Where in the world have we been map

So this is yet another tale of it-was-sitting-in-the-garage-for-three-months-before-I-did-it. There are a lot of those, if you haven’t noticed. It is how I do.

I’ve mentioned like 50 times that one of the things about our basement that I LOVE is the potential for the walls – there are a ton of them. There are not in the rest of the house (open concept, few walls without windows, I’m really not complaining, it’s a great problem to have).

But I do love having a space that has expanses of wide open walls ready to be decorated in the basement. There’s this one that you see when you get down the stairs:

Gloriously empty. And big.

Months ago on a trip to IKEA (I think I got this six months ago?), I picked up one of their huge wall maps. It wasn’t necessarily cheap, but for the size (more than six by four feet), it really wasn’t too bad.

I’ve known I wanted to put it that spot but wanted to change it up a bit. At first I was going to cut the map down into three equal sizes and then mount it somehow – just for something different.

But I knew I’d need something large to mount the maps to, and I didn’t feel like spending the extra cash on big sheets of particle board and all. So it stayed in the garage. (It also lived in the dining room/library and in the mud room for a while too – I like to change up the scenery you know.)

I also had an idea I wanted to implement on the map – I wanted to make it personal and interactive for us. My plan has always been to figure out a way to note where in the world we’ve been – a way to mark where we’ve each traveled. But I didn’t want to use pins that would ruin the map and I wanted it to be safe for little visitors. I mulled over the idea for months and on the flight home from Disney last week it hit me – I knew exactly what I was going to do!

So the other night I started putting the map together…finally. It was VERY easy:

I didn’t get the map as taut as I wanted, but it’s fine. It was easy to put together but not so easy I was willing to do it all over again. :)

I got it hung and you know my middle name is Can’t Leave Well Enough Alone, so I knew it needed a little something. I got some of the cheap, thin lattice boards at Lowe’s, stained them and then cut them down to make a huge frame around the map:

I started out by trying to glue the wood around the edge of the map, but it wasn’t secure enough so I ended up just using my nail gun and installing it that way. The metal frame is so thin and lightweight I knew the nail would go through easily.

It worked great! And I was so happy I added the dark frame – it was the perfect way to finish it off!

The final step was to take a hole punch and some random vinyl colors I had around and start punching:

As I mentioned, I wanted this to be something personal and fun for our family, so the little dots represent each of us (red – me, silver – hubs, yellow – Bub) and I started placing them on the map. I don’t know why it took me so long to think of vinyl instead of push pins, duh, but it worked!

Hubby has been to the coolest places by far:

  

Together we’ve been to some pretty amazing spots too:

 

And the kiddo isn’t doing too shabby in his U.S. travels, considering he’s only six:

That’s not even filled up yet -- I realized quickly that the dots are going to be too big. I am on the lookout for a smaller hole punch so I can keep adding to the U.S. map. :)

I love how the whole thing turned out – I stood back and realized the colors in it(blue, green and yellow with the touch of dark wood) are the exact colors I’m using throughout the basement.

Haaallooooo – perfect!

And I just love that there’s a little extra something that is significant to our family:

You don’t really see the dots until you get up close. I think it will be fun for the kiddo to show his friends where in the world he’s been. :)

If you’ve been around for awhile you know I’ve been using a lot wood tones down in the basement – I’m going for a comfy but ever so slightly industrial/funky vibe down there. I didn’t notice till I was taking pics how well the wood frame ties in with the wood planked wall on the stairs:

I meant to do that. ;)

I’m loving maps lately, obviously – I realized after it was all done that I have two hanging right next to each other down there. OH WELL. I’ll deal. Are you digging maps lately? I’ve seen them used in all kinds of new and fun ways over the past year or so. Love it!

Haven Giveaway!

Hey all!! Hope you are having a lovely Tuesday! I loved reading all of your Disney comments on my last post. ;) We were considering a trip around Christmas and now I’m determined more than ever to get back then!

I’m back today with the last of our Haven Conference ticket giveaways! If you don’t know what I’m talking about when I say Haven, go here to check it out. I’ll wait. :)

We have ONE more ticket to give away and I’ve got it! WHOO!

If you’ve already bought a ticket, you are still welcome to enter – you can sell your old ticket! There are a ton of people waiting to buy one, check out our Haven Facebook page to find someone who may want to attend!

If you are attending, don’t forget to add the button to your site!:

Can’t wait to see you all there in two short months!

To enter, just leave a comment here! (Remember to include an email if you don’t have one attached to your account.) The giveaway will be open till this Thursday, June 13 at noon.

