jesser

The great room is a big work in progress, for sure. It still has quite a few boxes, mostly of artwork, photos and A/V equipment that we need to deal with. But this house has less wall space, so we’re biding our time, figuring out where the best things go and then we’ll have to make some decisions about the others.

The great room is again where we ended up condensing two rooms from the old house into one room here. Our mostly unused living room merged with our oft-used family room and here’s the result. Couch for TV viewing and socializing, fireplace for coziness, piano for playing, a cozy chair for reading and for good measure, the Mad Men bar cabinet that used to be in Matt’s office.

We got an odd bonus in this room when our builder decided to tile past the mantle straight to the ceiling. We hadn’t spec’d it or paid for it, but we got it anyhow and we do think it looks nice. It did make mounting the TV a huge pain in the arse. Oh well.

Done

• Mounted the TV
• Installed the window coverings (7 total!!)
• Cleared out a ton of stuff

To D0

• Hang artwork (sooner)
• Clear out other random boxes (sooner)
• Program the motors on the shades to work from remote control (sooner)
• Fix the wiring to the subwoofer (sooner)
• Throw pillows for the couch for color (whenever)
• an area rug (whenever)
• Paint the piano (later!!)

Yes, you read that last one right. I think I’ve decided to paint my grandma’s piano. I like the dark honey wood better than I expected to in this room, but it’s not my favorite and I do think we could use a big pop of color on that wall. I want to live with it for now and try infusing color in other places first. I might even just start with upholstering the bench.

The Office

I’ve mentioned before that we actually ended up condensing some rooms when we moved from our old house to this one. We no longer have a family room and living room, just an (albeit larger) greatroom. And likewise, Matt and I no longer have separate offices, we now share one. Granted, this is not much of a sacrifice. I have a  lovely office that is 100% my own at work so my use at home is limited to when I want to do crafty things and when I need to work at home for work.

The office was pretty much a blank space, but we considered carefully and figured out what we wanted to do with the space: comfortable work area for Matt, occasional work area for myself and the kids and storage of all office/crafty stuff for the house. We bought the cabinets a month or more before we moved, on a Discover Card bonus 5% back and stored them. Assembly/installation was easily the biggest task in this room, but it’s done now and the room is otherwise progressing very well.

Done

• Assemble all cabinets
• Hang/install all cabinets
• Unpack/fill/organize all cabinets
• Setup two desk areas
• Search madly for a bookcase because (wow!) we still have a fair few books and get that in place
• Unpack the books
• Install window coverings
• Hang photo board (from old dining room)

To Do

• Finish up the unpacking/organizing the remaining random stuff and clear surfaces!! (sooner)
• Construct and install the barn door! (sooner, hopefully)
• Find a pair of chairs for either side of the work surface (sooner)
• Add floating shelves and maybe a set of drawers above the work surface (sooner)
• Hang some more art on the walls (whenever!)
• Maybe add some floating shelves above Matt’s desk (??)
• Rug??

The Foyer

I debated even putting this “room” on the tour because it’s hardly a room and pretty lackluster at this point. That said, however, I like this little entrance area and it has nice potential. Despite the fact that it spans both floors, it doesn’t feel too grand and it’s not overly big, but has a good feel. In the photo, you can see the front door and the window to its right. To the right of that is a very nice coat closet that is currently being used to store random things like the tools we’re still using to put up this and that. The wall on the left side is the office and it will eventually have the barn door we’re building. Behind me as I’m shooting this, it opens to the great room and kitchen.

Done

• Put up window covering
• Disperse the tons of junk that collected there while we were moving (the pile was WAY higher!)

To Do

• Finish up with the boxes (sooner)
• Think this area needs a nice rug … not sure what (whenever)
• Place shoe rack for guests (sooner)
• Maybe some art?? (whenever)

The house tour continues this way, to the kitchen and dining room areas. The kitchen may have been the room I was most excited about before we moved. I truly loved our cozy little kitchen in the old house and was sad to leave it, but I was eager for the very nice upgrade this kitchen gives us. I’ve said it before … people gather in the kitchen, especially when you cook! We love to cook and would frequently have 6+ people in our little kitchen. That plus extra space for one of our favorite hobbies had both of us twitterpated.

Kitchen 

The new house has an open floorplan so dining, kitchen and greatroom seamlessly blend together for a big room that somehow nonetheless feels cozy. I love that the dining room is directly adjacent to the kitchen and I really love our dedicated pantry and a ton of extra cabinet space. This room is probably second only to our office in terms of level of organization required since we have LOTS of cooking gear, all of which we USE. We are about as far along in this room as we are in any room, but we still have a little ways to go.

I was very excited to find a great spot for our spice rack. Not only do I love it for looks and function, but it’s one of the first things Matt ever built! On top of that, it ended up being a great place to showcase these cool little tin prints my mom got me (actually I think she got me the veggie ones and these went to my sister, but I ended up with them anyhow).

