Update and Guest Room Colors!

I think it's time for a little update house wise, Rob and I have been clear to close for about 2 weeks now, we had a HUGE almost month long hold up with the pest inspector who commented that the crawl space had been moist when he was under there in July (which was before we had fixed the siding, so yeah duh). We ended up having to pay to get it reinspected to shut the lender up (and we fixed the ventilation wells at the same time while he was there to approve of it). We had a closing date 2 weeks ago but the sellers weren't ready to close. Fancy that, they only had 3 months to prepare! But, this is apparently common with short sales since in order to sell a house as a short sale, the seller has to get their needs re-approved monthly. And our people didn't bother to re-up theirs when it ended July 31st. Brilliant. As of right now we have another closing date at the beginning of next week. I am totally out of patience. If they move it again I might go insane.
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Next up in the paint planning is the guest room. This will probably be one of the first rooms we do paint, since we have some guests that are flying in October the 13th to stay for two weeks. If you do the math, that means we have ONE weekend (and 7 ish days) in between closing and them coming to rip up the manky carpet and attempt some paint. It'll be okay though, the house is completely liveable now (bathrooms and kitchen are sparking clean aside from the grotty oven). And they know their room won't be show room perfect. Although it will have perfect flooring dangit. That carpet is nasty. I think it's doable though if we get a few friends to help!

Anyways, I think new flooring and a fresh paint job will be plenty to make the room fill homey (well that and a bed). We already have bed linens and pillows. :) Whew, on to the pretty pictures and paint possibilities!

(I don't know why this one is smaller?)

via Southern Living

I think the Handmade Home first linked this but I can't remember. Anyways, I love it and it's the main inspiration for the guest room! It's the opposite of Rob's mancave since it's so fresh and light. The problem is that this room is painted Dix Blue by Farrow and Ball and we cannot get that paint in po' dunk Kentucky. I can't even get a paint chip for it. I can order it but it'd cost a bucket load and I am cheap economical, plus who knows if it'd look good in my room?! It would probably look like I murdered the Jolly Green Giant instead. 

But, it's a starting point right? I also love the feeling of this room:

via Pinterest

So I've been discussing this with the local Benjamin Moore guys (it's hilarious how they can't pick a mint color swatch to save their life but they can look at a paint chip online and debate what formula it might have) and we've honed in on two possible mints. 

Colony Green by Benjamin Moore

This doesn't look anything like the real swatch.

and North Shore Green by Benjamin Moore

Again, totally wrong. 

Here, this is with my phone but it's still closer to what they look like in real life on the swatches. 

Closer... sorry, blogger is freaking out. I don't know why it looks like the bottom of this picture has been chewed away?!

Anyhow, both should be a barely minty color and since they're the lightest on the chip they shouldn't be too strong. I don't want it to look like a teenagers room and I definitely don't want it to veer into looking like an aqua. I think aqua is so overdone right now. 

I also like Ante Meridian by Valspar. But Valspar's online paint chips are just so insanely off base I won't bother putting it here. It looks purple online for some crazy reason. It's a washed out mint dang it! 

I think these light mints paired with some colorful ikat like the inspiration pick or a modern colorful floral in curtains will be nice :) This is MY room by the way, it's my chick cave. Since Rob gets his own room to design and paint how he likes then I get one too! It won't be bubblegum pink with frills, no, but I do want a dash of pink somewhere. And I think mint walls are girly :)

Man Cave or Call of Duty Room

As I've mentioned before and shown in the house tour (here) our house has 3 bedrooms, 2 of which are upstairs and decently sized. The third is downstairs behind the kitchen and is just an all round weird room.

It has an attached bathroom, which is handy, but the room itself is only 11x11. Tinnnnyyyyy. The attached walk in closet is a third of the size (and will be our handy closet, full of tools and other manly things like chest hair). Added to these odd proportions is the fact that this bedroom has the only back door to the house, leading to the back deck.

If this was used as a real bedroom it could get awkward walking through a guest's room while they're sleeping to get outside. Stalkerish even. "Ooh I see you sleeping.. oh don't mind me I just need a dip in the hot tub... naked". Kinda thing. (Side Note: a hot tub is imminent in our future, no comment on the skinny dipping though).

