Before and After: Living Room Fireplace

We don't have a fireplace anywhere else in our house, but that title sounded more elegant.

Our living room has come a long way since we moved in. We've made two significant contributions: the built-ins, and now the fireplace overhaul. It actually feels more spacious than when it was, um, naked. I mean bare. And this is important because our living room and the word "big" are not in cahoots.

So here's the teaser, as taken from the bottom of our stairs...

BEFORE

AFTER

WARNING: Pictures are misleading. Jason did not turn into Alex. But everything else is an accurate representation.

So as you can see, the old fireplace was old. Brass firebox, white brick...it wouldn't stop any shows. It's been on our list since the beginning and its time finally came. Of course, I do what I always do and head to Pinterest, show Jason what I want and then sit back and eat bon-bons til it's finished. (Wouldn't that be nice! My real job is to keep the boys out of the tools, paint and general construction - no small feat and we usually have to leave the house. Oh, and the cleanup that comes with saws and drills roaring away. Total mess.)

But the end result is always sooo worth it. Pinterest had lots of lovely fireplaces to choose from, I narrowed it down to the ones with TVs above the mantel and picked these as the father and mother.

The color and bottom half of the left one and the top half of the right one and voila! Our fireplace was born. 

Of course, no child is a perfect combination of their parents. I went with Benjamin Moore's Gunmetal for the gray, slightly lighter than the father's Peppercorn by Sherwin Williams. And we chose regular white marble tile vs. the herringbone (our picture is a little wonky, the tiles on the floor are the same white as around the backsplash, despite looking creamy/yellowy). And of course, there's our dirty little secret.

The background info is that Jason built the cable box into the wall a long time ago and our TV is mounted so that we have not dealt with any stray wires. But the new question was, how to hide the cable box? Our remote is infrared and communicates through the wood, but we knew we had to be able to access it from time to time. As the design came together, Jason realized he could make the whole left vertical board slide in and out...

Genius! I think he is most proud of that little hack ;) 

So let's look at our fireplace's (re)birth story through pictures.

First trimester: tiles over brick and ugly orange floor.

Second trimester: All the wood parts. Bottom build out and top latticework.

Third trimester: prime and paint.

Official birthday: November 24, 2014 at approximately 9:30 pm.

Yay! I need to get some mantel decor but overall, it pulls the room together and is just so nice! We thought about doing the traditional white but there's so much white trim overall that we decided to go for it and make a statement, especially after finding the picture of its father. Let's look at the after picture one more time :)

There you have it! Success for which I can take almost no credit for. Jason's new catchphrase is "If you pin it, I can build it" haha. Thanks to Pinterest for the inspiration and to my husband who has truly done some wonderful things for our home. Welcome to the world, new fireplace!

Before and After: Half bath

We have this little half bath downstairs right off our kitchen. We squeezed in our peninsula and two bar stools right in front of the door, so it's not the easiest to "get to" because of that, and it's not in the most private spot a bathroom could be, but nonetheless we are glad to have it. While not mission-critical, I have created this nice map for you.

I find it helpful when I have a frame of reference and therefore assume you do too.

So, this half bath has always been fairly builder-basic: plain mirror, plain wall, cheap overhead light. Even the paint, Benjamin Moore's Gray Cashmere, was the most boring color on the planet and did nothing for the space.

That's me before we moved in (almost two years ago!) with our painter in the background. I was telling him I wanted to do wide horizontal stripes but that never happened. 

Anyway, it also always bugged me (still does) that the toilet is facing the sink. Like why couldn't it have been installed with its back on the same wall? I asked this very question to a plumber who could not believe I had spent time thinking about such a thing. He told me it would be a pricey change for no good reason. Humpf. The point is, if you ever come to my house and use this bathroom and think "Wow, I could rest my chin right here on the sink while I sit and pee!" you are not the only one. 

So the first change we made was to put up a new mirror. I have always lusted after the bathroom pivot mirrors from Pottery Barn. But even the name sounds expensive (the Kensington; would you like to have some tea?) and Jason told me no. Siiiiiigh. I knew what my real option was.

It actually doesn't look that bad. We hung Mr. Ikea up about a year ago, I slapped a free printable in a frame and for a long time our bathroom was in a holding pattern. It's so hard to get photos of this small space but for your viewing pleasure, my panorama attempt:

In early November, we decided to launch it into high gear. Jason added crown molding (moulding?) and board and batten, we picked Benjamin Moore's Mineral Alloy (and painted the ceiling!) and hung a new light fixture.

