The point was really driven home at HomeGoods awhile back when I pointed out two fabulous X-benches to my husband and explained that I wanted to buy them, paint them, and recover them for either our den or our master bedroom. He looked at me patiently and said hopefully, “Maybe you might want to finish up a few projects before you start new ones?”

Bless his poor little heart – the man practically lives in a war zone of my incomplete projects. The dining room is littered with chair parts . . .

. . . the guest bedroom has become a landing pad everything that has been displaced by baby stuff (example here), the hallway has empty and crooked frames hanging everywhere waiting for me to print photos for a new gallery wall, our master bedroom just looks sad and has a broken curtain rod, the nursery curtains are made and hung but not hemmed, and our master bathroom has a big gaping empty space above the toilet because I stole our wedding photo for the new hallway gallery wall.

As I said, bless his little heart.

Tell me I’m not alone in this – please?!?  :)

No, not the breakfast nook.  And not the DIY painted slipcovers on the chairs.  And not the leaded glass panels (even though we love those).  Look closer.

Clooooooooser.  Now you’ve got it!

My husband’s family gave him this gnarly espresso machine for his birthday in February and he has since become a man possessed.  It makes him swoon.  It can foam and steam and grind and do all sorts of crazy things and it has caused him to consume more caffeine in the past few weeks than I thought humanly possible.

Who would have thought that this ugly nook . . .

. . . could eventually be turned into my husband’s favorite spot in the house?

Our wine fridge recently died (sad!) so we replaced it with a beverage center instead – now it houses overflow soft drinks, wine (sniff, how I miss it!) and . . . you guessed it . . . more goodies for the espresso machine.

Other than the fact that my husband is delighted, the sole reason I’m excited about his new coffee shop is the cute little mugs.  :)  We got them in my family’s Christmas gift exchange (thanks, Jessie & Charles!) and they’re just perfect for his endless cups of espresso.  Aren’t they cute?!?

I’m thinking about making a little chalkboard menu for Jason’s coffee shop – something like this, maybe?  I’ll keep you posted.  :)  Is there a nook in your house that has randomly turned into an important spot for your family?

This Post Brought To You By Calgary Welding & Fabrication.

Well it’s time to show you the final result – here’s our new front door!!  I’m smitten.

When we first bought our home in the fall of 2008, we were less than thrilled with the peachy-pink paint and frilly iron bars on our front door, and the sheen on the interior of the door was almost as blinding as the gold, shiny flocked wallpaper.

It improved dramatically during the renovations that we did to the house – the peach paint was scraped and sanded off and the door was stained a rich brown, and the inside of the door was painted a crisp white.

The door looked a whole lot better, but it still wasn’t great.  We didn’t love the dated, curvy lines of the door, and it wasn’t in very great shape – it let in air through little gaps in the wood and it was really starting to deteriorate.

We like to try to do an update to our home every time that we do a flip – the trades are a little more flexible with their pricing when we already have them booked to do work on the flip.  Last time we replaced the windows, another time we made some changes to the lighting, and this time we swapped out the front door!

I’ve really been looking forward to this update – the front door was one of the few “grandma” things that we still had going on in our house, and I couldn’t wait for something new!

Obviously, the first thing the door guys did was remove the old door – it came out in sections, with the door being taken out first and then the sidelites.

Things looked much worse before they started looking better.  I was a little concerned that the big notch in the wood floors wouldn’t be covered by the new threshold.  Luckily, it was.  :)

It was a rough day, supervising the job while I enjoyed the sunshine flooding in and worked from the couch!

The door guys picked up the door that we had selected from Seconds & Surplus – that’s where we’ve gotten the front doors for all of our flips, and we’ve loved all of them.  We originally fell in love with another door there but after we waited a few days checking measurements it had been sold (that’s the risk of a surplus store – they’ve only got what they’ve got, and no more).  We wound up finding the exact same door there, but it was in a higher grade of wood (solid walnut versus mahogany) and had upgraded glass – it was pricier than our original choice, but we really love it!

The new door is slightly taller and skinnier than our old door, so they had to make some slight modifications to both the door and the opening in the house.  We had checked everything out with the door guys before we bought the door, so they were prepared for the changes that needed to be made and they got right to work.  From what I gathered, they made the door slightly shorter, added some additional framing and casing around the door, and removed some unnecessary trim above the door opening to make the new door fit like a glove.

I knew I was really going to dig the door as soon as they started installing it.

It sat there, installed yet unstained and very unfinished, until our painting crew started work on the flip – then they took a turn at our house (over the course of 3 days!) to painstakingly stain the door and paint the new, wider casing.

Even the unstained front door looked better than the old one, and we got some compliments from the neighbors.

But once it was stained?  True love.

We stuck with our tried and true Dark Walnut stain by Minwax, with polyurethane in a satin finish.

We like that the door has an updated, more streamlined look as compared to our original, frilly door, but that it still looks traditional and fits in on our little ranch-style house.

