new furniture

when we first decided to build the house, my main concern was that we wouldn't have $ to afford furniture to put in the house!  (there were many families that i worked for as a nanny that lived that way, and i didn't want to be like them)

my husband insisted that we would, and that we could get new furniture for the living room whenever i wanted.

we have lived here for about 4 months now so it was time.  there wasn't enough seating in the living room for when we had guests over.

before...

 

where Remi is standing there had been a brown chaise lounge there.  no one used it, so pretty much the only seating was the couch.

after...

these aren't the best pictures, but you get the idea.

i absolutely love the new furniture.  it is very traditional.

we originally wanted to get a sectional but the one we REALLY wanted didn't fit.  it was way too long and would have blocked some walking room.  that would have made NO sense, because the whole reason we have such a large open room is so that we don't feel cramped, or like there isn't enough space.

hope you like it as much as we do :)

some new target finds

i've been keeping my eye out for a few new pieces of furniture and some different things to finish off rooms.  lately target has been where i have found everything.  

i am obsessed with target!  they have the cutest things and always at a great price.  

plus if you have a target debit/credit card, they give you 5% off your whole order.  better than the 10% discount i got at wal-mart when i worked there, because i hate shopping there, so i rarely used it.  

anyways....

first, i got some new bookcases for my office.  (i haven't done a whole post on my office yet, but will soon!)

originally i was going to get the really cheap bookcases that they sell and have Marky Mark put some trim on them and fancy them up to look like built-ins, but he has enough projects on the house.

instead i waited for these to go on sale and snatched them up.  they are originally $110 a piece, i got them for around $75 each.  such a good deal, and they ended up looking so good in the space.

i got white to match the whole feel of the office.  i have added more things to the bookcases since this pic, but would like to do some more styling to them.

second, i got a front entryway bench.  this was really important because we had been noticing that anytime someone came over they had a heck of the time taking their shoes off.

originally i was just going to put a table here, but decided a bench made more sense.  we wanted a place for people to sit down or set their things down.  there is also additional storage in the bench.

it was $170, but i got it on sale for $110!

eventually i want to get a pillow. (i saw one at TJ's that said "happy home."  i passed cause i wasn't too sure on it but might go back for it)  and i was thinking of possibly putting a table next to the bench on either side.  i have been eyeing a really pretty silver one at, where else, target.

and we definitely need a new rug for there ASAP but i have been having a hard time finding any rugs I like.

i got these baskets for my office.  they look a little funny in the picture but they look really good in my office.

they says mail, stuff and magazines on them.  i actually needed a place for all of those things so this was perfect.

they were originally $20 and i got them for $16!


these are just a few of my recent buys from target lately.  i also ordered some bedside tables for the master that should be here next week!  excited to get those, especially cause Mark has always used a garden table as his bedside table.  he will finally have drawers!  and a place to put his things!  it will be awesome :)

home tour: 1/2 bath

we really wanted a half bathroom for when we have guests over.  when we lived in our split level, no one ever knew which bathroom to use because there was one upstairs and one downstairs and none on the main level.  most people would go up but that was our "master" bathroom, which wasn't ideal.

it's in the hallway, in-between the mudroom and office.  right off of the main living space.

anyways, there really isn't a great way to show the half bathroom.  this is the best i could do (terrible lighting and too small of a space)...

so glamorous right?!  it's a cream color.  the tile, which you can't really see in the pics looks almost like a linen.  just something different for a small room.  the light fixture is the same as in the master bathroom.

