Spotswood House

I hesitate to even do a post in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic because I want to be sensitive to other people and their situations and I don’t want to come off as out-of-touch but I do want to share my thoughts and experiences. As with all of you, Adam and I’s life has been turned completely upside-down due to the COVID-19 Pandemic. Fortunately, both Adam and I have the luxury of working from home and have guaranteed paychecks (for now). I have been working from home since Wednesday, March 18, 2020. By nature I am a homebody so the self quarantine isn’t really bothering me. I do miss human interaction but I really miss eating out. Every Friday night is date night for Adam and I and that usually involves stuffing our faces at a local establishment. We ordered take-out but it wasn’t the same.

I realize how lucky we are to be able to stay home while other people are on the front line fighting this virus. My company, the U.S. Postal Service, is considered an essential service and there are many employees who can’t stay home, the mail has to be delivered! I hope they stay safe and don’t contract the virus. So far, 4 people in my building of over 1000 people have the virus. I am hunkered down at home and don’t appear to have any symptoms, although the allergies here kill me!

To occupy my “spare” time, I have been watching a lot of movies (only one movie per day, I have to maintain my schedule). Here is a rundown: Jumanji, Jumanji 2, Knives Out, Bombshell, Gemini Man, King Arthur (Guy Ritchie version), Collateral, and Valentine’s Day. I actually really liked the Jumaji movies with The Rock and Kevin Hart, just light fun. I also liked Bombshell, it was terrifying and so sad because even though it was lossely based on fact I don’t doubt any of that happened. I also threw in a Taylor Swift documentary for good measure. And, I finally finished The Man in the High Castle series on Amazon. Don’t get me started on that one. They took an amazing series, ran it into the ground, resurrected it, only to end it permanently.

A couple bright spots: Our drywall guy is coming tomorrow. Once our walls are mudded-in we can start tiling. That will be our sole focus this weekend – Lindsey Taylor, Tiling Machine. Very lucky that our bathroom remodel coincides with a full lockdown. I’m not trying to be funny, I’m happy we’ll have something to do to keep us busy and it will bring us a lot of satisfaction in the end. And now for an update on my milestone birthday year – notice I pivoted from day to year. I will most likely be celebrating my birth “day” quarantined so I’m kinda sad about that. I haven’t cancelled our trip to France yet. I have two months to figure it out and I have the option to change the flight with no penalty. We have a trip planned for Buenos Aires later in the year and I just booked a trip to Belize. Traveling brings me so much joy as well as the planning part of a trip. I will spend countless hours working on my trip planning projects.

What are you doing to cope with the COVID-19 Pandemic? Any tips on how to stay sane?

THANK YOU to those on the front line, working to fight the pandemic and to the essential businesses, please stay safe. Thank you for your service to our country. I hope this passes soon.

We are now in the middle of our master bathroom remodel.  Or, I should say we are in the beginning stages. Here are BEFORE pictures. Spoiler alert, it has the worst layout. Another spoiler alert, we aren’t completely re-configuring the room, just minor tweaks.

So, that’s our builder basic bathroom beauty! Did you notice the size of the “walk-in” shower…more like “scrunch-in” shower. It is pretty much not functional.

Here is the current layout of the bathroom. We have a garden tub and tiny walk-in shower. Not my idea of a great time!

In the new layout the garden tub is outta here, replaced with a purtty walk-in shower. Where the munchkin shower used to be will be turned into a closet. You can never have enough storage, ya’ll.

Here are photos of our current situation.

The “in progress” photos just aren’t as much fun as the “finished product” photos.

The plumbers are coming tomorrow to move the shower lines and drain and then it will be on like parmesan. We have already purchased the floor tile and it is a really pretty creamy marble. Here it is laid out in a sample pattern.

We popped over to Baltimore this weekend. I don’t know why people hate on Baltimore, I definitely think it is “Charm City.” They have great food, great architectural design stores, and funky neighborhoods. If they built a high speed rail from Baltimore to DC I would totally live in Baltimore.

We hit the jackpot at our first stop, an antique closet door for our bathroom. I LOVE IT! It was exactly what I was looking for.

Adam found this hardware for the door on Ebay. We just need to clean up the green paint and it will be beautiful.

Now for an update on my favorite past-time, travel!!!!! Or, thinking about travel, dreaming about destinations, plotting out possible trips…you get the idea. I think I mentioned before that this is a milestone birthday year for me. To celebrate, I want to take 4 international trips in 2020. So far I booked a trip to France – starting in Paris and ending up in Nice. Then, I booked a trip to Buenos Aires, Argentina. I’m still trying to decide on the other two locations, wherever the flight deal takes me. Unfortunately, the Coronavirus is threatening my Paris trip but I’m going to hold off canceling as long as I can. I really want to take that trip!

