Stump tuggin'

We continued the front garden project that we started yesterday, and we've made some great progress!

First, we finished building the second tier of the side garden. We dug out some of the slope and stacked two rows of stone pavers to create a retaining wall. Then we capped them off with a row of edgers.



I'm really happy with how this wall turned out! (I picture planting some phlox or something similar so that the flowers drape and pour over the wall.)

As often happens around here, our plans then took a little detour and instead of planting and mulching, we decided to rip out all of the dead stumps and dying bushes from the front of the porch.

The previous owners left behind a few unsightly stumps in the front yard.



Not pretty.

After looking at them for the last 10 months, we decided it was definitely time for them to go.



Luckily, we had a pickup truck, chain, and the help of our bff Josh. It was time to tug out some stumps!



After wrapping the chain around the stump, all it took was backing up the truck and the stumps came up pretty easily.



After the old stumps were out, we turned our attention to the half-dead, awkwardly placed evergreen and rhododendron bushes.



We figured while we were tuggin' stumps, we might as well give everything the heave-ho. Those two bushes came out pretty easily, and the change was already huge.



We were left with quite a mess, though. The back of the bushes had apparently been a dumping ground for random garbage. We found everything from an old diaper (seriously, one of the grossest things everrr) to a 3-foot long iron spike.



Some raking was all it took to get the area back in shape. After we had it cleaned up, we got out some twine and stretched it across to get a straight line.



Once we had the twine set to use as a guide, we started laying in the edger stones along the perimeter of the new garden bed.



We then implemented the very scientific method of standing on the stones to level them.



This was followed by the equally technical process of hitting the stones with a hammer to get them in line.



We ran out of edgers just before we could complete the border, but we laid out what we had leftover to get an idea of the end result.


After just a few hours of work today, the change to the front of the house was already pretty tremendous!



And because you know I can't live without a good before and after, let's take a look at where we're at now...

Before:


And after!!:


I'll be sure to keep ya'll updated when we get to planting. Anyone have recommendations for low-maintenance plants that do well in part sun/shade??

Spring cleaning!

It's been a while! Things have been so busy lately, between my starting a new job to stuff around the house, that I haven't had time to post anything. It's not that we haven't been doing anything though!

We're into April now, and after a seemingly endless winter, the enormous mountains of snow in the yard finally melted away. We've spent the last few weeks cleaning up the back and front yards from the mess of winter, raking leaves, picking up sticks, trimming hedges, etc. We filled about 60 paper leaf bags with yard waste!

This week, we turned our attention to the gardens in the front of the house. First, Branden dug out a garden on the side of the porch.



Then he laid and buried a pipe to direct water away from the house. The pipe was covered with rocks to help with irrigation.



We took a trip to Home Depot (where else??) and picked up some pavers, edgers, and a couple of new bushes.



We added the edger stones to the garden border. The larger paver stones we added to the front of the garden as a retaining wall, keeping the soil in place. Since the yard slopes so heavily, we're building a couple of levels of garden beds, held in place with the paver stones.



I picked out two azalea bushes and a blue hydrangea, which is my absolute favorite!



We picked up more edgers today and plan on continuing the stones all around the front of the porch. The plan is to lay the rest of the edgers, plant the shrubs, and spread the mulch tomorrow. It's going to make such a huge improvement to the front of the house!

We've also been making smaller changes around the backyard. Remember when we had hundreds of pounds of ice blocks fall from the roof onto our glass patio table and grill? After the snow melted, we were left with this mound of shattered glass:



The glass luckily stayed pretty contained in the snow and ice, so we were able to clean up the mess pretty easily. We discovered that our grill had also suffered a similar fate:



Since we love having backyard barbeques, Branden headed out to Home Depot and came home with a shiny new replacement:



We've already used it quite a few times this year! Gas is so much easier to work with than charcoal... I don't think we'll ever go back. We're still on the lookout for a new patio table though!

For the last couple of months I've been dreaming of having a fire pit in the backyard. I love roasting marshmallows, making s'mores, and just sitting around a fire on a summer night. So this week while I was at work (and Branden was home on vacation) I came home to find this set up in the backyard:



I want to get some low, comfy Adirondack chairs so we can lounge around the fire all through the summer. Can't wait!

I'll post more pictures of the garden process soon. It's so nice to be able to get outside in the sunshine and get our hands dirty again!

Books, books, and more books

Sorry for the silence around the blog lately. Things have pretty hectic! I started a new job last week, working for a marketing company. After working full time out of my home office since September, it's been a big adjustment to get back into a real work environment. Even though we've had plenty of projects around the house, I haven't really had the time to devote to finishing them up.

One project that I did finish (for now anyway) was building a bookcase/storage unit for the guest bedroom. I had mentioned in my last post that we've been picking away at making this room less of a storage dumping ground, and we're still working on it.

Since moving in, one of the biggest problems we faced was dealing with the boxes and boxes of books that we had piled up. The bookcase in my office was being used for work materials at the time, so now that I'm no longer working from home, I was able to clear that out and finally unpack our books!



It might not seem like much of a difference, but I broke down at least 8 or 9 boxes that had been piled up in the guest bedroom. Getting rid of those was a major breath of fresh air!

Because we have tons of books (even some textbooks left over from college...) this one bookcase wasn't going to provide enough storage. We had some scrap wood left over from a different project and it was just sitting in a pile in the middle of the guest bedroom floor, totally in the way:



Not very inviting... you can see why we're working on this room! Branden put the heavy planks to good use and built a long bookcase for us to tuck into the corner of the room underneath the eave.