Things that still need to be done:

• paint trim and door
• seal granite (i know we should have done this when we first got it :/)
• caulk countertop
• rug
• art
• trim around mirror
• table for corner

hanging around

i finally got my hubby to hang some stuff around the house!  some of it i bought before we even moved in so i had no idea if it would work in the space.  luckily it all looks great (at least i think it does ;) )

these used to be above our bed in our old master, but they are WAY too little for the space now.  they fit really nicely between the master closet and master bathroom.  i love finally having some our wedding pictures up!  now i have to figure out what i want to put above our bed...

this chalkboard was just something fun for us.  we plan on using it for when the kids come to visit and let them decorate it for us or for us to write little notes to each other.  it's right outside our master in the hallway.  we didn't want it in a high traffic area though because in case it says honey do list items, our guests don't need to see it.

i LOVE this sign.  it's perfect for us, since we always have fresh eggs thanks to our girls.  we put it by the patio door.

this is my favorite of everything that got hung.  i really wanted this sign a long time ago, so i just bought it even though i had no idea where it would fit in our kitchen.  my mom had the idea to put it above the cabinets since our ceilings are so tall.  i think it looks amazing!

spring

all i can think about lately is spring...

i just so desperately want it to be spring already.  even though i'm obsessed with our house and love being in here, i just want to go outside!

the dogs are so bored.  they play and fight all day long, but you can tell, they want to do that outside.  stella has been trying to stay out as long as possible, but her poor paws freeze.  Boston's were not built for the cold.

i want to asphalt our driveway, and get rid of the huge mounds of dirt surrounding our house.  i want to plant grass, and start a garden.

i want to go for a walk. every. single. day.  and maybe even start running (haha let's not get ahead of ourselves)

running to the store should not be a chore.  i shouldn't freeze my butt off every time i get in the car.  i shouldn't have to put off going to the store for a few days because it is below zero and i can't even stand the thought of taking a step outside.

walking to the mailbox shouldn't be the only outdoor activity we have.

please let it be warm soon.  pretty please.  even 30 degrees would be some sort of relief...

five on friday (home tour: laundry room/mudroom)

the laundry room and the mudroom were the most important rooms in the house in designing the house. 

unfortunately, not everyone felt the same way, so there were a lot of problems with this area as we were building.  mainly, it was made much smaller than the plans originally said.  not enough space was not ok for this space, but luckily my mom came through and figured out how to fit everything in.

although not all of the problems were resolved, it is still one of my favorite rooms in the house!

welcome

look at that beautiful blue.  still love it every time i see it.

the mudroom/laundry room is right next to the master bedroom

this area was the most important, because it had to have enough room for:

• dog's kennels
• place to hang jackets, and for shoes
• countertop for folding/cat food
• hampers
• washer/dryer
• sink
• broom closet

1. behind the door to the mudroom is the dogs kennels, nicely tucked away under a countertop

there is a door so that if people come over, all i have to say is 'kennel' and they will run in there and i just have to shut the door to keep them from jumping all over our guests.  this is nice so they don't always have to be in their kennels.  so far, they don't scratch at the door.

the Boston Terrier sign, says 'a house is not a home without a Boston'

i also insisted on having the cabinets above them, because that's where all their goodies are kept. (this will be in a later post)

if we end up getting a fourth dog (which is something we are considering), or when we have a foster (and if both happen, that means space for 5 dogs!), i'm not sure where she/they will go, but i'm sure we will figure it out.

2.  ok, i know this looks pathetic, but until we find a solution, it is working for us.  we have a place for jackets and shoes, it's just not the prettiest space in the house.

eventually, i would like to get a bench with baskets underneath for shoes, some nice hooks, and some storage above.  it's not a priority for right now, but it'll happen eventually.

3.  in the laundry area of this space is my must have sink.  i honestly only wanted this sink to be able to fill up the dog's water bowl.  which isn't the best reason to spend a lot of $, but it ended up that i use this CONSTANTLY.

i LOVE this sink!  best idea ever.  

and the cabinets house my cleaning supplies.  all in one area.  not the most ideal, but for fostering it had to all be kept out of reach from the littles.  so this is where it goes, and it's been working for me.