Well, what started with a new rug turned into a new dining room. Here’s what I started with (you may remember from the last post).

I really liked the polka dot rug but it was just a pinch too small so I returned it. I finally pulled the trigger and bought a rug from Wayfair (see below).

This rug is really cool, like an abstract painting. But, the curtains don’t match the rug. Luckily, I have two houses with tons of furniture and accessories (there’s some sarcasm there). I took the velvet curtains down and moved them to Spotswood and took the curtains from there and brought them to Stonegate. I spend lots of time arranging and rearranging things…

But, after all is said and done I’m really happy with how the dining room turned out.

It’s driving me crazy how the bar cart isn’t centered underneath Priscilla (the portrait). I’ll figure out what to do soon to fix that. I really like how the room has a bit of a modern feel to it, different than my usual taste. I swear, I have so much fun decorating my house!!

I think I have cured my rug purchasing phobia and I am now eyeing new rugs for our hallway.  Polar opposites, right?! I always chose neutral rugs in the past but I’m really feeling patterned rugs right now.

Ronnie Hand-Tufted Ivory Area Rug – Wayfair

Novogratz by Momeni Jem Terri Hand Woven Flatweave Rug – Overstock

We are still waiting to get started on our bathroom remodel. Our HOA meeting is this week and fingers crossed our renovation plan is approved. During one of our weekends of waiting we made a quick trip to Philadelphia. The highlight of the trip for me was Bud & Marilyn’s, a restaurant of course. The food was so good…CHEESE CURDS!!!!! The design though… amazing, decorated like a mid-century Midwestern rec room.

We have been to Philadelphia before but we never visited Independence Hall, where the Declaration of Independence and the U.S. Constitution were both signed. So, we had to check that off the list.

I’ll be back soon with more updates. In the meantime, I’m on the search for our next international vacation.

My current life consists of spending an inordinate amount of time rug shopping. I mean lots and lots of time!!!! The problem is I’m online rug shopping and I don’t like online shopping (for most things). I need to see it, touch it, and be able to easily return it if I don’t like it. I don’t want to drive all around DC searching for a rug either because – TRAFFIC. So, here I am, still searching for my forever rug.

I visited Home Goods yesterday and bought a rug, actually THE RUG I was eyeing online and I found it in-person. Problem solved right? Hahahaha, no. I knew the rug would not fit. I have to have at least a 5×8 rug and this was 5 x 7’6…yes, that makes a difference. I bought it anyway just in case they can’t do math but they can and I will be returning it, LOL. I just wanted to see if I was headed in the right direction and I’m not. I need something a little more subdued. So, here is my rug.

So, obviously I don’t have the dining room staged so please excuse the mess. Notice the blue outline on the floor, that’s the dimensions of the rug I’m looking for. I really like this polka dot rug but I think it’s a little extra. I need something not so in-your-face.

So, back to the drawing board. I was in West Elm the other day and found this rug that might work (below).

Ok, this is a perfect example of how what you see online looks nothing like real life. Here is the photo of the rug above online (below). It looks gray but the rug in-person looks navy, what the hell?! See why I don’t trust buying something online? Maybe you are wondering why I don’t just buy the West Elm rug. So, I’m being really cheap. I don’t want to pay for shipping. I mean, we have a local West Elm, why do I have to pay shipping??

When I first started my search process, these were the rugs I was attracted to. Then, I noticed if I didn’t check carefully, they weren’t really 5 x8, they were 5×7’6. That was really frustrating. Just as I was adding the rugs below I noticed the rug on the bottom in the middle is not actually 5×8 so it is out of contention now.

Carbon Loft McCoy Black and White Handmade Geometric Wool Area Rug, Overstock

Ashton Hand-Tufted Black/White Area Rug, Wayfair

Bourgeois Abstract Tufted Navy/Beige Area Rug, Wayfair

Interlock Charcoal , Home Depot

Mohawk Midtown Shodo Sand by Under The Canopy, Home Depot

Then, I almost bought this rug ( yes, I have a thing for dots) but after reading the reviews, the rug is brown, not black. I wasn’t sure if that would look right.

Then, I started gravitating toward these (below) and I think I am on the right path now. No closer to making a purchase but getting closer.  