After it was built, I primed the knots before painting.



Side note: I think the paint would've covered fine even if I didn't prime the knots, but whatevs. I didn't want to take a chance so I figured I'd do the quick extra step.

Two coats of white paint later, and this was the result:





It's nothing earth-shattering, but it provides a ton of much-needed storage space for the guest bedroom. We already had the wood, nails, primer, and paint on hand so the best part about this project is that it was f-r-e-e! Gotta love using what you have.

We also got a free hand-me-down area rug that helped cozy up the room a ton. The next step in here is a futon (we want to be able to sleep people if need be). I also have a spray paint art project in the works that I hope to share soon, if all goes to plan!

A new look and a lighting update

Hey all! I've made some changes around the ol' blog, switching up the header and adding some pages for easy navigating. Let me know what you think! So far there's a page about the blog and us, and I'll soon be adding a "house tour" tab so you can get a better idea of the many, many transformations that this house has undergone all in one place! Check back for that soon.


We've slowly but surely been picking away at some projects in the guest bedroom. As of now, it's still a storage space. One of the biggest issues we were facing is lighting in the room. There was one very outdated ceiling fixture when we bought the house, but since the room was renovated in June it has just looked like this:



Not very welcoming. Gotta love having exposed wires in your ceiling.

It's tough to get projects done in here with just a couple of table lamps. We knew we needed a solution, but the placement of the fixture, wayyy off on the side of the room against the wall, made for a tricky situation.

We wanted a way to bounce a lot of light around the room, and we knew that just one light wouldn't help brighten up the rest of the space. Enter the solution: track lighting!



This was not an easy fixture to install, and took quite some time and frustration. Installing each of those supports while keeping the heavy tube level was a task. The result, though, is fantastic! The room is so bright now and having five movable fixtures means that we can direct light in any direction we need to.





I love the versatility that we'll have when we actually start using this room!

With the spotlights, I feel like this wall deserves some really interesting artwork now, but I'm not sure what will live here yet. I'm thinking that the dresser will need to move as well. We hope to someday put either a daybed or pullout couch in this room so we have the option for guests to stay over.

We're working on finishing up a long bookcase that Branden built from some scrap wood we had from another project. Once finished it will give us ample storage space in here. I can't wait to show you how it turns out!

Total Transformation: The Master Bedroom

Well, I promised more total transformation posts, and here's another one already!

I've been making little tweaks to the master bedroom lately in an effort to make the room feel a little more finished. There's still some more to do before it feels "complete", but I thought this would be a good time to take a look at this room and how far it's come!

As with the rest of the house, this room was covered in layer upon layer of corroding wallpaper, as well as laminate paneling on one wall and those strange mystery panels on the ceiling. Consider this your warning that the pictures you're about to see are kind of terrifying!

Here is the room after we closed on the house in June:





Scaaaary!
(And I don't just mean Branden's wild man beard... though that was scary too.)

The first thing we did was pull down the ceiling panels and put up new, flat sheetrock.



Then the laminate paneling (faux-birch... fancy) was removed.



You can see there's still a little bit left on there in the photo above. And of course there was wallpaper underneath that paneling. Of course.

After the paneling was down, the new drywall started to go up.




This was the last room finished when we moved in. We actually slept in our guest bedroom for the first week or so after we moved in while our contractor finished this room up. After lots of mudding, sanding, priming, and painting, it was finished and I absolutely love how cozy and inviting this room is now!

Here is what we started with...



...and here's the room today:





My absolute favorite part of the room is my little vanity nook...



The prints on the wall are from London. When I lived there, there was a shop outside of my tube station (Baker Street... home of Sherlock Holmes!) that sold these prints of all different London landmarks. They were completely touristy, but on one of my last days there I decided to buy a few to bring home. Love them.

My vanity table has all of my jewels (having a jeweler for a boyfriend is a lovely thing...) and some keepsakes, like the blue box that my sister brought me home from Venice and a shell-shaped dish from my grandmother. I absolutely love sitting here each morning--it's nice to feel pampered in your own home!

Across from the vanity is this dresser that I've had since I was very little.



It used to be an ivory color with gold details (very 1980s), and was also covered in stickers. Gotta love little kids. When I was in college I spray painted it (very poorly) purple with silver drawers. Now it's gotten yet another makeover, with cream paint and new, simple hardware!



There's a bit of a bird theme going on here, but I like it! I picked up this little tray for Branden to keep his watches in one safe place, since they have a tendency to wind up all around the house.





Now that you've seen the details, let's take another step back and appreciate this room's total transformation!

Before:


After:


Before:


After:


(Please try to ignore the air conditioner... yes, we left it in all winter. Yes, we were too busy/lazy to take it out. If you read this blog regularly you see all the stuff we've got going on, so cut us a break on that one pleaseandthankyou!)

Way back when we closed on the house, I had posted this inspiration picture for what I had in mind for the room:


Obviously our bedroom ended up very different than this, but I did stick with the original color scheme that I had planned back then.

Here is another view, looking into the bedroom from the hallway.

Before:


After:




Pretty amazing, no?? It makes me so happy to see how far we've come since we closed in June! I just love looking at the difference between those hideous ceiling panels with weird designs, and the clean and modern ceiling we've got going on in there now. Happy sigh.

There are still some tweaks to be made, like replacing that area rug for example. I'm on the hunt for something that works and that is affordable (seriously, whyyy are rugs so expensive??), and I'll keep you all updated on that venture!

So what do you think? Pretty good transformation, right? I'll work on another total transformation post for another room soon!