Changes around the house..

This is what our dining room looked like this summer.. I love this room because it is cozy and my fav seagrass chairs. This summer  I updated it with a latern on the bar cart and new latern on the table. But it was missing a mirror.. I always wanted a large oversized mirror to reflect the light that comes in from the front door. But the budget at casa de Embley has been zip..and I can't afford the price  tag of those large beautiful mirrors. So I shopped the house like Nester suggests and used what I had.

I had purchased a large mirror last year for the third bedroom. But it was too large to go over the dresser in that room and was missing hardware to hang it .. so I decided to lean the mirror on the bar cart like Inspired Room does! Boy that Mirror is heavy but sure do love it leaned! I like that the it accents the moldings above the french door well.

I love  love the brightness the mirror brings from all the light in the middle of the day! I felt like the cork wreath fit nicely over the large mirror but needed something else. So I stole the lamp from the entryway and added it over on the bar cart! Perfection! I think the lamp compliments the chandelier also. Here are some more pics taken at different times.. notice in one the linen runner on table is missing. We had a mishap and it needed to be washed.. We do live here!!

I also think I might have a lamp obession. I have a lamp in the dining room, a floor lamp & table lamp in living room and a lamp in the entryway. But I love the light lamps give off verses overhead lighting.

Little Blurry Sorry!

Because I stole the entryway lamp, we needed one in there. So I shopped the house again..

I came up with the Home Goods Pottery Barn Lamp.. I love this lamp because it is full of Hawaii wedding sand, seashells, sea glass and coral from our anniversary trip to Belize! The lamp was originally bought for our third bedroom (eventually a nursery).  It will be in the third bedroom eventually.. but as of now no one is staying in that room and we needed it down stairs. I want to replace it with a fun turqouise lamp later. But that isn't in the budget now!! Here's a shot of the whole view.. at night and during early morning.. I love all the light that comes in our house thru the front frosted door and the back with the french doors.
 

So those are the changes made.. small but I am very pleased. If you noticed I removed coral and a tray from the entry way also.. simplize the look. 

 Nate really likes the mirror in the dining room. I have caught him checking himself out before he leaves the house..lol.

But let's look one more time at the dining room..

It's still missing something.. I think it's curtains.. So with my magic couponing skills I got these awesome Ikat Curtains in my fav color Turqouise and Nate's fav color red. Can't wait to put them up and show yall.. I'm gonna hang them high above the door and they will never be closed to allow all that light in and let us still have a view of the pool (who's brick is red and water/tile is blue).. curtains are going to look fabulous with the pool behind the doors and my PB rug!

Here is a thumbnail of it from the website. Ikat is all the rave right now and I am so excited to find some in colors that match our home's personality and budget (20 bucks a panel). I have found ikat curtains every where but selling for over 100 a panel!!

As soon as I finish DIYing the third bedrooms panels and hang these I'll be posting pics.

Have a great Labor Day Weekend.

PS the curtains aren't 20 bucks a panel.. it's just I am pulling a Young House Love Trick and splitting one panel to make skinner panels.. which will lower the cost of panels and allow light to still come in the french doors.

Easter & Spring Decor has vomitted itself on our house- Project 14

Look my hibiscus tree is blooming! Yeah!

Well this week was hard to say the least. I am struggling with my emotions still over the baby, it was report card week (stress because I procrastinated on grading major projects), dealt with drama at school with students, and I had huge assignments due in my Master's classes.. on top of that I have a sinus infection/upper respiratory infection so I feel like crud. Nate has been in a tennis tournament for 2 days now and he has bronchitis too. When he went to the Dr. the Dr. found a mass in his right ear so he is seeing a specialist for that. Praying that is nothing. Also my mom was seen this week and they found cancerous and precancerous cells on her face for skin cancer. Cancer and my mother seem to be way too friendly these days.  She is going back to get treated again April 7th. I am taking her to that appt. and my boss gave me holy hell for asking off to take my mother to the dr. I think is ridiculous because by law it is none of her buisness why I am taking off and two she took of more than 6 weeks to be with her father who had cancer (she should understand). She was upset because I was taking off two days prior to the Science Festival-give me a break I am going to be there for the festival.. any how.

Last week I decorated for spring and I meant to share pics but I was soooo busy. So I am gonna share the pics and than go get my oil changed and off to a GF's house for her daughter's spa sleepover bday (I am a relaxation specialist for her bday).