Long story short, it's going to be used as a mancave/ gaming room. I'm more than happy about this because we have a whole bunch of couches, like... we have 4 couches. That's a bit much right?! 3 are proper couches and 1 is a super thick futon. The futon will probably go in the man cave (I don't have a picture of it sorry). So that we have an extra bed in case our guest bedroom is full. This is smart as Rob's parents and his sister fly over for visits about twice a year.

$25 dolla, holla.

The futon, the 32 inch flat screen and his TV unit trunk (seen here) are about all that will fit in the room. Rob says this is fine since men don't mind sitting all crammed in on one another while playing Call of Duty. Or men plus me since I like to play as well (gotta represent the G11). Maybe we could squeeze in one of those tiny Ikea $70 arm chairs, or an ottoman. We'll see.

As for paint colors, Rob wanted to go bold. Like toned down peacock bold. It's completely his decision but I've snagged paint chips in dark gray blues from Benamin Moore for weeks and I know which ones are my favorite contender! He'll probably instantly hate them now haha.

First, Atmospheric by Benjamin Moore

Love it. If he doesn't end up using this I might have to steal it and use it elsewhere, like the Laundry Room.

Here it is in use:

See how it pops with the natural wood tone? The futon is wooden too so I'm hoping they'll mesh well. Painting or staining it would be a total bitch. Ooops, I mean beeeeeeep.

Second, Rushing River by Benjamin Moore

I can't find many pictures of this color in use that aren't full of eye sore furniture or scabby cabinets. I think this picture is a bit washed out or tweaked. The color would have to be darker in real life, this color is the second to last shade on it's chip!!

I also don't think it would look so gray. It's on the same chip as Gray Wisp and I know that has a bit of intense blue in it when the sun hits. Oh well. 

Lastly, I also like Bella Blue BM too, it might be too dark though.

But any similar sort of shade will go well with the Gray Cashmere that will be in the kitchen... like a surprise, but a better surprise than nude hot tubbing would be!

Being Original and House Colors

I really hate to be like anyone else. I dislike having clothes that other people do-- if I see someone I know wearing a top/sweater I own then most likely I stop liking mine and stop wearing it. I don't know why and it's very frustrating. The same goes for decor and decorating. I like the infamous yellow flower target pillow, chevron fabric, and striped walls, etc. but I don't want something in my house that a lot of other people do. 

For example, I made the mistake of mentioning that I wanted to do a similar striped treatment in a bathroom that John and Sherry did in their old house to a few family members a month ago and they all decided they wanted to do it too. This was also all said before a zillion other bloggers did it. So now I am NOT going to do that and I won't be discussing plans anywhere else but here (not many family members keep up with this blog). Although saying that, I don't think they have the balls to do a striped wall. They're not easy. 

via Young House Love

So with that in mind, I've sat down to write about the paint colors we're considering in the new house many different times but I always ditch the post because I don't want to be copied or see someone take my whole house color scheme and run with it. 

Now that I've thought about it though (for months since I've been waiting to own the dang house for-ever), I realized that I don't care if internet people know, most likely the paint colors wouldn't work together in any house but mine since lighting and size play such important roles. The thing that truly would bug me is if real life friends did it and then I had to visit them in their mimicry house. So, here goes. And know that if you blatantly rip off me I'll come to your house in the middle of the night and place Timmantha in bed beside you. You really don't want that ;)

We've discussed house paint before (here), but I'll say it again. I hate tan and builders beige, it looks like the walls are weeping with boredom when I see entire houses of beige blah-ness. I also dislike brown, it looks like poop smeared on walls, NOT chocolate, unless it's poopy chocolate. In contrast, Rob also dislikes white and cold grays as well as ivories, tans, and browns. Basically the only neutral we can agree on is warm grays and black. BUT we like to paint furniture in those tones so the house would again start weeping from looking like a dark cave. All that to say that there won't be normal neutrals on the walls in this house, sorry if that breaks some sort of design code, it's just not our bag. 

Instead, we're leaning into the airy gray blues and gray greens with a few shocks of moody stormy blues. We basically already have the living room and kitchen color set in stone (although we'll still sample it. If it looks dumb obviously I'll moan on here and try again). We really love Benjamin Moore's Gray Cashmere. 

