Below I'm sharing our 2021 project goals and the plans we have to keep our home transformation going. Every year, at the start of the year, I like to sit down and really think about what our house project goals are for the year. Since Todd and I do all of these projects on a budget, with cash, setting aside the funds and creating those budgets is essential in actually finishing projects. House projects and budgets go hand in hand, and I've learned when we have a designated amount set aside, it's easier and more fun to create a budget for each project we'd like to complete! Even with as much progress as we've made in our Willow house, there's still more spaces to finish, projects to ...
Projects
2020 Project Overview
How did we do on our project goals for 2020? Find out below as I share our 2020 project overview. Now that we're fresh into a new year, I wanted to look back and share our 2020 project overview and see how we came out on all of our project goals we set at the beginning of the year. It's no secret, we had a lot of projects on our agenda and we had high hopes that we'd be able to complete all of them. But even if we didn't completely finish the list, we're still happy with all the progress we've made on the house. And, oh ya, we had a baby too, which just about changes everything! 2020 Project Overview 1. New Garage Doors: Complete Mark this one off the list! We had our new ...
Vertical Planking & Open Shelves In The Kitchen
See how we installed vertical planking & open shelves in the kitchen to make it feel bigger and brighter! Our kitchen has come a long, long way. After we had our backsplash installed, it was time to add vertical planking and open shelves in the kitchen. From the very beginning when we were designing the kitchen, I knew I wanted open shelves to make the kitchen feel larger. We don't have a big kitchen, but the new addition of the open shelves makes the kitchen appear bigger and less crowded. Before we could have the shelves installed, the first step was adding the vertical planking. Todd and I decided to tackle the project a few weeks before I was due to have our baby ...
Laminate Countertops & Backsplash
The secret is out: Our kitchen has laminate countertops & backsplash! See how we made it look like real marble! It's been a hot minute since I've shared anything about our kitchen, but so much has changed lately! It's time I shared an update on one of the biggest additions yet, our laminate countertops and backsplash! When we designed the kitchen, we knew we'd need to splurge and save in different areas with the countertop and backsplash being one of them. But just because we needed to save in that area, didn't mean they needed to look cheap! Quite the opposite really! Laminate has come a long, long way from what it used to look like. These days, you can get patterns that look ...
Easy DIY Raised Garden Beds
Looking to create your own garden? These easy DIY raised garden beds are the perfect solution and can be customized to fit your space! One of our big goals this summer, is to get our backyard in shape. It's a scary mess of dirt and weeds and we're both so over it, we could cry. That's what we signed up for though when we bought our fixer upper. This is the year though... we're both determined to get this large yard in shape! Our first big project this year for the backyard, was to build some easy DIY raised garden beds. Last year our garden was in a small area of the yard, but since the property had been severely neglected for several years, I spent so much time hoeing and pulling ...
Our New Back Patio
Late last summer we had our back concrete patio replaced. It was such an exciting and house transforming project! We did all the demo ourselves and even though it was hard work, it was so fun to see that beat up, cracked and crumbling patio removed and replaced with a much better and larger concrete patio! Before we had the patio replaced, I shared our inspiration and plans for the new patio, and then some of our progress with demo, but I realized I never shared the new, finished patio! Let's take a walk down memory lane and look back at where we started... Our Old Back Patio Not only was the patio small for the house, but it was pieced together, crumbling apart ...
Wall Moulding In The Nursery
Today I'm sharing how we installed wall moulding in the nursery. It's added the perfect amount of character to the bare walls, really bringing this room to the next level. We've been hard at work getting ready for baby girl! It's been a real team effort, but her room is looking so good and things are coming together beautifully! Today, I wanted to share the wall moulding we just installed in the nursery. It's made such a huge difference and it's added the perfect amount of character to her room. If I'm honest, I've been a little bit indecisive when it came to what exactly I wanted to do in her room. The one thing I knew for sure, was that we would be installing wall ...
