Ghosts of Living Room Pasts

If you read yesterdays post you know that my living room is my major project this weekend. I found some pictures to show you how it looked before I talked my hubby into letting me paint the walls.

Here is the living room in early 2009. We bought the house in 05’ so I went four years with these brown walls. Now I know that they are not that bad, but to me they just screamed 1980’s! Michael loved them, but I was home all day and the brown walls on top of the brown carpet was just way too much.

I just had to throw this in the mix. This is the tile that I am pulling up this weekend as well.
Is this stuff not awful?!? I can’t believe that I have not got rid of it sooner!

Note: Please excuse the crazy mess that is going on in this pic.
This is the living room after we painted it. It was a pain to paint because of the paneling on the walls, but in all I am happy that we ended up painting it. I think it brightened up the place. You can also tell that all of the furniture we had was just a hodge podge of stuff that we had collected over the course of our marriage. That couch, when it was new, was the most comfortable couch on earth! I literally slept on it the last 3 months of my pregnancy with Jacob. It was soooo comfortable! Unfortunately, the coffee table was not really kid friendly. Those sharp corners and wobbly babies did not get along. And the carpet you see a little bit of there was the oldest carpet I had ever seen. It was the original carpet from 1982!

And here is my living room these days with a few adjustments here and there. The carpet was the first thing to go. One day after I tripped over the carpet that was bunching in the hall I decided enough was enough! I went and bought a heavy duty box cutter and started tearing it out. The funny thing is when Michael left for work that morning we had carpet, when he came home it was all in the dumpster :) It was so old that the padding underneath had deteriorated. Yuck! The best transformation though was Michael getting me new furniture for Christmas last year. I know it wasn’t brand new, but it was new to me :)

You have now seen the changes I have made to my living room over the last couple of years.
I will post pics next week of the new wall color and soon I will be able to show you all the new floors!

I Have Been Inspired

I have posted about re-doing my house for a while now, but have not really accomplished anything. I am the worst procrastinator in the world! But the main reason is because I have not been able to decide to what I really wanted to do with my house. I have kept in mind to keep it simple and put what I like in the house, but to also keep in mind that I need to keep it somewhat neutral so I won’t have to repaint everything when we sell the house.

My living room has been my biggest project. As you can see from the picture below it is still a work in progress.

I painted my walls a while back. The color is called brandied pears and it’s great, but it is too white for me. I am now painting them a color called natural wicker and I just love the color! The entryway looks completely different than it does in this pic. The walls need another coat of paint and I am pulling up the tile this weekend. I could go on and on about all the things I want to change in this picture alone. Here are just a few: move T.V to opposite wall {you can’t see in picture}, hang new window treatments, install hardwood floors, replace fireplace doors {I HATE THE GOLD!}, repaint walls, hang a cute chandelier type light in the entryway, get new light switch plates, paint table in entryway… and there is so much more!

This living room immediately caught my eye because of the color of the curtains.
I love the green!
I think it would be a great pop of color in my living room.

Moving on to my other big project in the house… the kitchen!

{I don’t really have any good pictures of my kitchen that would make for good viewing so we will just do without them for now.}

I love the kitchen below. I wish that my kitchen was this big. It would be nice for sure. I always thought that I was a fan of black kitchen cabinets, but lately I have been liking the idea of white cabinets and a black island. I think it looks way better than all black cabinets, and wouldn’t make my small kitchen look any smaller.

And don’t you just love the tall green bar chairs!

This is the dining room.

I like how they red pulls everything together and makes it feel like home. Plus, it’s hard for me to resist red kitchen walls!

Photos via Google

This is another kitchen that I found on Pinterest today.

