New roomies, garbage theif, free finds, and updates!

Being a home owner has been absolutely WONDERFUL! I wake up every day feeling so thankful and blessed to have such a great place! 

Richelle and her doggy Fio have moved in. My house is no longer quiet and lonely. Our rugs never stay in the same place! :)

Kobe and Fio LOOOOVE to look out the windows together...

And someone was breaking into our trash... I found out who it was......

Yeah... that was a piece of pizza.

I was going through our garage and I found this awesome mirror. It is solid wood and extremely heavy... so I have not hung it yet. (Ryan?)

Also, Ryan, Chad, and I were on our way to Ry's grandma's after church a couple of weeks back and we drove by a buffet table with a "Take me, FREE" sign on it. Ryan points and says "Hey, that looks like something you would like." Not knowing that I would actually like it and really want to stop and get it. So I yell. "TURN AROUND!" Which we did, then Ryan chose to drive right on by it again. I spent the next two hours trying to convince him why I NEEDED it and that we should totally go back and get it. He, however, still did not want to get it. After many convincing arguments, I finally got him to (reluctantly) agree.  We went to pick it up. I was in loooove! :) And once he saw it in its new home, he finally admitted that it is perfect! I think it may be antique, but what do I know... I just love it!

And Now, some updates on the house...

Living Room

New tile in front of the fireplace!

Huge new basket for blankets

Dining Room:

(Still in need of chairs)

Kitchen

Laundry Room

 Upstairs Landing

My Room 

(pics of Richelle's room to come)

Close up of my revamped side tables

Well... that is all for now.  We are working on the outside with some updates, planing on painting the dining room blue, and painting the laundry room. So excited about everything!

Home Sweet Home!

So, yeah... I haven't written in a while. But, I was a little busy moving into my new house and getting my classroom ready! :)

Here are some pictures of my new house (better ones will come soon)

Living Room

Before:

Now:

 (I'm not 100% sold on the color, but Ryan is... compromise right?)

Kobe LOOOOOVES to look out the windows. (Sorry about the flood of natural light.)

Kitchen

 Once Again... Looking out the window

Dining Room

Progress... We cannot find the nuts and bolts to put it together... so in the meantime, this is my basically empty dining room.

Bedroom

Bathroom

(Sorry for no before pics... bad blogger! The bathroom before was a pale gray. The color of the ceiling.)

The shower curtain is a much more light and airy color than the picture shows. I painted the whole room cotton white first. Then, I measured off 12 inch stripes, taped them with painters tape, and painted away! Yeah, this is my favorite room! :)

Laundry Room

I eventually want to freshen this room up with a bright fun color, some more concealed storage solutions, and some decorations. 

So that's the inside of my house. I am thrilled to be a home owner! I will be adding some exterior pics soon once some of the construction is finished! :)

And now for some pics from move in day...

We COULD NOT get my queen sized box springs upstairs...

But... later on we got another queen sized box springs upstairs after about 40 minutes of maneuvering. :)

And... Ryan and I watching Clash of the Titans in 3D on our TV!

Yay for my house! :)

The Perfect Reading Chair

Once I found out that I was going to be teaching Kindergarten, I began my mad hunt for the PERFECT chair that I could use for circle time and reading books to the children.

I searched and searched at many different thrift stores around, but was very unsuccessful. I really feel like someone came in and cleaned out our local Volunteers of America... all they had were like 163 old entertainment centers... so if you're in the market...

Anyways...

On a trip back to Cincinnati, my mom and I found THE chair. Now, it looked like something straight out of That 70's Show (Which I am currently re-obsessed with for some reason thanks to Netflix on my phone).

The color is a little bit more light greenish in person. It reads a little more gold in these pictures.

It was definately interesting trying to fit this huge chair and my huge dog crate to travel back to the Round Town. I had some doubters *cough, DAD, cough* But they totally fit. Sure I couldnt really see out the back window... but they both fit! :)

I really didnt like that old dirty looking wood color. So right away I got some primer and white paint to sort of polish up the look of the chair. I felt like the white paint would make the chair seem breezy like it could belong in a beach house.

I sanded the wood down to give the paint a better surface to grab on to.

The upholstered part was impossible to remove without destroying it, so I just taped it off.

Then I primed the entire chair. This took FOREVER because the wood color was so dark I knew I needed to really lay on the paint.

The wicker/lattice work on the arm rests were exceptionally diffucult to paint. And I'm pretty sure there was a heat advisory outside while I painted these. But I was impatient and really wanted to see the finished product.

Once the primer was dry (overnight) I finished the chair with a white semi-gloss paint.

Best part about the chair? It only cost me $7.50!!! All of the paints I already had on hand! Sort of awesome if you ask me!

I finished the look with this very awesome close-out $5 pillow. I feel like this pillow and chair are soul mates.

I am absolutely IN LOVE with the finished product! This chair is so comfortable and I can totally see myself sitting in class reading stories to all of my little inquiring minds. :)