Choosing a Dining room color...and being left alone with bacon.

Praise the Lord, drywall is done!!

 

*raises hands to the sky, looks up, closes eyes, smiles like a fool, does a wee jig, then proceeds on*

 

On top of that elating news, my husband said that our trim guy, Mike, was already out at the house and was getting ready to hang doors! I love, love, love it when people just show up at our house, first thing in the morning, tools on hand and ready to start working, without having to be called 732 times to ask where the bleep they are at?!

 

It maketh me very happy...

 

..happy to the point of Shakespearian vocabulary.

 

Another occurrence that makes me very happy? My wonderfully helpful mother offered to fly back to this wintery hell from her Utopian location atop a hill in sunny California, in order to help us prime and paint the whole Farmhouse and she's out there right now as well, just workin' away!

Another upside to today?
 

It smells like sweet vanilla cupcakes and bacon in the bakery right now...

 

Pure bliss.

 

Anyways, with my mother out priming away, the deadline for picking out all the colors for the interior walls of the entire Farmhouse is quickly nearing, and in case you have realized yet, I'm not the best at making quick decisions.  I mean, it took me 5 months to pick the perfect shade of white for the exterior of the house. You can read about that debacle here.

 

So, past paint blunders aside, I now have a lot of paint colors to decide on. I know I could just go the easy route and pick one lovely shade of light taupe for the whole house and call it a day, but I just don't operate that way. I love taupe. In fact I'm sure my family room and some hallways, entryway etc. will most likely be a nice classy neutral shade of it, but I loves me some color too. I was lucky enough to decide quickly on the girls bedroom colors and was mentally stable enough at the time to make the final decision and pull the trigger on purchasing those gallons, but there are 5 other rooms right now that I just can't decide on.

1. Master Bedroom
2. Master Bathroom
3. Girls bathroom upstairs
4.Kitchen
5.Dining room

After thinking of ways to make the decision making easier, I'm decided I needed help and that I would have to break these down into a few separate posts, complete with my inspiration pictures that I have been flipping back and forth between. Today I've decided to start with #5, so let's get to decision making!

Excuse me while I find my clear-minded Zen place, steal a piece of bacon that was designated for scones tomorrow, and settle back in....

...ok now I'm ready.

The Farmhouse Dining Room

So, to help us out with the dining room wall color, there are currently two aiding factors in place.  One is that we will have very tall (6 feet tall, ceilings are 9 feet), craftsman style, white wainscoting in that room, so all the photos I will include have wainscoting to help us visualize.  The second factor is that I had recently reupholstered 6 dining rooms chairs that I had found on Craigslist.
 You may remember them?

They look a little brighter than they really are, but as you can see they are full of colors, so I figured choosing one of these lovely colors for the walls would be a helpful start. I already know I don't want the orange or the dark greenish/brown color, so those are out.  So that leaves, deep red, golden yellow, cool neutral, medium blue/green, or a green that's best described as a "bright sage". 

So here we go.
(all pictures from www.houzz.com)


1. Red

 

Very Classy, very warm, very Farmhousey.

 

2. Golden Yellow

 

 

 Traditional Dining Room by Portland Interior Designers & Decorators Garrison Hullinger Interior Design Inc.

It's bright, it's warm, it's happy.

Or this one, a hair lighter.

Beach Style Dining Room by Santa Ana Interior Designers & Decorators Darci Goodman Design

3. Classy cool neutral

 Traditional Dining Room by Morristown Architects & Designers Arturo Palombo Architecture

Beautiful. Exudes class and is very inviting and cozy.

4. Medium Blue/Green

                         Farmhouse Dining Room by Charleston Architects & Designers The Middleton Group

This one is a little on the "cool" side, and could stand to be a hair more on the green side, but it's close to the cushion color. I would pick a version of this color was also just slightly darker and richer.

 

5. Bright Sage

 

 Farmhouse Dining Room by Millbrook Architects & Designers Crisp Architects

Very classy, bright but not "in your face!" and it's crisp.

So? Any opinions? I'm struggling to choose and I really need to make up my mind. The kitchen is connected to the dining room and the kitchen will be mostly white beadboard but there will be some painted wall space, so any color I pick for the dining room will need to go nicely with the kitchen as well. 

Hmmmmm.... what to choose, what to choose....

...............

Maybe one more piece of bacon will help me decide....

...or two...

....alright fine, I already ate 6 pieces while I was typing this all out.

...ok 7.


:) Ashley

 

Craftsman Fireplace Surround Project... and forgetting the corkscrew...