We also really love the slightly obscured glass, and the fact that all of the glass is up high at the top of the door – the couch that we sit on all the time is in direct view of the front door, so we like having some privacy from the post man and everyone else that comes to the front door.

It doesn’t hurt that we’ve had buckets and buckets of rain lately (perhaps you heard about the tornadoes?), so the lawn and flowers are really popping out and helping our new front door make the house look snazzy.

Have you made any long-awaited changes to your house lately?  I can’t tell you how happy I am to finally be able to check “new front door” off the list!!

While the rest of the room may still be a disaster, at least the upper right-hand corner of the nursery ceiling is looking spiffy.  :)

I knew I wanted to hang tissue paper poufs in the nursery ever since I fell in love with this image:

And I also knew that poufs had to be a part of the awesome baby shower thrown by my mom and two friends a few weekends ago:

So lucky me, I got to be the recipient of a jillion pink poufs once the shower was over!!

My mom actually made me two more poufs that I haven’t had a chance to hang yet – but I know they’re going to look awesome and fit right in with the rest of their friends.  :)

Hanging them was insanely easy – I just used a clear thumbtack and fishing line (which my mom had already attached to the poufs) and used my fingers to push the tacks into the ceiling.  See?

I also have lots of little poufs that look just like the ones used in the mobile (sold by Etsy seller Party Poms) below:

I’m thinking of using them to make my own mobile, probably for over the crib, but I’m worried that it might be pouf overload.  Or maybe you can never have too many poufs?  Deep thoughts.

This Post Brought To You By Basement Development Calgary.

THIS is happening right now at our house:

If you’re wondering why I’m so excited, click here to see our old front door – it will all become clear.  :)

A few weeks ago, this little lady helped me sew coral chevron curtains for the nursery.

Right now they’re hanging in our little girl’s room, all ready to be hemmed.  If I ever get around to it!!

We have tile at the flip!!

The bathrooms and laundry room have been fully tiled and grouted – now we’re just waiting on kitchen counters before the backsplash can go in.

This ol’ giraffe lamp is in the middle of getting a makeover.  We’ll see how it goes.  :)

What’s been going on with you?

Maybe a different angle will help.  :)  Check it out!

The last time you saw our den the back of the sofa was looking a little naked:

And that’s just inappropriate, so I had to do something about it.

The solution was a sofa table – I’ve wanted one forever, and had been looking for the perfect candidate for ages.  I almost jumped on a gorgeous one from West Elm, but in the end I realized that it’s dimensions were all wrong (too tall and not long enough).  So I eventually made my way back to Ikea’s Hemnes sofa table – and I’m so glad I did.

It’s been perfect! Or, at least, it is now.  :)

The first issue was entirely my fault – I got all the way to this point in putting it together . . .

. . . when I realized I did the very first step incorrectly. Boo!! Round 2 went much better. :)

The second issue was something that I anticipated from the start.  The one thing that I didn’t like about the Hemnes sofa table was the fact that it is divided into a jillion little compartments (which you can see here).  All of those little compartments were a problem because (a) I wanted the flexibility to store larger items in the table, and (b)  I didn’t want to be forced to use Ikea baskets and storage components since I didn’t want people to think “Ikea” the second they saw the sofa table.

So I decided not to install the two vertical dividers on the lower shelf.  I wasn’t worried about stability problems since there is a third divider that runs from the top to the bottom of the table, but I knew I’d have to camouflage the dowel holes for the missing dividers (you can see them in the photo below).  No worries, it was nothing that a few Q-tips and a little stain couldn’t fix!

(I didn’t include an “after” photo since it just looked like a piece of brown wood.  Exciting stuff.)

I’m totally digging having a console table behind our sofa.  Look, lamps!  What a luxury!

More places to put stuff!  An even bigger luxury!

( This is the first attempt at styling – nothing set in stone, we’ll see how it goes. )

I’m especially excited about having a place for baskets – they’re currently empty but I know they’ll come in handy once our little girl arrives in May (I don’t know if you’ve heard, but babies come with a lot of stuff).

(Ooh, and did you notice that the stars have made a new appearance?  I used this trick again for hanging them on our wood paneling.)

I also get to display lots of goodies that I’ve had stashed away for ages because I had nowhere to put them.  Like this antique box!  My mom collects them, and she gave me this particularly gorgeous one that has an intricate inlaid brass detail.

It’s great for storing all of my cords and connectors, girlie necessities like hair bands and Chapstick, and there’s even another compartment underneath that holds my camera and a tape measurer.  So handy!

Oh!  We also moved the secretary over to this previously-blank-spot by the kitchen.  I’m digging that I can drag the aluminum side table over there as a makeshift seat for writing notes, etc. – not that I’ve done that yet, but I could.  :)

Now that we’ve had the sofa table for a few weeks I can’t believe it took me over 3 years to add one to our den!  Have you recently added anything to your home that you’re kicking yourself for not thinking of sooner?

I didn’t get a proper “before” photo so you could see how truly hideous our flower beds looked but just take my word for it – they were looking really beat.