Customizing Our Ikea Pax Dining Room Cabinet
Today I'm sharing how we customized our Ikea Pax dining room cabinet. It's the perfect way to add character to Ikea cabinets while staying on budget. Our kitchen is small. We don't have a ton of storage, and that's something our entire house lacks as well. Getting creative and adding places to store our items has been on my project list since we moved in. In order to help add storage space to our kitchen, we added an Ikea Pax cabinet to our dining room. It instantly solved the problem of adding more storage space to our kitchen, but it also stuck out like a sore thumb, not really blending into our kitchen. With our kitchen and dining room essentially one space, I really wanted the ...
New Garage Doors
Our New Garage Doors are installed and our exterior is looking better than ever! If you remember back when I shared our 2020 project goal list, adding new garage doors was at the top of our list. We worked on the exterior of our home so much last summer, and we made really great progress with new paint, windows, the addition of our front pergola, and all the landscaping we completed. The last really big item to finish things off, was having new garage doors installed. I've mentioned it time and time again, but the previous owners of this home really beat things up. They didn't take very good care of the house or property and the garage doors were just as much evidence of that as ...
DIY Towel Hook Rack
This DIY Towel Hook Rack is the perfect addition to our master bathroom and a great way to store towels! We've been busy working in our master bathroom and I was hoping to be able to share the full reveal with you at the end of the month, but since I haven't had the easiest time shopping for all those pretty finishing touches, things have been pushed back for a while. One thing we were able to create, was our DIY Towel Hook Rack. This was such a fun project to put together and I love the finished product. Believe it or not, but the wood is actually a left over stair tread from when we did our DIY staircase makeover. I loved the stair treads so much, that I wasn't willing to ...
DIY Staircase Makeover
Are you ready for a big transformation? Our DIY staircase makeover has made a huge difference for our home! If there's been one project that's been glaringly obvious that we need to finish, it's our stairs. When we were knee deep in demo'ing the house, we went through and removed all the old, super gross carpet, but other projects became more important and we ended up moving in with the stairs still in pretty rough shape. We've hated them, but we've dealt, just as anyone does when living in a fixer upper. With this project being one we wanted to complete this year, and the fact that it's been holding us up from finishing any base trim that connects to the stairs, we decided the ...
How To Install Wall Moulding
We've been doing some work in our master bathroom and it's coming along beautifully. When coming up with the design plan for this bathroom, I really wanted to add some extra character, especially with the bathroom being such a small space. Wall moulding was an essential part of my plan, and we just recently installed a few walls, with one more to go. Today though, I wanted to share our method on how to install wall moulding. It's such a beautiful way to add character to any space. How To Install Wall Moulding Before we get started, if you haven't caught up with progress in our master bathroom, you can read my last update here. This bathroom has come such a long ...
Five Tips For Living Through A Remodel
Living through a remodel isn't the easiest thing. We spent months working on our Willow House, making it livable, before we ever moved in. But even with all that time and hard work spent on making this house something we could move into, there were so many different items that would still need finished after we moved in. Now that we've lived here for over a year, we've both learned several lessons about what it's really like living through a remodel. Today, I wanted to share five tips for living through a remodel. It's not always as glamorous as what it's made out to be, but it is worth it! Five Tips For Living Through A Remodel Tip # 1: Be Patient I think it goes without ...
An Update On Our Master Bathroom
It's time I shared an update on our master bathroom! We've made such incredible progress, and here soon, I look forward to revealing the finished space! Before that happens though, we have a few things left to finish. Let's take a look at how far we've come! The last time I talked about our master bathroom, I shared our design plan for the room... And a few pictures of the different elements we're planning on using in the bathroom... Today though, I wanted to share just how much progress we've made in our master bathroom, and what we have left to do before the room is finished. Just to refresh your memory, here's a look back at what we started with... Here's the ...
