Gypsy Forest

The Girls Room!

Well, it's been done for over a week, but it just takes time to get pictures taken....

I'm like that, I've noticed.

For example the chairs and gaucho linen pants I posted about as "WIP's months ago, are finished (look Miss Seven is wearing hers in this caterpillar photo) .... I just haven't taken photos to share..... once it's done and passed to the kid, it's in a flurry of usage and I only remember I wanted to share it with you all as I toss into the washing machine...... hmmm....

So, better late than never.... here are some photos of the girls room. All that's left to remodel inside is two bathrooms and some little things in the kitchen. No sweat right? Yeah, I know all of you that have remodeled a bathroom are snickering under your breath right now.... shhh! I am not listening....

So..... the girls chose this awesome vintagey blue.... I love it. LOVE it. Joe took the closet doors down and built a work area for them, which is also fabulous.... see the little yellow chair in there? In the next few weeks we'll be setting up a sewing station for them with my old machine......

  

   

   

   

  

So what's what? I love seeing room redo's and finding out what people used.... the beds, as some of you may have guessed are from IKEA. They extend.... which is great because a 7 year old doesn't need a full size bed and we can shrink it down to give them more play space. The tree art is a vintage embroidery from my friend. The dressers are both old. The dark one we recently found for $100 at an antique shop. It's got beautiful engraving on the top drawers and all tongue & groove joints in the drawers. Solid little piece. The tan dresser was in Joe's house when he was little.... we rescued it from the shed of his parents about 12 years ago. It had survived a house fire and Joe spent hours cleaning it up! My mom laminated some nature posters for the girls and the vinyl wall stickers I won in a blog giveaway forever ago. Lastly, and most important, is the quilt on Miss Seven's bed. It was given to us last summer by my Aunt Lori, an amazing quilter.... and when you have a small twin bed, like Miss Seven, a lap quilt is just the right size. She put that quilt on her bed a few months ago, declared it was hers, and that is where it's been since!

{Thank you Aunt Lori :)}

Wishing you all a wonderful weekend!

   

More Remodeling... The Boys Room.

 

  

   
 

I know I mentioned the beginning of this room forever ago! And it's been mostly done for awhile, but Joe finished up the last of it.... the stuff that makes me very thankful for his years as an electrician. Replacing all the light switches and receptacles in each room and swapping out the fan (all the bedrooms got new fans like the one in ours). I really love the space he created in the closet. Taking the closet doors off really opened up the room.... and the boys now have some great storage and a small desk to use. We just need to get the boys artwork hung up. It's our weekend goal. The girls room is waiting for a similar closet makeover and then it will be done too! Wait until you see the color those girls of mine picked out.

It might seem sort of funny, and certainly a little "attached".... but when you move a lot, you sort of rely on a few special decorations that make it home. We have a few pieces of "artwork" we've collected at art shops and thrift shops as we've moved..... the kids may have lived in a dozen houses at this point (okay only 7 or so) but the same stuff follows them. That bear on the floor in the boys room was a gift from their Uncle and reminds them of Alaska... where they consider home to be. We've got fish prints and Alaskan art and rugs from Joe's time in the Middle East.... Joe's Grandfather's old krill... an old ship clock from my Uncle... an old wooden airplane propeller that my dad picked up at a yard sale as a kid... and many beat up tables, chairs and trunks bought at junk shops. Things we've tucked away along this journey. I guess now that my big kids are, well, big... I see their need to set up house. Much like mine & Joe's. To make the house a home. And not just with any stuff mind you, but good old stuff that invokes a whole lot of memories and story telling.

Truly I intended this to be just a remodel post, but I guess I got a little sentimental about the value of creating a family home as I typed :) Thanks for reading!

   

Remodeling (yeah!!)

So, getting settled back in is always a challenge for me. It seems to take me a solid week to unpack and in the process we somehow manage to dismantle the house..... so then I pull the house back together..... and because my sweet dear man of a husband usually does some renovating while we're away.... I had a room to unpack too...... 

Everything had been emptied out of our room.... including the very old carpet on the floor (woot!). I wonder if you can sense the excitement in my little typed letters on this screen? The taupe carpet and walls were replaced with a glorious deep soft orange and lovely new bamboo floors..... the whole room feels so clean... I absolutely love it. Joe also painted our closet and hung up new shelving and hanging rods. Which is especially lovely because the last ones were homemade, and while I mean no disrespect to the maker of these.... you couldn't fit a hanger on the hanging bar. You had to sort of tilt the hanger sideways to get in on there.  He replaced the rickety off balance (and hideous) old fan. And while I do wish I had a photo of the room before.... I do not. So you'll just have to trust that it was drab and dull and in major need of new flooring.... I do however have a photo of my fabric stash "before" storage. Clip together wire shelving which I would cover with an old curtain to keep out the dust...... 