Presenting the official side by side before and afters (although even in the first set, the molding in both is "after")

A couple of personal things. 5 years ago for our wedding, our calligrapher made a custom map that went out with the invitations:

She sent us the original as a gift, which we framed and hung in here.

We also had a certain three year old paint the little pot that went on the shelf:

But of significantly more interest was actually hanging the shelf.

Because, you know. Power tools. 

The most outside-the-box thing we did was paint the ceiling. We knew it was a dark color and wondered about the impact but it actually adds a dimension to the space. Final glamour shots:

That's the story of the little half bath that could. Happily ever after, the end!

We are (34) and (8 months)

Alex and I both are having big "birthdays" this week! I turned 34 two days ago and Alex will be 8 months on Sunday.

So my birthday started off with two incredible things before 8 am. First, Alex crawled. He had been allllllmost there all week and then, on the morning of November 12, off he went! A little shaky but officially he did it :) I wouldn't go so far as to say that we have a true crawler at this point, but where there's a will there is a way, and Alex has the will. I have watched that video more times than I care to admit - I'm so proud! In my other videos of the same feat Ashton is actually cheering him on, it is indescribably cute. And the second amazing thing is that Ashton stopped what he was doing, announced he had to poop, we walked to the potty and he sat and went. Up until now, this 3 year old has been about as unpotty-trained as they come, so this was positively jaw-dropping. Despite my penchant for recording almost everything my kids do, I did not record this ;) Talking about poop so freely on this blog is punishment enough for my readers. Nonetheless, it has started a new routine in our house and just, well, thank god.

The night before my birthday, we were all talking about our day (Jason was off and had gone shopping with the boys) when Ashton piped up: "Hey Mommy! You're getting a new coat!" Jason started to crack up and I said "Wow! I am?" and he said, "Yeah! For your berf-day. It has hair on it." We tried to explain what a "surprise" is but he continued to chatter on about my new hairy coat. Jason promised me it would all make sense.

That same night, Alex had his first puffs. He has two little bottom teeth but besides that, it's gums away! Right now he eats lunch and dinner, which is either some kind of finger food, like avocado or banana (or now puffs), and some baby cereal and purees. 8 months is going to see the addition of breakfast and also yogurt/dairy if all goes well. I still leave 3 six-ounce bottles a day for him so between the milk, the food, and the naps (twice a day), Alex really has very little free time.

Other things that have happened this month. Alex had his first dinner out, which meant his first french fry.

And then lots of push-ups to burn it off.

Annnnnnd, snap! The weather turned cold :( Happens every year on my birthday, like the worst present ever. Luckily the hats are cute.

Anyway, enough about Alex and more about me ;) As I turn 34, I find myself in a very in-between place with my work/life balance. Some days, I hint in a not-so-subtle fashion to Jason that I don't want to work anymore (which is not really an option, but I still say it haha).  Some days, I am so thankful that I do work and can't imagine not getting up, dressed and out the door, dropping Ashton at preschool on my way into the office. I have come to love the morning chaos routine in our house.

Part of my problem is a function of where I work: a university, where everyone is extremely smart in something so they have advanced degrees in it and also teach it. I feel very bottom-of-the-totem-pole in that regard, but I don't have the time to crack any books or attend any classes to fix my education right now. I love Bentley and I love the people I work with, and my job gives me almost everything I need except...pride, I guess. I've always had administrative jobs, and it never mattered too much because I was "young", but over the years, with getting married and having kids, I'm just now looking up and realizing I'm still more or less doing the same thing I was 10 years ago. In the meantime, I miss out on a lot of things at home. This would be okay if my professional life was where I wanted it to be, but I know it isn't because I'm not satisfied.

So what's a girl to do. While I think every working mom wishes she could stay home with her children, I'm certain a lot of moms who have this privilege sometimes wish they could go to work! At this point, the right thing to do is focus on the positives. Working gives my life structure and helps me provide for our family. But it's time to set goals for where I want my "business life" to be. In an examination of my life at 34, I am going to have to get a little more ambitious in order for the time I spend away from the boys to be as worthwhile as possible. Not sure what to do exactly, but that's the latest thing occupying my thoughts. Hopefully by 35 I'll have an update for you haha.

Back to the present. Overall my birthday was perfect. I don't post the date on Facebook because for some reason, I find all the "birthday wishes" a bit meaningless if someone didn't remember on their own. I don't say that with any hostility, I guess I'm just private about it. I don't measure a good birthday by how many people I hear from. My little party of 4 is all I need.

