Mirrored Desks

Now that I am deep into home office makeover, I'm thinking a new desk would be nice.  I have been crazy, in love, with mirrored furniture for quite some time...and what is better than to have a mirrored desk in the office!  Everything I have seen is expensive and definitely not in my budget.  I love being married to my awesome husband so I must'n shock his system with a pricey piece of furniture that I don't need since we already have a desk  that I need.  I found a few that I like but I am not liking the price :(

Lusetta Mirrored Desk is in the budget if I can buy it quick enough!

Via Houzz

This design is so pretty and very french looking...ooh la la :)  However, I think the desk is too traditional for my taste.

Via Room Service Store

I really like the clean lines and pewter accent and of course the gorgeous crystal knobs.  The drawers are a bit too small for my constant clutter.



The search continues......

Candles and food...yummmyyy

We entertain almost every weekend.  This weekend, we had special friends family over and hubs made Lobster Risotto.  It was so luxurious and tasty...I could eat it every day but my waistline doesn't agree!  We dined by candlelight.....

Glowing candles, great food, and great company.....the best combination!

UPDATE....Dining Room Wall Color

I just couldn't leave the yellow alone! I wanted something fresh and chic.  I looked at many paint colors.  There are so many white and off white colors from which to chose....seriously....A LOT!!  I choose Linen-Benjamin Moore.  What do you think about the new color??

It's so fresh and exactly what I had in mind from the beginning.  I didn't realize how dreary it felt in this space until I painted the room.  At dinner, hubs asked if I changed the bulbs because it was so bright....I said, uh honey that would be the wall color! I'm a happy girl :)

More Christmas Cheer

I have a staircase that I love to decorate.  It makes me all warm and fuzzy inside to see the Christmas lights and garland everywhere.

I bought this garland from COSTCO!  Hello....already decorated and adorned!!!

I also mixed a little modern with traditional....

An Ode to the migraine!

My oldest son and I are members of a Philanthropy organization and yesterday was the Mom's holiday meeting.  We exchanged gifts and had apps and dessert.  But, while I was shopping for the gift, hubs called and wanted to have lunch.  We had just sat down and I noticed I was having a hard time reading the menu.  The words had disappeared where I was looking, although I could see my peripheral.  Panic set in!  Then it was as if I was looking through a kaleidoscope.  Everywhere I looked, the lights were "dancing".  I was so scared!  My blood pressure must have been through the roof.  I then remembered my father telling me that when he gets a migraine, he doesn't feel the pain but his vision is impaired.  I realized that both of my eyes were affected so I took Advil and hoped for the best.  As we ate lunch, I started feeling pressure in my head and behind my eyes but, thankfully, not the pain of a migraine.  We went straight home so I could, hopefully, sleep it away before my meeting.  When I woke up, I felt so much better and needed coffee!!  I was taking the coffee canister to the basement when...........

I watched in slow motion as the canister hit step after step!  Shock and disbelief is an UNDERSTATEMENT!  I immediately felt nauseous and just left it on the stairs. I needed a moment...actually several moments.  I made the coffee, with the 3 tablespoons that was left in the canister.  Calmly, I told hubs that I wanted to show him something.  As he rounded the corner, he said OH MY GOD...then he saw three stairs and said OH MY GOD  what the???  I nudged him to look all the way up and he said Holy &%*#!!! OH MY GOD!!!  Yep....it's best to sit and do nothing after a migraine! Unfortunately, I didn't have time to vacuum so my hubs, the sweet man that he is, the regular vacuum wasn't doing the job so he realized he needed to pull out the heavy machinery for this job....SHOP VAC!

The shop vac still didn't clean it all :(   Needless to say...the carpet is stained and now I have to shampoo it!  But it will have to wait for a few days so I can recover from the trauma of disbelief it happened!  Hopefully it will come clean!  Wish me luck :)

Christmas Mantel 2012

Christmas is such a festive time.  I love the smells of Christmas, the music and definitely the decorating at Christmas! We spend a lot of time in the family room so I wanted something special for us to enjoy...

The decorations on the garland are so pretty

Christmas White Dining Table

Christmas decorating is in full swing! I love decorating the dining room.  Seriously...I just sit in here and enjoy the space because I love it so much!  The kids think I'm coo-coo, but hey... it's the little things in life :)

I just love white and silver. It's so elegant and pretty...

Blingity, Bling, Bling :)  It's a good thing!

Home Office

This is what the home office looked like before we moved in.   I can see lots of possibilities in this space....the first thing needed is to paint these walls but I have other rooms to do so it will have to wait.

Since this house is technically move-in ready, I am waiting for a while to make changes.  In the meantime, this is what the office looks like since we moved in....

I'm clearly uninspired....thus the mountains of clutter!

It's a pretty room even as is but I'm really done with gold walls.  I want a fresh, clean look.  On my to-do list for sure!

Laundry Room Closet

This closet always becomes a mess within a few days of cleaning it.  I had school supplies in here and here, so I realized that I had to come up with organization that is teenager proof!  

Before.....





Having teenage boys means bigger backpacks, coats, and SHOE SIZES.   We have more hats than you can buy at the stadium.  They are all over the house.

Once again, the closet is clean and the boys are keeping it clean.  Whew!  One of the boys has a 14 shoe size and another is a size 12 so I am on the search for baskets that will accommodate each size and still look stylish :)  This is also where we keep all belts for the boys.  Otherwise, they get gobbled by the closet monster, under the bed monster, or just simply disappear into thin air!

More Kids Supplies

The GOOD....



