Tour Around

Rearranging furniture is a cheap way to redecorate (... well I guess reorganize) a room. I just finished changing around my living room.... here is a photo tour around it:
(Side note: after painting over the dinning room wallpaper went so well I am now considering doing it for the living room... we will see though)

Out with Old

I changed my accent color from coral to teal and green, because of this I had no pillows in the livingroom... so I made these to replace my other pillows...

Cha Cha Changes!!!

With my walls freshly painted and my chandelier modernized I felt I needed to update the color scheme of the room. I found this amazing striped fabric in teal (to match my chairs) and different colors of greens (to match my pictures and the carpet) for only 5$ a metre... it was meant to be. So I re-re-upholster my chairs and the cushions on the teal chairs. I took out all the coral accents and replaced them with different shades of greens and blues. I love the new look!

Lighting FIXture

After we painting our dinningroom we noticed the lighting fixture was a little dated. (Ok, I noticed this before painting the walls... but with walls like that no one was looking at the light fixture). So I dusted off the glassware and spray painted the gold away.... and voila!
Eventually we hope to buy an amazing, show stopping light fixture for this room and then I think this chandilier would look great in our ensuit bathroom.

Before (At Halloween... sorry this was the best photo I could find)

Painting

... and the final product!

Went For It

So on Valentines day I got fed up with my dinningroom walls. (As you maybe will have forscene this from my last post) So me and my husband broke out the paint and start priming the walls... over the wallpaper. It didn't take us long to realize that one of the layers of wallpaper peeled off when it was painted... so we put down our brushes and spent about three hours preping the walls. We didn't take off all the paper, but we made sure the one layer was off. It tooks us two days of work... but the change is amazing. It's so nice.... it feels like my eyes can finally relax.

above: after photos
below: before photos

Dramatic, Deep and Desirable Walls! (Get it... 3 Ds... 3D walls)

Oh me and the jokes. .... but seriously it took me a while to come up with 'Desirable' ... so hopefully someone appriciated it : )So a quick catch up for the random reader that has never read a Refuge Creative blog before. First thing you need to know, I moved into a house that was filled with this:Second, we are renovating the upstairs. Ripping everything down to the studs. Evenatually we will do the whole house, but doing things in sections works for us.
So point 1 and 2 pretty much cover all you need to know for this blog.
So upstairs, which is where the bottom four wallpapers are found, have already been taken down. What I am working on now is the dinning room, which had the top left flower boquet wallpaper... but now looks like this:With added red painted hand prints, which was awesome for our Halloween party... but not some much any more.... in Febuary.
So we are planning in a year or two to renovate this room, down to the studs. So my problem (and the point of this blog entry) is what to do with the wall.
I have come up with a few soluntions....
1. The obvious. Take off the 4 layers of wallpaper and paint the plaster. I have attempted this for hours... it is painstaking, especially since I know in my heart of hearts that it will all be for nothing when we renovate.
2. Textured paint over the wallpaper. This was my husbands idea. I am just scared it will look really stupid... although it probably can't look worse then is does.
3. Glue something to the wall. I came up with this idea as a joke, but I think it is only a joke because I don't have a good 'thing' to glue. My ideas were starbucks cups and legos.
4. Fabric covered tiles. I like this idea, although it would require a lot of time... of which most of it is being used in working upstairs.
5. If I had lots of money Chrysalis Wall Flats! (Which I still might do, even though I don't have a lot of money, because they look so awesome!)

Whitewashed and Wonderful!

I love white bathrooms! Our master bath will have three windows making it very open, bright and airy. The color white will just add to this feeling. Here are a few of my favorite white bathrooms:

Poetic Home

House to Home

Design Heaven

County Living

Lighting Inspiration

We are now getting into the fun parts of renovations.... buying stuff! We are searching for lighting fixtures for upstairs. So far we have bought two vanity lights, pot lights and two ceiling mounted lights. Our hunt continues for a sleek hallway fixture.
Here are a few pieces from westelm that I love:

Come on Be Happy!

Being mad sucks. So even though I am still really mad I am trying to let it go and move on. All renovations have their bumps. I was watching this show where this girl was flipping a house and she went 50 000$ in debt and lost money on the house. It was so sad.
Anyway... yesterday I made a list of why my life rocks... it helps to forget the little things.
1. Everyone I love is in good health. (I am so very thankful for this)
2. I have amazing people to love
3. ... and dogs. : )
4. My husband loves his job. This one might sound lame, but I think it is important to love what you do. I am not quite there yet... but hopefully one day.
5. I have a home that I get to be creative with
6. Two new people are following my blog!!! Welcome Lee and Miranda

My list goes on but you get the idea.
So to who ever reads this, I hope you are having an amazingly happy day today, but if you are not, try making a My Life Rocks List... it might help.

Thumbs Down for Amerispec!!!!!

I am so mad right now I want to throw up. We went to the home show a few weeks ago and talked to some people at this booth for Amerispec inspection. They gave us this sales pitch for like a half an hour on how much money we could get in federal grants. I was totally honest with them and told them about all the work that we had already done, but they said that wouldn't matter, they would still be able to tell the insulation that was their before. So I book an appointment. (It's 260$)... and I told the lady on the phone the our situation too. Then the guy came over, Bob, and he said that he could only report what he sees. and I told him my story so he called his supervisor and told him all the wall and attic were insulated... and they weren't, I left one wall and part of the attic with the wood shavings and I said that well he was on the phone, but he ignored me.
What gets me is he says we should take pictures so he knows what is behind the walls after we drywall and I said I have pictures of the shavings can't you use that? But no.
Argg... moral of the story... do not use Amerispec!!!!!!!!!!