Wednesday, April 27, 2016

Spring Front Porch

Our Front Porch is all spiffed up and ready to show. We really worked hard on this space because it's the first place potential buyers will see when they walk up to the house. 


As the saying goes, you never get a second chance to make a first impression.

I found a cute front door mat at Wayfair.com for a reasonable price, but it's also available on Amazon.



We spent countless hours painting, cleaning, planting and decorating to get to this point..
I painted the front door, sidelights and transom window first, then Mr. DIY painted the porch posts and arches.  The railings received a fresh coat of black paint too. The porch concrete floor was powerwashed, benches and pots cleaned, and finally, flowers were planted. One of the last things I did was to go to Michaels to get some faux flowers for a basket I spray painted a light green.




I found these colorful Gerbera Daisies at our neighborhood Lowes. I'm so glad we have one less than ten minutes away!


I dug up the green daylillie and the trailing variegated plant from the backyard. Both plants had spread and were a little bit crowded in the space they were in, so it worked out well. I purchased some Spanish Moss from Amazon to top all the planted pots off.


Lowes also had a sale on ferns, so I purchased a few for the porch.
I was really disappointed when I cleaned the pots because the white finish was chipping off and it was unsightly. I didn't want to go out and spend $$$ for a new pot, so I did a temporary fix of painting the top rim and covering the edge with moss and the trailing plant. It was a quick fix and should get us through the next month or so. 


The bench pad and pillows were moved from the Basement Patio.





Here's a closeup of the basket of faux flowers for the Front Door. I picked purple flowers before I decided to bring up the bench cushion and flowers from the basement, otherwise I would have chosen red or orange flowers.









Mr. DIY is taking this week off to finish the "get the house ready to sell list. I'm hopeful
we'll get everything finished by the end of this month- in 3 days.

We're getting down to the wire, as they say...

If you were a potential buyer, would our front porch make a good first impression?



Pam

Friday, April 22, 2016

Final Spring Basement Patio

Don't you just love the sound of a good rain? 
One where you can hear the rain coming down a good bit.... A drenching rain that soaks the ground and waters the lawn without being a gully washer. 

That's what we had last night; a good bit of rain. We sure needed it because this Spring, so far, has been pretty dry. It was overcast today, but I went out and took photos of our basement patio anyway. 

I'm currently getting  the outdoor spaces ready and staged for when we put the house on the market in May.  I didn't plan it this way, but  the basement patio was finished first. 

We had someone come and give everything a good powerwashing and the mulch was spread this year by someone other than Mr. DIY and me, so those big Spring chores were taken care of. I just had to purchase some ferns and flowers to plant. Here's the view from the french doors in our basement family room.


I purchased a new cushion and some pillows online from TJ Maxx.com awhile back. This is my favorite outdoor spot, so it has to be a comfy spot. It's below the main floor deck and is a cool spot except in the hottest part of the summer.






This is the view of the backyard from the bench. I'm going to miss this spot when we move. The garden is going to be more difficult to leave behind that the inside of the house.













I was in the garden today and took this video. All of the liriope( aka monkey grass - the green round mounds) originated from a couple of plants that a handyman brought me from his garden 16 years ago after we moved in. I divided them every year until it was a whole grove! I have even more from the same few plants in several other places in the yard. 



Hope you enjoyed the tour!

Pam

Wednesday, April 13, 2016

Ottoman Slipcover

How are you friends? 

I'm hoping you're doing well and having some fun. 
Mr. DIY and I are still working on the "get the house ready to sell" list day and night and on weekends.Today I  painted the deck stairs.(the deck is on the second floor since we have a walkout basement) The deck floor is next...and it's my last painting project. 

Hurray!!!

I believe we have painted about 95% of all the trim in our big house and about 85% of the walls.
Of course, we didn't forget the front door and sidelights and the posts and arches on the front porch...oh and the deck. 

We still have to clean carpets, do a final clear out of the basement and clean/clear out the garage.(and it's awful)
Did I mention this has to be done by the end of this month?

After all that, the house has to be staged to look pretty.

Which brings me to the ottoman in my bedroom. 
I bought it several years ago for $30 when it was on sale at Pier One.  It really doesn't look good with the chair in my bedroom the way it is and there may have been an little run in with some of Mr. DIY's barbecue sauce, so I needed to make a slipcover for it.



I ordered some fabric from Fabric.com and it arrived a few weeks ago. I found a tutorial online over at  Sew 4 Home and it helped me figure it out. I sat down one evening and measured, then last week I cut out the fabric. Finally yesterday I started sewing. 


Not bad for a first try. I'd do a couple of things differently should I have to make another one, but 




overall I think it came out pretty good. At least, it's good enough. There's no time for perfection these days.
I think I'll put the slipcover away for now and bring it out when the house is all finished just in case there's another run in with barbecue sauce.



Hope you're having a good day!

Pam

Friday, April 1, 2016

Updated Master Bath Shower Reveal

Don't you just feel good when you finish a big project?
I mean completely finished...no little things left to check off the punch list.
I mean COMPLETELY finished!

That's how I feel about our Master Bath. 
I was dreading having to update the Mater Bathroom because it has a lot of little and not so little details and lots of molding to paint.
I was also looking forward to having this big project checked off of the "get the house ready to sell" list because there are still a lot of things on that list.



So here's how the shower looked before. We could not put it up for sale looking like that! The brass framed shower was soooooo dated, plus the brass was coming off and the faux marble surround was cracked.

A few weeks ago I posted about the process and told you how Mr. DIY, despite coming down with the flu on his week off, finished the tile for the shower surround and the glass company was able to come out and measure for a frameless enclosure. If you'd like to see that post, you can find it HERE.

We were finally able to paint the bathroom after that, but we lived with our bathroom like this for about 2 weeks before the guys came back. The paint colors are listed down at the bottom.


So happy once this was installed. We couldn't even open the door (per the instructions) for 24 hours.


Mr. DIY installed a new shower head and shower handle/escutcheon.

Here's the before:


And here's the after:

So much better, don't you think?

Next time, I'll show you a few other updates we did in the Master Bath.

Hope you're having a good day!

Pam

PS. the wall color is Sherwin Williams Silver Strand  in an Eggshell finish, mixed at 75%.
      The trim paint color is  Valspar Ultra White in Semi -gloss