My new love

Hello all!! Happy Monday! I’ve already mentioned that I’m slowing down to my normal sloth-like pace on the blog this summer, but this also means my posting times will vary quite a bit. OK…they do anyway, but they will even more so in the summer. I’m not a good blogger that writes posts ahead and has them ready to go first thing in the morning. I wish I was. *Hangs blogging head in shame.* So things will be a little erratic, I hope you’ll hang in there with me. :)

So. I’ve fallen in love with a new city. Well, I should say park. A big one. You all know how much we love NYC – it’s our favorite place on earth, other than home. But now it has some competition, named Disney. ;)

Last week we took a very quick vacation down to Florida. And when I say quick I mean only about three days. And when I say vacation I mean VACATION – this is our first real family vacation (other than to New York) that we’ve ever taken anywhere that didn’t have something to do with work.

I’m serious people – every trip we’ve ever been on as a family (or heck, even as a couple!) has had something to do with hubby’s work. Every. single. one. And now that he’s retired, we were able to carve out a few days to get away. That would have never happened in summer’s past!

So the whole fact that we got away was so special to me, you have no idea. And the fact that my son and I (yes, I was a Disney newbie) finally got to Disney made it even more special.

We spent our first day in Legoland actually – the Bub is Lego obsessed so we HAD to go there. I think he was more excited about that than he was Disney! We had some interesting moments with downpours and tornado warnings and taking shelter in the restrooms with everyone else in the park, but after about an hour the day turned much better and we were able to really enjoy the park without crowds – it was perfect!

That evening we headed to our hotel at Disney and I started falling in love. We stayed at the Polynesian and it was STUNNING:

I wanted to spend about an hour taking pics but we just didn’t have time while there. I will do it next time – the grounds are just gorgeous!

So I totally got the Disney “thing” the second we walked in to the hotel – we were greeted and escorted through the hotel to our building. The squealing started (from me) when we walked in to our room and I saw the cute little touches everywhere:

And it continued when I realized the view from our room:

I almost cried. I almost cried a few times on the trip. It was emotional to finally get there after 37 years – it made me so giddy and happy.

The emotions certainly didn’t stop when we walked in to the park for the first time:

I had an obsession with Cinderella’s castle. I could have spent an hour just walking around that one thing.

It’s magical, of course:

So I mentioned this was a quick trip and I know so many of you experienced Disney folks are freaking out that we only spent two days at the parks. I know. But it was our only chance to get away in June (hubby is retired from teaching but so busy with other obligations already) and I didn’t want to go later in the summer when it was stupid hot, so this is what we got.

And we took full advantage! We rode a TON of rides in the short time we were there:

The Dumbo ride was one that I was especially drawn to – it just screams Disney to me:

The small world ride was one of my favorites too, but Splash Mountain was our family fave hands down. SO. much. fun.

We spent one evening in Epcot where we dined in Mexico:

And it was incredible. ;)

Hubby wanted us to stay for the Illuminations show that night, it gorgeous evening:

The show was AWESOME, we all loved it. Although hubs said it used to be even cooler and was more of a laser light show:

This view was another one of those that made me misty:

It was an amazing trip. I totally get it now. Totally. I am hooked.

I didn’t plan for our first trip like most would – I didn’t ask friends what we should do, didn’t read any blogs, didn’t make any dinner reservations. I’m the kind of person that just needs to figure it out for myself. I didn’t want us to be trying to rush to this or this “must do” while we were there, I just wanted us to experience it as we would.

And we did. And it was perfect. :)

I figured out a few things fast on this trip – here are my tips for any fellow newbies who may be going this summer:

1. Don’t try to look cute. Just don’t. The heat/weather/splash mountain gods will laugh at you.

2. Buy the fan with the water in it that you pass on the way into the park and think, “I’m not so not spending money on that!” For all that is good…BUY IT.

3. Dole Whip is seriously the most amazing, beautiful, delicious thing you will ever, ever, ever eat. Ever.

That’s just about all you need to know. :)

We didn’t even get two full days in the parks – the last day we got slammed with this:

We waited it out for about an hour, then when it calmed down a bit we did a little more, but it was just too intense. We headed back to the hotel for a much needed nap and a great meal.

Usually when we head home from a trip I’m ready. The only time I’m not is when we’re in New York. I felt that this time too – I was SO sad to leave. I wanted to stay for another week – and for this homebody that’s saying something:

We’re already planning our next trip. Hopefully later this year. :) I cannot WAIT!!

Are you a Disney fan? Did you feel like this after your first trip? How many times have you been? When do stop missing it? ;)

**P.S. Early June was a great time to go – I wanted us to go at this time of year on purpose. We were there before so many schools were out for the summer, the weather was hot but not as hot as it gets in mid/late summer and we actually got a hotel discount for staying that week. The only issue was the rain – I hear it’s an especially rainy season for Florida.

