Guest Bedroom Reveal- Before & After

It's been a while. I have missed this blog of mine, but we still don't have Internet at our house so it has also been a nice little break from it all. We are supposed to get Internet next week so I'll be back with lots of updates. I'm currently writing this at Starbuck's on my lunch break. We finished the guest bedroom last weekend, thanks to my mom and dad's help! I'm so excited to have an organized space that you can walk through. 

Please don't judge the before pictures. We only have two bedrooms so this was our catch all space while we were moving in. It was absolute chaos. 

THE BEFORE:

AFTER:

 The walls were white. It's hard to tell, but I painted them a pale gray called Seashell Gray by Valspar. We also painted all the woodwork white. I used shelves and picture frames that I previously had in our bedroom.

 Since this room is also our laundry room, it was a challenge to make space and keep it all organized. 

 I previously had the canvas totes. I bought them at a garage sale years ago. They were white so I painted them yellow with some Annie Sloan chalk paint I had on hand. I bought the chalkboard stickers from Hobby Lobby and adhered them with Velcro. This is where we store Samson's stuff, games, and towels/sheets etc. I bought the white shelf at Home Depot.

 I found this gray roller shelf between the washer and dryer at TJMaxx. It is exactly what I was looking for to store all our laundry detergent and other items. We had to come up with some creative storage ideas and these ended up working out great.

This is my little craft corner. It is not all of my stuff, but I had to keep some of it in the house and put the rest in storage. I painted the shelf light blue. I already had this shelf, I bought it at a thrift store and used it for my craft supplies in our old house. I also bought the shelf hanging on the wall at Michael's. It's my ribbon and tulle organizer. It's great to have this when I'm making onesies or wrapping gifts. It makes my life much easier. 

The chalkboard is from Ross. It is huge and exactly what I was looking for. It was only $30 which is way cheaper than anything else I found. I copied the writing from a picture I loved at Hobby Lobby. This might be my favorite part of the room. All the pillows are from Target and Hobby Lobby.

 My decorative straw collection. I have a thing for cute straws. I am constantly buying them and never using them...oops!

 The curtains I already had. We used them as our shower curtain in our old house. They're from Target.

 My tulle and ribbon collection.

 We have not done the flooring yet so please ignore our retro linoleum. We are still trying to decide if we want to put the money into the floor if we won't be here very long. 

 The rug is from Home Goods and the laundry basket is from Target. The bedding is also from Target.

So there you have it. Now we just need a visitor. We are finally ready for our friends to come visit us here. The bed is a trundle bed so we can sleep more than one!! 

Next up on the house project to-do list is our bedroom. We've already picked out the wall color, now we just have to paint and do the woodwork.

The Living Room- Before & After

BEFORE

This is what the living room looked like when we first saw it. YIKES!!! We had a lot of work to do ;)

 Here it is while we were in the process of painting. I had already painted the inside of the front door.

 Notice my wonderful little helper. A big thanks to my best friend, Alli for spending the day helping me paint. She was a huge help.

AFTER

 We painted the walls Oatbran by Valspar. I was really pleased with the way it turned out.

 I love deer skulls and antlers and I've always wanted to display them in my house somewhere. Aaron finally let me spray paint his deer skulls and now he's pretty pumped that I put them on the walls.

 The curtains are from Kirkland's. I decided to spray paint these antlers gold and I'm so glad I did. 

 This lampshade I found at Target.

 This pillow is my favorite part of the living room. I found it on Etsy here.

 We discovered the hardwood underneath the linoleum and decided to stain it Dark Walnut. It is not perfect and has a lot of character....so don't look too close. It by far beats the linoleum though.

 I painted the door Palladian Blue by Benjamin Moore, but in the Valspar look a like version. It is one of my favorite parts of the living room. 

 And there is our glorious hole in the wall from an old heater unit. Not  sure yet what we're going to do with it. 

 I found this rug at Target .

Everything else you see in the living room is stuff I already had. It's crazy what a little paint on the walls and woodwork and some stain on the floor can do to a place. We love it and are so excited to have one room in the house completely finished so we can enjoy it while we work on the other rooms.

Moving Progress!

We are officially Oklahoma residents again. We loaded up a 26 foot UHaul and three vehicles full of our stuff and moved last Tuesday. We are slowly getting situated and unloading boxes.

