HAPPY 8 YEARS, HOUSE!

Thanks to the magic of Facebook Memories™ I woke up this morning to the news that exactly 8 years ago today, we were handed the keys to our house! 

I thought that called for a little trip down memory lane and some new pics to celebrate! 

Here is what the house looked like when we moved in: 

And here it is today! 

I really didn't give much thought to painting the trim and soffit last year but in these photos it's like "BAM! 100% improvement!" and it's going to look 200% better when the whole house is done. 

And now, for a little (long) trip through the past eight years of home-ownership bliss ; )

As I mentioned, we were handed the keys on April 20, 2009 after a couple of months worth of hemming and hawing with the bank about the lack of heat among other things that come along with a foreclosed property. 

With a village worth of help, we put down sod, 

painted some interior rooms, and got married in the backyard on July 18, 2009

We wrote our very first blog post on October 6, 2009! It had exactly 0 pictures and an actual list of all of the things wrong with the house. It was written by Conan and you can really feel his "what the h did I just sign up for?" seeping through. But he ended it with ~

"IT REALLY IS A BEAUTIFUL HOUSE."

A few weeks later we gave a long overdue interior tour of the house: 

Missing cabinet doors, sagging ceiling, impossible to clean floor and an oven that didn't actually have a 220v outlet behind it. ~Those were the days~

This is the room where mismatched salvation army chairs go to spend the rest of their days, apparently.

Here are some other things we wrote about that year:

- Our honeymoon in Colorado (awwww)

In February of 2010, we *finally* got central heating installed in the house

A few months later we learned our first BIG lesson after we hired a fly by night company to replace the roof. It ended fine but it was...a journey to say the least. 

For my birthday that year, my dad built the living room shelves that basically made us famous on the internet ; ) 

Here's what they look like today

Some other things we wrote about that year:

- "Old" photos of our old house
- Heating the house
- Our first offer on the house!
- Removing one of the broken radiators
- New bedroom lighting
- Conan's little red sports car
- More radiator removal

In March of 2011, we started our first major interior renovation with the upstairs bathroom

The whole remodel took just a little over a year to complete. Here's what I wrote about during that year: 

- Cleaning up the guest room (round 1)
- Driving to Kansas City to buy an antique sink
- Buying escutchions
-The 1919 trash we found under the stairs in the bathroom

- Stripping and re-finishing the old door

- Painting
- Tiling the bathroom floor
- Tiling the shower

- Grout & more Grout 

- Refinishing a clawfoot tub

- Moving a clawfoot tub up two flights of stairs

- Turning an old TV cabinet into a linen cabinet

Our big project in 2012 was a tiny budget remodel of the kitchen. If you'll recall, the bathroom had leaked into the kitchen causing those ceiling tiles to droop so we decided to just tear the whole thing down and paint it white. 

Here's the before: 

And the after: 

Maybe the biggest thing in 2012, was the purchasing of our vintage camper and starting up Lamphouse Photo Co. 

Here's what the ol' girl looked like almost 5 years ago: 

And here's what she looks like today! 

Here are some other things we wrote about in 2012:

- Showering in a washing machine drip pan for a year

- Moving a clawfoot tub up two flights of stairs

- Turning an old TV cabinet into a linen cabinet
- Painting our old fridge with chalkboard paint
- Refinishing our kitchen floors
- DIY Antique Trouble Lights
- Finding a vintage Roper Stove at a garage sale for $45
- Saving our sash windows
- Being featured in This Old House Magazine
- Our first David Bazan Living Room Show
- Using the 1940 census to learn about our house
- Talking to the granddaughter of the family who lived here 1938-1944
- Being featured on Houzz
- Stumbling upon photos of our house from the late 40s
- Being in This Old House Magazine AGAIN!
- Being given a piano

Our big project for 2013 was the downstairs bathroom, affectionately dubbed the "toilet closet"

Here's what we started with:  

And here's the finished product: 

Here are a few other things that happened in 2013:

- We gave you guys the deets on our vintage camper plans
- We got a very cool antique camera cabinet
- We added a darkroom to our vintage camper
- Slow decorating
- We refinished our FREE dining room table
- Finding the perfect sink for the toilet closet

In 2014, we did a few little things like sprucing up the guest room to use as an Airbnb: 

Visiting Yellowstone National Park

and how the chalkboard fridge was holding up

We also did some work on the exterior of the house and added our beloved Birdie Booth to the Lamphouse lineup!