The layout is almost exactly like my kitchen :)

I love everything about this kitchen! I really like that they painted the walls green and the table red. I think that this color would livin’ up my kitchen and lighter cabinets would compliment my white appliances.
I think I may have a kitchen to copy :)

Photo via Timmon’s Family Lemonade

Clean House = Happy House

This week I want to accomplish so much! I have been putting a lot of it off for a long time and now that birthday and holidays are right around the corner I need to kick it in high gear. Plus, it’s out of character for me to actually do things before they need to be done :)

Stay caught up on laundry {I only have like 3 more loads to do}
Mop all the floors in the house
Clean off cowhide rug and put in kitchen
Pull baseboards from entryway, hallway and bathroom
Wash walls to prepare for painting
Put last coat of paint on entryway and hallway walls
Paint living room walls
Detail both bathrooms {clean really really good}
Vacuum out the urban burban
Clean pedestal table in garage and move to kitchen
Move current table to office and set up as {really BIG} desk
Finish painting cupboards in laundry room
Remove tile from entryway {this one is going to be fun :)}
Make all the beds
Vacuum bedrooms
Clean boys bedroom
Be on the lookout for the perfect window treatments for the living room!

See! I told you it was a crazy list of things to do! But I am confident that I will be able to complete everything that I need to in the time I have given myself. And as soon as I get these items checked off my list… I get new hardwood floors!!!

Happy Monday Y’all!

Thankful

I got to thinkin and I don’t mention enough how thankful I am for my favorite people{s}.

So I just wanted to take a moment to do just that…

I am very thankful for my husband!

God could not have given me a better person to spend my life with. We may have had our ups and downs, but no matter what we always come through it loving each other more that before.

My boys!

God blessed me greatly when he chose me to be the mother of these two very special and handsome boys. My life would not be complete without them. I love them oh so very much!

What or who are you thankful for?

Four Hundred

That is how many posts I have posted so far! Well, four hundred and one of you count this one.

I love blogging!

Thank you to all of you who read my blog :)

Lately, I have been working on some blog changes and hope to have them completed in the next week or so.

Hope you are all having a wonderful Sunday afternoon!

Xoxo

Photo Friday Week 42: On the Shelf

Welcome to another Photo Friday!

This here is one of my most prized possessions.

These paper flowers are what Jacob made in pre-k and gave me for Mother’s Day this last year.

Are they not the most beautiful flowers you have ever seen?

And the best part is they will never wilt and die.

I love you, Jacob!

Now head on over and check out all the other wonderful photos on Trina’s blog.

Next Week: Memories

A Little Obsessed

Lately I have been obsessed with the color turquoise.

Here are a few photos that I am loving right now.

Have a turquo-riffic Tuesday!

{All Images via Google or Pinterest}

Randomness

It’s been a crazy busy week so I wanted to take a minute to post a bunch of random pictures taken with my rusty iPhone over the past week or so…

Temporary wreath on my nifty turquoise front door.
{My super purdy one is almost done.}

Uber excited that the Cabela’s Christmas catalog arrived!

It rained the whole weekend we were at the deer lease. Thank you Jesus!

Are these not the teeniest tiniest bananas that you ever did see?
I mean it’s not even a bite! What would you use these for?

My sweet boys!
{Do you see Tyler wearing his huntin’ boots with shorts? Love em!}

My homemade ranch dressing.
{Recipe coming soon!}

Homemade fried okra.

Chicken fried DEER steak.
{I even tenderize it myself!}

I tried that sock bun thingamajig. I have to say it is pretty cool.
Check out the video here.

Another view of my sock bun.
Michael thought that I bought something expensive to make my hair look like this, little did he know it was just one of his socks :)

I {heart} decorating with shed horns!!

Photo Friday Week 40: Colors

I can’t believe that it is Friday again! Where did this week go?

This week for Photo Friday I took a pic of this cute Amazing Grace sign I got today. I was looking for bedding but came across this instead.

I have decided to use it as the color inspiration for my bedroom!

What ya think?

You can check out all the other photos over at Trina’s Blog :)

Next Week: My Neighbors

That Time of Year

One of my favorite things about Fall is that it means HUNTING SEASON!

It is the one thing that we all get together and love doing as a family. I don’t know what it is about sleeping outside or having no running water that brings a family closer together.

This last weekend we made a day trip to the lease to check feeders and just hang out.

Here are a few {lots} of pics from our little trip…

Never to young to learn :)