MARLED INDIGO WOVEN COTTON RUG, Dash and Albert

Thurston Handmade Geometric White/ Dark Gray, Overstock

This seemed like a long time coming but the kitchen in our condo is finally done! Hip-hip-horray!!!! Here is a before and two afters:

The before picture doesn’t look that bad, right? Well, don’t let it fool you, it was a disaster. Cabinets so tiny, they are practically useless and the cabinets themselves felt like they had a cheap, plastic coating on them. And whoever thought is was a good idea to put a desk in an already microscopic kitchen?? The biggest changes we made were…well everything! Even though our kitchen is small, it lives large. We have even more space than we did in our Yorktown house.

Lets start from the beginning. Here are photos of the kitchen prior to the remodel.

We completely demo-ed the kitchen.

One of the biggest changes we made was opening up the side wall (unfortunately we couldn’t take it out completely unless we added a beam and that just didn’t make much sense). It was a minor change but ended up making such a difference.

Below: All of the pergo flooring is out and real hardwood is in!

Then it was time to put the cabinets together. There were so many cabinets!!

Installation time:

We originally bought a wine rack to go over our refrigerator but when we put it up it clearly didn’t fit. That was only the start of our problems. Here are the cabinets installed with the massive gap between the top of the cabinets and the ceiling. Note: if your ceilings are taller than the standard 8 feet, 42 inch cabinets will not go to the ceiling.

Adam didn’t think the gap was that bad but I couldn’t stand it! As we debated what to do we moved forward with the countertops (below). The stone company kept pushing me towards marble looking countertops but I wanted the kitchen to have a bit of a modern edge and I was adamant about getting the light, speckled color. It’s so pretty and sparkles at the right angle. I am very happy with our selection!

Next up, backsplash install.

I am ecstatic with how the backsplash came out! We bought this tile on clearance and I have no idea why it didn’t sell out. It is such a cool, modern shape and that color…green, gray, blue. Is there a better color on the planet??!

So, back to our unresolved kitchen quagmire…the cabinet gap. We decided to build a soffit (props to Adam’s handiness) and cover the gap between the cabinets and the ceiling. Here is phase one: soffit painted and installed.

Phase two: molding

Phase three: crown molding

I bought this really cool removable wallpaper and we installed it in the pantry. Holy F, that was an experience. Why is wallpaper back in favor?? It is so hard to install!

Finally, the moment you have been waiting for, the fully installed kitchen.

As you can see from the photos above I got pull-out drawers, a silverware organizer, a lazy susan, and a pull-out trash can. I highly recommend those extra features in a kitchen or if you decide to remodel your kitchen definitely add those features.

Another change we made was removing the microwave from above the stove and purchasing a drop-in range. Both of those changes were life changing. Having all of that extra space above your range, instead of a massive microwave that just collects grease and dirt, is totally worth it. We are going to move the microwave to the pantry.  The drop-in range was a little bit of a vanity purchase but once we had it installed, it made such a difference. It just completely streamlines the look of the space and we really like having all of the knobs and controls on the front of the range.

There is one thing left to purchase for my kitchen, a rug. I have been eyeing this rug from Ruggable – a line of washable rugs. Has anybody purchased a Ruggable?

With the kitchen down, we are aggressively planning for our remodel of the bathroom. We bought our vanity today and I will purchase the faucets and shower accessories next. Stay tuned for more updates.

Adam and I just got back from visiting his family in Knoxville, Tennessee for Christmas. To make the trip feel more like a vacation, we made a few pit stops on our drive back home. We stopped at Devils Backbone Brewery for Adam and Luray Caverns for me. If you haven’t been to Luray (the caverns that is) I highly, highly recommend it. They were AMAZING…I mean A-M-A-Z-I-N-G!

From Wikipedia: Luray Caverns was discovered on August 13, 1878 by five local men, including Andrew J. Campbell (a local tinsmith), his 13-year-old nephew Quint, and local photographer Benton Stebbins. Their attention had been attracted by a protruding limestone outcrop and by a nearby sinkhole noted to have cool air issuing from it. Seeking a cavern, the men started to dig and, about four hours later, a hole was created for the smallest men (Andrew and Quint) to squeeze through, slide down a rope and explore by candlelight. The first column they saw was named the Washington Column, in honor of the first United States President.