Here are some other things we wrote about in 2014:

 - Our second David Bazan Living Room Show
- Replacing the front porch steps
- More chalkboards

2015 was a pretty slow year for the house but we did manage to add built in shelves to the dining room: 

We built a second Birdie Booth to keep up with demand and put a "pool" in the backyard : ) 

We also got back to the business of painting the house. Picking colors

Climbing around on scaffolding, etc. 

In 2017, Lamphouse became our full-time jobs (INSANE!) so that occupies pretty much 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Still, we're hoping that the house will get some attention this year as well. 

This year, our big projects are working on the exterior of the house and installing a privacy fence in the backyard.

A lot has happened in the past eight years and it was a trip to see it all laid out in front of me in pictures! I know we're not the most punctual bloggers but we really did leave a nice record of our time in the house so far. 

Thanks for hanging around these past eight years! 

Keep Smiling! 

In Defense of Slow Decorating

You know how the saying goes: 

When God closes a sink, he opens a toilet paper holder. 

Or something like that? Anyway, this weekend that is exactly what happened. 

It all started on Friday afternoon when I left work and went to Old Town Architectural Salvage. You may recall me mentioning them a few times before. We bought our upstairs bathroom sink faucet there, our upstairs bathroom light fixture there, our soap dish for the bathtub, and too many push button switch plate covers to count as well as other odds and ends over the years. So, I head there in search of a really small antique sink of some kind. And after a little confusion about what I was actually looking for and what my budget was I came across this guy: 

I put my giant feet in there for scale.

It was about 17" from back to the front of the bowl and about the same across. I thought I had found the one and I frantically called Conan and my mom for advice. Could we mount a sink to the wall? Would I ever find another sink with the fixtures that's small and $45? After mulling it over on my own for a few minutes I decided to ask if they would take a little off because as you can see in the picture, there's a considerable piece of porcelain missing from the front. They assured me that I could get a porcelain kit to fix it for $10 and it would be good as new. I wanted them to take that amount off of the sink but they wouldn't budge.

So I left empty handed. Bummer. 

**You may recall me saying something about a corner sink when we began work on the toilet closet but since we moved the duct work back, it looks like we'll be able to put the toilet completely out of view and so we may have room for a small, regular sink. I would really like to find a vintage sink like this one but it seems like the smaller and more unique they get, the more expensive they are.**

In the end, I'm glad I didn't get it because it looks like even a measly 17" would have been pushing it in the size department. 

We're planning a trip to a couple of our very favorite antique spots in the next couple of weeks to continue the search and even if we don't find it then, I'm taking my own slow decorating advice: 

You will find exactly what you want, for what you are comfortable paying, if you are willing to wait.

Sometimes I get so ahead of myself and I feel like "If I don't get this right now, I'll never find another one like it!" Now, sometimes that may be true but by and large I've found that if you aren't in a real hurry (that sink won't be installed anytime soon) then you should wait for the exact, perfect thing. 

And that's where the toilet paper holder comes in.

Truth circle. For the past 2 AND A HALF YEARS we have not had a toilet paper holder in our upstairs bathroom. Instead, our TP plays musical chairs, moving from the edge of the sink to the back of the toilet to the floor, shame, shame, etc. etc. 

But on Saturday night while browsing Craigslist, as you do when you're cool like me, I found the Holy Grail of TP holders. A solid brass one for $10! 

I know it sounds silly to wait that long to put your toilet paper somewhere because, "Dang girl, you can always replace it!" but I couldn't bring myself to even put one up if it wasn't exactly what I wanted. 

 And this is exactly the one I wanted!

It just took me a REALLY long time to find it.

Same thing with the accordion mirror we put up a while back.

