New Wood Flooring Has Been Ordered

Posted by Patchwork Reality

It has taken quite a bit orf researching and information gathering as most well thought out projects do, and I am happy to say that we have chosen and ordered hardwood floors for the upstairs living space as of 2 hours ago!!

Ok so here is a before picture:

The carpet looks fine in the picture, but it does not look great up close, it is 6 years old and was very inexpensive carpet to begin with, and it no longer looks nice.

What you cannot see in this picture is that the carpet in the living room buts up to red oak hardwood flooring in the kitchen/dining room. When we built this house the orignal plan was for hardwood throughout the main floor, but I asked to have carpet in this living room area. We had just sold a house that was all hardwood flooring, which we loved, but is hard when you have littles, I wanted an area where I could plop them down with some toys that would be soft landing.

Now that everyone has graduated from toddler-hood, the carpet has done is job and is ready to retire.

Here is what we purchased:

It is an unfinished red oak “select” meaning it has no knots or imperfections, which is what is already in the house size 3 1/4 X 3/4 inch.

We purchased the flooring from Lumber Liquidators, we looked at HOme depot, they did not have it available in unfinished, we also tried to buy from a local small town restoration business but after a week of waiting for a return call, and our tax return money just sitting there in the bank;), we decided on Lumber liquidators.

We have to wait 7-10 days for the flooring to get to our store, then we need to let is “rest” in our house for 7-10 days, 2 weeks being ideal.

Then we can install, sand and clear coat.

We are really excited and I will keep you in the loop for each step! We are pretty seasoned DIY’er our last house we had to refinish the floors, but we have never actually installed them so this will be new for us.

“Room” for Improvement.

Posted by Patchwork Reality

Previously I shared Avalon’s room, you can see it here.

It seems no small task to get their rooms tidy enough to take photos to share, but I am sharing Santanna’s room because it needs to be redone read, paint, and decor.

By far it is the hardest to get her to keep her room organized, it seems like every time we “deep clean” it and I give her bins and tips, and take more out, it just ends up haphazard all over again. Cool with me if she can find things…but thats not the case.

Anway…here is her room AS IS:

Walking in we have a coat hook, I think this might have to go, it feels like a catchall and clutters the entrance?

Looking in from the hallway, can you see that we have started to patch holes in preparation for fresh paint, probably evident in every picture;)…oh and there’s Farley..he loves Santanna!

Curtains need to go/change, I painted her name in one color than was going to change it to match the Circo Love and Nature bedding, which will probably stay, but never finished…add that to the l ist.

Bed side table….less stuff, or maybe one on each side, for books and alarm clock, lamp?

These shelves used to be over a bookshelf, and now just look out-of-place, I think they need to move to a more thoughtful/purposeful place.

Here is what houses almost all her books and toys, it was 2 bookshelves ( that we built) and repurposed into a cubby system. Notice those green woven bins from Target again that I used in the pantry …man I might have bought them all from our store.

I would love to see a cushion on part of this?? She likes to set up her toys and play n it, so maybe just 1/2 for a cozy reading spot.

View of her bed sitting on the cubby system with my back to the window, you can see the heavy blanket peeking out from under her bedding, it gets COLD here, layers are cozy!! She needs a headboard or bed frame of some sort.

Recap of to do list for this room

Paint
Move coat hook
Paint her letters or remove
Bedside table…add another/declutter
purposeful shelving and wall decor
Headboard/footboard, bed frame
Cushion on cubby system

Spring Break….Day one

Posted by Patchwork Reality

5:43 AM….I hear a whimpering, Jon goes in to check on Santanna, she has thrown up all over 😦

6:03 Jon left for work Tanna is tucked in and has a “bowl”

6:40 I hear someone crying, I go into Avalon’s room…she is also throwing up.

Ahhh yeah, Spring break, Bring. It. On.!!!

The older kids had a blast the rest of the morning setting up a sick hospital upstairs, complete with patient cards with their diagnosis. I just love seeing them care for each other when they are not feeling well.

We still managed to dye eggs, most of us anyway.

Yes at our house we use our hands 🙂

Both hands.

And sometimes skewers?!

The 2 big kids and I went to the gym and the played while I ran 3 miles and bikes 10. Still going strong on my training plans for my 1/2 Marathon in May and my Dualathon in April.

Then we went to the Public Library and stocked up for the rest of vacation. We listen to LOTS of books on cassette tape, I mean to the point that is Jim Dale came and ate supper at our house, the kids might not even notice, his voice is just like the paint on the walls.

This is just a small sample of the 36 library books/stories we checked out. The rest are already being poured over in other spaces.

We has spaghetti for supper that was lip smacking delish!!