 I must say, the house already looks 100x better after cleaning it and putting our stuff in it. I have already picked out and bought the paint colors and I will start painting the living room tomorrow. I will post the before pictures as soon as I get them taken and can find Internet service. We don't have Internet set up yet so I'm using the Internet at my parent's house right now.

Aaron started his job today. I'm anxious to hear all about how his first day went. I can tell you that he is absolutely loving where we live and being out in the wild. So far we have spotted wild hogs, a momma bob cat and her kittens, 3 coyotes, a flock of turkeys, and some big bucks on the land. To say Aaron is in "HOG" heaven is an understatement. I'm pretty sure he goes outside every chance he gets to look for wildlife. I, on the other hand, am scared to death to step foot outside, especially in the dark.

I have started the interviewing process and will let you know how that goes as things progress.

We owe a GIGANTIC thank you to Aaron's family and my parents for all they have done for us during this move. Aaron's family came to Mammoth and helped us load everything. Then they drove to our new place and helped us unload everything. We could not have done it without their help. Thank goodness Aaron has two brothers because their muscles were definitely needed to move all our big furniture. My parents spent 12 hours cleaning the house prior to us arriving and then they came down the day after we unloaded the UHaul to help us get everything situated. They also babysat Samson for two weeks so we wouldn't have to worry about him while we packed and moved. It was a huge help, but we missed him so much!

I came to my parents house this weekend and reunited with Samsy! We went for a long walk and I might have almost cried when I first saw him. We were both so excited. 

It has already been so great being so close to family. I was able to spend the weekend on the lake with my mom's side of the family. We had relatives in from Virginia so we had a big get together and it was so much fun.

 I haven't seen Isabel and her parents since our wedding last June. It was so fun to see her and see how much she has grown. She is adorable and says the cutest things.

 I also got the meet sweet baby June for the first time. She is the prettiest baby ever. Those big brown eyes and her gummy grin will steal your heart. She was such a good, happy baby.

Love my family so much and so glad we got to spend the weekend together.

My brother and his wife just got back from their vacation to Puerto Rico. I got to have lunch with them today and they brought us back a souvenir. My brother said they searched high and low for the perfect souvenir for us and I'm pretty sure they nailed it....hahaha. I love it. I wish we had a mailbox to put this on, but we don't have a mailbox yet so I can't wait to find the perfect spot for it. 

So far I have painted the front door (on the inside) a pretty robin's egg blue/mint and I've bought the "love grows best in little houses" pillow and put it on our couch in the living room. Stay tuned for the before pictures, coming soon!

"Love Shack" Pinterest Ideas

I'm in desperate need of a break from packing so I've been skimming through Pinterest looking for ideas for the "Love Shack". We have made a pretty big dent in the packing department tonight. The living room, kitchen, laundry room, spare room, and bathroom are all done. Now I just have to do our bedroom and my closet which I am dreading. I think we will be ready to go by Monday!! 

Here are a few options I'm loving for the new house:

Kitchen wall color- Palladian Blue by Benjamin Moore

 I am in love with these light gray kitchen cabinets. I'm trying to decide between light gray or white cabinets. Our counter tops will be white so that makes me want to do the light gray, but then I can't decide what color would look best on the kitchen walls with the gray because I don't want to do just white walls.

I also love just the white cabinets with gold hinges and handles. I think it looks so light and fresh. I will have my farmhouse table, parson chairs, and bench in there. My dishes are mint green/blue and I will keep my current kitchen decor that incorporates a little black and gold. Which cabinet option do you like best?

I'm going to paint the living room walls Oatbran by Valspar. I think this color will match pretty darn close with our current couches and curtains. I'm also going to paint all the woodwork in the entire house white.

We found an inexpensive faux hardwood linoleum at Lowe's that looks similar to this for the living room, hallway, and maybe the kitchen floor. I can't decide if I want the kitchen and living room in the same stuff or if the kitchen needs to be something different.

I would also like to do some sort of tin/white ceiling tiles or a board and batten type ceiling because the current ceiling is bad and peeling off in places.

I love this color gray for our bedroom walls.

Or this green/gray color called Ancient Marble by Sherwin Williams. I have always wanted to paint a room in my house this color. 

I'm still not sure what colors to use for the bathroom and guest room. Not sure if we will make it in this house long enough to touch the outside, but I would love to paint the brick, put up shutters, and paint the front door. 

I've always wanted a yellow, mint, or robin's egg blue front door. Here is my inspiration:

 Wythe Blue

 Whipped Mint- LOVE LOVE LOVE

Not sure what color this is, but I love it!!

