My Favorite Room

I have three rooms that I consider my favorites:  My sewing room, my loft and my tea room.  I consider these rooms my favorites because they are the only rooms in the house that I decorated the way I wanted, without any thought of it being too feminine for my husband.

I'm showing my tea room today only because the other two need a little cleaning and straightening first.  They are not photo ready!  I've shown my tea room before at Christmas time here.

Here's my very "me", froo-froo, feminine, room in the Spring.

Notice the little chandelier above the piano.  You all know how I love chandeliers.  The piano is at least 60 years old, passed down to my mother from my grandmother, and then down to me.  We've all taken piano lessons on this same piano, including my two sons when they were young.

The fainting couch was given to us by my sister-in-law.  She had it re-done and it's very old and beautiful.  The arms come down so that it lays flat.  When SIL was re-decorating her home she no longer had a place for this and knew it would go perfect in my room.

I have a small collection of red transfer-ware plates.  Some are hidden in a cupboard, but I love to see these hanging on the wall.  The small counted cross stitch quilt  of a piano next to them I made several years ago.

A hanging cupboard holds tea cups, a miniature crystal collection, and a Maude Humphrey collection.  The little purse necklace hanging on the door I knit from crochet string and beads.

This cupboard holds more teacups.  My better ones.  I also have a small collection of antique fan and floral vases.  The pillow on the floor is a cross stitch that I made.

More tea cups on the tea cart, along with a pewter coffee service that was given to us as a wedding gift by my cousin almost 32 years ago now.  Those rhododendron bushes in front of the window are almost ready to pop open and will be a beautiful purple any day now.  I'll get a picture of that when it happens.  It's so pretty, but they just don't last very long.

I made this tiny little Tea for Two quilt that sits on the tea cart.  My mother decorated the old antique silver spoon sitting next to it.

Now I need to get my other two girly rooms cleaned up and ready for their photo shoot.  Keep checking in.  My darling loft has yet to make it's pictorial debut.

Linked today to Show Off Your Cottage Monday
The Plumed Pen's Tuesday's Tea for Two
Lady Katherine's Tea Time Tuesday
Martha and Terri's Tea Cup Tuesday
A beach Cottage - Good Life Wednesday

Powder Room Reveal

Here it is!  It's done!  Well, almost.  The side splash to the vanity top isn't in yet, but I tried to camouflage  it with a plant for now.
This remodel came with it's share of frustrations, as most remodels do.  From the huge hole in the wall behind the old light fixture to the plumbing pipe that had fallen down through a large hole in the bottom of the cabinet and into the floor.  You notice all the shortcuts taken by builders when you take on a job like this.
Hubby became very frustrated over these things because he insisted on doing the work himself.  My frustration came when I would ask him if I could call someone, such as a professional electrician and plumber.  His response to me would always be, "I can do this myself!".  O.K., O.K. but is it worth all this frustration?  Well, I now must say, he did a great job.  Much better than the original builders!
I showed the before pictures in a post several weeks ago, but I need to show them now next to the "afters".

Here's the "before" bathroom.  Not horrible, but very basic and low grade building materials.  Notice the solid green walls.

After:

The marble top, copper vessel bowl, faucet, toilet paper holder and towel ring were all ordered through Lowe's.  They were very helpful and knew their stuff.

Before:

After:

The Tuscan wash paint and murals were done by a professional painter/artist friend of mine.  As you can see, I didn't want to go with a basic bathroom light fixture.  I saw this little rusted metal chandelier and fell in love with it.  I already had the mirror and little "powder room" plaque.

Here was the big hole left behind the old fixture.  This was partway through the drywall patching that Hubby had to do.  It was just one big hole!

This is the cabinet before:

I asked Brenda, my painter, to make it look like a hand painted old piece of furniture.  That's exactly what she did.  She even put two little legs underneath the front.

Then came the new valance, from Lowe's

The new rug, from Wal-Mart

Just yesterday I finished up with accessories.  The rusted bronze vase and eucalyptus are from Wal-Mart.

I found this picture at Ross for $9.99.   It looks like Tuscan scenery to me and I just loved the frame. 

These wall sconces are also from Ross and they are hanging on the wall above the toilet.

Here was the old plastic wastebasket and basket for magazines.

This is the new magazine basket and wastebasket, from Ross for $4 and $5.

Much more Tuscan looking, don't you think?

I also wanted to change out the old plastic switch plate cover, which wasn't an easy thing to do.  The configuration of it is not a popular one and the only place I could find one to replace it was on-line.  I had it in a few days from Switch Plate Superstore.

There it is!  I'm very happy with it and find myself just turning on the pretty chandelier and just standing in there looking at everything!  

I'm linking this post to Cielo's Show Off Your Cottage Monday

and also to Creative Bloggers Party

Powder Room Remodel

I've been waiting for this for six years!  Not a new diamond ring!  Not a nice fancy new outfit!  Not a new car!  But a remodeled little powder room.  Isn't it funny how priorities change over the years.  I love to be creative and this extends to the remodeling and decorating of my home.  I not only like it to be nice and new and clean, but I like it to be a little different.  I like someone to walk into the room and say, "Wow, that's so different.  How did you do that?  Where did you get that idea?"

