In With the New

The old book shelf is "new" again! I'm glad to have painted it before we move, because I know it probably was not going to happen after that. Not to mention... I really enjoyed painting it, and now I have the itch to paint everything I can think of that needs a little updating.  :) uh oh. I just might tackle (not literally) the shelves on our living room wall next...

Ta-da! The new book shelf

It was filled with books, baskets, and magazines before... but I sort of like it with less on it. We'll see how well that works for us. We have tons and tons and tons of books to fill it, so I'm guessing it won't look quite this neat after moving. Oh well. I'll just keep this picture as a memory of the neat-ness.

I did a little bit of distressing to the book shelf, but might have to be more aggressive... it's sort of tough to see it. You can always paint over any mistakes, right?  ;)

All in all... I think the book shelf "remodel" was pretty successful. Let's hope we don't scratch it up too badly in the move. However, I guess if we do I won't need to distress it later...

Dream Houses

Even if we had the money to buy a house right now... we probably would not do it. Not because we enjoy living in apartments... nope, that's not why. The unsure nature of our life is the reason we would not buy a house right now. With Nate being a pilot and the high chance of him being hired somewhere else in the next year, it does not make much sense for us to commit to something that big (and expensive) at this time in our lives. If we did buy a house in Colorado... we would probably have to put it up for sale in the next year, and I'm pretty sure we know that would not end very well. (Have you seen the number of foreclosures and brand new/unsold houses?!) Not to mention, Nate would probably have to commute if we lived in Colorado, and I would much rather live wherever he is based.... because that means seeing him maybe a few more days each month!  :)

Since we probably won't own a house any time soon, I have been getting my house fix by visiting some of the model houses on Denver's Parade of Homes instead. I'm thinking maybe I should spend more time visiting model houses around metro Denver, because that definitely helps with my lack-of-house-to-call-our-own blues. And when you tour model homes and make discoveries like this in the basement....

... how can you be blue? I wonder if the sales person would notice if I showed up each day just to climb that rock wall?! Notice how Nate takes up the entire height of the wall, and I appear to be clinging for dear life to a cliff side (minus that smile on my face). Yeah.

I gathered some design inspiration for the dream house I've been designing since I was maybe 10 years old. Man... designing a floor plan for a lake view is tough, because I want every single room to have a great view. However, I don't want our future dream house to be 100' long and 20' wide in order to do that. I'll just have to keep growing my design idea folder for a while longer until I can figure something out. In the mean time...

Nate found an office that he wanted... I told him that some day I'll design him a sweet office with airplane props, ship steering wheels, and old automobiles in it. :)

I like the windows in this living room... funny thing is, they don't have a nice view to the outside... but the dream house I'm designing will. Our dream house will also have a nice little window seat on the stair landing perfect for reading a book while gazing at the waves... aaaahh.

I have been obsessed with houses ever since I was a little girl and grew up with a dad working construction. He always took me (with some pleading involved) to tour beautiful houses, and I've loved them ever since. One day we'll have our own house.... but until then, I think I like the freedom of being able to move where we need.

Out With the Old...

We're moving soon. Very, very soon... and no... we are not moving far. So for anyone in Colorado... we'll still be here for at least 7 more months, and for those in Michigan who would love to have us closer... sorry if I got you excited with that first sentence.

In the spirit of moving and changes in life... I decided (with some convincing) to paint over Nate's old book shelf with a lovely shade of Martha Stewart's Bayou. No longer will the book shelf be a confusing red/orange/wood color... but it will go with some of our other living room things a little bit better. To all you husbands out there, it's not that we wives don't love your stuff... it's just that we like new stuff once in a while and your *cough cough* bachelor-style black leather couch with recliners is ridiculously huge for our small apartment. And I might have something against black leather... I was born that way, okay. I recently saw something online that made me think of this situation and made me laugh.... it said that "a relationship is where one person is always right, and the other is the husband". Now I don't agree with that.... but in most cases (some dudes are incredibly stylish), I agree with that statement when it comes to designing and decorating a house. I know many men probably can't tell the difference between teal and turquoise... so men, just leave that up to your women.

Please excuse the messiness and piles of stuff, I'm already packing things up for our move. Here's a little peek at the book shelf sans paint: 

Thank goodness we have a garage with our apartment, because I'm not sure painting in the living room would have been a good idea. Things got a little messy. :) Nate and I went to Home Depot and bought some supplies, then with the help of some Martha Stewart paint, a drop cloth, and a "Purdy" new paint brush... that old book shelf was on it's way to looking new again.

I have it all painted, but it's still in the garage. Nate even said that he likes the color and thinks it looks better than what it did before. 

Victory!  :)

Will post pictures of the finished product soon.

Oh No They Didn't

Considering that I really like design, it makes sense that I would enjoy touring homes that make up the Denver Parade of Homes. Now... Nate does not like architecture and design as much as I do, but I drag him along with me anyway. (thanks for being a trooper!) Yesterday, we visited a few houses that are not too far from where we live... and my heart hurt after touring one home in particular.

