Master Shower is quite the Looker!

Well, after 2 days of a professional working on our master shower it is obvious why people pay others to do it....it's already done and it's perfect. I tiled the guest bathroom, and as much as I'm proud of it...you can tell that I tiled it :) This one is oh so pretty and it's inspired us to get going on the floor (which we are tiling). We still have to texture the walls, tile the floor, buy a sink faucet, install vanity and faucet, and replace the light fixture...lighting in there is horrid.

Here's the floor of the shower.

Our tight little master shower.

And a pretty shot of the accent tile up close.
Can't believe that it looked like this last week.

Here are two shots of our dining area chandelier looking a bit more moody.

Love the shadows it casts on the ceiling.

Shower Power and My Love Affair With a Chandelier

Our tile friend came by last night to let us know that there was a cancellation, and hence, an opening in his BUSY schedule for TOMORROW! {Which is now today} and wondered if we wanted him to do the shower tomorrow...um, wow. Normal people might say that we hadn't even LOOKED at master bathroom tile, as in ever. Normal, right minded people would thank him for thinking of us and tell him we weren't ready, we didn't even have the tile. Normal people might have laughed it off...Well, apparently we aren't normal people. We said yes and right now he is tiling our master bathroom shower!

This meant that we made an appearance at Lowe's at the butt crack of the morning to look, discuss, pick out and {gulp} purchase tile. So this is what was in our budget AND tickled our fancy. The top photo is of the 2x2 tile that will be on the floor in the shower. The photo below is the large tile that will be on the walls.

And here are two photos of the accent tile, one with and one without the flash to showcase both the stone and the glass that will be featured as our accent tiles a bit over midway up the shower walls.

With flash to showcase the color of the glass pieces.

And while we were at it, you know being methodical and rational... we headed over to the bathroom vanity area and picked up this pretty young thing. I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE it! We will each get 2 drawers, a small and a large and since there is no linen closet in {darn, I forgot my towel...running naked quickly and discreetly} close proximity it will allow us to store towels below on the shelving area along with a short waste bin since it's large and in charge and just fit in our tiny master bathroom.

We still have to purchase, and install ourselves, the master bathroom floor tile, a faucet and new light fixture...but other than that we just got ourselves a new master bathroom! It looked like this last night


Stay tuned for what it looks like later this evening.
And now for my new favorite light fixture...

Ok, so I realize that this isn't exactly some fancy photo shoot that really captures the ambiance of the chandelier, but hey...it's our house and my crappy camera so we're working with it. I'm sure a night photo would be best but I'm too excited to wait. But, seriously...I LOVE this chandelier. I think it's rustic but goes with our more modern industrial pendant lights too. Lowe's has several great chandeliers and smaller chandeliers right now...they mimick some of the great industrial/modern lights that are popular without the fancy price tag.


Here's one of it up close and personal.

And from a different angle, sigh...I love it.

Lost of Little Projects = BIG Gratification!

This weekend we punched out some small projects, leaving us sore, but feeling quite accomplished! John started and completed the first coat mudding the master bathroom. Jack helped, of course. We are hoping to get the master bathroom done before the baby comes, as we know life will get a little crazy at that point so there's no time like the present.

Exiting the shower...soon to be shower area.

Jack and Daddy working together. Well, it wasn't all work for Jack. He helped me re vamp his playroom.

Here's the new look of the playroom, complete with new reading nook on the right.

These are the Ikea spice racks ($3.99) each, that I painted and installed as bookshelves! I just love the way they turned out and Jack and I already love reading together right there snuggled in the pillows.
I also painted and hung a mirror for he and I to practice speech, play and just be silly in front of. Jack adores clapping and laughing at himself. It's too cute to watch.

Hurricane Jack approves! It's already getting lots of love and use.

