Snapshots from around my home...

I love peeking into other people's houses. I am addicted to HGTV and DIY network and of course Pinterest and blog land. So I thought others may like to see a few peeks into the place I (and my hubs and our four kids and many pets) call home. I'll try to do more posts like this with snapshots of things, rooms, decor, etc., around the house. But for today, this President's Day, as we take a day of laziness--doesn't everyone need one from time to time?--I listen to my hubs and kids playing video games, I sit in my PJs still at 1:00 in the afternoon, and I take a few little shots around my house, including some adorable ones of my family eating brunch earlier, but since my teen and tween daughters begged me not to post those, I won't. :) 


This is what I see when I'm blogging. :) A super cute mug from my mom that I used to put a splash of color in…yeah, fake flowers. I accidentally kill real ones every time. Oops.

The view into our dining room from the kitchen. The light at this time of day is so bright coming in from the windows--I love it!

Our brick fireplace that is waiting to be whitewashed and the mantel will be stained a deeper color. Also I need to frame out the discarded bathroom mirror that is now finding a new home on the mantel.

My gallery wall. This thing is forever changing and I love it. It's probably my most favorite thing in the house. Those shelves are Ribba picture ledges from Ikea.

The view into the kitchen from my desk. It's so bright and cheerful! And all the pops of my beloved teal make me smile. (Keepin' it real--fingerprints on the fridge, yup!)

View into the living room from the gallery wall. My husband says this photo makes the couch look maroon. -__- It's brown. Again, the light coming in from the windows is super intense this time of the day. I LOVE it, but it does make it difficult to capture good photos of everything else. The pillows have already been squished by my kiddos and there's a cat toy and a video game cord all making appearances in the photo, but I don't care because this is my real life! :) 

Hope you enjoyed the little peeks into my home. I hope you have a great day! :)

Kitchen Remodel

We recently remodeled our kitchen. We painted the cabinets & hardware, replace the counters, and did some shifting in layouts.
*Note: Click images for full-size view and you can use your arrow keys to scroll through all full-size photos!*

Before:

 

Awful, right? Eep! Just look at those organgey-cabinets...they blend in with the floor and create a whole lotta dark, orange icky feelings. So much clutter too! Yeesh...I can't believe we lived with it like this for nearly 8 years! 

And now for an after: 

MUUCH better!

And here's a new one from today since I've changed a couple minor pieces of artwork:

Here's a breakdown of what we did:

• Shifted our refrigerator down and moved the odd little square of cabinet and counter down also, as well as the "bridge" cabinetry above the fridge. This got rid of a weird, neglected waste of space that just collected clutter and dust, and allowed us to have a bigger stretch of countertop space. Since we bought a French door fridge that had an in-door ice maker, being able to open that one door completely open wasn't as big of a deal, and there's still plenty of room for the door to open wide enough even being against the wall like that.

• We also got rid of the weird lifted bar area that we hated, and created a wide, flat, open piece of countertop for the bar area. (We still need to paint our barstools and return those to their spot.) 

• We purchased butcher block countertops from IKEA. We went with oak because they were out of birch, and turns out, we like oak the best after all. 

• Stained butcher block with super strong coffee and treated it with tung oil. 

• We painted our cabinets White Dove by Benjamin Moore and the hardware a hammered bronze by Rustoleum. 

I love my new kitchen, it is SO much brighter and even feels much bigger than it did before. I made my hubby's day by telling him it's my dream kitchen. :)