* We toured this house... and it wasn't too bad... except for a shoddy paint job in the living room (I can't help but notice since I painted houses for a summer one year) and lack of trim in key places *

Sometimes I get a little... ok... a lot fired up while touring houses, because it's obvious that not much thought goes into some of the designs. I really like how some of the model houses take off doors for your convenience of touring the model... but the real reason is that the architect/designer did not leave hardly enough room for the door to swing into the space. Yikes... that really pushes my buttons! I mean, it's not really a good thing that you're trying to hide the fact that, in order to close the powder room door, I'll have to wedge myself between the wall and the crapper and repeat again after using said crapper in order to get the heck out of there. Now why don't you just put all of the doors back where they belong and not try hiding something from people who are paying so much money for a new house, okay? Thanks. :)

Don't even get me started on laundry rooms that have no shelving/cabinets/sink. Ugh!

* Loving the recycled glass tile (minus the colors) on the stair risers *

With that being said, not all of the Parade houses are entirely thoughtless. I've actually seen some really great things while visiting houses on the Parade of Homes the past few years. Recently, with the demand for "greener" houses... we saw one house incorporate a lot of recycled materials and still be aesthetically pleasing (bonus!). I am still not sure which house has been my favorite over the years. I've still yet to tour the perfect house, but in order to get the perfect house.... I'll probably have to design it. Even then, it probably still won't be perfect. Argh... we can't win!

* The scale of this bedroom is nice... plus it has a neat little built in desk in the window! I love, love, love built-ins *

Out of all the houses that Nate and I have seen at the Parade of Homes over the years, one that we looked at yesterday took the cake for worst thing we have ever seen! Talk about turning away prospective clients, because the way you staged the house is not for everyone.... it was the straw that broke the camels back for us really really disliking this house! Whoever designed this bedroom might want to think about making a few changes....

* I know it's difficult because of the orange walls and bedding, but notice the jersey on the bed *

I will give the designer a little break, because this house may have been staged before Jay "Crybaby" Cutler left the Broncos... but come on, you've had time to change it. Get yourself a new jersey for that bedroom and things might not be so bad. Now, the thing I dislike worse than tiny bathrooms and door swings that make you do the "truffle shuffle" in order to close them is Jay Cutler! Gross!

I Want to Ride My Bicycle

I've been trying to win a bicycle from New Belgium Brewing for quite some time now. They are giving away a fat tire cruiser a day... yes, you heard me correctly. They are giving away one bike per day! I have been entering just about every single day to try and win this amazing custom bike... with no luck as of yet.

Maybe my desire to have a sweet cruiser bike some day is fueled by my memories of watching Pee Wee's Big Adventure as a child... man that bike was cool!

I already have a bike, but it's a mountain bike equipped with clipless pedals... so it's not always the most convenient to just hop on and go for a cruise. Not to mention, I just love the simplicity of a one speed cruiser bike. To top it off.... the bike that NBB is giving away has a little rack on the front conveniently sized to carry a six pack. How is that for ingenuity?! Yeah. That bike just screams "Ashley!", so cross your fingers for me.

Tryin to catch me "ridin dirty"

Plus... I just sort of feel like a bad arse on a one speed. Takes me back to my childhood days of riding around the driveway at my friends' house with crushed beer cans on our tires so our bikes sounded like motorcycles. Don't worry, we didn't drink the beer when we were that young... those cans came from our parents. We weren't that crazy as youngsters.... but we were pretty inventive!

If you want to try and win this bike (you have to live in a state where NBB distributes... sorry to my Michiganders) enter on their website. But if you win it, please can I take it for a spin? I promise not to wreck it! Thanks.

Bathroom Transformation

I am obsessed with the beach! Yeah, ob-sess-ed. My favorite blogs typically have something to do with the sea... whether it be design related to the sea, blogs about people who live near the water, or how to live a more simple life that's sea-inspired. I love it all.

Just a couple days ago I slathered some white painted on a floating shelf we have in the bathroom and the frame on a piece of wall art. Too bad I did not do a better job documenting that transformation, because it was a lot of fun changing something old into something new! It's looking much more like a beach in our bathroom with each passing day. I also made a visit to Home Goods (if you haven't been there yet, you might want to try and make time for a trip there... it's got lots of great deals) and purchased some cheap towels that reflect the colors of the beach. We're talking white, turquoise, and gray colors! Mmmmm. I can hear waves crashing just thinking about spending time in our sea-inspired bathroom now.   :)

This was the rather unattractive before picture of the framed wall art that was on the bathroom wall:

My architecture supplies and x-acto knife wielding skills really come in handy when changing things around our place   :)   (who said that my architecture degree is useless... oh wait, that was me... well, it's not useless... see!)

After dissecting the pieces, I painted the ugly golden brown frame a calming whitewashed beachy white:

* You can see the insides/guts of the frame to the right of this picture. I covered the "pretty" red color with turquoise scrapbook paper! Much better. *

* The result is much nicer than the funky red and gold thing that was there before! Loving the beach theme... and sorry for the lack of quality pics. The floating shelf below this wall art is also white now. *

Here's a few pics of some more beach inspired bathroom goodies:

(don't mind the brown washcloth...
I'm slowing weeding that color out of the bathroom)

* I love the seaglass-looking color of the soap dispenser, 

I've had that since college and still love it *

Now the good thing is that we have a much more soothing bathroom, but the bad thing is that I want to browse all of our belongings for more things to paint and transform....