Toy Closet Overhaul

We have a 4 year old granddaughter who spends a lot of time at our house.  So, when we bought our home, we decided to put all of her toys in the coat closet in the living room.  But it never worked quite right.  The combo of the shelves and the large Rubbermaid storage box made it tough for her to get to her toys and keep it organized.  Everything would wind up being thrown on the shelves, which would then fall on the floor.  It was making me nuts.

The princess couldn't help but show off.  See?  Mess.

This past weekend, it was time to get to work.  We pulled everything out of the closet (which made it look like Toys R Us threw up in my living room.  Pulled out the useless hooks and spackled the holes.  The next morning I painted the closet a light pink and Brian added very sturdy shelves.  A trip was made to WalMart and Target for boxes and baskets.  A few minutes with my printer and we had labels.

It makes my little OCD self so happy.

Everything has a place and not only is it easy for her to get the toys she wants, it is just as easy to put them all away.  The labels have pictures on them, so she can "read" them.

Very satisfying project and it only took a few hours!

Score!

For dinner last night, we decided to head over to our fav pizza place - Buono's.  Of course, I couldn't help but stop by Goodwill and see if there were any hidden treasures.  For the last year or so, I've been trying to find a bench to put between the front windows, with no success.  Sure, I could buy a new one for $100.  But no one will ever sit out there and I wasn't willing to spend that much.  

Lookie at what I found!

2 perfect chairs.  Ok, not so perfect.  They had some rust spots and one of the seats needed to be soldered. Like I cared about that.

A few minutes with a wire brush, 2 cans of RustOleum paint and now, they are perfect.  

We arranged the plants that had been out there around the new chairs.  I really, really loved how they turned out.  My cost?  $26 and I have some paint left over.  Might need a couple more plants to round it out.  Maybe a pillow on one of the chairs.  I also need to find something to hang on the wall between the windows, but that is another post.  

Winking at you

Our old garage door was a bit of a nightmare.  It was 30 years old and every time we opened or closed it, I was afraid it was going to fall on our car.  It was one piece and we also worried about someone parking too close and being hit as the door swung out.

Here's a picture of the old one.

Today we had a new door installed.  Isn't it pretty? You know that funny winking thing your eyes do when you smile really big? I think it looks like the garage is winking because we have a happy home.  My husband probably thinks I'm nuts.

Makes such a huge difference to the front of the house.  You can also see that we had the hideous street light taken off from over the garage a few months ago.  Why it was there, we have no clue.  The grass is finally starting to come in and we also put numbers on the house.

I love Talavera pottery and couldn't wait to put them up.

Of course, I keep eyeballing that lovely siding on the house and formulate my plot to remove it and have the house stuccoed.  Perhaps that is our next big project?

Meet Frieda

Last summer it seemed like our AC unit struggled to keep the house cool.  We thought the problem was the lack of insulation and unsealed duct work.  It contributed to the problem, but in retrospect, the unit was dying a slow death.

When the first hot days this Spring were upon us, we turned on the AC.  Listening to it run and run and run, we knew.  An inspection by a local AC company confirmed my worst home owner fear - we needed a new unit.

After 4 bids, a week of sweltering and $6000 later, meet Frieda.

She is a thing of beauty.  She's quiet, cools the house off and better last for 20 years.  I'm still cringing over writing that check.  I feel like she should be christened before she goes up on the roof.

Why the name Frieda?  Because she's frigid.  Get it?  Yea, I know...blame the heat.

Laundry with style

We've done some behind the scenes projects that, while making the house more comfortable, no one ever sees.  New insulation and sealed duct work in the attic was a huge project, but fluffy cellulose fiber isn't something you blog about.  I needed a new project.

Our laundry room is the first room you enter the house through the garage and it needed some decorating love.

This laundry room also had an odd nook that held our water heater.  Built in the early 80's, these little houses all had the water heaters indoors - something that builders no longer do.  Our house inspector suggested we move it to the garage.  All I could see was closet potential for the nook.  $350 later, the water heater was in the garage and I got a weird closet.

See how boring?  My daughter and I painted the entire room the color Spiced Squash and I made curtains for the closet and window.

I love how it turned out!  A few tips on painting a laundry room:

• Go bright and cheerful!  You spend a lot of time in this room, why not make it pretty?
• Move the washer and dryer to the garage, it would have been a lot easier if we'd done this.
• Replace dated switches and outlets.  They were all that ugly cream color.  Changing them all to white make a huge difference.  We liked it so much that we will be doing this slowly throughout the house.
• When hanging curtains over a small window, put the bar 6 or so inches higher than the top of the window.  It makes the window look larger.  We also took the time to put a shade screen on that window, as it faces east.