Focus in 2016

This is a post I meant to write right after I did Memories, Dreams and Reflections but I forgot about it. This is a good post for me to write, to focus myself on what I need to focus on this year. Of course, making a house a home is always an evolving process but there are so many things that need to get finished in each room. When each room in complete then I can post about what was done in each room.

In case you are wondering why I keep saying focus, that is my word for 2016. So fitting for the road ahead.

I am going to go a little off topic here and say that I would love to make this blog more a full time job. I would love to make that my focus and get paid to do all the things I love to do. I just haven’t found the niche, or process, to make that happen. How happy that would make me to be able to re-purpose items as well and sell them. I would have to make a flea market road trip, people are really weird about how they price their junk around here, too pricey. There is this really awesome craft fair in Albuquerque every year, the first Saturday of December. The last few years there has been this booth that sales painted shutters, and filled terrariums, lanterns, ect. But their prices are still really good. No way they are buying the antique, or used, items around here. This year, I asked and they go to Colorado and Arizona to find most of their stuff. Go figure. I would have thought Texas.

Back to my focus on my house and blog for 2016.

Master bedroom/bathroom:

What a long way it has already come. But a lot to do still.

• Find a way to stick the finials in the ends of the DIY curtain rod
• Reattach the gliders to the floor for the closet doors
• Make the barn door and hardware for the bathroom door (I removed the door because it opened into the bathroom, right at the sink, and I thought it took up too much room). The hardware for the door looking something like this:
• Window cover in the bathroom
• Finish ripping out old shower tile and walls (they were in bad shape once I pulled one off to look)
• Re-tile shower
• Maybe rip out the overhang/bulkhead ceiling over the shower as well and make it more open (have to make sure it’s not hiding duct work or something)
• Add tile back splash to the vanity

Laundry Room:

I pretty much gutted that closet. Sold the washer and dryer because I already had my own. Painted it/parents tiled it, even gave it a tile baseboard. My brother installed the cabinets he brought home for me and I decorated. Because it had had that plastic accordion door, there is currently nothing on there right now. It is aesthetically pleasing so a door isn’t needed for the purpose to hide anything. I just want to be able to block out that noise a little. What do you suggest? It’s in the hallway, the master bedroom doorway is right to the right so I think french doors might be too bulky. I really don’t want to do bi-fold. I think something like what Leigh Anne at Houseologie did here (but I would have to do double doors as a really big door would hang way into the hall when open for the dryer):

Hall bathroom:

This bathroom is pretty much complete but I wouldn’t mind painting the shower tile white. Just to get rid of the yellowy brown tile. It also needs the tile back splash on the vanity.

Spare bedroom:

I use this as an office, storage room. Really all it needs is to be organized and have everything put away or purged.

Brendan’s bedroom:

His room is pretty much complete. It may need some paint touch ups. Oh, and the finials attached to the DIY curtain rod and the floor glides put back on the closet doors.

Living room/dining room/greatroom:

It’s really just one big open space. All I need to do is paint inside the arches again and touch up some other paint. Put some pictures in the frames on the wall.

Den:

• Replace door to screened in porch with a door that is half glass (need the bottom half wood to add a doggie door)
• Replace door molding so it matches other 2 doorways
• Finish shiplap and paint it
• Disguise electric box
• Hang art/pictures/ect
• Would really love to build a faux fireplace on the wall that has the screened in porch on the other side but that would be last on the list (or have a real fireplace installed)

This room was once half of the 2-car garage. I don’t know at what point they finished it off but at least they did is properly. Except that it is colder than the rest of the house right now. But the garage is pretty cold too so maybe I need to do something about that. As you can see, there were 3 (3! people) different wallpapers in here. I think it was her Golden Girls patio type room. See all the plant hooks up there? The floral paper came right off. But the textured stuff on the bottom was a different story. And that whole garage wall wasn’t textured before it was papered so there was a lot of damage with the paper removal. So what’s a person to do? Add shiplap of course (I learned we’re calling it that now because of Fixer Upper). I textured the top half of the wall and added shiplap to the bottom half. And painted. The after isn’t really how the room looks today but it’s not a finished room. The other side, where I am standing, still needs to be finished. Luckily, this room didn’t have popcorn ceilings so when my dad removed the florescent light and put in the ceiling fan instead, he was able to fix the ceiling without really being able to tell there was a hole there.

Kitchen:

• Paint ceiling
• Replace florescent light with track lights that also shine on the island
• Fix top of wall where we removed the wall
• Finish the “beam” from where we removed the wall
• Finish island 1. Paint the shiplap side 2. Trim the edges 3. Add baseboard
• Replace cabinets
• Redo countertops (maybe cement, maybe painted marble look, depends on the new cabinets)
• Replace sink

This is the room that we made livable and have a lot of bang to still add to it. At some point, they replaced the cabinet doors with laminate covered plywood and the drawers are plastic. The laminate is peeling in some spots. I wonder if I could just remove it and paint the wood for now. I might try that. My brother is constantly looking for cabinets for me. I told him they didn’t all have to be the same color, I could paint them. I really need the free route on those. LOL.

As you can see, I also need to finish painting the door. I need to make it a day I will be home all day so I can take off the handle and do the inside and outside. I have a gorgeous color for the outside. And I also need to replace the light outside while I am at it. It’s currently sitting in the hall closet. I also want to make a house address sign, something like what Whitney did on Shanty 2 Chic:

Standing at the kitchen sink, you can see what they had used as their dining room. We built a pantry (my parents did).

For some reason, my photo grabber wouldn’t work and take the picture off of my phone. So I uploaded it to Instagram. Then WordPress couldn’t find that link, so I had to settle with a screen shot. My parents got a new slider upstairs and we were going to switch out this one with their old one, but the company couldn’t take it out in one piece. So I am stuck with this one for now. When I can replace it, it needs to open from the other side but I would prefer french doors. As soon as we get doors on the pantry I can add the curtain rod, which I think I want closer to the ceiling anyway so I will have to move the one at the living room window up too. We are going to put barn doors on the pantry. Something like what Erica at Designing Vibes did (but don’t need the hinges since they are going to slide, and the sliding part will be much like what I am doing for the bathroom door):

 

Well, I think that is a lot to focus on this year. So I best be getting at it. I have four vacation days coming up later this month so I see that door getting done. =-) The future of the house also includes a new furnace (still using the 40-year-old one), new windows and the paint redone on the stucco. Before the beginning of summer break, I also need to get the cut down tree and the cactus trashed and the new fence on the one side of the yard put up. Brendan and I really want a dog and over summer break is a great time for him to be able to get it house broke. Happy DIYing.