4.  obsessed with my washer and dryer.  

we didn't have one in the rental and it was pure torture.  ok, maybe it wasn't that bad because i got to visit Grams every week, but still.  it sucked having to haul all that laundry back and forth.  

i truly appreciate and love these.  they are LG just like all of the appliances in our house.  and i love the steam feature.  especially with the dogs.  and a dog that has a tail infection.  just ew.

5.  my little shelf above the washer and dryer.

it houses my laundry detergent, and similar items.  a little garbage can for lint.  and a wash bucket.

originally, i was going to add more cabinets, but i wouldn't have been able to reach any of the shelves anyways.  this worked out perfectly and i love it.

ignore the plugs and plumbing...apparently the plumber, electrician and HVAC guy all don't know how to use a tape measure.  my husband, ahem the electrician, is trying to think of a solution to hide it.

Things that still need to be done in this space:

• paint trim
• paint doors
• install end on laminate
• lockers or storage for jackets/shoes
• rug
• touch up garage door
• install garage door knob

Lily loves to sit in the laundry basket on top of the washer.  it's one of her favorite places in the house too ;)

bathroom pantry cabinet

A bathroom pantry cabinet?  Well, really in a kitchen it would be a pantry cabinet, but it's in our bathroom.  It really is our linen cabinet, but I still call it the pantry.  Not sure why, but it confuses my husband.  Haha!

Isn't it a beauty?!

Anyways, I LOVE how spacious it is, and I haven't even used all of the space in it, but thought I would show how I keep it organized.

top of cabinet

Top shelf:  First bin holds my blow dryer, hair spray, and straightener.  Second bin has "Misc."  Things like cotton balls, Qtips, or anything that doesn't really have another place to go.

Middle shelf: Kleenex and toilet paper.

Bottom shelf: The shoe box containers hold stomach and cold meds, each in their own containers.  All the other meds are in the bin.  My favorite part is that I can keep my toothbrush plugged in, in the cabinet, so that it's not sitting out on the counter.

bottom of cabinet

 Top shelf: Towels.

Middle shelf: Nailpolish container (which you can see is overflowing).  Wash clothes and coconut oil.

Bottom shelf: Scale.  Bin full of "Extras."  Things like contact solution, toothpaste, body wash, deodorant.  I like to keep an extra on hand so we don't ever run out.

I used the bins in our previous house in the linen closet, and they are super helpful at keeping this organized.  I try to keep things that we both use in the linen cabinet, and then we keep our stuff in our separate vanities.  I was shocked to see that I had so much leftover space in the cabinet, but that's how I like it.  I hate clutter so this has been helpful for keeping everything away and in it's place.

Check out the full bathroom here

Five on Friday

1.  We closed on our house this week!!  So happy to have that all done and behind us.  Now we will get our last check and finish paying all the workers, and maybe even have a little left over.  Yay!



2.  Got to hang out a bit with Starla and Aron.  Me and Starla even had a lunch date at Chili's.  Yummy!

She totally spoils Marley

3.  Went out to lunch with Grams yesterday, which was a blast!  We went to a little diner in her town called the Lumber Inn.  I had the fish sandwich and she had a beef sandwich.  It was really good!

4.  On the way to her house there were cops EVERYWHERE!  And then I noticed on my way to Trader Joe's there was even more cops.  Called my Grams and she turned on the news to hear that Mr. President was in Waukesha, down the street from our old house at GE.  After leaving Trader Joe's I was headed home and realized that no one was driving on the other side on the freeway.  I went to get off the freeway and got stuck in traffic right next to the freeway.  Next thing you know, a million cops, and the President's Suburbans all come rolling down the freeway.  Kinda cool to see!  (And no I didn't get any pics, because I was on the phone with my mom complaining about being stuck in traffic.  Ha!)  But it looked like this...

5.  I'm not a big crafter or DIY'er but I saw arm knitting on a blog somewhere and decided I wanted to try it.  I found a tutorial on YouTube and spent 2 hours last night on it.  It turned out AMAZING!