Who knows how far into this project we will actually get before we buy a house, but I sure am starting to get excited while looking for ideas.

The Love Shack

House hunting has been an absolute adventure in the area we are moving to. When we first found out Aaron got the job, we sent my mom and my aunt to be our eyes. They spent an entire weekend searching for a rent house and came home discouraged. We found out that there had been an oil boom in the area and rent prices were sky high for not so great houses in not so great areas. We also had to deal with the issue of them allowing a dog. We continued our research, found a few more possibilities and we sent both of our parents back again to check out another rental. Once again, it was not that great and definitely not worth the crazy high rent prices. You also have to realize we are coming from a small town where the rent is ridiculously cheap so we've been spoiled a little. We were kind of at a dead end road when Aaron got a phone call from his boss telling him that they have a house on the property that we are welcome to live in rent and bills free. Aaron was pumped!! He was so excited to tell me the news, that our searching could be over and that our wildest dream had come true. I on the other hand, was scared to death. For one thing, I knew it was an old house that needed lots of work. I knew the oven didn't work and I knew that it was out in the middle of nowhere. I was expecting the worse and praying that I could convince Aaron that paying rent for a place would be better.

You see, I'm not a spoiled rotten brat and I don't require a mansion or fancy things, but I do put a lot of importance on creating a home that is comfortable to live in and very welcoming to guests.

This weekend we went to the area where Aaron will be working and we looked at the free house. Pretty much all of my reservations about the place came true. Everything I had pictured in my head was true. It was old, small, and rough. I tried to go in with an open mind and I kept telling myself FREE and TEMPORARY, but I just couldn't do it. My parents, Aaron, and I kept exchanging looks and at one point in time I looked at Aaron and mouthed the words, "I can't do this." I could tell his heart sank a little because in his mind there was no question it was definitely do able. I'm pretty sure any man could live wherever as long as it's free and right on a ton of hunting and fishing land.

We continued our search and looked at a few other options, but none of them were in our price range. Plus, Aaron gets a company truck with his new job and he has to live within a 20 mile radius of the area in order to drive it home everyday so that eliminated our other option.

I can promise you I was bitter, sour, and not a very nice person to deal with that day. My attitude was terrible and I was pretty devastated about it, but I knew there was really no way to change Aaron's mind.

My mom and Aaron's new boss made it a point to say, "just think of all the memories you'll make out there". I didn't want to make memories out there, but I know there will definitely be lots of memories and stories to tell about it. One day we will look back and say remember when we lived in the love shack our second year of marriage and all the things that house taught us. Yes, we have named her the love shack. She is in Love County and she is a shack and she will definitely require lots of tender love and care so there's really not a better name for her (and yes we will refer to it as a she).

I put lots of thought into it over the course of that night and the next morning I woke up with a much better attitude. I had accepted the challenge and decided that we are going to flip this house. We are going to make it our home and it is going to be small, but cute and very very homey. Everything we put into it will come out of our pocket and won't be reimbursed, but you can't complain when it's free, right?

I guess you could say that now I am excited. I now look at it as a challenge and a project and I've got all kinds of ideas floating around in my head about what I want to do with it. Don't worry, it will all be documented here on this blog so get ready for some before & after pictures. We made a trip to Lowe's yesterday and picked out paint, flooring, and ceiling options. The majority of our furniture will have to be kept in storage. Our house hunting journey will begin ASAP and hopefully we will buy a house in the very near future. This house is temporary, but we're going to make the best of it while we can and hopefully save a ton of money. We have a huge yard on tons of land and we're going to put up our hammock, fire pit, and have lots of fun so come visit us in our love shack and hopefully we'll have room for you to sleep!

This week is our last week of work and we will begin loading the U-Haul next Monday. Our goal is to be moved into the Love Shack by Wednesday. AHHHH...can't believe this is really happening.

This quote is one of my most favorite quotes and it is going to be our motto during this season of life. I think I'm going to need this pillow sitting on our couch to remind us this on a daily basis. 

I hope this post doesn't sound snotty or bratty. I do want you all to know that I truly am grateful for this opportunity and for a free house. After all, we are so thankful for a roof over our heads, running water, and heat and air. That's a lot more than some people have. I know this will be a humbling experience for me. Here's to another adventure with Aaron!!! I have no doubt in my mind that he will be in heaven with this new job.