And here's the new look of the office. We got rid of our giant antique teachers desk (which I loved) but we got rid of it because it took up too much room in our little office. We used all items we already had, so this makeover cost us nothing.
It was all started by inheriting this beautiful, antique wood and glass bookcase from 1880. We decided we wanted to put it in the office so we got rid of the open shelving, giant desk and started to piece it together from there. I also started our floor to ceiling gallery wall, not much of a floor to ceiling gallery at the moment...but one day.
Desk area over looking the front yard.


Yikes, terrible photo, but too tired to retake :)


My favorite new print taken from pinterest and developed as a photo at costco...LOVE almost free/cheap art! Be awesome today!
A shot of our nifty bookcase, glass doors on the front of each shelf keeps them nice and dust free.

They open upward and roll into the bookcase above the books. SUPER neat, thank you Nana and Papa! In addition to all this work, we put new pulls on Jacks new dresser, I installed more shelving in the hoosier to house more of my craft supplies, John built shelving in the garage and we got the nursery laid out and cleared out...a lot accomplished, now I'm off to bed at a shameless 8:20pm. I hope you all had a great, productive weekend!

Bathroom Towel Rack Sprucing

I love me some chalkboard paint and labels! I found these over on etsy of course. I thought they would help us keep the who's who of our towels in order...and therefore cut back on my laundry due to the, "Well, I don't remember which one is mine...I'll just grab a new one..." disorder.

I love the way they look and they were easy peasy to adhere and use. They wipe off easily, without leaving the previous message, unlike a lot of paints. This will keep things in order until we get that master bathroom started/finished.

Side Yard Vines

If you haven't noticed, I have rarely done posts on our poor, pathetic backyard. Well, there are several reasons for this, 1. There is SO much to do, we don't know where to start, 2. Our vision is a bit pricey, and 3. We love our front yard so much we just spend a lot of time out there. Well, I have had enough of the neglect. Even though I'm 22 weeks pregnant I can do some sprucing.

I found two kinds of plants that I love and noticed seem to do well in our neighborhood: lavender and siskiyou pink gaura. They love sun, so I lined a few of them along our fence to turn the barren landscape into something a bit more inviting.



These siskiyou pink gaura's will one day look like this:



Today they look more like this....again, patience, one day they will be beautiful.
With those 3 planted, I asked John to do the heavy lifting and get our beautiful, Passion Flower Vines planted along the fence. Easy enough right?

Here's a close up of the Passion Flower.



Not so easy, turns out. Our french drain pipe runs along the whole side fence. Doh! We wanted to plant these vines here to give us something pretty to look at, other than our neighbor's house, when standing at our kitchen sink or looking out our large kitchen window. Well, John came up with a great idea that allowed us to plant our vines.

He built planter boxes for them to place along the fence. Jack, as always, was right by his side to "help".





Daddy lets Jack use the drill all by himself :)


John added a back so as not to rot out the fence, and a bottom so that the roots don't harm the drain pipe. This is what we ended up with.

Once we attached the trellis we wove the vines up to the latticed topped fence.


After a solid 24 hours in the ground, this is how beautiful the flowers looked this morning.
Grow vines grow! I cannot wait to see how beautiful all our plants will be by next year. Happy planting!

Front Yard Facelift

Welcome to the new, spruced up version of our front yard. I've added a new welcome mat, I've decided that those brown grassy type ones are less than ideal for hardwood floor entries. I was always sweeping up the grassy bits inside. So I opted for this one made from recycled plastic and rubber, $12 at Kohl's.
I made a little flare for the front door, still non the hunt for a fun little bit of ribbon to add to the bottom left, but looks fine for now.

And I finally committed to plants in the front yard area. More hydrangeas and ferns. I think they'll look great as they grow and gain some height. Love the way it looks.


Kind of a boring shot, but thinking that they'll look great once they mature a bit. I noticed that people always plant too closely and everything gets crowded. I spaced them with enough room to mature and with the idea in mind that I can always plant some annuals to brighten things up. Have a great week!