 

If You notice there is a huge stack of papers are on the pool table behind the fireplace.. umm yea that is grading at its worst. Just focus on the spring mantel instead!! Lol

The first pics are with our Eastery E for Embley on the door and our new double door mat by PB.I think I said in a previous post I ordered a blue/green striped rug for our Kitchen eating area and the door mat. I recieved the door mat but my original rug for the kitchen got lost in an UPS warehouse. PB though is replacing it for free and it should be here this week- hence no pics yet. But I love love the PB double door mat. It looks so much better with our double doors- Nate calls it the HUGE rug! Love it! 

In the kitchen I added a springy runner on the table (I bought two of these short runners at Target for summer parties in the gazebo too) I than added some natural bees wax candles in my shabby chic candle holders and a pedestal with eggs and moss. I think it looks awesome.. but bella keeps eating the moss..ugh.
 I didn't change much on the mantel. The mantel scape I added bunny garland, moss bunnies next to the hydrangea vases, and Spring Blocks in front of the Hawaii Map. I feel that it is very springy in a festive way and definately not understated. I wanted some accesories that when I have kids I can place in their rooms, their bath and around the common areas that they would love (think bright colors) just like my mom did when I was little. So I made sure everything was kid friendly.

In the entry way I updated  the chalkboard decorated with feather/egg wreath and egg tree with more word blocks that state "jelly beans, colored eggs, easter bunny" on them. Also by the front door is my yarn wreath with Fancy Chicks on it.

Lastly in the bar area of the dining room, I added a bright green lantern (found at Lowes of all places). I think it looks great for spring and can transition into summer too! I love how all the bright colors transition well. I also added some eggs to my pedastal on the coffee table with my candles.
Hope you enjoy and your house is feeling very springy.

Check out theinspiredroom.net for her springy mantel. I am working on a gallery wall for my stairwell currently that will incorporate our wedding momentos and be able to grow when we have a baby. Young House Love turned me on to shadow box type of frames that can display artwork (until we have a baby it will display 8*10 photos). But I asked for more inspiration and Inspired Room will be doing a gallery linky April 6th. Can't wait. Be sure to look for it!!

Kitchen & Dining Room Updates- Continuation on Project 12

    

First let me say Happy Spring Break! Wohoo!! I made it. After a long 1/2 day at work (I am blessed to get 1/2 day Fridays) I went to Target and found the most awesome hurricane lantern by Smith & Hawkens. I love that line at Target.   The Hurricane is  Awesome with seagrass. I got the meduim sized one and thought it would look stellar on the dining room table I am thinking now I need to go back and buy the extra large one two! But I had to show you.. oh look at my beautiful chairs too! Aww.. seagrass. My dining room just feels like we are sitting in Hawaii still on the beach eating fish tacos. DONE! I finally achieved what I wanted.

Now on to the kitchen progress! My new light fixtures for the hallway and above the sink have come in today. I picked them up and they are awaiting to be hung by Nate.  I really want to update the lil fan above the table but it is going to have to wait till we take down the light above the island so the light above island and above the table all match. Plus it cranks out some air for those summer months.  I went for a bronze finish to match the switch plates and cabinet hardware. I know we have alot of stainless steel also in our kitchen but I am really drawn to how it looks against our pine cabinets and our backsplash. I also didn't want to have to buy all new hardware :).  I was considering painting the kitchen and decided against it. Instead I took InspiredRoom's advice and lightened it up by adding touches of cream and white. Here is the before

 

Before with reds all over.. Made the kitchen seem dark when it gets tons of light and is actually a very large kitchen.  To NOW: Light & Airy

I gave you the hint yesterday! The hint was the new cream valances that have a subtle hint of pattern on them. I put them up last night and had not put the slip covers on them and Nate wasn't sure yet. I think he was afraid they were too bland and had nothing else to match. But with my new slipcovers they all blend so well.  I love that it breaks up all the pine in the kitchen and they are linen! I adore linen. Sorry I didn't exactly press them before pictures ;). I love that you can still see the carved legs and it looks like my chairs are wearing a skirt! This was such an inexpensive makeover. I originally wanted to paint the chairs white, but Nate really likes wood tones. So to find a happy medium I felt these slipcovers were appropriate. I have seen similar ones online that just cover the tall parts of the chair but not the actual seat. Our seats are padded and covered and the upholstered part didn't match my new light and airy kitchen. So continue to skirt the seat was perfect.