Not long after moving in (of course I didn't find a place for everything) and with the kids going to school and sports in full swing, I had to organize quickly. This is a miscellaneous cabinet in the laundry room and the craziness of some of the school supplies and crafts. The bottom shelf didn't start out this way but is what happens when boys have better things to do than to put things back the way they originally found them :)

The BAD.....

There is a bottom cabinet that I have to admit is where I threw "stuff".  Important, useful things!



After throwing out a construction bag worth of stuff....just look at the rest of what came out of two cabinets that needed a home.


The UGLY.....

It is the messy cabinet where I decided to house kids supplies and crafts in an organized system...as in EVERYTHING has a place with a drawer or a lid.  It my "you-can't-just-throw-it-back-in-system"!
Ahhh.. it's a beautiful sight :)

The kids have been so happy since they can find everything and have been really good about putting things back in their place.  Occasional reminders, but all and all....WOOT WOOT!!

Kids Supplies



I was feeling a little stir crazy from all of the kids supplies in different places and the utter chaos. The boys just didn't want to deal with the mess and would get frustrated because they couldn't find things easily. So Mama's OCD (Organizer of Chaos Deliverance) Mission began!!

I don't know what I was thinking when I threw the supplies in a drawer without organizers! The pencils and pens were lined up and grouped but quickly became a total mess.

Before.....

Kitchen Makeover

Hello 1990's kitchen...we are bringing you current!

Didn't know I would need a good picture to put on a blog :(

Those white floors with blue diamonds were not a good thing with kids and dogs.  The counters were just ugly. They were speckled with tan, white, and blue.   I had a vision of modern, and clean, and budget friendly (except for the granite of course)!!  We decided to move the old island to another spot in the kitchen, so I got pre-assembled cabinets and painted them black.  I (added new jewelry) changed the hardware on all the cabinets.  They are transformed!! The new hardware really added to the new modern feel.  The new tile is so nice and I love the running bond pattern.  

We moved the old island to just beside the refrigerator (see next pic).  It fits exactly, as if it was supposed to be there all along.  I went to the manufacturer to get upper cabinets but they were discontinued...of course!   So I did the logical thing and hung a mirror :)  

Although I don't have a picture, we took down the ugly, too small, dirty fan and put up sleek track lighting.

The light fixture over the table was already there, although hung too high, will stay as is.

The black granite.....it has silver sparkles all throughout.  They are blinged out let me tell you! 

What a mess!

Although I do cook, it's not my passion.  I'm more of a taste-the-end-result kinda girl ;)  Thank God Hubs loves to cook.  He tells me it helps relieve his stress.  Funny....it stresses me to cook without a recipe and even at that I am still prone to mess up a meal.  Seriously, hubs is a great cook. He should be on Chopped.  He can open the frig and throw things together (I get nauseous thinking about it). The only thing about hubs cooking is that he only cooks with stainless steel and apparently our cook top knobs only have one setting....HI.  Therefore, every pan is burnt.  I think I got tennis elbow from all of the scrubbing!  I have been looking and tried many products to make clean up easier.  Well I found the answer...it's called:

BAR KEEPERS FRIEND!!

I am not joking when I tell you it cleaned my pans within minutes with barely any scrubbing! Take a look..

BEFORE:

AFTER:

Hubs food tastes even better now!! WOOT-WOOT

Master Bedroom

I love this space....however, notice the wall of windows.   Just beyond those windows is a big brick monster...my neighbor!  Must find cover :)  Our bedroom faces East, so the sunlight in the morning...we'll just say there is no sleeping in.... EVER!!



I bought filter paper and stuck it to the top part of the windows. The white panels look clean and fresh BUT, in the morning, our room was glowing...again no sleep!  I then bought cheap dark panels from JCPenny and mounted them (on the same rod) behind the white panels and viola....SLEEP :)

Now on to what are we going to do about the headboard that got lost in the move and since our bedroom furniture is now our Conversation Room furniture read here ..... I need a plan!  Everywhere I looked, I couldn't find the right size and one that I liked as much as our large sleigh headboard.  So I decided to make our headboard.  Because our ceilings are so tall, I wanted something dramatic.

The headboard is 87 inches tall and 80 inches wide!  It looks so nice in our room and I couldn't be happier :)








Dining Room

This space is connected to the foyer and is the second thing you see when you enter the house. 

How it began......

Notice the color on the walls...this was before the bank painted them infant poo GOLD

Even before we moved our old dining room furniture, I knew the furniture wasn't going to "make it" long term.  It did the job, but my decorating wheels were on over drive!!

So sorry for the bad quality of the picture

One day, LB said some of the legs were wobbly and needed to be fixed or replaced.  I think I just heard  angels singing!  I quickly said, your right, they definitely need to be replaced.  (I had already found chairs that I completely fell, head over heels, in love with as well as a buffet!)  I said... in my sweetest, pleeeassseee let me redecorate the dining room voice... honey, I found the chairs I love and you will too but they don't go with our traditional table and buffet. And not to worry because I also found THE buffet that is perfect for this room!  He smirked and said, OK I see where this is going...I guess we are redecorating the Dining Room!  I had my mind set on a certain pedestal table but because I'm not a wait 6-8 weeks kinda girl...I was on mission.  I finally found my table!!  I knew as soon as I saw it. 

4 chairs may be a little crowded???

And let's not forget about the light fixture.....I get giddy looking at it :)   The sunsets in the front of the house so I open the curtains and the entire room looks like diamonds on the walls!

I love this room...between the mirrored buffet, nailhead trim on the chairs, the crystal on the chandelier....I have to stop there because the post will end up inappropriate!