Happy Snowy Day to you!

Anyone else ready for Spring?

 

As I mentioned last night in my "Hardwood Faux pas" post, on Saturday night my husband and I decided to forgo the traditional anniversary date night of lookin' swanky and smellin' nice, in order to get caught up on some Farmhouse related projects.

 

The project of choice?  

 

Our Craftsman Style Fireplace Surround!

 

We had decided early on that we were going for a lovely, Craftsman Style fireplace surround to match the rest of the Craftsman feel throughout the house. We were also pretty sure that we were going to build our own, mainly to save a ton of cash, and also, because of the pride that comes along with building your own stuff...and bragging rights to all your friends.

 So after hours of looking through picture after picture on www.Houzz.com, I stumbled upon the PERFECT fireplace, and I knew that this was the one we were going to try to match.

 

 

We loved the clean craftsman style trim and the dark slab mantel., so we got to work!

 

First and foremost, it was still our anniversary after all, so we started out by setting the mood...

 

 

A little pizza and wine makes any construction project a little more classy.

 

**Not Pictured: The 10 buffalo wings we utterly annihilated in the car on the way out to the Farmhouse...I was a saucy mess, and I didn't care***

 

The first and only snag of the night? We forgot the corkscrew. Luckily we know the "bottle in shoe against the wall" method. 

 

Wine Survivalist right here.

 

 

It wasn't just us out at the house that night. We had some dinner guests...

 

 

Look how cute I am. Feed me your pizza. All of it. I'm starving. I love you. Feed me.

 

 

So we stuffed our gobbs, wiped our faces and hands so we didn't leave greasy fingerprints all over our woodwork, and we got crackin'.

 

Step 1:

Measure thrice, cut once...

 

 

(a view from our family room out the front doors. Best Craigslist find ever!)

 

Step 2:

Build the boxes

 

Because of some light switches between the fireplace and the door going out to the porch, we only had about a 16 inch width to work with. Per codes, the non-combustible material surrounding the firebox opening (ie, tile, stone etc) has to be at least 8 inchs wide, so that left us with another 8 inches to work with for the wood trim surround.  We built 8 inch wide and 6 inch deep boxes up the sides and then a box to fit along the top that was slightly taller to accommodate a little extra trim that would go along the top, but directly under the mantel top, once we get that... like this...

 

 

Pretty exciting, I know.

 

 

Side Note: I love when people find cool stuff inside the walls of their 100 year old homes, so I figured I'd add a little secret something of our own...

 

I hope whoever discovers this one day isn't disappointed that I didn't leave them a bundle of cash...

 

So how did we attach this frame to the wall? Well I'll tell you.

 

Step 3:

Attach anchor boards to the wall

 

In order to attach this boxed frame to the wall, we attached two 2x6's to the wall for the edges and one 2x8 for the top, taller box to attach to... like this...

 

I know, I know.. it looked simply stunning just like this, but we figured we better keep going.

 

It was a very tight fit getting the frame to slide over the boards that we attached to the wall, and for a second I was worried that it just wasn't going to give, but finally, with a little persuading and a few harsh words, the frame slipped on over the boards. We threw in no less that 700 nails to secure it...

 

...and we were on to the next step.

 

Step 4:

Attach the trim!

 

We bought 1x2's to attach to the edges and across the top for that lovely craftsman detail like the inspiration picture above. We went up the outer and inner edges first, then across the bottom and top of the top box, then we cut the little pieces to fit between for that little extra added detail...

 

My new favorite tool...although pulling that little trigger a few hundred times apparently utilizes a special forearm muscle that I am not accustomed to using, and I now, 3 days later, feel as if I have a severe case of Arthritis tunnel.   

 

Yes, it's a thing.

 

Almost done!

 

The damn dirty thieves helpers at this point were exhausted from all the pizza they stole and were officially down for the count...

 

 

 

And here's it is with the last of the little trim pieces...

 

 

Success! Aside from the mantel top which we still have to cut, all the woodwork is complete, and all in 3 hours!

 

I still haven't decided on the tile inside the trim, but I do know the mantel will be a 3 inch thick, rough sawn, dark stained oak, and the wood trim will be Dover White by Sherwin Williams to match the rest of the house trim.

 

We are very happy with our handy work and are now completely confident in our abilities to add wainscoting to the entryway and dining room walls, but that's a post for a later date.

 

I'm now off to lather my arm in Icy Hot and then soak it in a warm salt bath, much like Tyson after a big fight....

