And We're Back...

So after a month hiatus, I'm finally back to posting things on our house. We've done some small projects, but I've fallen behind on talking about them here. My fall goal is to continue posting things both big and small.

Over the week, Steph and I bought some really cheap picture frames from Hobby Lobby, which I thought would look perfect in the corner of our living room. It's a slow-going process, but the living room is really coming together, from the surprise wall color I chose to the third-time's-a-charm curtain selection.

Here's the before and after for the corner of the room. The lone clock no longer feels like it is on a sea of wall.

Before:

After:

Steph and I were both amazed at how adding five picture frames totally cozied up the corner. The next step is finding a way to add a new end table and getting rid of the four cubes that are just there. 

Return of the Curtains + New Pillows

Steph and I had the opportunity to go back to Atlantic for the Atlanticfest Road Race, a five mile run that cuts through our hometown. This is one of the races that I've participated in for the past four years since I started running. On a side note, I got fourth in my age group (not too bad!). 

Anyway, after visiting the family for a little bit, we made our way to the Walmart in Atlantic. While we're both adamantly opposed to going to most Walmarts, Atlantic's is always less crowded and not nearly as scurvy as some of the other ones we've been to. Our goal was to find some new curtains. The eggshell blue curtains just didn't work in our living room since I painted, and we've been needing some that more closely match the walls. We looked online, but the prices were way more than we were willing to spend, I thought it was too risky to look at curtains based off of internet photographs. Walmart seemed like a decent option.

We totally lucked out as well. There were several options to choose from, and we could spend fifteen dollars for two panels rather than ten, twenty, or, in some cases, thirty+ dollars for just one. We finally decided on a color called bennett (don't ask me what sort of name that is), and the result looks like this:

Instantly, our walls don't look as blue as they had with the eggshell curtains. I also really like that the the curtains have a semi-sheer look that lets in some light, while blocking out the interior of the house when someone looks in from the street.  We may end up going with a darker brown rather than this tan color, but we definitely like the neutrality of the look. 

The older pillows we've had for a couple of years didn't work. A combination of five different colors, including purple, the old pillows really clashed with every other accessory we owned in the room. While shopping for the curtains, we found these pillows as well.

This blue color in the pillows definitely helps tie the room together, and it matches the blueish hue we get from the walls, which oddly enough, seems to help bring out the grey in those very same walls. It's amazing how quickly accessories and curtains can help to bring a room together.

The Wild Hair

Steph went to Kansas City this weekend to work at her office for the day, so I had the entire weekend to myself. I had planned to go into a vegetative coma, but I got a wild hair to paint the living room (much to Steph's chagrin). This was somewhat of a daring move on my part. I chose the color without Steph's approval, and in hindsight, that wasn't the wisest thing Ive ever done.. So on Saturday afternoon, I went over to Lowes and picked up three gallons of "autumn fog," a color I instantly liked  as soon as I saw it. 

So the living room, in the course of 24 hours, went from this: 

to this:

It's definitely more blue than the color swatch led me to believe. That being said, after sitting in the room with Sir Pouncelot, a glass of wine, and just letting my mind go, the color has really grown on me. It matches more closely what I had in mind when we bought the curtains. But now I think some patterned curtains that have either a brushed bronze or brown look would work better in the room. I'll have some new posts up later this week to show what we did with a new TV we purchased and our decision to do away with the entertainment center.

Always a work in progress.

An Experiment on Curtains and Curtains

The office is close to being done. I just need to touch up some areas. The next big step is going to be decorating the room into something that works for Steph as her office, and helps to seperate her work space with her living space. This won't happen over night, but we're talking things over for what she wants. To start things off with decorating, however, we've had some yellow curtains that we used in our old apartment that we put up temporarily in the living room. Over the weekend we went to target and made, what is for us, a rather bold choice in new curtains: eggshell blue.

Aside from a messy living room, I do't know what to make of these. The color, at first, is kind of off putting, but I think mixing them with the right paint color and decorations could really be fun. Here is what Steph found for inspiration. Like I said, I'm still of the fence about these curtains; I'm hoping they'll grow on me, and I'll find a color scheme that will work in my mind's eye. 

Only You Can Prevent Home Fires

A crazy thing that I don't know how we managed to miss when we moved into the home: there was only one smoke detector in the entire place. I don't know if the previous owners took them when they moved or if they never had any to begin with, but this needed to change sooner rather than later, especially since we have a rental space in the basement. Steph's mom had purchased some brand new ones that she ended up not using, and she gave them to us. Very easy installation and now I can have a bit more piece of mind.

Living Room

Hallway

Kind of a mundane home improvement update, but a necessary one!

Finally, one way we're trying to make our place feel like home, is to take full advantage of all that Des Moines has to offer. So today I tried out Yoga in the Park at Gray's Lake. Overall, I really enjoyed it: great, relaxing environment and each week offers a different instructor and a different type of class. I'll definitely do it again, only next time I'll try to drag the reluctant wife along as well.

Yoga Cat

A Very Busy 4th

We had a super busy and productive day. We're getting much closer to being able to paint the office. After using the paint remover on one of the walls, I noticed that there were an additional two layers of wallpaper covering it. Layer number one was quit easy to remove; layer number two, however, had permanently bonded to the wall and was stubborn as all could be.

Paint layer 1, wallpaper layer 1, and wall paper layer 2

After watching some really informative how-to videos on YouTube, we needed to go to a hardware store to buy the appropriate equipment: a scoring tool, a plastic scraper, and wallpaper remover gel (in addition to the not-so-effective, water/vinegar mix I was using for the first layer of wallpaper).

Wallpaper circa 1958 (it smells like it too)

In addition to buying all of the wallpaper removal items, we came across the exact shades we were looking for at Lowes. Good bye, blue tarp, you served as a great means of privacy for the first two weeks of living. Our new bamboo roman shades from bring in the perfect amount of light while giving us the privacy we want.

We're making some progress and are holding out on choosing curtains until we decide on a new color for the living room. 

More to come on the wallpapered office from hell as well.