so excited!

I'm totally geeking out over here! I just got an email tipping me off about this...

Carter's room is up on Ohdeedoh today! I'm kind of surprised about this, but so stoked! Go check it out, I don't know how long they leave these up, so it might be short lived, but we are so excited!

http://www.ohdeedoh.com

what's on your walls?

I'm so inspired by wall galleries! I'm really digging these lately. The photographer in me just can't get enough of having portraits and photographs everywhere. I ran across this beauty in a pottery barn catalog I had from a while ago. I'm DYING over that yummy brown paint, even though I tend to be a light paint person, I'm LOVING the way it pops against the white trim. This has me wishing my basement stairs where even MORE open, we opened up the stairway as much as possible, but I want to do something like this. I'm so inspired by this space. I love the contrast of the industrial looking light fixture with the more traditional wainscot and banister, and HELLO orange striped rug, you are gorgeous! I tore this page out of my catalog and I've been staring at it a few times a day, just analyzing what makes it work so well.

I went looking for more on the pottery barn site and found this useful little guide to making a wall gallery:


Can you tell what's on my mind lately? Right now our basement projects are taking up most of our time and energy, but I'm still thinking about how to make a great display of favorite family photos in our family room.

I think I'm going to wall ledge route for above our couch, I love that even though there are a lot of pictures, it still looks "clean" and collected.
I'm thinking it's time to get to work. The hardest part for me will be choosing which photos to display. I love all of our pictures, and when the time comes to hang them up on the wall this is always the biggest challenge for me.

Mine might end up looking like this:

Which is lovely, but in real life, it's just a tad too much. Nice for an ad though.

Real life would be something more like the one Lindsey (the pleated poppy) has in her dining room:
I'm in love with her whole house, actually.

If you'll notice, the majority of these are black and white images. I see the logic behind it, they all match and go together, but I'm kind of a color junkie. I don't know if I could commit myself to doing all black and white.

Have you done a wall gallery of any type? I want to see it! leave me a link in the comments and I'll come check it out, I'm on the hunt for more inspiration! (if I were a REAL home blogger we would have a real linky party, but I'm just a little "how I'm decorating my new house" blog, so this will do!)

our humble {housiversary}

Last week we passed the year mark, here at our humble little abode. It's gone fast, and I think we've come a long way with making this the house we hoped it could be. It's been a fun little start to our journey here, and we have lots more we still want to do.

When we saw this house our old house wasn't even on the market yet. We were trying to decide what to do and I found the MLS listing for this home:

Maybe you can imagine why my hubby wasn't too interested to come and check it out. It lacked curb appeal. It had been unoccupied for a year or so. We wanted a home with lots of character, we wanted a perfect area. We took a drive from the suburbs of Salt Lake where we lived to this small town, it feels like "the country" compared to where we were before.

It was about 400 square feet smaller than our previous home, we went from 3800 sq ft to about 3400. Everything was beige inside, a blank slate, but definitely lacking in charm and architectural details that we love. It had a bigger back yard, we went from .25 to .35, which was a plus for us. It backs a fenced canal that runs from a canyon, but the plus is that it's being put underground starting this month, and a bike/running trail is going over the top of it, which is a big plus for us, we can't wait to take our bikes right out through the backyard and onto a trail that goes for a long way into a canyon.

The first time we drove through the neighborhood I knew I wanted this house. There were kids all over the place, super nice neighbors, and I just felt like I could see myself calling it home. I joke that we bought this house for the park down the street with tall trees and a little creek that runs through it. I'm half serious about that. I wanted it before I even saw the inside and we kind of agreed that it would take something really bad inside to change our minds, like a terrible floor plan or something that couldn't be changed. But we walked through and though it was plain, we saw potential.
A year later we still have a long way to go, but it's closer to what we hoped it could be.

Here's a look back at all that has changed over the past year.

From the main pictures you can see the shutters we made, so I won't re-post those pictures.

We replaced the cheapie blinds that were all over the house in most rooms, I still have bathrooms and the living room left to replace.

Front Door
before:

after:

Formal living room
before:
after:
I haven't touched this room at all, aside from putting things in it, no paint or anything else has been changed yet. As you can see, we use it more as a living room/office combo. when the basement is finished the desk will go down into a real office and I have a piano that my grandma gave to my mom and now my mom is passing it to me. It needs refinishing, but I'm really excited about it. we'll put that in here and I'm not sure what else we'll do with this room.

Big Boy Room
before:
after:


Little Boy's Room
before:
after:
(his room has changed even since these pictures, he moved into a twin bed and out of the crib.)


Master Bedroom



The master bedroom is almost finished, I'm waiting for a nightstand on back order, and still working to solve my chair problem mentioned last week. :)

Family Room

I haven't done much with the family room, I'm kind of waiting for the basement to be finished, then I plan on sending these couches down stairs and starting fresh with something lighter upstairs. I feel like I need a fresh pair of eyes in this area, I'm not 100% sure of the direction I want to go, but I have time and it's okay for now.


Basement
before:
after:
we are getting so close down there! We've actually progressed past the point of this picture, the walls and ceilings are all primed and painted.

The hubby and I went down last night and put extra breakers in all by ourselves! We have a little bit more electrical work to do, trims, doors, banister and stair stuff and then the big one, carpet and then all done! I can't wait to start enjoying it!

Backyard

after:
It speaks for itself. Grass is about the best thing that happened to us all summer long! We love it. Scott did the sprinkling system himself, I helped dig some trenches, but he did most of that. We chose to hydro-seed and we were amazed at how fast it grew! We are hoping to build a pretty pergola over the patio next summer!

So the things I hope to do in the near future:
We've had hardwood floors in our past homes and really love the look and practicality of it. I have visions of something like this throughout the main floor:

of course lots more trim work, of course finishing the basement and moving our leather furniture down stairs, slipcovered couches for upstairs, move my piano in, figuring out what I want out of the family room, and of course I will always be imagining taking my kitchen from this:
to this:

or something close to it, consider this a conceptual drawing. :)

I have lots of other little things planned, and the more we get into it, the more I'm loving it!

Happy Housiversary to us!