Installing & Painting Our Interior Doors
Let's just take a minute to celebrate the accomplishment of installing and painting our interior doors! It's been a long road getting here, but it's such a sweet victory in having every single interior door installed! Let me just tell you, you'll never fully appreciate the function and beauty of a door until you've lived without them for nearly a year! Yes, a year! When choosing our interior doors, I knew I wanted something a little more traditional in style, but we also didn't want to order custom doors. We found our door style in stock at Lowes, and since we've slowly been adding them to each room for the last year or so, it worked best for us to be able to buy them when we needed ...
Master Bathroom Design Plan
I can't even explain how excited we are to start on our master bathroom remodel! It's been a project we've wanted to do, but held off from finishing while we prioritized other projects that needed done first. It's finally here though, and I've spent so much time working on the new floor plan for the bathroom, as well as the design plan for the space. Before I share the design plan, and the new layout, let's take a walk down memory lane and look back at where we started... The Master Bathroom Before: When we first bought the house, this room appeared to have been one of the only rooms in the house that had undergone some sort of an upgrade. Even with that said, the ...
Our Project Goals For 2020
Since we're still fresh into a new year, and baby girl will be joining us in July, Todd and I took the time to sit down and go over our house project goals for 2020. We have several spaces and areas we'd like to finish this year, so it felt right to sit down and work up a list so we have a good idea what we're looking at, and which projects we need to budget for. While living in a fixer upper, there's never a shortage of new projects that come up. We tackled so many big things last year... projects that really set the foundation for this house and the direction we see everything going. Now that the majority of those larger projects are finished (yay!), we get to add in all the fun ...
Designing And Buying Our Ikea Kitchen
I'm late in sharing this post, but better late than never, right? Designing and buying our Ikea kitchen was a new experience for us. We'd never went through the process of designing, creating and purchasing Ikea cabinets, and while it was definitely an experience, we're still glad we did it. When we first bought our Willow House, basically everything needed gutted. There really wasn't anything worth saving, and the kitchen cabinets were in really, really rough shape. We knew, just like with the rest of the house, the kitchen would be getting new everything. And because we needed to remodel the house on a budget, we'd be leaning on Ikea for the cabinets because of their solid ...
Our Fall Front Window Box
Better late than never, right? Today I'm sharing our fall front window box, and honestly I was hoping to have this up on the blog a few weeks ago. Unfortunately, we got a below average cold spell right after I bought some plants and I just couldn't plant them only to have them die a night later. Then, because I waited, some the mums I bought started looking a little tired, and not the prettiest, so I switched gears and used some wicker, light up pumpkins as my focal point instead. I'm not sad about it, because they look amazing! When I was pulling out all of my summer plants, I decided to leave in the ivy. It's mainly dried at this point, but it still looks really pretty ...
Four Reasons We Chose Carpet For Our Bedrooms
Since I recently shared the tutorial for installing our laminate flooring throughout the house, I wanted to also share the four reasons we chose carpet for our bedrooms rather than installing the laminate floors. To be honest, we thought long and hard about installing the laminate in our bedrooms as well, but in the end, carpet won out. I know there are so many people who prefer a hard surface flooring throughout their entire home, but that's just not us. Here's why. 1. Carpet Is Soft & Warm Underfoot One of the biggest deciding factors, was the fact that carpet is soft and warm underfoot. We enjoy stepping out of bed and landing on a soft, plush surface. Sure, we could ...
Painted Front Door Interior
There are a few existing things in our house that we're temporarily keeping until the time comes to upgrade and replace them... our front door and the stair hand rail being two of them. In order to stay and blend in, they both desperately needed painted. I'll share more about the handrail later, but when we painted our exterior, I went ahead and painted the exterior side of our front door as well. Since we were still knee deep in demo'ing out the inside of the house, I didn't spend the time painting the interior side, knowing it would get scuffed up. After we moved in, the interior side of our front door looked really out of place. I put it off for a little while, making it out to be a ...
