Finished backyard planter

Here ia how that yard work came out from a few weeks back. What do you think!? We love it!

So Parker and I are getting started on our huge list of items to get done in our master bath. I wanted to share with you some inspiration I have for the room. I am going to affordable, clean, cool tones and modern with traditional mixed in. Does that confuse you enough? So to give you an idea of what we are thinking here you go:

Source: soulstyle.ca via Christine on Pinterest

Source: soulstyle.ca via Christine on Pinterest

Source: houzz.com via Christine on Pinterest

Source: pepperdesignblog.com via Christine on Pinterest

We have found some tile at the RE store that might help save us some money and it is pretty darnd close to what we had planned on getting anyway. We have some leftover paint in "Cucumber" that I am hoping might work in the bathroom on the walls. I am actively searching for a vanity, I have not found anything that I love that does not cost a fortune naturally. So there you have it. What do you all think? I think it is going to look awesome!

Bathroom Remodle - We are crazy!

Parker and I are about to begin our biggest project to date in our home. We are going to be renovating our master bathroom! We are both so excited and ready to tackle this project but we are well aware of how much work it is going to be. So we are proceeding with caution.

Before we begin the juicy detailed posts of everything we are doing in the bathroom we wanted to give you a rundown of where we are starting off.

We have a partial wall and the vanity in the master bedroom. Parker’s closet is directly behind that sink. So getting ready in the morning is never fun. Then add in the door to the toilet and shower and you have a really tight space.

On the other side of the door is out toilet and small stand up shower. Small is an understatement. This shower is so tiny I can barely lift my arms to wash my hair in there. It is horrible. The fan in the bathroom does not work very well so it always seems damp and smelly in this little room. I almost never go to the bathroom in there anymore because it is just weird.

So you ask, what is the plan? Well we are gutting it. We are building a new wall in the master bath, knocking down the wall and door, expanding the shower, leveling the floor, tiling, handing new sheet rock and taking out Parker’s closet. Not in that order of course.

Here is a mockup of the new floor plan we did on floorplanner.com

 Pretty great right? Well it does not look like much right now but we think it is going to be awesome.

We have already moved Parker out of his closet (he is now using the guest bedroom closet) and we have moved all of our bathroom items into the guest bathroom. We will be living out of that bathroom for the duration of the project.

How long will the duration be? Well we think it is best not to set tight timelines, but we plan on being done by April. All going according to plan that is.

Here is our checklist for our big bathroom remodel:

·         Move Parker’s closet to guest bathroom

·         Move bathroom to guest bathroom

·         Hang tarps and lay carpet protector down for demo

·         Buy bagster and other demo products

·         Cover vents to dust does not get everywhere

·         Remove medicine cabinet and other electrical fixtures

·         Remove light from wall

·         Remove mirror

·         Take out toilet

·         Take out bathroom vanity and sink

·         Rip up flooring

·         Remove door and frame

·         Remove fiberglass shower

·         Remove crown bolding (save for later)

·         Take out wall, cut half wall next to toilet

·         Call plumber to move plumbing for new shower and sink

·         Build new wall in bedroom (contractor)

·         Level flooring

·         Buy tile for floor and shower

·         Hang sheetrock

·         Hang hardy backer board for tile

·         Build shower pan (Contractor)

·         Move electrical outlets and lights

·         Lay floor tile

·         Lay shower tile

·         Grout and finish all tile

·         Paint walls (do a beadboard?)

·         Bagster pickup

·         Install new toilet

·         Install new lighting and fan

·         Install new vanity

·         Install new mirror

·         Rehang crown molding in bedroom

·         Install all new shower fixtures and faucet in sink

·         Finishing touches

·         Drink a beer (or bottle of wine depending on our mood)

WOW I am exhausted just thinking about all this work. You will notice, we left of one HUGE item. The shower doors. We are actually going to leave the shower open for a few months and save up for the shower doors. They cost around $1200 and will be amazing when we get them installed. But we just could not come up with the money right now. So instead of going into debt for the bathroom we are just going to take our time!

Our entire budget (sans doors) is $3000. We shall see what we can do for that! Wish us luck!

So we did some yard work this weekend. NBD.

Here is what Parker and I were up to this weekend. We built a GIANT planter off the back of our house! Let me just say, I am super sore today but we hope it woll be worth it!

Meeting Young House Love

So you might have guessed it from reading my posts, but just in case you did not know. I love the blog Young House Love. John and Sherry are a normal couple that began writing their blog years ago as a way to keep their families apprised of their home updates. From there it has become a monster success. So much so that they have both quit their jobs and have written a DIY book!