Oh by the way, my "hairy coat" was a faux-fur hooded jacket. It looked like this ;)

Before and After: Back Deck

This project has been so huge that I did an intermittent before and "in progress" back in April. The deck we inherited with our house was weathered, splitting and generally a mess. Luckily, the foundation was solid, but we had to replace all the top planks, rails, spindles (balusters, whatever), rebuild the stairs and lattice the sides. I say we but really mean Jason and the other handy men in my family.

So that all got done and then we had to wait to stain it. Wait wait waaaaaait. Not my strong suit. I guess the wood needed some time and I stared at yellow pine all summer (is it pine actually? I have no idea. Some kind of plywood). Finally, a couple weeks ago it was time to pick a color! We debated gray to match the foundation of the house but ultimately, I chose taupe. Our kitchen has big sliding doors out to the deck which make it very much an extension of our living space. We look at it year round, therefore I thought it would be best to keep the inside and outside "floors" a consistent color (our kitchen has a tan tile).

I'm in a real pickle here because I can't decide whether to post the before, in progress, and then after pictures. Hmmmm. I guess if you want to see the in progress ones, click on the link above :P

The final results! I know my angles aren't perfect but you'll get it.

The posts are going to get caps around the bottoms at some point to fancy them up, but for now it's finished. I owe it to Jason to post a picture of him laboring away:

He put two coats of semi-transparent stain on the deck and stairs and on all the balusters. He must have reminded me what a pain in the ass those balusters were like a hundred times. Hee hee. That really is a lot of tall, skinny sticks right there. Four sides each ;)

Overall, our house is so much less sad than when we bought it. The grass is greener, the colors are more cheerful, and I think it can tell it is very loved :) Half bath and dining room projects are in the works!

Star of the Week

Ashton was Star of the Week last week at school! I promise you, he did nothing to receive this accolade. He is just 3rd in the class alphabetically and they are going down the line with one kid per week ;) 

What does this mean? From his teacher: "During your child’s week, he/she may bring in family photos to display on  our “STAR” bulletin board. You can make a poster with pictures or just send individual pictures in. Feel free to be creative and have fun with this theme. Along with the pictures your child can bring in special items to share with the class such as: a favorite toy, favorite book (that I could read to the class) or anything your child feels is special to them.  This gives all the children the opportunity to get to know one another. Throughout the week they will be filling out a form with Miss Kristen to hang on the board so that everyone can get to know the “STAR”. The child will be line leader for the week, the teacher helper, and get to do a one-on-one special project with me! At the end of the week your child will be given a certificate to keep as a token for being “STAR.”

Tell me you don't remember the rush of superiority that came with being the line leader.

Anyway, "you can make a poster with pictures" was my second assignment so far where I've had to send Ashton to school with something crafty (first was valentines). Okay, so let's "make a poster with pictures".

Get all set up and paint.

Go all Jackson Pollock on it.

Cut out letters. (Really, watch your mom do it. "Kid scissors" is kind of an oxymoron.) Then glue them.

Practice for college and work late into the night.

Then, go to bed and in the morning, the poster is magically finished!

He proudly trotted off to school with his poster and his battery-operated Diesel train for show and tell. I couldn't wait to pick him up and see how it went.

Well, he came home in pants that looked like this.

Let's just say there was an "accident", his diaper didn't quite hold and he needed to borrow some clothes. Luckily I don't think he knew enough to be embarrassed but this is certainly not how you want your first day as Star to go. Line leaders need to be taken seriously and pants like these are hardly ideal.

But the rest of the week went fine, he came home with big star stickers, a certificate, and his special "All About Me" form, which stated that his favorite color is blue, his favorite toy is his scooter, and when he grows up he wants to be a racecar driver. I suspect this was influenced by what he knew he was going to be for Halloween ;) He also said he lives with Mommy and Daddy (sorry Alex, no mention of you) and that his favorite food is "carrots". What the what? I'd like to see that! In the meantime, my kid is out there lying to his teachers.

Sunday night before Ashton's week began, Jason and I were looking at his poster in awe. Our little 3 year old has a real little life, his own likes and dislikes, goes to school and without a doubt, seizes every day. He wakes up in the morning raring to go because isn't it true?

I could now write something cheesy like "Ashton, you're our star of the week EVERY week!"...oh wait. I just did ;P