Done

• Unpack. This was a hurculean effort and it’s DONE. YAY US.
• Organize the kitchen
• Hang spice rack
• Hang produce basket from wall
• Place attractive decorative plant and

To Do

• Organize the pantry (sooner)
• Get rid of the random spaghetti junction on the very back counter that is our ad hoc temporary networking center (sooner)
• Replace the pendants over the island with the big green ones (sooner)
• Think about alternative arrangment for paper towels – under sink? (later)
• Replace the bar stools with ones that function properly and compliment our decor ($$$$ later)

The function of the kitchen has been great so far. We have tons of space to work in and even some empty drawers and cabinets (!?!). The kids can eat breakfast at the counter and it will be a great spot for a little homework as well in just a few weeks. The pantry, even disorganized is miles ahead of where we’ve ever been.

Additionally, one of my favorite features in the entire house is in our kitchen – the kicksweep. Kicksweeps in case you don’t know are awesome little vents in your floorboards that you can kick open. They then produce suction and allow you to sweep a pile of yuck into them. They are genius! We love them.

Dining Room

The dining room was an exciting room for me decorating wise because we got to get new furniture. With all the expenses of a new house, we didn’t want to replace most of our furniture, and we didn’t NEED to either. But the dining room was a different story. Our furniture was from ikea and going on 12 years old. It had been through dozens of parties and years of little kids. Its time had come and gone.

So we looked at length and finally found a furniture company out of Canada, Canadel, who makes semi-custom furniture. Pick a size, pick a leg style, pick a finish, etc. And so we did … A table, two benches and two chairs. It wasn’t cheap, but we got exactly what we wanted and we’re super happy with it. Likewise, our “sidebar” from PB teen, is also a perfect fit.

Like the kitchen, this room isn’t 100% done, but it’s 100% livable

Done

• New dining set
• New “sidebar”
• Organize dining accessories
• Hang roller shades

To Do

• Put some stuff on the walls!! (sooner)
• Consider a chandelier (later)

The house is coming along grandly, so I’m going to share, room by room what it looks like right now, what’s been done, and what’s left. Since the mudroom is where you enter, I’m starting there.

The Mudroom

We are so happy with the way this room has come together. We both feel an incredible sense of “hell yea!” whenever we walk in the door. This is one of those grand plans that truly has come to fruition. The spec on this room is for there to be a closet in the corner by the powder room, but we paid $50 to have it removed (I know!!) and Matt built cabinets to put inside it, based on this sketch I did.

Of course, things changed along the way. We opted to do a pencil drawer right under the counter top and we nixed the shelves on the left for a broom closet and the boot bench is stand alone and doesn’t open to the floor and its topped with cherry, not fabric. But the essence is there.

And here’s a look at the opposite wall and a view outside into the outdoor living room.

What we’ve done:

• built cabinets <– Matt is AWESOME
• finished cabinets – Matt, my sister and I all worked like dogs on this
• move alarm pre-wire switch
• install cabinets! – Matt, a friend of ours and our helpful handyman did this not so little task a couple days after we moved in
• procure granite on the cheap (all Matt)
• install granite – included in the price of the granite (yay!!)
• install hooks in each locker
• install holders for vacuum and broom/mop in the broom cupboard
• clear out Loki’s stuff that was stashed in the drawer and put it in a basket in the top broom cabinet shelf  and put in pens and other useful things
• hang keyrack

What we’ve got left to do:

• make and install shelves in each boot cubby (later)
• make and install doors on broom cupboard (later)
• trim out left side of cabinet so it runs all the way to the wall (sooner)
• repaint patch from where alarm prewire used to be (sooner)
• procure baskets for top cubby cabinets (sooner)
• teach kids to use lockers/cubbies (sooner)
• paint giant chalkboard on wall closest to the dining area (considering will be done later)
• hang kids’ measuring stick on end of wall closest to dining area (sooner)
• general organization stuff (??)

All in all? Not bad. The doors/shelves will be done once Matt’s shop is up and running again and once I get over my current antipathy towards painting/sanding/finishing.

The Powder Room

There are few rooms in the new house that resemble their counterparts in the old house as closely as this one does. We used virtually the same color for our accent wall and the same art, hand towels, basket, etc. I really liked our old powder room, so I saw no reason to mess with success. But here’s a recap:

Done

• accent wall (thank you painting faeries!)
• accessories added back in

To Do

• Hang wall art, couple of great camping related prints (sooner)
• Frame and hang another print that our friends gave us, a cute travel trailer made from CO maps!! (sooner)
• Wouldn’t mind changing out that mirror for something framed (no hurry)

So that is part 1 of the main level. Tomorrow – the kitchen + dining room!