Every Friday night we have a “Friday night movie” Original name I know. Jon and I are not strict about many things but screen time, or audio-visual time as we call it, is one thing that we really limit. They get one hour a day and most days it just doesn’t fit into the schedule. So each Friday night we kick off the weekend with a big bowl of hot buttery popcorn and a movie of one persons choosing. We rotate through all 4 kids, we get a lot of repeat Pocahontas, Homeward Bound and Disney’s Hercules.

Tonight was Solomon’s choice and he chose Goonies….Love this choice!!!!

I did forget that there are some “scary” moments, dead guy in the freezer with ice cream??!! and a few bleep words, mostly the S— word but overall what a fun adventure movie for kids to watch!

HEEEEYYY YOU GUUUUUUUUYYYS!! Have a Happy Spring Break everyone!!

Littlest Girls Room

Posted by Patchwork Reality

At one point we had all 3 girls sharing this room, it was a fun idea, the sisterly love was there, but this room just does not provide enough space for 3.
It was a sage green color that we loved, but like all the walls in our house it needed a fresh coat over the builder flat paint that we insisted they not use…flat paint is just not a good idea.
Before:

We painted it a very light gray, I put together a duvet cover for her bed, she’s really into polka dots, and made the ladder style bedside table.

Pinterest inspired embroidery hoop fabric pieced wall decor:

We hung 3 mirrors on her wall to make the space feel, bigger, they hang on the wall across from her window which lets in fantastic day light. The pink Bilbo toy serves as a step stool for our little shorty to reach her light and fan switch.

100+ year old metal bed from our family farm, it was bronze but has been painted a number of items, we painted it white over a previous blue, so it has an amazing patina.

Antique toolbox at the end of her bed holds all the books that will not fit on the bedside table, if we have too many of anything at our house it is books, but I think that’s a great thing;)

One wall that houses her closet, we have a plan for some of the closet pace in our house, we might take 1/2 of this closet and give it to the adjoining room. Than take the closet from that room and add it into our MB closet space…stay tuned.

Whiter and Brighter

Posted by Patchwork Reality

It was time.

I did love the color, but it was dark, it’s winter, things needed to be brighter, we have 4 kids that kick off boots, throw down back packs, a dog that slobbers, hands that use the wall instead of the railing…you get the idea.

We painted the entry way.

Here is a photo I found of the before color:

Two more…not great, I took these at night when the kids were sleeping, this is the only safe time to paint at our house without *help*, but you get the idea.

Nice right??!! I do love this color, it took a few tries to get this right, it may even be a custom blend.

But here is what it looks like now:

It is so much brighter and cleaner feeling, I love the cool darker colors, but to be honest this space just needs a light bright color to make this space feel more inviting. We do not have a mudroom or separate entrance, that will be a must have in our next house, so this is where everyone enters our house, the door next to the mirror is the door to the garage, so we really use this landing space ALL. THE. TIME.

Fab Five February 2

Posted by Patchwork Reality

Really should be my sixth post, but here I am still at it. I fall off when Jon works, it is enough keeping everyone happy, fed, somewhat clean and alive, I know that 5 items per day will be there when next I have time.
So in an attempt to catch up on 5 items to be sold per day I have a few more than 5. Bringing my total to 12, I have 2 of teh silver lamps, and there are 3 ikea magnetic cutlery holders. it may be harder than I think. to cut 140 items.
Here are todays items:

Corner Redo…DIY Fireplace

Posted by Patchwork Reality

When we put a wall up along an alcove area in our basement, to make an actual office space in our garganteuos basement living room we left rough ins for a fireplace in the corner. Our house is a split level home that we built just over 4 years ago and I was honestly surprised at how it can be a little chilly in the winter downstairs. I guess I thought since it was so new and efficient this would not be the case, but when part of your house in the dirt, I guess this is bound to happen.

So here is a snippet of the star of our fireplace DIY…the plan is to have stone up to the ceiling with a wooden mantle, inspired somewhat by this photo (hopefully a little less cabin-y):

We are slowly adding more details and characteristic to our house, although we built it with some extra touches that we feel added more character than a standard build we have found we are still missing that “us” feel, I am hoping this fireplace will give the basement some warmth and character.

First step….get a permit to complete this project!! I was fanatical about this, especially since this will be a gas fireplace, I do not want this to be done improperly and jeopardize anything or anyone, plus if we decide to sell and there are no permits on record we could have to pay to have it all redone, don’t skip this step, it is very important.

Second once we knew what was code for the fireplace we bought we went ahead and framed out the spot in 2 X 4’s. Jon made the openings in the wall and ceiling and then we called for a gas line hook-up and inspection this line. The gas line was the only part of this project that we hired out. again we had no intention of taking any chances when it came to safety. The total cost was $164.00 not to bad for safety!

Midway update here