Plant Swap

Our neighborhood hosted a plant swap this weekend and it was a blast!  I am fairly new to landscaping, keeping ANYTHING green, planting, transplanting etc so I thought this would be a good opportunity to learn a few things from the people who have been successful growing things around me!

I brought donuts and a couple herbs from ACE to share with the neighbors as my herb garden is only one year old (rosemary, cilantro and oregano). 

Check out what I brought home!  (I think the neighbors felt bad for my lack of expertise and therefore loaded my cart).

Purple Iris.  My neighbor, Pat, has orange iris and would like to share.  Next weekend we plan to dig some.

 Mint- love the smell.  Mojitos anyone?

 Wandering Jew- sorry the picture is fuzzy.  I planted five or six of these.  Apparently they will spread like crazy. 

Can't remember the name of the plant on the left...Basil is on the right.  I'm 'rooting' and will put them in the ground as soon as they're ready. 

View of my bed in the backyard.  I also got two bronze fennel plants (that will attract butterflies) and two other plants (can't remember their names...terrible, I know!) 

Tropical Cannas- I received these as bulbs from from Mrs. Drake's garden (not the plant swap), but they are doing well, so I wanted to share! 

All in all, I really enjoyed the plant swap, the breakfast, and of course the sense of community. Check out our hood's website for more 75229 fun!  http://www.joescreekwalnutgarden.com/

Picture of us from the weekend-  Lexus TACA on the Green at the Mansion.  Have a great week!

Master Bath Reno

So there are a ton of pictures, but I'll be brief.  I think we've made a huge improvement.  What do you think?

Before: with previous owner's things.

Green/ yellow faux marble countertops..pink walls and pink cabinets.

 This is the view of the powder room.  Notice there's not a door on the end looking into the PINK bedroom.

Another view from the bedroom

 First, Karen and I thought we could paint it and make everything go away.  We chose blue.

 Slight improvement, but because I get up at 6am, I couldn't use the powder room because my dear hubby would still be sleeping.  So I crammed into the bathroom, closed the door and suffocated myself before work trying to get ready.

 Then I convinced Jerad that we NEEDED a renovation.  This room was truly my vision.  I priced a few contractors and went with one mid-range. 

First, I had him knock out the wall between the two rooms and move the doorway to the end (between bedroom and big bathroom).  To save money, I kept the existing cabinets as they were in great shape.  I had them add a piece of plywood on top of the cabinetry to raise the height of the countertop (Jerad and I are tall!).  New toilet, new shower, new tile floor and new countertop.

Bye bye shower!

Next, I had him adjust our lighting.  Originally, I wanted canned lighting in the ceiling, but once we removed the fur downs and noticed all the lovely AC pipes, gas lines, and wires, we decided to condense and shrink our fur downs and add the canned lighting in them.  I really like the way it turned out!  Notice the original fur down line...the new ones are about half the size!

New tile shower (without grout in this picture)!  Another $$ saving point-  I had them cut tile and make a design at head's height instead buying different tile to make a contrast.  This was cheaper than buying completely new boxes of different tile to make the design.  It's cheaper to buy in bulk and adds a bit of visual interest!

Fresh paint on the walls, lighting, toilet, and shower...and NEW countertop and sinks!  We kept our existing hardware for the sinks.

Final product!

Our mirror was $99 from Garden Ridge

Lately, I've added some beachy accessories.

 Love that fish!

This is basically what it looks like now. 

 Home sweet home!

Red Room

Jerad and I call our front living area our 'Red Room' (if you walked in our house, it would be immediately to your left).  It's come a long way over the past year and I'm really pleased with it's progress. 

This is the before picture with the previous owner's lovely PURPLE pool table.  Somehow through all the colors, I saw possibilities with this room.  I guess when you get 'the feeling' in a house and when you know it's yours, it's yours, no matter the condition!

At first, we didn't have any furniture for the room.  Our tiny two bedroom apartment furniture didn't spread  very far into 2500 sq ft! 

Then, a couple weeks later, I had some SUPER budget buys at an estate sale across the street.  Literally, I got a dolly and wheeled about eight pieces of furniture across the street.  Thats the best $1K investment I've ever made!  Such a steal!  From this sale, I bought the table on the left (which I painted..was originally forrest green) and the hutch.  The two chairs on the right were 'trash' finds from our old apartment.  Why would someone throw away two descent looking chairs?

I did my best to make the room somewhat home-y with pictures/ lamps.

I also bought this fun red writing desk.  I absolutely love this piece and it's distressed coloring!! 

I put this on the back wall of the room.

Here's the desk filled with stationary, teacups and saucers, and mixing bowls. 

I like the slightly helter-skelter look of the shelves' contents, which is unusual for me.  I normally like accessories fairly organized, but for some reason I like this desk to be slightly misplaced.

Next, I made another huge discovery!  My coworker, Shannon, wanted to donate the couch below.  Silly ol' me...who had an empty house, graciously offered to swing by and pick it up to take it off her hands.  Her donation became the main seating area after a quick cleaning of the cushions and pillows!

I purchased some additional 'red' accessories like the pictures on the wall and the throw pillows from Kohls and Garden Ridge and finally the room was coming together!

Then, we removed that yucky green carpet and replaced it with hardwoods.  To protect the floors we added a brown rug and put the room back together (the rug was a wedding gift from Jerry Griffin).  The mirror was a gift from my mom (which I spray painted white), the chair below was my great grandfather's, and the hutch to the right was another $50 garage sale find.

I'm very pleased with the outcome.  I like that we have a mixture of different woods and painted furniture.  Notice the chair on the far right?  That's the chair from our apartment trash!  With a solid coat of spray painting, it looks like new!

 Red is the overall theme, but it's not overbearing.  I feel like its comfortable and welcoming for our guests.  And I hope you like it too!