Traditional Home Makeover-Powder Room (Part 3)

If you have been following along during this makeover, welcome back! If this is your first visit you can see what I have been working on here and here.  

The last post covered the foyer and the home office. Just beyond the office is a coat closet and then the powder room. This is a two-piece bathroom with no natural light. This is just a cosmetic change, nothing structural, electrical, etc. Sorry, no pictures before as the painters got there before I did that day! Again, if you're new here I do that... a lot! 

            

                     

The new paint color is Glass Slipper by Benjamin Moore. 

The bathroom already had two mirrors on opposite walls, one bigger than the other. There is a ledge behind the toilet that one mirror sat on, leaning against the wall.  I am huge fan of mirrors as they are usually cheaper than artwork and bring light to a space. Having said that, you have to be mindful of what they reflect. For instance, one wrongly placed in the kitchen may only reflect a sink full of dirty dishes, yuck! Try to position your mirrors to reflect the outdoors when possible. Leaning backward, like on a mantle or in my case, a ledge,  only reflects the ceiling-boring and empty. And, in this case it only added to the fact that the room is dark with no natural light. Instead I hung the mirror a few inches above the ledge. 

My homeowner found a art piece online that sits in front of the mirror. Originally this piece would have been out of our budget but it was pre-owned and she got a deal!

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A rug purchased from Amazon with the tassles cut off.  (Yes, you can do that.) The watercolor prints from Gracelaced, framed and hung, add some color and interest in the room. I love her artwork and I love being able to incorporate it into my decor and that of friends and clients. These prints depict the Fruits of the Spirit with a nod to the beach-staying with our theme of trying to lighten up and give this home an airy feeling. 

                    

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A little zhooshing with items picked up at locally and we can call this room done!

Come back soon as we move into the formal living room and dining room.

Linking up to these blogs:
Life With Lorelai, Shabby Art Boutique, Our Home Away From Home, Celebrate & Decorate, The Dedicated House, Our Mini Family, Ducks N'A Row, Shabby Art Boutique, Life With Lorelai, The Pin Junkie, Katherine's Corner, Blue Sky At Home, Imparting Grace, My Repurposed Life, A Delightsome Life

Traditional Home Makeover-Foyer and Home Office

Hello! I'm glad you could visit with me today!  

In the last post I showed you some before photos of a home that belongs to a friend. To recap a bit, she has lived in the home for more than a decade and has not changed much since she moved in. She, unsure of her decorating abilities, said she is not good at picking out things for her home and asked for help to lighten and brighten the space. She recently purchased a second home close to the ocean for family vacations and a rental space. It offers that coastal vibe one would expect when visiting Cape Cod or New England beaches. It is with that idea in mind that we moved forward with this project of giving the entire first floor a makeover or facelift; nothing structural here-just giving it a fresh, airy, more casual touch.

Two pieces of artwork my client/friend owned are serving as our jumping off point. She loves color and leans more contemporary than traditional but we will have to work with a lot of existing furniture.

We are going to try to pull the blues and aquas through the home. 

Entering the front door you are greeted with a beautiful staircase that sweeps up to the bedrooms. 

The goldish-tan color was all the rage 15 years ago but seems to just blend into the flooring and stair treads. It got a fresh coat of paint in Benjamin Moore's Balboa Mist,  allowing the light (which this space has tons of) to bounce around the space easier.

A new 5x7 rug greets you by introducing some color into the space and giving a taste of what is in store for the rest of the home. 

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The space is large enough to allow for a chair and cabinet; a little space for visitors to wait or to put on shoes. The owner's daughter painted the picture of the foxes! The cabinet was existing. The chair is new as is the pillow. Use what you have! You don't have to get rid of everything in order to start over. We used a family photo to greet/send off guests. Decorating tip: print out inspirational quotes in a pretty font and color for inexpensive artwork. My friend chose Scripture to encourage herself, family and visitors; you will see it scattered throughout her home.

                                        (Isn't this beautiful! She is a very gifted artist!)

Upon entering the front door there is a large entrance to the formal living room to your left. The wall above it needed something big that filled some of that empty wall space. I found a couple options.

Artwork from At Home harkens back to our inspiration. I purchased 2 and hung them side by side over the entry to the formal living room. 

There are a set of French doors to the right that enclose a home office where the mister of the home works from. 

Her mister likes the wall color and didn't want it changed.

He does video conferencing from home so I rearranged a portion of the built-ins behind his desk.  Do not underestimate the value of cleaning up the background if you video chat, work from home, vlog, etc. Now his background is cleaned up. It tells you a little bit about him; representing a little about his personal values and character. Practicality requires the files be readily available but new folders in coordinating colors keep it neat looking and speaks to the organization skills of the person who uses the office. 

Notice the shelves to the right are a little "less pretty". These are not in the shot when video-conferencing so they can stand a little less formality; they hold more personal items that are important to the person who works here. 

That's is where we will stop for today. Much going on behind the scenes. The painter was in and out in a matter of 3 days! He and his crew painted the foyer, bathroom, kitchen, stairways, and family room in that short time. He was headed out on vacation so we needed to jump on it quick and boy did he deliver!

So, what do you think so far? Check back soon when we'll move on to the formal living room...