I still want to add a white fruit bowl to the table and replace our red utensil crock on the island with a simple white one. Other than that I have just removed the reds.. I also purchased $5.99 rugs at target to replace the area rugs at the french doors out to the pool and by the kitchen sink.  The french door in the kitchen even has stain glass in it.. don't think I have ever shown that. I love the stain glass it reminds me of my mom and Grandma. They both love stain glass. I went for cheap and plain simple rugs so that if they get ruined from chlorine pool water and dogs I won't get upset. 

Since our kitchen is so large I wanted to break up the tile a little more. I was going to put our sisal rug from the living room in the kitchen because I just ordered another from PB on sale (8X10 rug on sale for less than 100 bucks) and with my gift cards. But I decided I wanted the plain sisal rug to go to our master bedroom and the new sisal rug to go in the living room. All our floors in the house are wood or tile. I like area rugs in the larger rooms to keep the toes warm.  The current living room rug is just sisal.. the new one actually has a border of brown on the edge. I will show pics as soon as they come. Since I decided not to move the LR rug I was back on a hunt.. our kitchen and living room see the most traffic especially during warm months when the pool is in use.  We all hang in the kitchen to chat, eat, get out of the sun- it is the hang out spot. I started to consider an indoor outdoor rug than since the durability. That is when I came along this:

It is a gorgeous indoor/outdoor rug from PB. I ordered it and it will be in the kitchen soon! Can't wait- best part is you can take it outside to spray with a hose to wash and hang dry. Plus both sides have the stripes so if one side sees more wear- flip it over. Great features for a house that I hope will eventually have lil ones in. But for right now we do have three fur balls living here and plenty of kids that visit (esp in summer for the pool). 

I love love stripes if you can't tell. The last rug I ordered was stripes for the dining room (see in first pic my last PB rug purchase). I feel stripes are safe and never go out of style.. yet they are still fresh and fun! So that is the updates so far in the kitchen.. oh I almost forgot. I got a soap dispenser that reminded me of sea glass and some new washrags in my inspiration colors.

Sorry mid day sun was streaming thru. There is the new washrag, soap dispenser and our honeymoon Hawaiian Bamboo Surf Cutting Board. We love it. Aren't they just fun and casual. Beach Vibe? Summer Vibe? Coastal Vibe? Hope I achieved one of them..

 

Ill post pics of the PB rug as soon as it is delivered. I ordered online because our local store didn't have my Garden Rug. Talk soon and enjoy Spring Break.

PS.. I pick up the nursery dresser tomorrow from Simple Matters. I am sooo excited.

Busy Busy Bee- Project 12

Before

Whitewashed & a coat of Blue

Close Up

Dining Room with 4 Chairs :)

Herbs starting to Grow Yea!!!

This week has literally been a week of  Insert Four Letter word here starting in an H ending in a Big L.. it has been non-stop at work (meetings, grading, parent emails/conferences), students just going crazy because Spring Break is so close, tons of assignments for my Masters Program and the house a total wreck because lack of time to organize and too many projects started at once.  I am in deep need of vacation in such a bad way.  But for relaxation what I do.. find more projects to do..lol.

I'm one of those people I think of projects while I am going to sleep, showering, driving to work and I will think about them, contemplate them and obsess until they are done. I think I mentioned that I spoke with Melissa from The Inspired Room about our kitchen. I was getting really TIRED of the red.. it is just not me and is too warm. I know people like Red it is actually my hubbies fav color. His office is St Louis Cardinal Red.. but I don't like it all over my house. I like neutral with a punch of color. So I search for my inspiration for the kitchen with out re painting and adding the neutral tans and whites with a touch of blue..

Than it hit me sea spray wreath I have ( I kinda have a rug and wreath addiction).. this is my inspiration for my kitchen- the colors, touch of classic traditional, touch of vintage with modern.. love it. So on my long hallway wall are some vintage iron wall decor in a red color. The color just didn't fit the new kitchen. I went to the garage and got a plain dry brush and white washed the wood. After it dried I distressed it and re hung on the wall. I liked the white. But it was just too white and too much of a contrast on the walls. So I went back to the garage and found some leftover Blue Paint from the upstairs (all the rooms are various shades of blue-robin, teal, aqua, sky) and dry brushed over the white being sure the distressed areas were still noticeable as well as the white. The finished product is above. I really like it and once you see the whole finished kitchen I think you will too.

