Operation: Good enough!

There is absolutely nothing that works as well as a motivator as putting pictures of your cluttered mess on the internet for all to see.  In case you have no idea what I’m talking about, about a month ago, I took pictures of the disaster zone known as the third floor of our condo.  You can check it out here.

For those click adverse folks out there, here it is the space in its clutterific glory:

The best way to tackle a project like this is to enlist help and boy, oh boy, did I need help.  In plain english, I was afraid that I would accidentally discard something that might be important to Justin.  To avoid any accidental decluttering incidents, we tackled this project together.  We worked hard, going through boxes, consolidating certain types of items into one place, instead of many places and little by little, the clutter started to disappear. 

The biggest change to the space was installed last week. 

The reason the third floor was allowed to languish as unused space for so long was heavily influenced by its temperature.  Let’s just say that spending any extended time up there from June through September was…unpleasant.

Something that I am constantly learning through reading everyone elses design blogs is that it is super easy to get sucked into wanting an “idealized” space.  We look at magazines, blogs and television shows like Nate Berkus and HGTV and get unrealistic ideas of how to live in our own homes or what our homes should look like.  Would we all love to live inside of the Pottery Barn catalogue?  Yeah, maybe for a weekend, but eventually, you’d miss the comfortable, fun space that was yours.  *Stepping off the soap box* 

For our third floor, I wasn’t going to fight its role.  For us, this space needs to be a fun, modern, washable room that you can watch tv, drink a beer and play darts or do some crafting.  Not drink tea out of a porcelain tea-cup with our pinkies extended.  Does the furniture match?  No.  Am I okay with that for now?  Absolutely! 

The futon got a new cover courtesy of an Ikea duvet set with two matching pillow cases.   For the two pillow cases, I grabbed two old square throw pillows and tucked the extra fabric inside.  Easy as pie!

Neuman approved!

For the rest of the room, the only goal was to find homes for the stuff that was staying and get rid of the stuff that wasn’t.  Once we cut down on the amount of clutter, the room just came together.

It is now my favorite room in the house. 

-Kate

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Rocking Around the Clock

Back during the days of endless Summer, I had a rocking chair that I was tasked with giving a makeover to.  You might remember from this post.  It was a fun job.  Due to some shipping challenges with the fabric, the project got shelved. 

Finally, as the days got cooler and the leaves started to change colors, the fabric arrived and it was time to shake a tail feather and get that rocking chair back to its rightful owner (and outta my garage). 

This is what the rocking  chair looked like the day I picked it up.  It had some wear on the arms from being an obviously well-loved piece of furniture and the owner wanted to update the fabric seat to match her newly designed living room space. 

I promptly took it home and started gently sanding off the old stain.  Our original plan was to re-stain the piece, but in the end, a rich, dark chocolate paint seemed to be a better fit.

After being painted!

After the paint was dry, the chair came into the house for the last step of its makeover.  The fabric that the client picked out was truly gorgeous. 

It was hard to say goodbye to my friend, the rocking chair.  I hope that it enjoys its new look as much as I do!

-Kate

p.s.  The third floor is just about finished with its magical makeover.  Check back later this week for the fabulous Before & After shots.

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