The Sewing Bee's Cottage

My mom, the Sewing Bee, has been remodeling my grandparents house for the past few months - with the help of a wonderful contractor.  The new house is much smaller  (my dad passed away about three years ago) and just the perfect size for her.  My mom and dad owned it as a rental house so it was in need of a lot of TLC.  

Well, it was finally finished (at least the interior) this week.  (of course, it was the week we all started back to school - not the best of timing, but that's okay) I knew you would love to see it.  It is so cozy and cottagey and sweet and so like my mom.  

She completely gutted the kitchen...

New beadboard cabinets...

New stove and microwave.  The whole microwave area used to be a tiny coat closet with the door facing the hall, but mom had her contractor knock that closet out to give her more storage in the kitchen.

She used beautiful green glass subway tile for the backsplash.  I did lots of shopping with her and she fell in love with that when we saw it.  My pictures do not do it justice.  

The counters are silestone.  I personally just LOVE the contrast of the white cabinets, the black counters, and the sparkly green backsplash.

The kitchen has about 2 more linear feet thanks to extending the cabinets from what they were.  Her flooring is a laminate and she knows there is a risk there, but it's just her, so she thinks she'll be able to take good care of it.

She also gutted the bathroom...

I need to get more pictures because there were still a few details that weren't done when I took these shots.

And she wallpapered her bedroom.

It's a buttery soft yellow with gorgeous flowers in shades of jade, soft blue, and a rosy coral color.  She plans to get a white iron bed for the room.  Do you see the new closet doors?  Aren't they cottage perfect?  She replaced all the doors in the entire house - interior and exterior. 

So, we already have several projects lined up for her new little cottage.  

We have furniture to paint, curtains to make, slipcovers to sew, and vignettes to arrange.  

I'm so glad I have some where new to play!  

As we get her moved in, I'll show you some more of the details that make this little cottage just perfect for her.  

Now we just need to come up with a name for her new home.  

Jade Cottage, maybe?  

Do you have any ideas?

Thank you so much for buzzing by!  Oh, and I'm making yummy iced mochas to celebrate my mom's move.  C'mon over and join us!

And the before's were so bad, I put them at the end!  

Oh so drab and dreary...

Yellow tile counters were sunny about 50 years ago - not so much now.

This was just disgusting.  

Doors were pretty boring.

Of course, I'm sharing this metamorphosis over at Susan's.  This is one of the best I've ever been a part of!

The Big Reveal or How a Little Paint Can Make a Big Difference

If you're here looking for a dramatic change......

well......

I don't think you'll find it here.

However.....

if you want to see how just a few gallons of paint and a little editing of furniture and accessories can really change the look of a room, then this post's for you!

Before......

Yellow walls.....

 Look how intense that yellow looks.  It did look a bit better in person, but......

it didn't make me smile anymore.  It felt really dated.

We painted the walls yellow before we added the skylight.

Dark green paint on the library bookcases.......

It felt cozy, but it was dark.  Really dark.

We moved some furniture too.  You can see that in a bit.

************************

So last week I convinced Worker Bee it was time.  Time to move out all those books, stuff, and furniture.

And this is the result......

C'mon in!

And no, that's not your imagination - our ceilings are blue!   That part's not new.

I love how much more open it feels now.

Love these frames!  But I haven't updated them since Baby Bee was about two years old.  I told her it was time to put in some new pictures and she protested.  I have a sentimental little Baby Bee.

Do you see the fish bowl?

That's Greg, Marcia, Peter, Jan, Bobby, and Cindy.

They are some goldfish that Baby Bee won at the school carnival 

(drum roll please) 

2 1/2 years ago!  

Do we do anything special to keep them alive?

Absolutely NOT!

They are just in one of those huge glass general store type jars.  

They really want to live.  They are survivors. Worker Bee even brought one of them back from the brink.

We call him the Fish Whisperer.

As you continue in we had this open space and it just didn't look quite right. 

Sewing Bee suggested filling it in with the two chairs.  She was right.  (But don't tell her I said that - I don't want it to go to her head.) 

I think I need to look for a little table - some sort of pedestal - to go between the two chairs.  For now, the red boxes will do.  (Yep, that's another "That's Good Enough.")

 Look to your right and there's our piano......

 and game cabinet.  These two guys switched places.  We're still getting used to it, but I think they'll stay exactly where they are. 

 And remember these great aqua floral pictures that I couldn't decide if I should keep?  Well they now have a permanent home.  I love how they look with the red candlesticks, the little aqua bird and the red gingham lined basket that holds some of our music. (Baby Bee and I both play the piano and Worker Bee plays the guitar.)

