A Skiff of Snow

You know your winter has been less than stellar when a skiff of snow and some big flakes get you all excited to go outside and play.

 And apparently Mom making you come inside and take your boots off is worthy of a ginormous tantrum.  

When Sheets are Washed

Large piles of pillows and blankets never cease to make these girls happy.

Master Bedroom Redo: Part II

Back in October I started a major project of redoing our master bedroom.  I had wanted to for YEARS but things always got in the way.  Like kids.  Kids got in the way, let's be real.  And a little thing called money.

Well I was done with excuses.  I painted the room and made-over our bookcase before we left for Kauai in November.  When we got back, the unexpected purchase of a new camera made me a little leery to spend more than necessary, especially with Christmas on the horizon.  So I decided to wait til January to pick the project back up again.

When it was time to get back to work, I tackled what I had been most afraid of and the necessary next step: painting all our hand-me-down oak furniture white.  I started with the dresser.  I had painted about 3 pieces of furniture before this, all of which were cheap $30 or less pieces.  This was a scary deal to me!

I seriously had to take a couple deep breaths before starting the coat of primer.  I could hear 90's decorators from the past screaming at me, "How dare you PAINT over such a good piece of honey-colored oak!"

Alice has quiet and sneaky hands, but thankfully she only did this once.  I had to start painting more when Dan could help with kids or at night.  But I did the entire dresser in about 24 hours!  (Big reveal in a minute.)

I moved on to the two nightstands the next day.  They took longer than the dresser because I had figured out a different painting technique that left a much smoother, factory-like finish.  It involved painting everything by hand, then only lightly going over it with a clean, dry foam roller every few minutes of painting while things were still wet.  For the dresser I had pretty much applied all the paint by roller which is why it was faster, but the finish isn't as smooth.  It isn't a big visible difference but one I felt was worth the extra effort of hand brushing.  It definitely added a lot of time per piece, though.

Next the footboard.  Ugh.  All those crevices and trying not to make the paint drip down one side as I was painting the other was a huge annoying task!

Lastly, the headboard.  It took me a few days to get to it because I was feeling pretty DONE with the whole painting furniture thing by now.  Plus, it had all those stupid slats I hated painting on the footboard.  My painting job is not perfect, but I did the best I could.  Painting late at night stinks, by the way.  It was so hard to see where I had gotten subsequent coats and where I had missed even with extra lighting in the room.

I wanted to wait to show the whole room finished, decorations and all . . . but again, it's that money thing.  I have just a couple more accessory touches for the room, but they aren't all cheap or quick so some have to wait for now.

So here's some before and afters as of right now!  The before pics are from the day I started painting the room back in October.

Before:

After:

So much prettier, right?!  

I have big plans for above the bed, but I don't want to share them yet in case I lose my resolve.  But I will say it will bring more greens/blues into the room.  Each nightstand is going to get more dressed up too and have a little bit of accent color at some point.  Those pictures will end up on the wall in nicer frames somewhere instead of taking up nightstand space.  

Before:

After:

 So much better!  I found the hardware for a good deal at dlawless online.  It took me weeks of looking to decide on these knobs, but all of them for the dresser and nightstands only cost about $50!  I have plans to hang that painting on the wall, it just hasn't happened yet.

 Before:

 After:

I actually did the curtains and rods before leaving for Hawaii.  I always HATED the curtain rods in this room that came with the house.  They were always falling apart.  I took some time deciding between bronze or silver, and finally chose these ones from target.  I love the acrylic finials.  For the curtains, I knew as soon as I chose a darker gray for the paint in the room that I wanted a white curtain that let in lots of light. These were a fantastic deal on Amazon.  I love the longer length draped on the floor, and they let in a good amount of light while still not being too sheer.

Thanks for looking!  Someday hopefully I'll get to share all the finishing touches to the room but it may be a while.  I may have to move on to the master bathroom redo first.  (Time to get the peachy/tan paint out of there!)

Lacey's First Haircut

Lacey is nearly 4, and she just barely had her first real haircut last month.  I've trimmed stray hairs here and there but have never really cut or trimmed the whole thing.

It was getting way too long to take care of for her.  It nearly went in the toilet every time she went potty.  I wasn't cool with that.  She'd been begging me to cut it for a while but I hesitated because I loved her long hair with it's natural ringlets (which aren't shown here since her hair is wet, but trust me, she had some.)

Before I started cutting, I was telling Dan how afraid I was I'd screw it up. (I'm not so great at Jossy's thick hair, and she's the only girl I've ever cut.)  Lacey heard me and said, "It's okay, Mom.  It can grow back."  Such a smart, sweet girl!

I cut shorter than I meant to, but she loved it.  After a while, so did I.  I just miss those ringlets that never came back.  :(

She looks more grown-up now.  Ugh.  I wish they'd all stop doing that.