Goodbye First Home: Kitchen

Prep area and tiny eat-in

Window + sink = important

Brown, tangerine, and gray.
We made it work.

When we moved in, the walls were covered in gingham-style (heyyyy, sexy ladies!) wallpaper that was incredibly difficult to remove. If you're wondering why we got rid of it, you might be imagining J. Crew prep when, in reality, it was more country charm (think geese with bonnets, instead). Once we got all that off, we selected a warm gray to go on the walls. From there, we repainted the cabinets, changed up the hardware, and switched out the counter tops. Eventually, we went stainless with the appliances (January is a good time to buy).

We also reconfigured the room where we could. It wasn't a classic, functional kitchen setup before. It was somewhere between L-shape and galley, without the desirable 'triangle' of work stations. Now the pantry and prep area are much closer to the fridge and sink. We made that stainless steel table by drilling an IKEA counter top to two Elfa shelving units. You'll note the neon green clip on the mesh shelves therein, this is to keep the kids from pulling them out or, worse, getting their heads caught underneath. (This is not mommy-doctor approved!) I will say that the nice thing about this contraption is it has wheels, so it can actually be moved to the middle of the kitchen and act as an island and put back afterwards. We also made good use of wall space, which is always critical in a small, heavily trafficked area. 

Goodbye First Home: Leepo's Room

We went with an earthy, explorer theme here. It fits him perfectly. Those gorgeous windows will be missed. So much good light in this room, perfect for highlighting what he refers to as "working trucks."

Goodbye First Home: Our Bedroom

The walls were crimson red when we moved in here. That was TOO intense. We switched it up with multiple coats of "Bedroom White." Ah, tranquility.

Goodbye First Home: Beanie's Nursery

I've posted other pics of the nursery before. It's a small, intimate space that brings me much joy. I think it's pretty girly. That nursing chair is the best, it can fit me and two little kids on each side. The chair is, of course, coming with us to the next house. The sad thing is, my daughter's memory of this place will not follow along. 

Goodbye First Home: Den

This place got its act together once we relocated stuff to the playroom. I wish we had had more fires going during our time here. We were able to build a few before we had kids, but afterward it felt like too much of a hassle and safety issue. The unused fabric on the window sill speaks to my procrastination regarding window treatments. Despite those things, this room housed many great memories. It's where most of our guests stayed (that's a sofa bed in the corner). On that rug is where the little ones practiced sitting up and crawling. Those bookcases were one of our first 'projects,' and all we did was paint the background black. It really got us on a DIY roll, though. Shortly thereafter, I painted horizontal stripes on the walls. They're subtle, can you see them?

This room has a lot of my favorite things in it, too. You can only see one, but that circular object on the wall has a larger buddy and that motif was inspired by a West Elm catalogue (see here). --Each one cost 25 cents! Those chairs, wait for it. . . $2.50 each (before reupholstering). Hank the anatomical naked man on that coffee table is a keeper, of course. The table itself was a resale item from one of my favorite people, Tommy E.

Such a sweet spot.

Goodbye First Home: Dining Room & Entry

Good lighting makes this appear palatial. In reality it's a decent size, but the lack of a true entryway means that this open and zen vibe doesn't last for long. In fact, right now, there's a bunch of clutter hanging out on that dining table. I do like what I did here with the colors, I'll miss that.

I will note again that, except for the IKEA entry drawers (which hold organizational and daily use items like coupons and diapers), all the furniture is resale. Also, I really dug those hanging globe pendants that are so in style, but found the cost to be prohibitive, so I tied some glass terrariums with fishing line and hung them from our ceiling light.

I think I did the best I could with the limitations I had here. What do you think?

Goodbye First Home: Playroom

Remember this post from a little while back? I'm FINALLY getting around to showing what we did with that spare dump-everything-here room. We did indeed turn it into a playroom, it I count it as one of the best decisions we ever made. Why? Because without it, during the first few weeks of Beanie's life, I would have gone insane. There's nothing like being able to say, "I'm feeding/changing diapers/trying to sleep so could you just go downstairs to play?" Ah, yeah.

Let's jog your memory. This is what we started out with:

BEFORE

From dungeon to playroom!

AFTER

The new playroom is the place to be. It was pretty quick, easy, and cheap to do, too. Moving clockwise from the door, we have the following:

• Role-play area with IKEA Bygel rod and hangers for costumes.
• Food prep station with grocery cart
• Gears and wheels section with "table" made by pushing two bathroon benches together (they were collecting dust in the attic)
• Chalkboard
• Activity table
• Chest o' drawers with educational items inside

Storage and fun go hand in hand

• Not shown above, we also managed to squeeze in this handyman area
• See that big Babar poster, I got it from Goodwill framed for $5. 

We did so well with maximizing space (even the little chairs come with hidden storage) that this room also holds our exercise equipment and a full set of drums! It actually makes me want to kick myself a bit because it took us this long to make this happen and our boy could have been enjoying it for much longer. Oh, and who are we kidding, us parents like to spend time here, too.