 I was one of the first in line to buy their book, and so pumped when they announced that they would be coming in to Austin to do a signing! My friend Corey agreed to come with me for the signing and talk they were giving on writing their book. I was pumped.

 Fast forward to this past Tuesday, I was worried because I had seen their updates from other cities and it looked like the lines were going to be really long and because it was pouring rain that we might be standing outside in it for hours. Good thing the folks at Book People are quite the pros at hosting book signings and they had us all inside and cozy while we waited for them to arrive.

They arrived right on time and were as sweet and approachable as they are on the blog. Their talk on writing their book was really interesting. I was exhausted just listening to them talk about the process. Most nights while doing the photo shoots for the book they only got a few hours of sleep. They also did not hire any stylist or any other help to do all the project shoots and the projects themselves. Each and every thing you see in the book they did. It is really inspiring. It all makes me even more excited for our bathroom remodel!

Anyway here they are talking to the group. Sherry is of course making a funny face because that is how she rolls:

After the talk Corey and I grabbed a coffee and waited to get out books signed. The store grouped us by letter section so we all did not have to stand in line forever. It worked quite well. After only about 30 minutes our group was called and we started to wait in line. It then hit me that I was going to get to talk to them. And I know you all are probably thinking, “So what?”, but these guys are like mom and dad’s Bob Villa to me! They are the reason I have been willing to do so much of my home projects. I read their blog every day and refer to them by first name to Parker whilst doing almost all of our home projects. I of course began to freak out.

In line, they are on the other side of the glass. I think they would have preferred to stay that way after talking to me!

Corey gave me a look like “Keep it together Christine”:

 And I had this look on my face:

It is blurry because I could not sit still I was such a wreck!

Anyway I decided I wanted to tell them that I refer to them by first name so much that Parker now refers to them as my besties (silly term for best friends). I did not, however, think about how creepy this would come off. Oh well I went with it. Corey and I got up there, got our picture taken and then I stared to run my mouth. Sherry was gracious and said she thinks of other blogs as her friends and “besties” too and that she was glad I did the same. Yea right, I am sure she thought I was nuts. Oh well. Here we are, being awesome with my besties!

They of course signed the book to their bestie, Christine! Woot! It makes me happy. All in all it was a fun night. I am so glad I went. And if you have not read their blog you should do so. It is awesome, funny, thoughtful, and helpful!

House Goals for 2013

Happy new year everyone! We had a great year in 2012 and we are so ready to get going on new house projects for 2013! 

First off, I am going to learn how to sew this year! Parker’s very generous grandpa gave me a sewing machine and lessons for Christmas this year and although I never thought about trying to learn to sew I can already tell you I am enthralled with the idea of making lots of custom items for my home on this fancy machine. Just in case you were wondering I got the “Baby Lock – Grace” machine. It is amazing. 

I plan on making curtains for the whole house on this bad boy, straight lines are my friend. So far my inspiration comes from pictures like this:

And this:

And this:

I will let you know when I get started!

Secondly and probably the biggest DIY project I will ever take on is our Master bathroom renovation! Yes, you heard me right Parker and I are going to do our master bathroom renovation ourselves (mostly). We plan to take out a small closet, frame out a new door move the sink (I know, we are calling plumber) and tile a shower. We will also have to redo the floors and install a new vanity. This is going to be major y’all. 

Thirdly, install a ladder into the attic access in the garage. Right now we just have a hole and we pull our ladder up to it. Although it is not that big of a deal we plan on using the attic as storage for a lot of our Christmas décor and getting in and out of that area easily will be a big help. Plus we went to Home Depot the other day and we found that these attic access ladder things are not much more than $150. Not too bad. 

If I can get these three big house projects done this year I will be super happy with us. I fear the master bathroom project is going to take at least a month because Parker works on weekends and we are limited to how many hours we have together to get this all done. I will be back later with all the mood boards and ideas I have out there for this project and show you some detailed before pictures. Trust me you are going to be amazed we have been able to deal with this bathroom for 6 months.

First fire fail

Parker was super nice to offer to make a fire for me. It was the first night this whole year that it was going to freeze so we thought it would be fitting.

Parker got all the fixings for the fire and the Eagle Scout in him set up a great looking fire. Here he is working away! Don't you like our fireplace by the way?

Pretty fire with the stockings hung with care.

What we did not think of was how the house would smell after we made the fire with wood from the backyard. So although the fire was gorgeous and we enjoyed it, it also STANK!!!! So three weeks later our house still smells like fire and we will not be setting a real fire in there again. At least until we can figure out how to make sure the house will not stink after we have one.

Any thoughts?