Making It A Home

Inspiration For Long, Narrow Hallway

Christy — Mon, 18 Jan 2010 03:50:06 +0000

My hallway is long and narrow like this one. I’ve painted it and love the color, but it still needs something. The above picture is the result of a hallway makeover on The Devine Home. I’m not sure it is exactly what I want, but I do love how it really gives the hallway style. We plan to replace the carpet in the hallway with laminate flooring when we do the living room.

Happy 2010! A Year Of Decluttering, Organizing, And Many Projects!

Christy — Fri, 01 Jan 2010 16:16:32 +0000

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!

2010 – for me at least – will be a year full of decluttering, organzing, and doing many home improvement projects, large and small. Painting almost every room, replacing the flooring, changing the kitchen cabinets, lots of decor changes & additions, etc, etc.

Kim will also be doing lots of projects throughout 2010 & we will also be posting fabulous ideas we come across and great frugal finds that help us stretch our home improvement dollars! We welcome you to join us & we’d love to hear about YOUR home projects as well.

Here’s to an awesome, improvement-full new year!!!

Post & Data Loss

Christy — Sun, 18 Oct 2009 18:59:23 +0000

During a routine upgrade, some data and recent posts were lost on this blog and on sister sites. This is quite a blow and all possible will be done to rectify the situation and hopefully prevent this from occuring in the future.

Thrifty Finds

Christy — Fri, 11 Sep 2009 19:06:24 +0000

I found this little thing at Goodwill for 49 cents (I’m not sure what I’ll do with it yet):

I also picked up a pair of Old Navy jeans and Children’s Place jeans for Lil Roo and a ziplock baggie of clear beads for my niece-in-law, all $1 each!

Snapshots Of Kitchen Ideas

Christy — Fri, 11 Sep 2009 18:53:07 +0000

I’m starting with the bathroom, but thoughts are churning like crazy about the kitchen. I was flipping through a Woman’s Day Kitchens & Baths magazine (vol XIX No. 2, 2009) and saw several ideas that I would like to incorporate – or at least consider doing so. We’ll see once I get going on it what I’m able to do frugally – after all, it will be a ton more fun and interesting that way!

I apologize for the very poor quality of the pics. I took flash photographs of glossy magazine pages and doing some cropping seemed to
add to the blurriness. Hopefully you’ll be able to get some idea anyway.

Just the other day I was thinking of adding a small shelf under the cabinet between the stove and fridge (possibly for trays, etc). This is similar to what I’m thinking of:

A major change I want to make in the kitchen is to add small cabinets over the existing ones. We don’t have high ceilings, but we do have wasted space over the cabinets and quality storage around here is at a premium.

I saw this and just. love. it. I’d love to replace our stove exhaust with something like this (though it may prove to be more than I’m currently willing to invest) and I love the idea of open shelves over it instead of regular kitchen cabinets.

Speaking of open shelves, I’m wondering what the possibilities would be of taking a partial wall that creates the doorway to the laundry room, removing the sheetrock and adding narrow shelves the depth of the wall (am I making sense here?). It would be more for décor
than anything else, but even space for décor is hard to come by around here. It wouldn’t look like this picture, but this pic is what triggered the idea:

Lastly (for now), I would like to add a narrow, pullout cabinet between the fridge and wall next to it. We do not have a pantry, so anywhere I can add space for food items is a plus. These are lower cabinet pull-outs, where-as I’d want something as tall as the fridge.
We’ll see how expensive it is when I get around to it and go from there on whether it happens or not.

Christy’s Bathroom Makeover: Getting Started

Christy — Thu, 10 Sep 2009 14:46:01 +0000

Phase One of my bathroom makeover project is all prep work. Getting everything out, cleaning, and preparing to paint. Phase Two will be walls, mainly painting. Here are some “before” shots as I get this project underway (notice I started tearing away at the wallpaper border before I took these shots and before trying to do it the correct way – oops!):

Use Molding To Upgrade Bath & Kitchen Cabinets

Christy — Thu, 10 Sep 2009 14:30:00 +0000

Check out this instructional video from Better Homes & Gardens about adding molding to bath or kitchen cabinets to get a very nice look for a minimal out of pocket expense. I’ve been planning on painting my kitchen cabinets as well as adding hardware to change the overall look and may add some decorative molding to them as well to really add some style (they are quite plain right now).

Three Large Mock Pictures On Focus Wall

Christy — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 04:25:39 +0000

I like this idea of three large mock pictures for a focus wall in a child’s room.

Staircase & Hall Revamp Idea

Christy — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 03:52:58 +0000

How cool is this revamped staircase from the Centsational Girl? This would also work well for a long hallway (which I happen to have and which needs a little something!)

An Old Dresser Turned Into A Rolling Tool Cart

Christy — Tue, 08 Sep 2009 19:26:48 +0000

I love this idea from the Crafty Nest for turning an old dresser into a rolling tool cart!