Linking up to these parties: 

Our Home Away From Home, Lou Lou Girls, Create With Joy, Celebrate & Decorate, Dwellings-The Heart Of Your Home, A Stroll Thru Life, Ducks 'N A Row, My Repurposed Life, DIY By Design, A Delightsome Life, Our Hopeful Home, Imparting Grace, Katherine's Corner, Shoestring Elegance, The Pin Junkie, Shabby Art Boutique, Life With Lorelai, Happiness Is Homemade, The Dedicated House

Traditional Home In Need Of A Little Makeover

Wondering where I have been lately?  There are a ton of decorating blogs out there and I have been visiting them over the past several months. I have to confess I feel a some pangs of guilt knowing that I have neglected my own. I am still trying to find my place in this whole new world. I was a homeschooling momma for a total of 16 years but I worked myself out of a job. It is a mixed hazard/happy result of such a job. It does leave you standing around, turning in a circle a bit, wondering what to do next.

I haven't done much in my own home but have been busy in a friend's home. Been getting my decorating fix on there. Do you walk into your friend's homes and think, "This room would look so good painted a nice _________ color." Or, "Wouldn't it be nice to have a room like this to decorate?" My friend had decorated her home when she first moved in over a decade ago. She feels she isn't "good" at the decorating thing and asked for my help. Her home is about three times the size of mine with big rooms vs. my small colonial-cape rooms in my home. Ooh, this is going to be fun!

This is a two story home with a walkout full basement. I was asked to help update the main floor. Here is a floor plan of the main floor. (It is not to scale, just my chicken scratch rendering.) :

The foyer:

The formal living room:

Yes, we started this project right in the middle of the Christmas season!

The formal dining room:

The kitchen: I always forget the before photos so the house was already being torn apart when I snapped these.

The family room:

The plan is to lighten and brighten this home. My friend likes the Scandinavian style: clean, minimal, light and airy. Like me, she also likes bold and bright pops of color. She also loves the beach and wants to incorporate some of that feel into her home. (You know that's my jam!)

We are working with a lot of the existing furniture and two pieces of existing artwork.

A budget was set. I went home and put together a plan. I then met with both her and her husband and tweaked some things based on their preferences. We set up a Pinterest board as a place to share ideas and products for the project. You can find it by clicking here.

We jumped right in with paint. The kitchen, family room, mud room, guest bathroom and foyer will get some fresh color!

This will entail a series of posts, probably going room by room. Thanks for visiting with me today and I hope you come back to see the progress.

A Christmas Past

Nothing brings me more peace, hope, security, joy and assurance than knowing that in spite of all my failures and shortcomings I am still loved by God. In fact, I know I am so loved because of this: 

Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends. John 15:13

I shared the following in a post a few years ago. I've tweaked it a bit here and there and preach it to my own heart again and again. It is just as true today as it was 2000 years ago and it will be true until the end of time. I have interspersed photos of our home decorated for this Christmas season. 

Christmas is about Jesus, the Christ of God. He did not come wrapped in beautiful wrapping or decorated in the finest array. He was wrapped in rags; swaddling clothes. He did not lay his tiny, magnificent head on a soft bed in a king's nursery but rather in a trough that was meant to feed animals. There was no pomp initiated by the rulers of the day to welcome this prophesied Savior. There was only a young mother and her husband who knew he was not the father of this baby..... and all the heavenly host! It was they who preached to the shepherds in the fields. The shepherds rushed to see this thing the angels had declared to them. They saw the Promise of the Father! They saw, with eyes of faith, the One who would secure for them a righteousness that could never be earned-the perfection that God, the Father, requires for entrance into the gates of heaven.

Wouldn't it be so sweet if that were the whole of the story?

But, Scripture tells us more. We are told that not only can we not keep law of God perfectly but that we don't even desire to. In fact, we break the laws of God regularly and willfully and that is called sin. Scripture also tells us the wages of sin is death and that EVERYONE has sinned. Death is not merely a physical death, which is the evidence of our sin, but also a spiritual death that separates us from the Almighty-without exception. We are bankrupt and without hope.

But God (two of my favorite words), being great in mercy sent his Son, in the form of man, to live according to all the law of God-perfectly. 

And here is the hard thing to remember: that baby lying in a manger, represented so sweetly in my nativity...he came to die ... not because of sin he committed but because of mine and yours. The Father poured out his wrath for our sin on his own Son! (This stops my arrogant heart every time!)

The death of Jesus satisfied the penalty for the sin of all those who would believe in him. And we know that it was an acceptable sacrifice because God, the Father raised him from that dead. That is still not enough, though. Remember we have to be perfect to see heaven. A paid debt does not wipe away the fact that we had a debt to begin with or that I continue to break God's laws thus accumulating more debt. And here is the "ah-ha" that brought me a peace that knows no limits, remember the perfect life Jesus lived? He gave that to me. He wrapped me in his righteousness and presents me to the Father as his bride, clothed in white, without spot or wrinkle or blemish and I am accepted.

That, my friends, is Christmas. Maybe that is why I am so enamored with the idea of white and shiny Christmas decor. Maybe that is why I would like it to look perfect and peaceful.... and maybe it is such an unattainable goal for me because that perfection has already been accomplished. It did not come wrapped in gold and silver, velvet or silk....just rags and immeasurable love. 

May your Christmas be filled the peace that comes from knowing you are loved by God, the Father, because of the finished work of the Son, Jesus!

Linking up to these parties:
Blue Sky At Home, Finding Silver Pennies, I Should Be Mopping The Floor, The Dedicated House, Celebrate & Decorate, Our Home Away From Home, The Stone Gable, Ducks N'A Row, A Stroll Thru Life, The How To Home, Home Stories A to Z, Lou Lou Girls, My Repurposed Life, Savvy Southern Style, DIY By Design, The Vintage Nest, Katherine's Corner, The Pin Junkie, The Charm Of HOme, Shabby Art Boutique, My Repurposed Life, The Cottage Market