My little powder room is original to the house and still has the old builder's grade materials.  I've worked with it this way and tried to make it as "cute" as I could.  I sort of had ideas in my head as to what I wanted to do and knew it wasn't going to be real cheap or easy, as most remodels aren't.  So I waited.  Now the time has come.  I knew what I wanted and I set to work on finding the pictures that were in my head.  It's still a work in progress, but as promised in yesterday's post,  I'll show you the development so far.

To start with, here are the before pictures.

Notice the solid green walls.  This was also the ceiling color.  This counter top just grated on my eyes.   I hated it!  And the vanity is just plain and cheap grade.

I did what I could.

I had replaced the plain sheet of glass mirror that had been up and I am going to keep this new mirror.  I also like my little ceramic plaque that says "powder room".  But that ugly light bar above the mirror was also something that grated on me.

Hubby and I got to work last week taking down the hardware and fixtures and removing the old countertop.  I decided to keep the vanity because I had a plan in my head for that.  Of course, nothing is as easy and quick as you think it's going to be.

When the old light bar was taken down the hole left behind was huge.  This is the base of the new light fixture to show that there is no way it's going to cover up this mess.

In the meantime, I was able to hire my wonderful talented friend, Brenda, that does faux painting and murals.  She was able to squeeze me into her busy schedule and was coming last Friday.  So now we had to get the holes fixed by Thursday night.

Hubby worked into the evening but of course he had to turn the electric off in the bathroom and was working by lamp light.  I know he was frustrated but gave me an encouraging smile anyway!

It was coming along.  I knew it didn't have to be absolutely smooth and perfect because of the painting that was going to be done.

In the meantime, the week before last, we had ordered the countertop

and copper sink (This was the floor sample that had been dropped and is bent.  Ours will be new, of course)

Brenda came in Friday morning and she also had done my foyer shown here.  She knows me and the style I was going for.  I wasn't able to be home on Friday, so I described the pictures that were in my head as to how I wanted this tiny little bathroom to look.  I wanted  Tuscan style, with leaves and vines, but no flowers.  I wanted to keep the green walls but a lighter shade with a Tuscan wash, and I showed her pictures of the counter sample and sink.  We also already have the darling little chandelier that is going up, so she was able to see that.  Brenda is amazing.  I came home Friday night and it's just like she got into my head and could see the pictures that were in there!

This is now the wall and area above the mirror where the new light fixture is going to connect.

I had also pointed out to Brenda a little cupboard that sits in my hallway on the other end of this bath and told her I wanted the vanity to look something like that.

And this is what she did!

Similar but with no flowers.  Exactly what I wanted.

And notice the wooden feet she bought and put under the bottom lip.  Perfect!

Brenda is coming back tomorrow just for a few touch ups.  She had also run out of light while working and missed a few spots.  I hope tonight Bob has time to get the new light up.  We expect the new fixtures to come in next week.  I'll keep you updated!

Linking to Cielo's Show Off Your Cottage Monday.
Alison's Fridays Unfolded
Cindy's Show and Tell Friday

The Easter Parade in My Home

I was lucky enough to be able to spend the whole weekend at home so I got my Easter decorating done.  It was sunny all weekend, although not very warm, so it just felt right to be getting out the lighter colors and putting away the dark green.

I finished the front stoop and doorway.

I put Easter eggs on my little tree and flowers and vines above the door. I usually bring this little tree inside about now, but decided to maybe leave it out with seasonal decorations until it's warm enough to put a real flower planter there.

My entrance foyer table got it's Easter makeover.

 I made the little quilted pillows.  They are actually for sale in my Etsy shop here.

The Easter quilt is hanging on my quilt hanger in the upstairs hallway.

I made this several years ago.  The egg and flower baskets are hand appliqued and the quilting is hand done.

 It's one of my favorites.  It only hangs out for a couple of months a year.

My dining room looks so lighter and brighter now with  the light green tablecloth replacing the dark burgundy that was there all winter.

The little spring quilt in the center is one I also made several years ago.

It's a mosaic style to form a wreath in the middle.  I embellished it with ribbon and beads and lace on the inner border.  I hand quilted the border only on this one.

The buffet server is all set.

 The little wire tree was made for me by a very good friend.  It's made from wire coat hangers.

The eggs sitting on the cake servers were made by me a long time ago.  Many have broken over the years.  Some are ceramic from my ceramic days.  This was my hobby at the time I was pregnant with my oldest son. He'll be 30 in a few weeks.

The rest are just decorated shells.  The yolks have been blown out by carefully putting a hole in one end and sucking it out through a straw.  It was a lot of work and not easy.  I did that one year and never felt like doing it again.  Maybe some day I'll give it another shot.

Most of the little ceramic bunnies were made by my mother in her ceramic days.

It's early yet and I haven't been to JoAnn Fabrics and Crafts for a few weeks, so there will probably still be some additions to the decor.  For now, I'm satisfied! The inside of the house feels a little sunnier, even it it's not so much outside.

Joining Cielo's Show Off Your Cottage Monday
and
Kathy's  Delightsome Life's Celebrate Spring