On top of my kitchen decor project with paint, finally the two other seagrass chairs came in. Nate originally bought the first two seagrass chairs for me as an anniversary gift on our 3rd year. We were living in our first apartment together. I loved them so much and had wanted them so bad but couldn't afford them while in college and working as a bartender and nanny.  When he surprised me with them I was so excited and I still love love em.  The only thing I hate is my cat will try to sharpen her claws on them..ugh. I have been wanting to get more but at one point they were back ordered in my color and then I just didn't have it in our budget. Finally I did. So I ordered them and they came today. The newer ones are a slightly darker color. But I think they match fine because of the color variation of the seagrass. Aren't they beautiful??  Dining Room is officially DONE!! 

Oh and the Herb Garden I planted on the kitchen window has sprouts in all three containers..yeah!

Here's a hint on a future post to come in the kitchen.. good luck on guessing.

HINT!!

Dining Room Updates!!- Project #6

Before with basic light

Light in the box

Hubby getting started

Finished product

Love it!!

Close up of hydrangeas, shells and willow branches

Close up of the bar with personalized plate & wine cork wreath

This weekend started off wonderful! I picked up the second dresser I purchased and than headed to a happy hour at my gf's house which turned into a slumber party complete with my gf's sleeping in her son's bunkbeds.. it was a blast! I am so blessed to have great gfs who have helped me thru the good and the bad times. Shout out to my DHHC sisters!!  Saturday I picked up the new bed for the guest room and ran some errands. That evening we  went to dinner with Jon & Kelly.

Sunday rolls around and I wake up to my marathon running hubby putting up my christmas gift! My dining room chandy!! I love that man!!

 When we purchased the house it had no lights (foreclosure). So my mom who had just built a new house had custom lights put in hers and gave us all the basic standard grade lights for our house- which is awesome because they were free and we got lights. But I wanted to complete the dining room and had my eye on this light for awhile. Nate suprised me at christmas. It has been siting in the box forever and I thought he would get to it over spring break. But he did it this weekend.

The light was purchased at Lowe's for a fraction of what Pottery Barn charges. It is a antiqued bronze with a candle light glow. It is gorgeous. Where the light is centered on the ceiling it doesn't sit directly over the dining room table so we got a swag hook and moved over the center of the table. I love it and can't stop staring at it.

We ran into a couple problems along the way with installation.  I have never installed lighting- so Nate told me to interwine the cord with the swag chain while he worked on the other parts of the lights..well the cords to attach in the ceiling one is white and one is black. Well on our light they are both black and one had a white tag to identify it..well little did I know this was important and I pulled it off while intertwining with the swag .   Needless to say Nate was a little irritated when he discovered this. I called the help line but being Sunday no one answered. We decided to treck our way to Lowes and open the same lights and see which one it was that was suppose to be the white cord. After a thirty min debockle.. we discovered which one was the white cord and I learned my lesson!! So we went home back to install the lighting. Nate gets the light up and it is perfect- turns power back on and nothing!! Oh he was frustrated. We started at 11am and by this time it was almost one. We ate lunch and than Nate took the metal piece down that holds the wires to reexamine the connections. When he used the wire bolts to wrap the lights wires with the houses wires one of the wires snapped and wasn't connected. So he re-connected them and than wahla!! It worked and is fab!! He than decided to hang our new mantal!! I'll post those pics in a seperate posts so it isn't all pics!!  Did I say enough I love this MAN!!

But I love the dining room now. I want to refinish the old farmhouse mission style table in black..but that will have to wait.  I added the beautiful dried oregon hydrangeas to the willow and sea shells on the iron piece and I love the cottage costal look it adds.  We recieved that iron piece with a vase for a wedding gift. The pictures don't do any justice to our sisal Pottery Barn rug.. But I love it. It has light blue, dark blue, brown, red and lime green stripes on a tan background. I think it also brings in a more casual look and beachy feel!!  I think it is a marvelous room and very original! Hope you enjoy and Happy Monday!!