  

Above, you can see the many shades of taupe in the before room..... 

perhaps that interfered with any good reasoning I may possess in selecting paint colors.... 

hence the orange.... 

do see....

  

  

    

   

   

     

Isn't it lovely? That Joey is a keeper, he really is :) All that is left to do is hang up some items from that cardboard box you see in the corner, our artwork. We haven't even unpacked it since the move last summer. And you even got a peek at our very much not updated master bathroom....      

I spent the days of last week purging and reorganizing fabric and craft supplies, mostly a very enjoyable project. For me and for the receivers of the giveaway pile! All of us fiber lovers love to pet the yarn and fabric in our lives.... and somehow I do think it multiplies when we aren't looking. The bits of color are so pretty against the orange and though I truly used to grumble about having my "studio" space stuffed into our room.... I am now quite happy with the set up. I mean really, what crafter wouldn't want to fall asleep looking at that shelf. I see a lot of happy creative dreaming in my future :)

~more house updates tomorrow, that Joe was a busy guy while we were away!

WIP - The Remodeling Continues.....

Work in Progress. I think this is a good day to post craft stuff AND house stuff!

Ahhhh  yes.... remodeling. Remember that thing??

Next on the remodel list was the boy's room. No reason in particular.... it just happens to be the first room as you head down the hall..... and truthfully it did need a little help.

The pink room. Pink carpet. Pink walls. Pink balloon wallpaper border. Funny thing is the girls got the blue room! 

Oh, those poor boys.

Well, not that the little one minded so much..... but when you're 13 a pink balloon room is not so great... the Eldest was certainly quite happy ripping out the carpet..... and tearing the border down....

Joe had some drywall repairs and away went the intercom. A nice new wood door was put in and the walls were painted green. The flooring is nearly installed.... just the closet has to be finished. That will get done this weekend and then the remodeling of the closet.... we're thinking a bookshelf down the middle, a desk on one side and two clothes hanging rods on the other side. Also a nice new fan that actually works.... so many more little things to do..... but it's coming along very nicely.

And right now all four kids are all bunking in the girl's room..... I'd share a picture of all the beds.... but with that comes a whole lot of mess! It's a big room.... I keep asking if they could all stay in there and let me have the pretty little green room as my sewing studio.... so far it's a no go.... but they might have a change of heart!

And now on to some fun remodel photos........

  

  

  

  

   

   

     

I will *hopefully* be posting finished pictures by the end of the month.

Hope your day is a good one~      

     

a mini makeover

Sometimes, there's just too much yellow.

I know you've all seen the picture of our screaming yellow bathroom. White and gold vanity. Peeling linoleum. Oh yes, and don't forget the fabulous neon fish wallpaper border..........

Really, this picture does not do the colors any justice...... they were SO bright!

With the rest of the house looking better and better.... I had to give that bathroom a mini makeover. So for about $20 I did.

First the eldest scraped off all of the icky linoleum squares. Then I scrubbed the terrazzo with an sos pad and oxi clean....... then I patched about a hundred holes in the wall, redid some caulking, painted the ceiling, trim, walls and vanity. I spray painted the light fixture, towel rack and vanity handles an aged bronze color. And best of all, I made a shower curtain and mini curtains for the vanity. My only bad idea was attempting to replace one of those ceiling tiles. Don't ever do that unless you want to replace the whole ceiling!! Yikes! But after ending up with insulation in my hair, eyes, shirt, everywhere...... I did get the tile mostly back in...... and with a little paint you can hardly tell...... (really honey I promise!)

And if you need motivation.... just save the sewing project for the end, because that's the best part! 

So here it is, my mini makeover. A bathroom I can live with until we have the time and money to really make it over..... no more yellow..... no more peeling off tiles...... no more gold and white. And best of all no more neon fish! (sorry fishies!)

The paint color was a mix of the blue from the living room and white trim paint. It's a light smoky blue. The vanity was painted with leftovers from the doors in the den. And the vanity and shower curtains were made from a vintage pillowcase and flat sheet. I didn't want to look at the shower curtain rod, so I made the shower curtain with hidden tabs on the backside to hang it up... and since you can't see them, and I didn't want to press and sew a bunch of tabs..... I cut them with pinking shears and sewed them on..... I'm a cheater, I know. I measured to make sure there were tabs at the beginning, end and in between all the hangars so it would pull open easily. And that's a clear vinyl shower curtain for the inside.

It's surprisingly hard to photograph a little bathroom with no natural light...... but hey, I tried :) 

**And if you noticed the toilet with no tank cover, it's still on backorder from this event.

** And another funny thing, the sideways toilet paper holder........ this keeps my wild man from unrolling the WHOLE roll....... yes he's a funny one!

house update......