 

...yes, my arm is just as valuable and impressive as Mike Tysons....

 

Shush.

 

:) Ashley

 

 

 

 

Hardwood flooring Faux pas....

So it has been a busy couple weeks around the Farmhouse.  We've been dealing with drywall delays, returning of tub faucets, a nasty cough circulating through our house, and my husband and I had our 5 year anniversary!  In 5 years, we have added two baby girls, 2 businesses, almost completed the Farmhouse of our dreams, and have successfully managed to double the mice population of Saunders County inside the walls of our current home.

 

Not too shabby if you ask me.

 

Anyways, instead of the usual anniversary date night consisting of rummaging through my closet in hopes of finding a cute outfit that isn't covered in paint splatters or bakery stains, and also is not one of the many old maternity shirts that still grace the dark corners of my closet, all to go overeat at some overpriced restaurant, we opted for a more productive, construction related venture....

 

Building our fireplace surround!

My husband's mom offered to take the girls overnight so we could enjoy ourselves, and we were off to get our build on!

But more on the fireplace surround tutorial tomorrow...

 

Originally, we had decided we were going to start laying our hardwood floors upstairs, but unfortunately, the drywallers are still not done (shocking), and their many random gadgets, buckets, and ladders still occupy every corner of our home.  They said we could start anyways, and to just lay down cardboard over our finished areas, but that just seemed like too much work to me, and for once, I felt like that would be getting ahead of ourselves. That inconvenience aside, did I mention that we have had our hardwood flooring stored in the basement for months now, but never opened a box until 3 days ago to take a peak? 

 

Yes it's true.

And guess what? The floors I spent weeks and weeks and weeks researching and picking out, are too dark.

 

And I'm talking DARK.

 

Nearly black, kind of dark....

 

Midnight in a cave full of black bats, kind of dark...

 

Marianas Trench kind of dark...

 

 Stephen Hawking would write a thesis about it, kind of dark...

 

(ok that last one is a stretch, but you get the point)

 

Let's just say, the sample in the store must have been slightly faded from the sun or something, because I NEVER would have ordered floors this dark.  All I could see when my husband sent me this text picture was my Swiffer Sweeper budget going through the roof.

 

See?

 

 

 Plus, they are shiny... also not my taste.

 

So after my initial panicked stricken reaction to the dark and shiny floor reveal wore off, I calmly turned to my husband and said...

 

"How mad would you be if I tried to find a lighter floor and we returned these?"

 

Keep in mind, he about flipped his lid when I exchanged a bathroom light fixture at Lowes for a different style.

 

I half expected him to off me right then and there... but I think asking him on our stress-free, kid-free anniversary date saved me.  His reaction?

 

"Babe, that's a whole lot of flooring... and those boxes are heavy, and there's about 40 of them, and we are ready to start installing flooring in about a week."

 

Then I said (batting eyelashes and looking all sweet and cute-ish),

 

"I know...but I don't like them. They are just too dark and I don't want to regret installing them because we were too lazy to put forth the effort to load them back up and return them.  I'll load them all if I have too..."

 

He said,

 

"Ha, yeah right. You'll break your back. You owe me!"

Me (shocked that he agreed),
 

"I can live with that!"

 

So the urgent hunt began and needless to say, after much looking, internet researching and hassling the Lumber liquidators salesman, we finally found the hardwood we really loved that is a nice warm medium tone, with just enough hand scraping and rustic appeal while still being classy and lovely.

 

I give you, Astoria Birch.

 

 

Much better. Much MUCH better.

 

Lovely wide planks of varying lengths that aren't too warm, aren't too cool, with perfectly placed scratches and scuffs, and that definitely say "Farmhouse".

 

It wasn't so easy though. After one salesman at Lumber Liquidators told me that I was out of luck, and that all of the Astoria Birch in the whole United States was taken, I was feeling defeated and that I may in fact be stuck with the oil spill flooring.  The next day, because I am a huge pain in the keister for whatever reason, I decided to call back and ask if they could double check ONE MORE TIME, and low and behold, he managed to find out that their store in Oklahoma City will be getting a large shipment of this floor the first week of March!

 

Triumph!

 

In hindsight, this miracle may have happened because I threatened to return all of the flooring we had already purchased, and it's amazing what kind of miracles can happen when a company risks losing a sale...

 

We aren't super thrilled about the delay in flooring installation, but we will take what we can get, and in all honesty, the drywall may not be done by then anyways, so what's the rush?

 

Fireplace Surround Pictorial tomorrow!

 

 

:)Ashley