Our kitchen, then and now

Hey all! I’ve mentioned a few times lately that this time of year makes me nostalgic about our house. We moved in (after having it built) almost exactly nine years ago and my blogging anniversary was in May, so it’s been fun to see our house transform in real life and on the blog throughout the years. :)

One of my favorite transformations in our house is in our kitchen. Years ago I did a few projects that really made a big difference in there, and none of them were hard or expensive. Of course more has changed since then -- it looks SO different to me now!

I thought it would be fun to go back in time and then take a look at how it looks now too. I LOVE before and afters, oh yes!!

I hand picked everything in this room (well, every room) when we built – I stressed about every aspect of the room, and years later I still like the basics. The problem was it was just SO dark and heavy feeling:

Now don’t get me wrong, I don’t think it was bad – my tastes just changed. I needed to brighten things up in there! The biggest culprit when it came to the dark feeling was the black tiled backsplash.

I tried taking it off, but that was a MESS. So I went to plan B and just covered it all with beadboard. ;)

I think it was maybe $60 or something like that? I just glued it on top and it made SUCH a huge difference in there!:

The walls are the same color, obviously the cabinets are too – but that white backsplash really makes a big impact!

Here’s another shot of the old backsplash on the other side of the room:

By the way, yes the afters are taken with a better camera and the operator (me)knows a little more about photography now, but still – check it out!:

Years ago when I did the backsplash we also changed out the faucet and sink. Little things when you think about a whole kitchen for sure, but they made a big impact.

I love my sink area. It’s nothing fancy, but I have a window and lots of natural light and it makes me happy:

You can read about installing the sink (it was a REALLY FUN TIME) and the name of the sink and faucet in this post.

Here’s another before shot from about three years ago – and seriously, it feels like it’s been ten since the room looked like this. For real, crazy:

Excuse my notes, I was explaining my changes. ;)

Now that same view looks like this:

Have I mentioned I luuuurve my new table? Maybe.

Another little project that made a big impact was the kitchen island. OK, well it wasn’t little – I think it got four redos? Five? Here it is in its builder basic glory:

Awww yeah. Everything matched.

By the way, so many of you ask me about my granite countertops. They’re actually laminate. ;) I may write a whole blog post just about them because I love them that much.

Yes. You heard me.

I love laminate.

Ours is a granite look – you can find similar counters at the Wilsonart site here. Now they make them in a high definition version too and those look even more like granite than ours do. We got an edge on ours that makes them look more like a solid surface too.

But back to the island – as I said, it got a few redos, but after the last one, this is how it ended up and has stayed:

Butcher block on top, beadboard and board and batten on the sides and a lighter color made a huge difference! I love our island and I’ve promised to leave it alone for a while. :)

A few months ago I decided to change up a weird little wall we have in the kitchen and I think it adds a bit of fun and whimsy to the room:

I always say most rooms should have something in black – I think it just grounds a space. A chalkboard wall is the perfect way to accomplish that!

My most recent change in here is in the nook area – here’s how it looked a few years ago:

Again, I’m not going to dog my “old” look and act like I didn’t love it – I did. But it changed with time like the rest of the room (and we took the big blow up pool off the deck too, gah).

Just noticed the high chair too. Sniff. ;)

Here it is now with the new light fixture and the DIY farmhouse table:

Oh yeah, and the chairs I had been drooling over for months (just a less expensive version):

 

So there it is in a nutshell – years of changes in one compact little blog post. ;)

I have been planning BIG changes in here for about two years now, but have wanted to get other projects done first. (Ahem, cough, bathrooms.) I could easily see this kitchen becoming my dream kitchen -- I just need to get a final word on some of the ideas I have (if they are possible), and then I’ll be diving in. I’m still not sure if it will be this year though.

Have you been along for the changes in here all these years? Have your tastes changed a lot over the past five years or so? Blogging kind of encourages mine to happen more than the average person I’m sure, but I do love watching the transformation!

If you have any questions on anything I didn’t mention, ask in the comments! Have a lovely weekend!

DIY Craftsman Garage Door

So…yet again I’m blogging about project that I procrastinated on for weeks months and it only took 30 minutes or so to do. Seriously, this sat in the back of my SUV for forever! And with dark fast approaching last night we got it done in no time at all – after all that waiting.

Here’s the thing…we live in a suburban neighborhood. And I LOVE it. Someday would it be nice to live on more land? Maybe. But for now, with a young one, this is great for us.

But just like the inside, I try to do little things to the outside to change up the appearance a bit, so it doesn’t look just like everybody else’s house on the street. OK, there are no houses that look just like ours on our street, but you get what I’m laying down.

