Most MIA Blogger, Evs. But hey! Porch.

  Oh, goodness. It has been such a longggg time since I posted! Over five months! I feel like all of my posts start that way so, well. I will apologize now for being missing in action. It's been a whirlwind year in my life, we've had a death in the family that was very hard, teacher life has been dramatically more challenging this year than last year, which still seems crazy to me, and I think overall I just got into a creative slump with my house.

This month is the 7th anniversary of living in my house, which I hope to celebrate with a blog post.  But I suppose we'll see if that really happens! Let's hope. haha.

Anyway. One of the big things that has happened around here lately is that we got a new front deck! When I was in college we collapsed it during a party (oops) and made some repairs then, but since the gutters were so terrible before we replaced them, it expedited the rot occurring on the deck.

Here's some before action:

This is one of those embarassing moments where the deck is actually well, worse, than it appears in the photo. The wood was sort of start to move away from the white frame and supports beneath it... a little sketchy.

I went ahead and hired this job out to make sure that it was done correctly and looks good. Here it is:

Even in progress it looks safer and better!

Plus, our new step is actually to the size of a human foot. Which is great and results in less people falling to their doom.

The new deck with labor and materials was $650 big ones, but it looks great and will help with keeping the resale value of this little joint. 

I have purchased some stain for the entire deck and I haven't decided if I should stain the side steps that are still wood, or if I should paint them white. Any opinions out there? 

Here is the hopeful color of the new deck after I stain it:

(it came from Pinterest, but I can't find a direct link. Sorry. :( )

Obviously that house is quite a bit nicer than mine, but that's alright. I still like the way that wood tone looks with the white beams. 

Next steps to the TrailerPerf summer porch?

• Stain the entire deck and step
• Stain back steps to match (oops)
• Redecorate!
• Spray paint outdoor furniture
• Accessorize!

Here's to a summer that is less crazy and strange then the school year!

Merry Christmas!

It has been awhile since I have posted... this semester of teaching has been the craziest one so far! However now that we are on break I get to take some time to slow down, decorate, eat, drink, and be otherwise merry. This is my third year in a row hosting Christmas since my parents moved away and I think I am finally getting it down! Here is a house tour of the decor this time around- traditionally I go with a silver, blue. and white theme. This year I wanted to try something more elaborate and vintage. So the color scheme is red, gold, white, and silver. Hope you like it!

Here's the full tour:

The exterior and front porch decorations: 

 

 

  

 

 The interior is looking pretty festive with plenty of wreaths and garland, deck the halls they say:

I even wanted to make the guest rooms feel fancy and festive!

The kitchen has its own set of garland and mom has been busy at work making my favorite part of the holiday meal... stuffing!

Carlyle and I were setting up the Christmas table with our new vintage place settings. 

And then we dressed him up like Santa... hehe. Sebastian looks like an elf but he wasn't as excited to have his photo taken. Weird.

 

Merry Christmas from my family to yours! I hope that it is bright and merry and will perhaps have snow... unlike us. Even though we're in Colorado. Boo.

50 Shades of Gray... Door Edition

It has been a long time since I have posted... starting school two weeks early has been super hard on my life! It has felt like being a new teacher all over again. Plus the extra teams and work I have taken on... its put some house projects on the wayside a bit. But! I am finallllyyy able to reveal to you my beautiful doors!

Remember what they looked like before? The one on the left was the old, dated, and ugly door. The door on the right was the new and improved wonderful version!

I love the detail and character it adds to the house. Plus there is no wood grain that clashes with the flooring. Thank goodness. That is so ugly.

Now here are the two new doors together on the secondary bedrooms! Storage is still limited in our style of home so we utilize over the door hooks quite often but even so they are so much better. Plus the new handles really coordinate quite a bit better with the other fixtures that are in the house. Mmmm.... pretttyyyy.

Let's not forget the bathroom door! That one received a wonderful and beautimous update as well...

Clearly there's still some mild fixes to do and a couple of adjustments as the hinges get worked and the house settles a bit between the seasons. I am hoping to get those fine tuning details done before the holidays when we start having visitors come and stay with us. At least now they know that when they close the door it won't fall off the hinges in the middle of the night.

We like to make sure that guests are as comfortable as possible around here. hehe.

Remember my bedroom door where all this excitement first began?

Well here is a long distance shot from the hallway. Ahhhhh. I love it. Sometimes I stand next to it and say sweet things. I'm sure everyone does that to their doorways right? Oh! And I added a new handle to the front entry door too. I couldn't replace that door because I'd have to special order it, the door is in good shape, so at this point I'm not looking to spend the extra cash on it yet.

One final BEFORE shot of the ugly old 80s doors... for nostalgia's sake.

And the new! Yayyy! We love them! Pretty sure that's one of the features in the hosue my sister and I get the most compliments on. It's fun to add some extra color and appeal to the doors since the rest of my tones are pretty neutral. Art and doors are what pop around here!

What do you think of the new doors? 

Total cost:

• slab doors from Lowe's: $32x4=$128.00
• ORB handles from Lowe's (Gatehouse brand, not good for keyed locks though): $10.97x5=$54.85