We both hate working in the yard with a passion – and re-mulching every year just to have it look sad and faded after a few months is pretty depressing.  So this year we opted to bite the bullet and try out rubber mulch – it’s more expensive but it will supposedly last for up to 12 years without fading or decomposing!  If that’s the case then we will have recouped our investment after the first two years, saving ourselves money and lots of labor in the long run.  This is the brand of rubber mulch that we went with.

Have any of you tried rubber mulch?  What’s your take on it?  (And please ignore our straggly bushes.)

Once Jason finished spreading all the mulch our flower beds were looking pretty snazzy!!  I love the way dark brown mulch looks – it just does it for me in a way that reddish or light mulch doesn’t.  Anybody else?

And check out that contrast between the mulched and non-mulched areas – the mulch makes such a difference!!

Jason didn’t spread any mulch in the areas right by the sidewalk and front porch because . . . I promised I would plant some flowers.  What was I thinking?

We picked up 40 purple petunias from Home Depot and I got to planting.    First I had to fill up an entire garbage sack with all of the nasty weeds and dead flowers that I pulled out of the beds.  Good times for a chick that’s 31 weeks pregnant!  (And yes, that’s the same T-shirt from the nursery-painting extravaganza.  It now has pink paint on it which makes me feel somewhat sentimental – weird, right?)

Pulling out all of the dead stuff wound up turning over the soil pretty well so it was easy to plant those suckers once I’d laid them all out in their future homes.

You may have noticed that every tree within a 5 mile radius decided to shed its leaves about 3 seconds after Jason finished mulching – so please excuse all the leaves everywhere.

Anyway, after a few hours of work our flower beds were looking cute and colorful!

I’m ready for our little Japanese maple to get its leaves, and for the knockout roses to really start blooming.  Bring on the color!

I still have plans to add two planters to the front porch, but knowing me that will probably never happen.  :)  What about you – have you been fiddling around in your garden lately?

I seriously could not be more THRILLED with them!!  I feel like the bold splash of peacock blue (not really teal like I called them before) really pulls the whole den/kitchen/breakfast nook together.  Which is actually a pretty impressive feat for two wing chairs.

That side of the room really needed some height, so the taller backs of the wing chairs paired with the leaning mirror (formerly in our bedroom) adds some verticality that draws your eye towards our vaulted ceiling.

You may have noticed a few other new additions – like the tripod table between the wing chairs and an aluminum table by the couch (you’ll see it in other photos).  Before we got these tables the only surface we had for drinks, etc. in the den was the coffee table – and then we moved the coffee table in front of the other couch (because it looks better layout-wise) so Jason and I didn’t have anywhere to put our food/drinks/feet while we were watching TV, which just wouldn’t do.  :)  The new tables have been fab!

And, of course, change begets change and now I’m itching for new pillows in the den.  :)  Isn’t it funny how that happens?

I definitely dig the new view from the kitchen.

And the peacock blue wing chairs balance out the blue from the DIY squiggle art on the other side of the den.

Oh!  How could I forget our new pouf and basket??  I’m officially obsessed with the basket – before we got it there were piles of junk all over the coffee table, but now I can just cram everything into the basket and nobody is the wiser.  Tricky.

And if I’m really being honest, this is how the room looks most of the time – I have stolen the aluminum side table and claimed it as my computer/drink receptacle, and Jason is a huge fan of the pouf for foot-propping purposes.

What do you guys think?!?  Have you made any changes to your home lately that have made you as happy as the new wing chairs have made me?  And what about that domino-effect where you make one improvement to the room and suddenly there are a hundred other things you want to change – am I alone on that one?

By the way, I may have made a few other changes in addition to the wing chairs, new layout, basket, pouf, leaning mirror and new side tables.  Somebody stop me!

P.S.  Happy birthday to my awesome hubby today!!!!

There’s only one way I can describe the relationship I have with these new chairs for our den – true love.

I’ll have pics for you soon!  And the arrival of the chairs may have inspired a few more changes for our den . . .

Domino (?) via Little House Blog

Via Plush Palate

Via Small Shop Studio

Via Aesthetic Oiseau

Via Little House Blog

That’s why, when my mom asked what she and my dad could give me for a baby present, I couldn’t resist requesting a giant stuffed giraffe for my own little girl’s nursery.  My mom jumped at the chance to give a “fun” gift rather than a “practical” gift (the other half of my gift that I requested can only be described as practical), and a few days later this giant box from Amazon arrived on my doorstep.

Eeek!!!  Nelson is even cuter in person than I had hoped!

And apparently giant stuffed giraffes are fun for the whole family, not just babies.  My husband has had a grand old time chasing the kitties around the house with Nelson . . .

. . . and now Nelson has the habit of standing in random places to “surprise” people and kitties when they are least expecting it.

( Nelson sneaking up on me behind the couch while we were watching TV )

( Nelson peeking out from the breakfast nook.  He has also been found in my closet. )

We are a mature bunch around here.  :)

By the way, the best deal that I found for giant stuffed giraffes was on Amazon for the Melissa and Doug giraffe (that’s what Nelson is) – you can get your own giraffe here.