I have no clue why it looks so blue online. It reads more as a blue green color in real life. Here are some examples I've found online via just google images. Also, does anyone else have issues with Decorati.com? It always tries to give me viruses, grrr. 

Love it. It looks so warm with wood tones too. We're planning on painting the living room, hall, kitchen, stairwell and upstairs hall with it as well. We might cut the paint in half outside of the living room though, the stairs and kitchen don't have windows so we don't want them to get dark. Maybe not though, the paint swatch lighter than Gray Cashmere looks so washed out and blah. 

For whole house trim we're planning on using Honeymilk by Valspar. I'm not going to put the official valspar picture of it up because it looks pink on the internet and in person, the paint card itself looks very yellow. In real life, Honeymilk is a gorgeously complex milky color. It's like the old ipods. Remember the milky white depth they had? We used Honeymilk on our dining room table if you remember, 

See post here.

That table, by the way, will look glorious against Gray Cashmere (since we have no dining room the table is going to go into a corner of the living room). Anyways, we're planning on using Honeymilk for our mill work as well as the mismatched wood kitchen cabinets. 

And if you hold Gray Cashmere and Honeymilk up against the chestnut flooring they look amazing!!! :) So excited. 

So that's the plan for the living room and open areas of the house. Bedroom paint colors, mancave, and bathroom colors coming up!

New Header

I've been working on a new header for the blog, Rob says my old one was a bit sparse. Hopefully this one is a bit better? I have to admit that I did the whole thing using MS Paint. Yeah, I am down with the technology these days! I miss my old striped ribbon but I couldn't figure out how to work it in with the image of the house. Anyhow, please forgive my poor choice of software and tell me if you think it needs some tweaking! :)

Flooring Take 2

Since this whole owning a house process has taken so dang long, we've had a LONG time to consider flooring options. I guess this is good because it means we've definitely thought it all out (as I already posted about a MONTH ago, here). We were originally planning on going with laminate. We even came within a hair of buying 900 sq. ft of wildwood oak 10mm laminate from Lumber Liquidators at .59 cents a sq. ft (holla).

We hesitated though because LL has such a horrible return policy. We decided to wait until we close, just in case. Which was smart, because now we don't really want laminate. Plus I wasn't really in to the whole red oak color.


On Sunday, we went to a small flooring shop in town called Rite Rug. I was frustrated at looking at just Lowes/Home Depot and Lumber Liquidators. Rite Rug had a wonderful salesmen that we really bonded with (he flips houses for a living, well, beyond what Rite Rug can give him). And then we got some schooling on flooring by him.

He told us that if we went with laminate we would have to buy laminate without the pad attached, and lay down the pad first before installing the laminate, because laminate flooring with the pad already attached still void their warranty if you don't lay down a pad underneath it still. Why is that? Because the pad that is attached doesn't cover the particle board click lock sections of the flooring, which means that the flooring is weakest to moisture, at the weakest point.

Weakest point in ugly blue flooring. 

So if you spill your mountain dew or alcohol onto the floor, it would pool at the joints and then seep under the flooring with no moisture barrier to stop it. 

Pad attached flooring being laid down without an under pad. Tsk.

Meaning that if you put down flooring with pad attached and do not add a second layer of moisture barrier underneath that still, then you don't get your fancy 15-25 year warranty. No bueno, that's a lot of effort for first time DIY-ers like us.

All is not lost though! We ended up really liking resilient vinyl floor planks instead.

Sounds weird and looks similar to those tacky peel and stick linoleum tiles I know, but, they've come a LONG way. 

Look at these rooms:

via google images

via Decor Pad

Looks better than most laminates do to us! Plus they're in the same price range as laminate flooring and are completely impervious to moisture... if the house flooded, our floors would still be purtiful. And they're much harder than most laminates and hardwoods, so they are scratch proof (to the point that the 25 year warranty on them covers all scratches). Not only that but they have more realistic wood grain images, which are printed "deeper" in (won't wear away like laminates do over time), and the actual grain against your bare feet is much more life like than the laminates we could afford-- I know there are killer sexy laminates out there, but we are looking to spend less than $1.50 a square foot. 

