Making a House a Home

It has been SO much fun making our house into a home. The time and money I would previously spend on clothes or things I wanted for myself now go towards decorating our house. I would much rather get a Hobby Lobby gift card than almost any other gift (unless it's a trip). My birthday's in July, by the way, if you're planning ahead.

Anyways, we moved into our sweet little home in September of 2013. It is our first home, and though we don't necessarily think we will live here forever, we do really love it and we could stay here forever if we needed or wanted to. It's in a great location, and has 4 bedrooms and 2 and a half baths, so there is plenty of room to grow (though no plans for that right now!). We also have a great outdoor space that we love. Last year brought on lots of fun changes involving a new roof courtesy of a hail storm, a concrete slab, a fence, deck staining, patio furniture, and squirrels in the attic. More on that another time.

One of the things I have enjoyed most about our home is that we didn't have to do a single thing before we moved in. Seriously. I loved the paint in nearly all the rooms, the carpets were nice, the flooring was good, and the previous owners had obviously cared about keeping the place up. Knowing that we didn't have to do anything before moving in was great, since we moved in right at the beginning of the school year. Not feeling forced to fix anything up before we moved in has allowed for the flexibility of taking our time and slowly changing what we want to over the last year and a half or so.

*Please note, the before pictures are the ones featured on Zillow from the previous owners. We didn't have any furniture in those rooms when we moved in, nor do we own children's beds or anything shown in the before photos.

ROOM FOCUS ONE: THE GUEST ROOM

This room was super cute for a little boy's room, but I wasn't really feeling the whole striped room thing for our lovely guests. We threw my old full bed (thanks Mom and Dad!) in this room with a navy blue comforter on it just to get by and have something for people to sleep on if they came to stay the night. This was my Thanksgiving Break project.

BEFORE:

Cute for a kid, but needing some updates.

AFTER:

We found the windows for 8 bucks each at First Fridays down in the Crossroads district. I repainted the bookshelf that we had white, put up old red curtains that I already had in my room, and switched over our old comforter and throw pillows. We picked up a set of lamps at Nebraska Furniture Mart (one here and one downstairs), snagged the side table for $40, and used a coupon on a fresh paint color called Hops. 

Total Cost: Under $100

ROOM FOCUS TWO: THE BASEMENT

Let's be honest, this is the place where our TV and comfiest couch are both located, so naturally we spend the majority of our time in this room. Spending countless number of hours in this room really made me think about what I wanted to change. I already LOVED the color of the walls, but wasn't too crazy about the red above the mantle. I knew I wanted a pale neutrals look down here.

BEFORE:

Cute and cabiny, but we needed to our our own spin on the room. 

(Plus it had no furniture in it when we moved in.)

AFTER:

This was definitely a process. Our coffee table is made out of an old door. It was teal and orange originally, and behind our cake table at our wedding. Aaron made it into a table, and I finally painted it white. Aaron also made the side table that the lamp is on, so I painted that too!  Our throw pillows were super cheap and I loved the pattern colors on the white ones- a pair I found at Marshall's. The light brown pillow covers I found at IKEA, and I threw them over some old pillows. Four pillows for under $30 is pretty good! The vintage Coke crate on the table was an $8 First Friday's find, and the fake plant was IKEA for $5.

Our couch was the one room splurge, a sectional from Nebraska Furniture Mart that offers the best naps! The curtains were Aaron's Grandma's, and we picked up the clock (that I love) on sale from Hobby Lobby.

I used the leftover paint from the guest bedroom to paint the area behind the mantle white and tie it more to the rest of the room.  We picked up most of the things on the mantle at Hobby Lobby, along with a few artsy wedding photos.

The newest addition to the room is the framed picture of Kansas City, which was one of Aaron's Christmas gifts for me! This room has been oh so fun to decorate.

ROOM FOCUS THREE: THE "BABY" ROOM

This was the first room that I knew had to change. Though it was precious for their little baby, I wasn't digging the neon green and I also could see leaf decal impressions from previous decor. We had nothing in this room as far as furniture (and still really don't), so it was easy to paint.

BEFORE:

Sweet for a baby room, but I wasn't feeling the neon.

 And when we moved in you only saw the walls so it was a bit shocking.

AFTER: 

Again, we haven't done much. We painted the walls a pale gray/blue, and I picked up a few gray and white items including cheap chevron pillows from (gasp) Wal-Mart. My Grandpa's old rocking chair is in the room, but I need to fix the seat or find a way to re-cover it. If we live in our house long enough to have a baby, this will be the nursery area.

ROOM FOCUS: To Be Continued....

The next projects I'm tackling are small, cheap upgrades to our kitchen and bedroom. I'm also trying to make our front living room look like a room we actually care about. More to come on that later.

Currently,

Kelsie