Here's the video:

home tour: master bedroom

Our bedroom is on the opposite side of the house from the kid's bedrooms (and no we don't have kid's but we built them with the hopes they would be for our kids someday).  We decided to put the master bedroom behind the garage, because then that way we would hear if the garage door opened.  1. because my husband is always thinking someone is breaking in.  2. because if we ever had kids we wanted to make sure we could hear them coming and going.  3. because the dogs room is the mudroom and that way they would be closer to our room (yes, I do realize I sound like a freak when I want the dogs closer to me than our future children).  Although, I must say we bought the quietest garage door opener so we can't actually hear it from inside the house anyways!  And this way the master is also closer to the basement, which is again so we can keep a close eye on our kids (for in the future when we finish the basement), plus that's Mark's area of the house.  

We have the same furniture as we did in our old house.  But we were able to put the 42" TV in our room now, which will probably someday be hung on the wall.

I love that Marley is in all of these pics too :)

The comforter, sheets, and pillow were all new for this house.  We had a beautiful set in our old house, but Marley chewed a hole through it as a puppy so we needed something new.  The pillow is my favorite because it actually has sparkles in the material.  The bedside tables will eventually have to change.  We tried to buy a matching one to the one we already have, but they no longer make it, so we will have to find something new.  The lamp shade on Mark's side of the bed is actually broken, a door actually fell on top of it, so I will be looking for some new lights too.

The closet doesn't have a door yet, but it is ordered.

I love our huge closet!  At our old house we had to always switch out our clothes for the seasons, and in WI that is nearly impossible to do.  It's nice that everything finally fits in one place.  The guy that hung our closets hung everything wrong so the clothes on the top sit on the rack for the clothes on the bottom.  Not cool!

But at least we can still use them until they are fixed.

Things that still need to be done:

• paint door, trim and step for doggies
• curtains
• bedside tables
• lamps
• hang some photos on the wall
• art?
• fix closet racks
• door for closet

home tour: master bathroom

We moved into our home a little over a month ago.  Things have been pretty crazy since moving in, so there hasn't been a ton of time to get things done around the house.  I am SLOWLY working on it. We are pretty much still trying to unpack boxes, so we know what we have, and get the necessities together, so we know what we need to buy.  We designed this home ourselves and plan on being here for a LONG time so we have plenty of time to get the house how we want it.  This house has been such a luxury after the horrible rental we were in.  Our last home was a foreclosure that we flipped and made a nice profit on, but that means it wasn't really ours while we were living in it.  We were constantly doing projects to sell it, not projects for us.  This house is all ours, and I am loving every single second of it, even if there are still a lot of things that need to be done.

Our master bathroom was a compromise.  The whole house was my taste and my husband wanted one area of the house that was his taste.  His taste being brown.  He likes anything that is brown or tan, which is exactly what he wanted for this space.  He was also VERY insistent on a rain shower, whereas I wanted a tub.  In the end, his rain shower won and even though I didn't get my tub, I am really happy with the end result. 

When designing the vanity, I knew I wanted my own vanity if it was possible.  Marky Mark isn't the easiest to share with, he tends to be a bit messy (although he would say otherwise).  I wanted some sort of linen closet, but there wasn't space for an actual closet.  We were able to get a huge cabinet for in between our vanities to do the job.  I haven't even come close to filling that up yet!  The cabinets are dark espresso, the same color as our island in the kitchen, with granite countertops.

my vanity

Although my mom disagreed with my window choice, I am very happy with it.  The tiny window above the toilet.  I didn't want a big window because at our rental we had one and always had to open and close the blinds.  This way there is a little bit of natural light, but no one can see in our bathroom.    And the wall next to the toilet was a must.

This is the view when you first walk into the bathroom.  We decided to hang our towels on a rack, rather than on a bar, because it seems more practical...thank you Pinterest!