The thing about them that completely sold us though is that they are so easy to install yourself.  Just peel the side sticky parts away, line up the solid tile edges together, and then press down. After three days the glue is stuck permanently. And since they're glorified rubber you can score them with a utility knife and snap them instead of using a table saw to make cuts around corners and edging. Win!

Oh and if you're confusing resilient vinyl planks with that cheapo foam vinyl faux wood that comes on the giant carpet rolls at Lowes then please don't. It's very different. I had assumed they were the same as well. 

We're excited about our decision, and excited that we can meet our deadline of getting the house liveable before Rob's parents fly in to stay with us from England in mid-October since the floor is so easy to install!

Oh and here is the pattern we're planning on buying:

It's called Classic Chestnut and it's at Lowes. It's 3.5 mm thick and is $1.43 a square foot (after 10% off coupon and 5% on the card)-- which when added up to the 800 square feet we need equals out to around $1300. 

Now we just need an easy way to rip UP the carpet. :(

Coming Along

{Edit: I wrote the majority of this post last night, so the times are off. I felt woozy last night, not at 12:30 something in the afternoon! Also all pictures are off my phone, no way we're dragging the DSLR into all the chemicals we have going on over there}

I feel a bit high tonight. We've been steam cleaning the carpets today with a homemade mixture of bleach and vinegar (1 cup bleach, 1 cup vinegar, then fill the rest of the reservoir with hot water by the by). It is staaanky. We're also going to have to invest in a pair of goggles for both of us. Dumping out the used water made both of us cry. I googled it when we got home and apparently bleach and vinegar together is not so healthy. Oops. There is urine in the carpet so the ammonia mixing with bleach probably didn't make it any better.Double oops.

Maybe that's why my throat is currently burning...

That's so nice to contemplate. I think there is human poop upstairs too. Just a small spot. When we were house hunting (back in early MAY), we looked at a foreclosure house where the owners had taken massive dumps on the carpet and smeared it in (to get back at the bank/the man). The house smelled so bad it made me nauseous.... that's a nice tangent I know. All that to say that I can handle one small dump. Possibly.

This is what the used water pulled from the carpet looks like. It's a charcoal grey color. Mmmm. Just looking at that picture makes my eyes water up in remembrance. I won't be using the bleach again. I think I learned my lesson.

Here's the man cave after the carpet cleaning.

There is still some slight stainage in the back corner there. It's actually burn marks which we can't get rid of :(

I also OCD cleaned the stairwell with every attachment our Nano vacuum (which I bought purely for the aqua color) has on it. Much much better. It'll be even better after we tackle it with the steamer... although I will NOT be using bleach.

Look how clean the toilets and new seats are now! (I added Clorox tabs to the tank to eradicate that .01% of moldy floaters that might still be around). There really is a LOT of bleach going on in this house.

Then Rob went a bit OCD on the joint compound filling in holes and cracks. 

Practically every wall looks like that now. Good thing we're planning on using ONE paint or we'd have major flashbacking on the walls. 

And finally, neighborhood watch cat is watching YOU!

Down and Dirty

I'm in a sharing mood. 

Yes, that's black, solid mold floating on the toilet tank water. The toilet bowl was a lot worse before it's 2 week soak in Tilex.

This is more mentally gross. This is a Lysol sanitizing wipe AFTER I rubbed down all the inside door handles in the house. Yes this is ONLY interior door handle dirt. 

Cleaning is just SO fun. ;)

(FYI: These are pictures taken mid deep clean of the "new" house).

Paint Prep Cheapies

Well I was going to talk about my wreath today because it was going to be gorgeous and I would be crowned the Craft Queen.

Google images strikes again!

Buttt, that didn't happen. Rob said my wreath looked stupid, and it did (don't worry, he said it nicely). My ribbon was wonky because it had no wire in it so it kept flopping all over the place. The pumpkins were baaad as well. Rob said my pumpkins were 3D and my burlap was 2D so it looked dumb (ie: the pumpkins stuck out too far). Fair enough. I got new ribbon and I'm going to have my Nana help tie it so it doesn't look stupid again. I also bought some moss so that should help the 2D/3D problem. I almost typed R2D2 there instead, whoops. Anyways, huge FAIL.