 And how absolutely perfectly they all go with this adorable summer time banner that Joyce from Scrap for Joy made for a swap we were in.  Don't you love it?  She is uber-talented!  I need to show you some of the other things she made. 

Now.....come sit down - let's chat for a bit.  Let me go and make you an iced latte......

Ahhhh.......better.  Love those vanilla iced lattes.

We didn't change a lot in this area.  We did shift the entertainment armoire and bookcases towards the sunroom window.  This really opened up the area between the piano and the loveseat. 

It still feels warm and cozy to me, but just so much brighter!

Now look at the library!  The only change here was that we repainted the back of the bookcases.  From the original dark green to this gorgeous blue. 

Yes, you can look a little closer.

The blue brightens it up so much.

These READ letters are one of my favorite things.  I picked them up on vacation in Wisconsin - Fond du Lac to be precise - although the vacation was actually at Green Lake.  We were in a Target and I found these.  Worker Bee said, "C'mon.  We can get that back home.  Why do you want to haul that halfway across the country?"  Well I persisted and it flew back with us to California and good thing because (I bet you can guess this one) I never ever found these letters at any Target in my part of California.  Lesson learned - READ is always worth hauling from WI to CA.

Up on top?  Those are the Grandma Bowls.  You can read more about them here.

C'mon - sit down.  Finish that latte now that you've seen most of the changes.  You know how it is - there will be a little bit of tweaking and changes until I'm completely happy with it.   

And now you know why I haven't posted much lately.  Been a bit busy taking my whole living room apart and then putting it back together!  

Well thank you so much for buzzing by!  

Can you believe how much brighter and lighter it all looks now?

I knew it would be better, but I had no idea it would be SO MUCH better.

And if you're curious....the walls are painted Antique White (Behr from Home Depot) and the back of the bookcases are Sunken Pool (Martha Stewart from Home Depot).

And please don't forget to come back for my 500 follower giveaway.  Apparently I'm still being a tease about it......

Yep!  That's another sneak peek of the giveaway!  Yes, I am a terrible tease.  But won't you forgive me?

With lots of honey,

I'm linking this post up to

Met Monday
at Between Naps on the Porch
and

at The House in the Roses.

Thank you ladies for hosting such fun linky parties!

At Last! The Giant Chalkboard Is Done!

It's been a long time coming.  You've been patient with me as I tackled this project.

Shall we stroll down memory lane together?

I should probably start with my inspiration.............

I just loved the idea of writing inspirational quotes or menus or whatever in our dining room/sunroom.  I also wanted it to be portable in case I wanted to move it outside or really - anywhere.  

So I've painted a chalkboard on our pantry door in our kitchen and I've painted chalkboard paint on my most of my pots in the garden, so I was comfortable with the chalkboard paint,  I just needed to find the right thing to paint.  But I wanted to do this on the cheap.  Worker Bee looked at ReStore but the doors there started at $70 - too much for this project. So that clever Worker Bee found a cheap slab door he bought at Home Depot for about $18.  

I started off with this slab of a door as my Christmas present from dear Worker Bee.

Then I picked up some cheap moulding (we'll revisit my thoughts on the cheap moulding later) for a frame.

I painted the entire slab with the chalkboard paint.

Worker Bee and Baby Bee helped me cut and glue the moulding down.

And it looked like what you see above.  Cute, but this is a bee who craves color.

Well, I bet you can guess what color I picked to paint the moulding......

RED!

I got out my favorite RED from Behr - just an aside here, but I do love that Behr primer plus paint, worth every extra penny. (and no, Home Depot is NOT paying me for mentioning this paint)

It took 4 coats - but they went quickly - and then I rubbed a dark stain over the top of that to give it a richer color and some depth.

Don't worry - the white spot is a blossom from one of our backyard trees.

Well, what do you think?

I really like it, but I must confess I don't LURVE it.

Why?

Well, I should not have cheaped out on the the white plasticy moudling.  It looks nice and crisp when it is white, but it does not paint beautifully and I wasn't able to distress it like I had in my mind.  

For now, it will do, but someday I will improve upon this.

It's time for Metamorphosis Monday

over at Between Naps on the Porch!

And, of course, I've got to buzz by Sue's for
REDNESDAY!

I'm also linking up over at Boston Bee for Alyssa's Bee's Knees party!
Go check it out!

Oh yeah and total cost was about $32! (I already had the paints and stain and liquid nails.)

So thanks for coming by and seeing my metamorphosis!  

I truly appreciate you taking time out of your day to leave a comment of just stop by.  You are such a delight!

Wondering where my quote on the chalkboard came from?  It's on the bottle of my amazing grace shower gel from philosophy.  (yes, I'm a philosophy girl)  I love reading it every morning and it never fails to inspire.  Hope you enjoy it too!