The best way to prevent a fight is to have a great game plan. Hands down. 

If you are starting a renovation in one room, and plan on moving to the next, think about how all the changes will affect the rest of the house. For example, we replaced a door in our kitchen, but when we went to plan out our kitchen renovation, we ended up moving the door, and the swing was the wrong direction. Had we planned it out, we could have prevented ourselves from buying two doors instead of just one. 

Obviously, there will always be curve balls and changes, but to have a really good idea of what the "big picture" is going to be can definitely help with redundant projects- like replacing a door twice! Or ripping down drywall because you decided you needed some ducting or electrical. 

Knowing what you and your spouse really want in the end is going to save you some grey hairs. I see this all the time between designers and contractors, not just between spouses. To have a bad design costs tons of money, and to make {sometimes} silly changes, can cost tons of money. If the toilet doesn't fit in the room because you forgot to account for the door swing, you are going to have to change it! Depends on what point you are at in construction, but it is not exactly easy to rip out a toilet and just move it. It can mean ripping out your flooring, in-floor heating, plumbing, drywall, everything! So know what you want, and have a good design. If you need to make changes, make sure you make them at appropriate times- like before they cut the marble counter tops. 

Need advice? Feel free to ask! 

Obviously, during a renovation you want it done ASAP. However, they can draw out for months. Take time away from the project- go for a date, eat dinner OUT (rather than ordering in- pretty typical move for during a 
kitchen reno) Besides, what's one extra day on a renovation? 

Taking breaks actually leaves you feeling refreshed and ready to tackle the world, anyways. Maybe with a few extra breaks, you'd actually be more productive and get it done sooner! Why else do you think employers give you coffee breaks? So, while it may seem counterproductive to take a day away from the renovation, just do it. 
You'll save your sanity, if nothing else. 

Welcome to the first post of 2015! It is so hard to believe another year has flown by. I hope everyone's year is off to a great start. 
I know mine is! 

This post should have been written last year, but I finally got around to hanging the shelves, so again, I didn't get around to showing off this project until now. Maybe this should be a New Years Resolution- just get it done! 

After fixing things like the crack in the foundation, and tsome plumbing issues, we got the bathroom done. 
Not just half done. Really done. 

Even though it is a small bathroom, I really wanted to experiment with painting it black. To add some juxtaposition to it, I added white wainscoting to create balance. You just can't go wrong with black and white! I even painted the ceiling black, and I love how the room feels. 

When we originally renovated out bathroom, we picked out these great tiles. I absolutely loved the texture of them. Against our better judgement, we went with a white grout, as well. I will admit, at the time, it looked so clean and crisp. Until it didn't look so clean anymore. White grout sucks!

It was also sort of boring and bland. There is a fine line between "clean and crisp white" and "boring and bland white". My bad.

So, after living with it for a while, I swore the next time I cleaned the shower I was just gonna paint it. Well, the time came, and I had to keep my promise to me.

I had actually bought this grout paint (Mapei brand) earlier for a smaller project, and was pretty pumped at how easy it was. When we installed our new fireplace hearth (blog flashback here), we just used the left over white grout from our bathroom tile project, knowing that I'd be painting the grout because the white looked horrible against the grey tile.

Admittedly, it doesn't look great when it's painted on at first. I stood back and thought back to when I was a little kid and I was painting a house with bricks on it or something. I'm pretty sure that's what my painting would have looked like. 

The rule was paint near the lines, right?

Regardless of how messy it looked, I knew it was going to look great. I loved that there was some contrast in it now, and that contrast really showed off the texture of the tiles that we had been so drawn to. It really brought it back to life. And the only other step was to wipe that excess paint off the tiles.

And maybe start panicking about what tomorrow will bring... As of right now, I still have a working dishwasher, stove, fridge and sink. Tomorrow, I may not...

Happy Last Day of a Working Kitchen!

xo Jena

I've lost my cabinets. And some drywall. And a closet. Please don't return if you find them, though! The demolition of our current kitchen has truly begun.

While we are still waiting for our new door and countertops, we've slowly started the process of pulling down some upper cabinets, losing the front entry closet to open up the kitchen and ripped down the drywall where the new door will go.

It is definitely a process, and every night we chat about the best order to do everything in. Let's rip down this drywall, then let's take down the microwave. Oh, don't forget we need to do this. And that.

We knew we had about a month before we had the door and countertops in, so every day we are doing something to get ready between watching Nemo and Shrek.

I pulled out most of the tools I know how to use: mainly using the cut-to-length option that comes with the purchase of wood at your local hardware store. I did, however, save them the trauma of every single cut I was needing for my door shutter.
 I actually did most of it myself.

Honest!

First of all, I spray painted the brass at the bottom of the legs in my go-to colour of hammered black by Krylon and sanded the flaking paint off. It felt like I was wiping mud off my kid, the paint came off so easily. I do have intentions of painting or staining the legs... Someday. 

We had an old mattress pad that I cut up for the seat cover. I gave myself 4" extra material around the edges of the table so I'd have enough material to staple it to the underside of the table.

I sewed the four points of the table, so it was more of a fitted cover. At some point, I started thinking that there was nowhere enough padding to make this comfortable, so I started racking my brain for ideas about what I could use. I went into the basement, and the first thing I saw was the left over underlay from our carpets. I love moments like that. It's meant to be. I cut out a chunk of underlay and put that under the mattress pad- turned- fitted cover

After enough broken resolutions, I decided a couple of years ago to embark on my yearly journey of life a little differently. Rather than making concrete resolutions, I reflect on the last year and come up with the idea of how I could do this year better. Last year was pretty good, so not too much is probably going to change. 
In other words... I just didn't get around to making 
any resolutions for the past few years! 

Our closets were this bright orange wood. Not exactly lovely, but not exactly high on my priority list either, as they were out of sight. But when we decided to move the guest room to downstairs, the babies room into the guest room, and the office into the babies room, I figured I might as well fix up the closet before I put all of his clothes back in. A quick couple coats of paint on the shelf and a shower curtain rod cover on the closet rod, and that was that.

I rummaged through the recycle bin to see what I could save and create. I found a tissue box that had a really cool pattern, some cardboard, and the rest I grabbed from the supply box.

I cut out this piece of cardboard into a donut shape, and threw on some paint I had from a sample tin. I only did one quick coat and so it ended up drying a little streaky, which actually was what I was going for. It looks like painted wood from a distance.

This is where I busted out the hot glue gun. I used those pieces of the tissue box I had cut out and glued them to clothes pins. I also ran some thick jute around the edges of the cardboard, to finish off the ugly edges thanks to my dull scissors.


Lastly, I glued the clothes pins onto the front and some heavy duty magnets to the back of the donut shaped piece of cardboard 
and voila.