Friday, May 1, 2009
My Craigslist Find
I think it's been about 4 years since we decided to tear out the coat closet in the foyer to make more room for guests entering the house. So for 4 years now we have been throwing coats on the end of the couch in the living room while I searched everywhere I could think of for a solution that fit our needs and our style. Last Friday, while searching CraigsList for something else I came across a great coat tree and immediately contacted the seller who said the piece was still available and he would hold it for me. WooHoo! It's made of a dark, really solid wood that matches the furniture in the living room perfectly. I love that it has a little bit of character. Here it is, my CraigsList find for $50:
Here was the foyer before (with the coat closet). The space was so tiny it was difficult to get a good picture:
Durring:
And After:
Here was the foyer before (with the coat closet). The space was so tiny it was difficult to get a good picture:
Durring:
And After:
Thursday, April 23, 2009
Beauty is In the Eye of the Beholder
That is a great quote - or so I thought before my neighbor moved in next door and decided to kill every blade of grass with round up and "re-decorate" his front yard like this:
He actually planted the ground covering plant that has taken over at the edge of the street.
The crazy thing is he actually spends A LOT of time getting it to look like this. It's his masterpiece. There has to be a limit to the amount of wire fencing one person is allowed to buy.
Notice the randomly placed "heart garden" with the tulips, butterfly lights, and cherubs. The gravel square is new - I'm really not sure what that is all about:
He actually planted the ground covering plant that has taken over at the edge of the street.
The crazy thing is he actually spends A LOT of time getting it to look like this. It's his masterpiece. There has to be a limit to the amount of wire fencing one person is allowed to buy.
Notice the randomly placed "heart garden" with the tulips, butterfly lights, and cherubs. The gravel square is new - I'm really not sure what that is all about:
Refreshing the Curb Appeal
A while back I posted a picture of the front of our house when the azalea's where in full bloom. They were beautiful, but only when they bloomed. Every other day of the year they were a mess. I tried to cut them back and restore them to good health but they were too big and overgrown for too many years before I got to them. J and I decided to take them out and plant box woods instead. They are much easier to maintain and leaves and debris wont get stuck in them like the azaleas (seriously, you wouldn't believe the stuff I found in them). So after we made the decision to remove them and plant box woods we decided to mulch all the flower beds, widen the side bed, and have hasta and day lilies replanted from another bed in the yard. The transformation is below. You can find the original post here. Stay tuned for the "after" pics!
Here is the side flower bed that we made bigger:
Azalea's are GONE!:
Here is the side flower bed that we made bigger:
Azalea's are GONE!:
Wednesday, December 10, 2008
New Ornaments!!
I love participating in Ornament Exchanges and was really excited when my favorite Nesties (the North Dakota i.e. Destination Wedding Nesties) decided to do one. I absolutely love the ornaments I got - so sparkely!! Thank you to my secret santa - you are awesome!! DH even commented on how pretty they were!
Monday, October 27, 2008
Doing Our Part: Recylcing
There are many ways that Jeff and I do our part for the environment. Things that most people don't even realize are environmentally friendly (not to mention wallet friendly). Here is a list of some of the things we do:
1. The Library: Check books, DVDs, and even video games out at the library. Membership is free and think of all the space in your house that is not being cluttered by books and movies you will only watch once! Not to mention all the dusting that you are saving yourself from!
2. Using e-mail as much as possible and scanning documents to PDF. You are saving a tree and some much needed space in your filing cabinet. You can save these items to an external hard drive, or a CD. Both of these items will also fit in a safe-deposit box if you are really worried about safe keeping.
3. Switch all your light bulbs to Compact Fluorescent. They are more energy efficient and last so much longer. Make sure you find the "instant on" ones, some of them take a second to kick on and that can be a pain in the rear. We have found GE brand to be great. Here's a great website to find what you need based on your criteria: http://www.edf.org/
4. Make a compost pile: Jeff created a compost pile just beyond our fence that he empties grass clippings, leaves, and table scraps (only of the non cooked veggie variety). It was easy to do, he used wooden pallets and nailed them together. I can't wait to have topsoil for my plants!
Jeff's handy work:
5. Grow an herb garden: Makes your kitchen smell nice and saves you money and time at the grocery store.
There are the obvious ones (recycle, reuse, etc.) Anyone else have some great ideas to add? I'd love to hear them!
1. The Library: Check books, DVDs, and even video games out at the library. Membership is free and think of all the space in your house that is not being cluttered by books and movies you will only watch once! Not to mention all the dusting that you are saving yourself from!
2. Using e-mail as much as possible and scanning documents to PDF. You are saving a tree and some much needed space in your filing cabinet. You can save these items to an external hard drive, or a CD. Both of these items will also fit in a safe-deposit box if you are really worried about safe keeping.
3. Switch all your light bulbs to Compact Fluorescent. They are more energy efficient and last so much longer. Make sure you find the "instant on" ones, some of them take a second to kick on and that can be a pain in the rear. We have found GE brand to be great. Here's a great website to find what you need based on your criteria: http://www.edf.org/
4. Make a compost pile: Jeff created a compost pile just beyond our fence that he empties grass clippings, leaves, and table scraps (only of the non cooked veggie variety). It was easy to do, he used wooden pallets and nailed them together. I can't wait to have topsoil for my plants!
Jeff's handy work:
5. Grow an herb garden: Makes your kitchen smell nice and saves you money and time at the grocery store.
There are the obvious ones (recycle, reuse, etc.) Anyone else have some great ideas to add? I'd love to hear them!
Weekend Project: Fireplace
After much debate we finally bit the bullet and made a decision about our fireplace.
Backstory: We've been working on this project for 2 years now getting estimates for gas, propane, pellet stoves (why don't they make attractive versions of this?) looking at the new gel fireplaces (most of which are too modern for our colonial home), figuring out direct vent vs vent less, electric vs gas vs propane, costs for each, etc. We would do some research, get discouraged and move on to a different project.
So behold our new fireplace doors: Yes, I do realize that these doors don't have the ability to make fire, but they are a cheap fix to keep the cold air out (at least 90% of it) and we can get rid of the hideous cardboard that we had there before. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, we were living ghetto fabulous with cardboard covering our fireplace. Here are the before and after:
Before:
And After:
What makes me even more proud of the completion of this project is that we picked out the doors online at Lowes and they were $339, when we got to the store they turned out to be $289. Wait, it gets better: we also had a coupon for 10% off! So we got $339 doors for $260.10! WOO-HOO!
Backstory: We've been working on this project for 2 years now getting estimates for gas, propane, pellet stoves (why don't they make attractive versions of this?) looking at the new gel fireplaces (most of which are too modern for our colonial home), figuring out direct vent vs vent less, electric vs gas vs propane, costs for each, etc. We would do some research, get discouraged and move on to a different project.
So behold our new fireplace doors: Yes, I do realize that these doors don't have the ability to make fire, but they are a cheap fix to keep the cold air out (at least 90% of it) and we can get rid of the hideous cardboard that we had there before. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, we were living ghetto fabulous with cardboard covering our fireplace. Here are the before and after:
Before:
And After:
What makes me even more proud of the completion of this project is that we picked out the doors online at Lowes and they were $339, when we got to the store they turned out to be $289. Wait, it gets better: we also had a coupon for 10% off! So we got $339 doors for $260.10! WOO-HOO!
