which seemed to have some pretty hefty price tags to go with it we decided perhaps we should take a second look at the one we have and see if we can't make it work a little longer.  I should mention our car had just broken beyond repair and we had just bought a new one to replace it so trying to save a little where we could seemed to be a better plan at the time.  But on our wish list is a new dishwasher....my husband took the entire dishwasher apart and was able to find multiple issues (mainly dirt/plumbers putty clogging hoses etc.).....once he cleaned it all out and put it back together it runs like a champ......still loud but it works much better than it had previously.  As for the sink sprayer we could have simply replaced it but we have never been huge fans of the sink faucet......so we invested in a new one.  Again....I LOVE IT!!  It has the sprayer built into the head of the faucet which now let us install a soap dispenser where the old sprayer used to be.  The best part is I love the height of it....makes everything from filling pots to watering plants so much easier!

 Speaking of sinks.....what about under the sink?  In our kitchen that is usually where we keep our trash can so it is out of sight as well as some frequently used cleaners.  Well every day or so taking the trash out and putting the can back in has made the finish on the bottom of the cabinet not look as nice as it once did when we bought the house.  So I saw an idea on Pintrest one day I thought may make it look better and serve as an easy to clean alternative to the cabinet base.  We found some inexpensive stick on tiles that matched our kitchen and installed them on the cabinet floor.  It has been fantastic for keeping things nice, neat, easy to clean, and a little pretty too I guess.

Another small project in our kitchen was adding an additional storage rack to our pantry.  You'll remember I mentioned we had installed one on the door a time back...it looked like this:

 Well we just needed more space so we added another rack and it has made a world of difference.  We have so much more space in our pantry when I can store more things on the door.

 So speaking of doors......we also did a small but big impact project on our garage door.  When we built we did not opt for the hefty price to have a pretty garage door put on our house.  Although I love the look of the carriage doors, I still don't regret not having one put on our house.  So to spruce up the door a bit we added some simple hardware to the outside.  It was cheap and I think it gave our door a bit of character......not exactly carriage door character but its a start.

So we've lived here for almost 3 years and have yet to paint the kids rooms.  We've painted the master bedroom and the guest room but the kids still have those plain white walls and its killing me to get some paint on them soon.  Kids rooms should be fun while they are young!! I've got some ideas on how I want to decorate their rooms and I've decided to work on the boys room first since I seem to have a better vision with where I want to go with it.  We recently tried something new in the boys room to see if they would go for the idea and not only were they for it but they LOVED IT!!  They were originally sleeping in bunk beds and we decided to take them apart to see if they would like having twin beds in their room.  Although they have less room to play and it took some getting used to everyone seems to like this set up much better.  So I've started their room decorating process and I think we'll be seeing some big things getting done in the near future......so this is where we started:

.....and this is where we are at now:

Last but definitely not least I have one HUGE project I am VERY excited to show you.  So as you are all aware I get some crazy ideas in my head sometimes.......I'm a dreamer what can I say?  Thankfully my husband is willing to give things a try even if he's not 100% sure how to approach them....he researches and he makes it happen for me......I Love him!!  So last year I had some crazy ideas I actually mentioned in a post once but never really thought much about since then.  Well recently we decided to tackle the dining room.  Originally I wanted to install board and batten like we did in our front entry way:

But visually I was afraid it would look too heavy on the molding on that half of the house (those who know me well know I have to have everything very symmetrical in appearance).  I wanted something elegant, with a dramatic effect, and that would bring an architectual interest to the room.  So I hemmed and hawwed about the board and batten and then suggested an old idea to my husband.  It was an idea like none we have ever tried before and he said lets go for it!!.....Let me just tell you I have NEVER EVER had a project make me so nervous before.....from start to almost the end I would really get myself worked up sick over it.  I don't know if it was because I wasn't 100% sure I was going to like it because I couldn't fully visualize the completed project or if it was because it was such an unfamiliar and big project for us that if we hated it I knew it wasn't going to be an easy or cheap fix to return the room back to the way it was.  I am so glad we stuck through with it though as it turned out awesome!!  So believe it or not this is where we started:

Yup those would be just folded pieces of paper in different ways........I know, we're very technical in our planning process....now you know why I was so worried....ha!  Any ideas on where I may be going with this?

So I needed to test out our ideas with some not so permanent visuals that I could easily see and change in different ways to see what we liked and worked best in the room......

Why yes that would be drywall tape.......so any guesses now with what we may be doing?

So once we had a pattern we really liked, which was actually harder to work out than we thought it would be, we bought the supplies and my husband went to work......

He actually did an amazing job with this project......want to see the end result?

So here is a before picture of our dining room (this was taken last fall):

Can I just say it is very hard to get any good pictures of our dining room....

.........and this is what it looks like now!!........

 Maybe you guessed it.....My husband installed a coffered ceiling in our dining room!!  He did beyond a fantastic job and so far everyone who has seen it has loved it and been amazed my husband did all the work himself.  So there still needs to be a second coat of paint applied to the ceiling but my husband was trying to get it mostly done in time for us to enjoy a mothers day brunch in our dining room....it was such a treat and I LOVE IT!!!  He also painted the dining room a beautiful shade of blue which is called Blue Willow by Olympic paint.  So now that its almost done I can start decorating and looking for new wall decor (the picture currently on the wall is not staying).......

So what do you think?.......

Well thanks for visiting our blog and I hope all of you out there in the blog world are doing well.  What have you all been up to this winter?  I would love to see your projects as well.  We have some more fun projects in our pipeline and hopefully we will get to them sooner than later.....until next time, take care.