Next to shower is a really long, empty wall.  I will definitely need to put some art up there.  Currently, we have a shower curtain hanging.  This is a very old curtain that will be gone ASAP.  We will eventually have glass doors, but it wasn't a must for moving in.  We will get the glass doors eventually, but for now the curtain will do.  

This is our fancy shower!  We each wanted our own shower heads, and of course we had to have the rain shower.  Because of the rain shower, we did tile all the way up and on the ceiling.  The niche has the only glass tile in the shower.  I would have designed a white subway tile shower, or something white and beautiful, but the glass tile in the niche will have to do.  The floor has travertine tile.  At the last minute we decided to add floating seats, originally they were going to be built-ins.  I like these much better and they don't take up as much space.  

We had a situation with our water, it was ORANGE!  We finally got our water softener installed so we are still working on getting the orange out of the stone.

Even though this room isn't what I had imagined it to be, it still turned out beautiful.  I LOVE the rain shower and use it almost everyday.  I really enjoy getting ready in this bathroom every morning.

Things that still need to be done:

• caulk around the shower
• glass doors installed
• side splashes for granite
• paint trim
• paint door
• touch up crown on cabinet
• hang hand towel holder
• organize cabinets
• art (maybe some floating shelves)
• remove orange from floor

setting up the nursery

Although the nursery was nowhere near done when we had our little visitor come stay for the week, we still had it to where we could use it.

Our good friends gave us their daughters crib!  It was such a blessing!  Their daughter was the last child I nannied for, so it was really special that they were able to give her crib to us.  I was so excited when Marky Mark put it together.  The room had sat pretty much empty since we moved in, so I was happy to see it finally coming together.

We put the cubbies in here, because I thought it would be good to use for organizing toys.  It did a pretty good job, but it could use some baskets for diapers and other supplies.  It was pretty convenient to just go in a grab a toy as needed.  Although, I'm not sure if a dresser might be a little more practical in the future.

My mom knit this gorgeous blanket!  This was definitely my favorite Christmas present this year!  It matched the green chevron sheets for the crib.  Our little visitor used it while she was here :)

I LOVE Scentsy! I had always loved these warmers and was so bummed when they stopped making them.  My mom, Grams and I went to a craft fair and there was a lady that was selling some of the older warmers for much cheaper than they originally cost.  Luckily, this was one of them, so we snatched it up!  I was too worried to put wax in it, so I just put it out for decoration.

I really wanted to get the Cloud B nightlight, but at $50 there was no way I was going to spend that much money on it!  I was so excited to see that Walmart sold an off brand for only $20!  This is the one that plays music and lights up.  I thought it was important to get a nightlight, because a lot of foster kids will even ask to sleep with the light on because they are scared.  Little girl LOVED this!  She would turn it on every time before nap and bedtime.  I had it set to run for 30 min and it worked awesome!

I picked a lime green paint for the nursery.  I wanted something neutral since we are open to either gender, but I thought that yellow was too girly for a boy.  Green was my favorite color when I was little (lime green still being one of my favs), so I thought it was a safe choice.  I love how it turned out, although I don't know that everyone agrees with me (ahem...my husband).  I was going to make it gray and green but since we have a lot of gray in the rest of the house, I'm thinking of adding some black in.  Originally I wanted a black and white nursery with lime green accents, but I don't know how great that will look with brown furniture (I was originally going to buy white furniture).

Anyways, that's how the nursery looks for now.  I have a lot of things I would love to add...

• curtains and rod
• dresser (?)
• baskets for cubbies
• rocking chair
• art
• shelves for decorations or pictures
• more crib sheets
• better toy organization
• fun rug (?)

And there are still a few things that need to be finished in the room...

• paint the trim
• paint the door
• closet doors installed!!
• shorten the blinds (they are too long and WAY too heavy) and cords (dangerous)
• closets hung correctly (a lot of our closets were installed incorrectly)
• dimmer