So in lieu of the wreath, lets talk about three cheap paint prepping tips I've picked up along the various furniture painting stuff I've done. Hopefully these are earth shattering-ly original. Or not.

1.) I hate tack cloths. They leave my fingers all sticky and I have to go wash my hands after using them. So I found another, cheaper, way of getting rid of dust and sawdust from surfaces.

Enter the Viva brand of paper towels. If you've ever used them you know they feel very different from normal paper towels... more cotton-y. They're also lint free and have the same texture as those Swifter dusters. Just swipe them on the surface and they hoover up the dust just like a tack cloth, only much better for my hands.

One other pro? Why pay $2.50 for a pack of three when you can pay $1.50 for a whole roll of Viva paper towels? 

Ta Da! Like magic.

2.) Those plastic putty knives are a racket. You don't need them. Just use your finger!

Hi I cost $2. 

Hi I'm free!

Spackle and wood filler are both water soluble so just scrub your finger afterwards. I didn't grow a sixth finger so it's obviously just fine. I know saving $2 isn't much, but I'm currently jobless. So every penny counts. Plus I hate feeling like a chump. 

3.) Changing hardware on dressers usually leaves an ugly impression of where the old knob used to be. Like this:

Via

It's a weird pet peeve to have, but that really bugs me. 

For my dresser, I just smooshed wood filler all over the old hole and impression marks (with my finger of course)...

And then poked the old screw back in to avoid filling in the hole. 

Now it's good for sanding and painting, the old impression is gone, and you can still put your new hardware in. Yay!

Now that I've blown your mind (sarcasm) anyone else picked up some odd tricks to cut costs when prepping furniture for paint? Anyone else so devoid of craft blood in them that their men had to save them from embarrassment? :( At least I can paint furniture dangit. 

Bit of a Ramble

I took the GRE this weekend. I studied... a bit. Okay hardly. I mainly just worried. I think I definitely passed it with a high enough score for grad school though (they give you a range of numbers your scores fell in and they seemed about right). Anyway, sorry for leaving you hanging. I've been SO drained since then.

I've got a million things on my brain right now, so this post is an amalgamation (ooh GRE study word, fancy) of the random stuff floating around me right now. Enjoy a glimpse into my brain.

I googled "my brain" and this was the "I'm feeling lucky" image it gave me. It seemed apt. 

Just to warn you though, all of these pictures are taken with my phone. Sorry for the quality. 

I went to our Restore last week and saw 2 campaign night tables for $10 each. They're like little dressers, like the Ikea Rasts. I didn't get them though and I kind of regret that now. I'm still not sure if they'd look good with our bed though. 

The brass corner bits are mostly painted over. 

I'm debating buying these sheets from walmart (the ones the right). It sounds cheap but I've heard they wash up nice and are very soft?? Rob shreds our sheets after a few months anyways so I don't want to spend a lot.

I picked up some hardware for the dresser at Michael's of all places. They had drawer knobs in the $1 bins!! I had to go to both Michael's to get all 6 that I needed since they were picked over but I love them! $1 is a lot cheaper than Hobby Lobby knobs would be. 

And of course the holes were too small so I had to fix that this weekend too. 

My Urban Outfitter order came in. I'm really enjoying having my jewelry on display now!

My Nan bought us two sets of these beaded white plates (from Walmart).

They're a good knock off of the Pottery Barn Emma line of dinnerware. 

Not to be outdone, my mom bought me these piggy tongs. Ha. I might have a small collection of animal themed kitchen stuff. Like a pirana pizza cutter, octopus dish scrubber, woodpecker scissors, monkey clips, etc.

I got little pumpkins for my wreath idea for $1.50 per bag from Michael's. I had a bit of a fail with the wreath making this weekend. :(

I got this ribbon for the wreath, stupidly forgetting that since it has no wire it will be impossible to tie bows with. :( It's so cute too. 

I got a case for my new phone from ebay for $7 plus a car charger :)

I like this fabric from Hobby Lobby. I don't normally like their stuff. I have no clue what I'd do with it but it's so cheap! Maybe guest room?

And finally, I am full of excitement. We have a closing date and it is real!!! I'm not going to say when it is, for fear everything will go bottoms up but I am too excited to keep totally quiet!! :)