Sorry for the lack of posts this last week.... but as I mentioned, I am flying solo..... and many moments I have felt like a chicken with it's head cut off..... so sorry for the gruesome analogy..... but I do feel like I've lost my mind... brain.... head.... whatever.

Please, if you locate it, can you send it back to me?

While we were away visiting my parents my sweet husband got so much done in the house, which I have been meaning to share here. So, while he is away I have this grand plan to also get a lot done..... while caring for 4 children..... and homeschooling..... and doing all the house chores..... see, that's where I am getting this head-less feeling......

Before I go on about what I'm doing, I'd like to show you what we came home to!

Before photo of the kitchen:: 

• 1970's broken ice maker & dishwasher
• 1980's linoleum, complete with holes & cracks
• 1970's wallpaper

 (this picture was taken before we bought the house)

And so while we were out, Joe tore out all the old linoleum... removed the icky broken ice maker, put in a new dishwasher and laid down this beautiful tile.......

 after

And as if that wasn't enough, he also removed carpet, finished the flooring in the hallway and living room, painted the living room, removed the bifold doors and hung up new blinds.

Before::

 (this is also a photo of before we bought the house, not our stuff in here)

After::

So, not be outdone I have given myself a massive task list to complete during his absence. And I am not so happy to report that I have checked off one thing from the list.

REMOVE WALLPAPER FROM KITCHEN

Did you notice how Joe's after pictures looked better?!?! I mean that is the general idea of home improvement, right? Well, the joy of removing wallpaper, aside from being covered in glorious icky sticky messiness, is that when you're done, you can't be sure that you actually made an improvement. And even better yet, you still get to sand, prime and paint those walls before it does look better!!

This weekend I am taking a break from the kitchen to do a minor temporary update on our lovely neon yellow bathroom. 

(this photo previously blogged here)

Wish me luck!!

A house Update

F-i-n-a-l-l-y . . . . . . . . .

We have officially finished one room!

Well, aside from putting in a new ceiling fan and replacing the door to the laundry room and touching up the paint where we attached the moulding....... but those things will come later. Right now we are happy to have one room that is beautifully peaceful to be in. New flooring, new paint, 2 new outside doors, new light switches, electrical outlets and new moulding.

PHEW!!

A whole lot of hard work and I must admit mostly done by Joe. A lot of this stuff is mostly a one person job...... so I stood back and made the food and cleaned up sawdust and kept the littles occupied :) You've know idea how intriguing these tools in the house are to the wee one. Table saws and drills and hammers. He loves them all.

But now, now the den is complete. A cozy spot for the family to relax. We (aka the evil parents) have declared this space a toy free zone! Sounds awful, I know, but since the living room will house the instruments and all their games and crafting supplies, we decided we wanted this space for us...... but they are of course welcome to be in the grown up room. It's just a read a book and sit and laugh and relax type of room. After a month of working on it, we certainly enjoy sitting on the couch with a glass of wine and finally listening to music! We've had the stereo system safely stored away from the whirling clouds of sawdust..... can you imagine all this work done with no music!?! We are a family with no television, so being without music is a sort of cruel torture to us!

But, on with the photos. Firstly, two before photos of the den........

and now, the after photos::

Jasper and my favorite thrifted table :)

we can't wait to cook some s'mores in here this fall....

Sid

The Den

and again........

Sid & Jasper think the windows and rugs were put in just for them!

Thanks for stopping by! Happy Monday to you.

a little progress

First, thank you all so much for your kind words in reply to my last post!! 

My funk reminded me of my favorite mantra "You are where you need to be"...... a tough one to remember at times.....  but a darn good one :)

So with that, here are some snapshots of the weekend progress.

kneepads are a must!

2 new doors, fresh paint and the floor mostly done.....

the tools

after a long day...... doesn't merlot go nicely with bamboo?

playing for the wee one in the tub 

(in our very yellow bathroom, the tub&tile are also yellow!)

this morning - kitty loves the view from the new doors......

So there you have the progress! 

Not quite as much as we had hoped...... but that's okay. We took a much needed break and hung out all Sunday afternoon at a friend's pool. The kids had fun and we relaxed..... I think we were beginning to forget how to do that!

I learned how to use the saw..... and we made a good team cutting pieces.... measuring and pounding these boards in. I really thought these would go together like big legos....... and they do..... but it's more like big ill fitted legos. At least, I don't recall using a hammer to put my legos together as a kid...... We sorted the boards into three piles. Blonde, honey & unique. This way we would make sure we didn't get big areas of the same color. We used the piles to place the boards and we LOVE the natural variegated look. Plus we got to put the unique ones in spots we knew we'd see them. Once we got half the room done, we both stood back, admired it and agreed it would all be worth it...... the time.... the mess...... the work and the tools living in the house.

The once dark den is so much brighter with the light coming in the new doors and the bamboo and the sunny paint.... and we're excited to see it all come together. 

Wether it's this weekend or two weeks from now.