Illuminate the Darkness

If you haven't heard about these solar tubes, where have you been!? It is a small, easy-to-install sky-tube that looks like a large recessed light in your ceiling. There are a series of tubes reflecting light from a "bubble" installed easily on your roof. The change in the lighting is truly remarkable. Here is a kitchen before a SolaTube installation:



Kitchen: Your Kitchen is one place that needs a lot of natural light. The kitchen is a gathering place for your family and friends to spend time together, as well as a center for activities such as cooking meals and entertaining. ...And After:



A Before and After Bathroom




These can be purchased at Lowe's (and some specific Home Depot locations) for a surprisingly small amount of money, compared to other standard skylights. The stores would probably install them for you, for a small fee.

When in Doubt, PAINT

My husband and I each "inherited" hope chests. These are important heirlooms from centuries back. Well, my grandmother's is from Pennsylvania his mother's is from the seventies. The problem is, we have no space for such priceless artifacts.

Recently, because my youngest is now practically entering puberty (actually he's four), we thought we should update his room from a nursery to a boys room. The pale yellow duckies on his wall just weren't cutting it for my little superhero.

I thought I would try to utilize one of the hope chests and use make it as a toy box in his room. I thought I would strip it, putty it, sand it down and stain it. A Labor of Love. I learned a very valuable lesson about hope chests: Just because it's old does mean it is solid word, or even well-crafted. I spent countless hours with my heavy rubber gloves, covered in an ewey, gooey toxic mess getting high on fumes. When it came time to scrape off the gooey mess, one scrape and the entire front veneer came off. Underneath this 1/4" of solid wood was particle board. Some heirloom. So, I got out the Elmer's and had a field day. After all that, I still had to putty the heck out of the thing and sand off all the mucky stuff that dried on during my veneer catastrophe.

The simple solution (and what I ultimately ended up doing) would've been to simply paint the dang thing. When I finally gave in to the painting nymphs, it all ran smoothly. Two coats of paint, three on the top, just to be sure. I used the wall paint that I already had from my sons room. It turned out beautifully. It looks like it's brand new, and was built as a boys toy box. Simple, Simple, Simple.

You will find that a new coat of paint can spruce up just about anything. It's really not as scary as you might think. Lowes will match any color of anything you can lug down to them. They'll stir it up for you (even if you've had it for a while, just bring it down to them), they'll give you the little key opener, thingies, and they even have little pint size "Sample" paints that are the perfect size for small jobs.

Solution Examples

When we bought our current home about seven years ago, it had parquet flooring*. You may not be familiar with parquet because it was only very popular in the seventies, along with wood paneling and avocado appliances. So let me say that this particular hardwood floor was, um, so say it politely, Uglier Than Sin! It was kinda like a 4" wooden tile, except in a little circle pattern. It reminded me of an old basketball court, if they even had those... Let's just say we weren't all that excited about our expansive and dated hardwood floor.

We loved the house, though. Looking back it was probably the chocolate chip cookies the realtor was baking as we walked through the open house. It may be cliche, but it works. If ever you want to show off your house, just bake cookies as guests arrive. They'll love your home, and not even know why!

But I do digress...

I had a problem. We were steadily moving into the 21st century and my floor was stuck with John Travolta in his white polyester. To make matters worse, the floor took up the largest chunk of my home. My kitchen, dining room and foyer was one aged parquet glob. To replace the stuff would cost more than a large SUV.

Solution: Paint. My husband thought I was insane, as he usually does when I present him with solutions. "You don't paint hardwood floors!" he said. Then again, considering his options were to embrace the 70's craze or the price of an island in the carribean, he gave me the go-ahead. Porch n' Floor paint from Home Depot was the secret. I used the colors from my china as the inspiration. You might not already know, Home Depot can match paint to anything you bring to them (pretty handy when you choose a shoe, or a picture of a baby giraffe, like I did for the nursery).

Since my son was 5 months old, and I didn't have anything else to do, I made a checkerboard pattern diagonally across the floor. Me and Painter's Tape became best friends. Two coats of Polyurathane and all my patience later, we had a unique conversation piece that lasted six years. Recently I decided we needed another update and I gave my parquet another color infusion and a whole new new look.

I know one day, after I win the lottery, we'll spend our Escalade money and replace the entire kitchen. We've already picked out the aged cherry floors we want to go to with the new cabinets and stainless steel appliances. My kitchen will, no doubt, be awesome. I know, then, I'll be just a little sad. What will I paint then?!

*Not all parquet is ugly, in fact, it can be quite beautiful if done right and not forty years old.
If you're curious, check this out... http://www.pavexparquet.com/

Understand this is design BY you, for YOU

I have spent many, too many hours in front of the TV watching design show after design show. All too many hours with a laptop on my lap, scanning over all the do's and don'ts about design. Can you say, overwhelming?! Mostly I think, "how does that stuff apply to me?" I don't know about you, but I truly don't want my home to look like a showroom floor. I'd rather it to look like my home.

Don't get me wrong. I think that all that stuff is great. There is some beautiful stuff out there. Examples of Interior Design are really fun to watch. Impressive, too. But when all is said and done, does it help you choose a color for your front bathroom? Does it fill you with confidence walking up and down the aisles at Ethan Allan? Are you everso experienced when standing in front of the paint chips at Home Depot?

I think it's a great idea to have one person, (namely me) who happens to have a natural "eye" for design, help another person (namely you) achieve the look you want in your home, using a personal style. Nothing more elaborate than that. What do you think?

Now About You

Alright, everyone. It's your turn. What can I help you with? Do you have a big, ugly wall you stare at all day and hate? A Bed with bad Fung Shui? Squeaky hardwood floor? What? Bring it on.

Do you spend your weekends watching HGTV or DIY, hoping one day someone will come to your house and Design on a Dime? That lady's got the tricks! But, hey, so do I. Whatcha got? Lemme help you.....

Introductions

Hello from cyberspace, and welcome to my world.

I have the most amazing venture. I hope you'll be interested to learn. But first let me introduce myself. This being my first blog, and all...

I am a stay at home mother of two boys, four and six. Before I chose that line of work, I was in the computer biz, and before that some administration work. I have been married for 12 years ~to the Same Man *sigh*. I live in the Bay Area. I'd tell you where I live but it's absolutely wonderful, and you'd want to live here and our freeways are all crowded up enough, thank you.

It used to be that I would make up answers, just to have something to say. I soon found out that people stopped believing me when I said stuff to fill in spaces, so I learned to know what I'm talking about, or find out the answers before I opened my mouth.

So now I have become a "Why Don't you Just ... " girl. I have answers for stuff. I have a need to provide answers. A little problem for me, sometimes. I can't just let it go, you see? You have a question, I will find the answer. It's a gift/curse thing I got going.

I love my home. I love making homes for others. I have an eye for things. People say I'm good at it, too. I truly believe I've found a way to help lots of people across the country turn the place they live into their home.

Mkay. 'nuff about me. I'll be blogging more soon.