I had been putting my makeup on, straddling the toilet in the water closet downstairs for over 2 stinkin' YEARS while I looked for the perfect, brass, extendable arm mirror to put because I couldn't get close enough to the mirror upstairs to see to do my makeup without my glasses on. #nearsighted4lyfe

Well, a few months ago I finally found one on Etsy that was exactly what I wanted and I couldn't be happier! 

Moral of the story: If you see something and you have even the slightest reservation about the price or the color or the condition. Don't buy it. It ain't the droids you're lookin' for. 

So, the search continues for a sink for the downstairs bathroom. I really think that an antique sink will make the room look more traditional no matter which way we go color-wise and it will be a nice detail for that room.

Up next?

I believe we're going to start framing the left side of the bathroom (where the toilet will go) so wish us luck! 

Toilet Closet Update & Inspiration

Well, we've officially finished one week with only one "bathroom" in the house and it's been really great for our relationship. I kid. But seriously, I didn't realize how handy it was having two bathrooms even if one of them, for all intents and purposes, wasn't even a real bathroom. 

Which gets me really excited when I start to think about having an ACTUAL bathroom downstairs with a sink and outlets and room to twirl*

*small twirl, arms only partially extended

So, here's how it looks at the end of week one: 

Here's the before/during/after for reference: 

Things you can see in these pictures: 

• The toilet flange was removed. That pipe had to be cut down in the basement because the flange was glued into it. No big deal since the pipe is going to have to be re-routed anyway since the toilet will not be in the same place. 

• The water supply going into the toilet also had to be cut so that we could pull the floor up. We used this neat thing called a shark bite to seal it off. My mom cut the pipe and popped that thing on in just a couple of minutes. 

• The "floor" has been pulled up. There's still the sub-floor down there but since it looks like the toilet supply was leaking, I'm thinking that wood might not stick around. We'll see. 

• The most exciting thing is the moving of the return air duct. It's about a foot to the left now and that means more space! It also means that we can start to see where walls will be and how far back we will be able to go on that side of the room. 

Here's a better look at the before and after of that:
BEFORE it was really close to the old bathroom wall, less than a foot.

AFTER it's moved a foot to the left so the wall can go back that much further! Yay walls!

Now then, let's talk fun stuff. Inspiration pictures!

I've noticed when you're looking for pictures of water closets or powder rooms, a lot of the really small ones use a bold color or pattern on the walls. It's kind of counter-intuitive but it works. 

Here are a few looks that I like for one reason or another.

This water closet from Meet the Shaffers has been on my "it" list for a long time. The high gloss green paint, the glossy black light fixtures:

Mmmmm glossy black...

Speaking of glossy black, this bathroom from Lonny may not be as small as ours but I love how the inky black goes all the way to the baseboards and you can see that they used hex tile like we're planning to. 

A few more ahem...bold options include chalkboard walls like this bathroom

I REALLY love the Twombly-ness of this but I'm not sure if it would work for everyday use. I can hear my mom cringing right now and saying something like, "Well, you have clean it!" I think, more than anything I just like the pattern and the colors here. The white, the brown, the blue/black. 

I also really dig using magazine covers or photos as wallpaper like this one from ElleDecor

Or this other one from Lonny

(originally, I thought we might have to do our sink like this - cut into the wall on the left)

Dogs and flowers! Flowers and dogs! That's just a little too bright for my taste but I admire their commitment and I've been brainstorming a way to use all the extra National Geographic covers I come across while thrifting. Hmmmm...

I also really like more traditional colors and styles because there's a chance that someone, someday might not be as excited about a chalkboard bathroom as I was.

My mom mentioned doing tile all the way up the walls just to make it easy to clean but I just don't think it's in our budget. Maybe just paint some faux tiles on? That'd be cool, right? Right?! Either way, I really like the white tiles/black grout and brass fixtures of Mandy Milks's bathroom from House & Home.

So, whadaya' think?

Stick with traditional or try something bolder?

There are pros and cons to each, I suppose. I'm going to try and locate a sink that I like this weekend so we can start thinking about how much room we have when we frame everything in. So I guess I've still got a while until I need to start thinking about paint colors, huh? 

: ) 

Have a great weekend!