Office Redesign

I took a long break from posting after our little trip and now I’m back with some updates on the house.  Last week I spent most of the week painting, and it seems that I’ll be doing a lot more of that in the next couple weeks.  It’s amazing what a little paint can do to a room (or hallway or shed, for that matter).   Last week I decided to re-paint the office and change things up because it seemed a little dark and gloomy in there.

The walls before were a nice tan color, but the color just didn’t seem quite right.  We also had mirrored closet doors covering most of one wall, which I didn’t like for several reasons.  First, there were too many mirrors on that side of the room, and second the mirrors had some distortion so I always had a fat head or weird proportions when I walked by.  Third, they were always getting stuck or coming off the track and causing me much (un-necessary) frustration.

So out went the mirrored doors.

And in went the new curtain doors.  So much easier to deal with!

I used a shower curtain rod to hold them up, and I used the same Ritva curtains that we have throughout the house.  Since I don’t have a sewing machine I used the iron-on hemming tape that Ikea provides to make the curtains the right length.

Here are some photos of the rest of the room, complete with new color and curtains on the window.  I took down the blinds because they were kind of a pain, and the curtains work just fine for this room.

What do you guys think?  Do you like the new color?

Hope you all had a great weekend!

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Putting the Office Back Together

The furniture (that we have) is back in the office, and things are looking pretty good in there.  I have some ideas of ways that we can make the room more functional and beautiful, but for right now I think we’ll have to go with what we’ve got.

Jimmee put on the quarter round.  It seems like we’re really into this stuff lately, but I guess we’re doing a lot of the same projects over and over again.

The last thing that had to be done was to paint all the edges and doors.  I didn’t do this first because there was so much sanding and prep work that needed to be done.  The previous paint job literally peeled right off if you touched it.  I pulled a lot of it off with my fingers and then used the orbital sander to help take the rest of it off.

Okay so let’s get to the furniture…

(Little side note to this photo- we can’t find the hardware needed to put the legs back on that chair.  It’s supposed to have the silver legs that are laying beside it, and  I’m hoping we’ll come across the bolts when we clean the house??)

Ha!  I just realized that picture (the one on the desk) used to be in the living room, but I moved it because we’re going to try to find something bigger for over the couch.

The next wall is a little sparse right now- we need to do something about that.

I love this hanging picture holder that my sister gave me for a present.  Maybe I should call it a mobile, or are those just for babies?  I don’t know, but this thing is great and always interesting to look at.

This weekend we are headed to Dallas to go to Ikea to look at kitchen cabinets and pick up a few items for the house.  I plan on getting some white curtains for the office and some other organizational things to put on the desk.  Also maybe some wall shelves…   You never know what you’ll walk out of that store with.  Happy (early) Friday!

Progress in the Office

We’ve been hard at work in the room that we’re calling “the office”- we’re calling it this mainly because it will have some desks in it.  Jimmee and I don’t really need a home office, but I thought it might be helpful when school rolls around again to have a quiet and organized place to study and type papers.

It was hard to start back at square one with a room, but I managed to find some motivation and get started.  First I had to sand down the horrible spray texture that someone put all over the walls, light sockets, and moulding.  This took forever and was not pretty.  At one point I couldn’t even see the wall in front of me due to the thick dust clouds swirling around.  I took a picture at some point in the process, and you can even see the dust on my eyelashes.

In the photo below you can see the dustiness, and you can also see the lovely mauve color that the room used to be painted.  I found this color underneath the tan color as I sanded, and then as I sanded further I found a powder blue color.  Now that I think about the mauve color matched (exactly) the comforter and decorations that were in the previous homeowner’s room.  I’m pretty sure the realtor had her paint over the pink after the house was on the market for over 2 years.  Almost everything in the house- walls, doors, crown and floor moulding- was one color when we moved in, and now it’s all making sense.

Once I had finished the sanding, there was lots of cleanup… walls needed wiping, mirrors and blinds needed cleaning, and the carpet needed to be carried out to the curb.  Here is what I found under the carpet.

And the decaying carpet pad continued across the entire floor.

Not to mention the large number of warped staples buried in the decaying pad.

At this point, I sat back and wondered how much it would cost to hire this job out.  I measured and did the numbers ($3.50 a square foot) and called Jimmee in Wyoming to let him know I’d be calling someone that week.  Then he reminded me of all the plants I had been planning to buy.  It was either the plants or hiring out the floor job.  My motivation was back.

So here is me trying to save money by using an orbital sander for the entire floor.

And it actually went pretty well.

Eventually I did rent the large machine so I could go over everything with the smaller grit sandpaper, and it looked really great when it was all said and done.

So that’s all for today, but I will try to get more pictures up tomorrow of the finished look.  The room is freshly painted, new quarter round has been put on, and the furniture is back in place so it’s ready for photos tomorrow morning (when the lighting is better).  Hope you all have a great night!  xo