I like a little detail, a little somethin’. And I found it while browsing Home Depot a few weeks months ago. Here’s our garage door as it was:

Boring. Really, it’s fine – it’s been boring for nine years and I haven’t cared. But over the past year or so I’ve been wanting to spruce it up a bit. I may paint it a different color eventually (I was thinking BLUE! Kidding.) but for now this quick change made me happy. :)

Anyhoo, this is what I found for only $10 -- I snatched it up!:

I love the look of craftsman/carriage door hardware – LOVE. I’ve been thinking of adding this type of hardware for a long time. It helps that this totally works with the exterior of our house too. It’s very much a cottage-type look and I knew this would look great! You can get a set online for as little as $25 but that’s the lowest I’ve seen a one till now -- $10 was a steal!

At first I was going to tape them up to see how I liked them, but the tape wasn’t holding, so I just said WHAT THE HECK and drilled them in. Schnikeys. That was stressful.

I mean, holes in the garage door people! That stresses. me. out. And while I was installing them my assistant, AKA, the kiddo, kept laughing and calling them mustaches on the garage.

?? Mustaches?

They are really decent quality – heavy metal and I liked that the screws even came with black ends to match:

I added the handles in the middle and was still stressing about drilling and then the Bub said the garage door now had mustaches and a nose. Still don’t get the mustaches. Still not funny while Mama was sweating.

I stood back and looked and I REALLY loved it!!:

WHY does our driveway look blue? It’s not blue.

Now for a real craftsman/carriage door look we need the windows across the top. I’ve seen that you can do that yourself with paint or purchase some vinyl – when they’re done it really does look like real windows. We’re not that far away from the street though, so I don’t know if it would just look super fake. I may try cutting some black vinyl just to see how it looks.

For now I’m quite happy with the little change. It’s not something you’d notice driving by, but you’d notice something was a little different, you know?:

I love the new garage door mustaches and nose! I think they’re adorable!

I love a simple and inexpensive little change! Have you tried changing up something on your garage door? Added hardware or painted it? Anyone tried those faux windows? Do tell!

June Before and After Party!

Hello all and happy summer to you!! First of all, thank you so very much for the lovely comments on my last post! We had a fantastic celebration this weekend and kicked off the new chapter right. What’s funny is I think my husband may be almost as busy “retired” as he was teaching – he’s got so many projects and organizations he’ll be working with. It’s already started!

It’s time for the June Before and After Party, already! I’ll just tell you now that June means summer (duh) and summer means I turn into a sloth. It’s true. I sleep in, take lots of naps, take lots of time away from the computer…so bear with me. I’ll probably go down to three posts a week, maybe even this week. We’ll see.

I was SO stinking impressed with all the links last month! I was seriously in awe and it was hard to stop with the highlights. They are were all awesome, here’s just a few that caught my eye!

Rachel’s home was beautiful before but now it’s simply stunning:

I DIE! I love it! Just lovely. Go here to see more on the transformation and the landscaping!

I have seen a lot of paint swatch art but Fabrizia’s was the coolest so far:

She said it didn’t take long and it makes such an impact! Art is usually so expensive – this is just the opposite!

OH my goodness, I was drooling over Courtney’s bathroom redo:

Just…seriously? Awesome. They DIY’d this too! Totally impressed.

Rebecca took a cast off piece of furniture and gave it a FUN color:

I don’t if I’d be brave enough for yellow but it is perfect in her home! She always rocks it.

I love how Brandi took an older sofa (that is perfectly nice and comfy) and made it look so different with modern pillows:

I love EVERY single pillow – what a great combo! She mixed patterns perfectly.

Cindy is pretty much an awesome mom – she helped her kids paint their kitchen cabinets and it turned out SO GOOD!:

I am digging the two colors – it is so modern and fresh! Want to come to my house next Cindy??

Kammy created a beautiful room for her daughter – all the details are just lovely:

That floor is especially amazing, isn’t it?

And the last one, but I could have kept going! I loved the kitchen over at Create Bake Celebrate – especially this armoire and the stone backsplash:

I have an obsession with anything x’d lately. Love that cabinet!

Now it’s time to see what you were up to in May! Like always, please add a link to TDC or this button (copy and paste the code) to your post to be considered for the round up post next month:

<div align="center"><a href="http://www.simplehomeinteriordesign.blogspot.com/" title="TDC Before and After" target="_blank"><img src="http://www.homestoriesatoz.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/beforeAndAfterButton_thumb1.gif" alt="TDC Before and After" style="border:none;" /></a></div>

Now it’s time to link up! The party will be open for a week, have fun! I’m off to take a nap!