Sam Buracker of Luray owned the land on which the cavern entrance was found. Because of uncollected debts, a court-ordered auction of all his land was held on September 14, 1878. Andrew Campbell, William Campbell, and Benton Stebbins purchased the cave tract, but kept their discovery secret until after the sale. Because the true value of the property was not realized until after the purchase, legal wrangling ensued for the next two years with attempts to prove fraud and decide rightful ownership. In April 1881, the Supreme Court of Virginia nullified the purchase by the cave discoverers.

I thought the history of Luray Caverns was fascinating, especially how the discoverers  completely missed out on their great find. The caverns are now owned by the Graves family (who apparently can’t stop fighting over their $20 million fortune). Enough about the background of the caverns, look at these pictures!!!!

So cool, right???? In case you were wondering, our kitchen is still not finished. You will definitely know when it is!!!! In the meantime, I have moved on to the master bathroom. We spent over an hour at Floor and Decor trying to match up tiles for our bathroom and I am so excited of what we ended up with. It is going to look fabulous!

Here’s how our process works…

We pull out the different tiles and patterns we like and try to form a cohesive mix of materials. This is what we ended up with; the master bath floor will be 8×12 marble tiles, the shower floor will be marble looking (but really porcelain to keep the price down) hexagon tiles, the shower walls will be a very pale blue subway tile, and finally we will add a marble accent stripe to the shower tiles (bottom left in the photo below).

My vision for the master bath is classic and luxurious. When I move on to the other bathroom, that will be my fun project. I already found the floor tile I want. Isn’t this the best (below)? I mean, I am in love with this…obsessed, fatal attraction, restraining order crazy about this.

Speaking of obsessed…you know I collect female portraits. Well, my Christmas surprise was a new portrait to add to my collection and I only had to drive 2 miles to get it. Without further ado, let me introduce you to Lorraine. Isn’t she pretty? Look at her steely gaze. Wonder what she is thinking?

Finally, I want to share with you some of my new purchases for the condo. I have been searching for rugs constantly, all day every day. It’s really hard to pick out a rug online and then hope it lives up to the pictures in person. I haven’t found anyplace locally with a good rug selection.

Originally, I bought this rug for the kitchen (umm, what was I thinking? It is wool and has alot of light colors in it). It is now living in my hallway and I love it.

Here’s another online purchase I made. This was my Christmas present to myself, oh yeah! I am finally going to give in and allow a TV in my bedroom but the TV stand had to look fabulous and oh, boy does it! I have been eyeing this table for awhile. It had tons and tons of 5-star reviews so I went all in and I am really happy with this purchase.

My new favorite home furnishings site is homary.com. I bought two lights from them, a pendant light and a wall sconce and they are both perfect.

So, the pendant light I bought is actually a West Elm light but somehow this website (homary) was selling it too for more than half off what West Elm was charging. It is so cool. Here is the light (below left) that was in the condo when we bought it (nothing wrong with it, just builder basic looking).

Here is my new West Elm light (below right). The actual pictures I took turned out terrible but this photo is a perfect representation.

I’m having so much fun remodeling and decorating our condo. Hoping to share more updates soon. One more update; in my last post I mentioned I was thinking about booking a trip to Turkey. Well, change of plans, we’re going to France. More details later. Au revoir!

We spent the Thanksgiving holiday in London and had a blast. I have to start with the hotel we stayed at, Redchurch Townhouse. I loved it!! When we travel abroad I like to stay in boutique hotels. I booked this hotel based on a few photos and that’s it. Come to find out, we were staying in the artsy part of London – Shoreditch. It was awesome. We walked to dinner and bars every night and ate amazing food!

This cheeky photo greeted us when we got off of the elevator.

I am obsessed with our hotel room. It is exactly how I would’ve decorated a room. Look at that chandelier!

Lighting is kinda my jam and that clear wall sconce is to die for.

Herringbone wood floors in our room, are you kidding me!!? And…terrazzo floors in the elevator. Are you serious?!!

A full bar in the room..ummm okkkkkkk!!!

How fun is this, a retro inspired radio? Jazz music was waiting on us when entered the hotel room.

And, finally the bathroom. I LOVE! Look at the warm wood cabinet with gorgeous marble countertops.

So, now that I have totally gone on a design geek-out I guess we can turn our attention to the main star, London.

First stop in London, the Tower Bridge. Yes, the same Tower Bridge where the terrorist attack happened; and yes, the same day. We toured the tower and visited the hydraulic room.

We went to an amazing bar the first night. I am so hesitant to order a cocktail because 9 times out of 10 I don’t like what I end up with but finally, a cocktail that tasted delicious. In case you were wondering, I ordered “The Littlest Hobo” (very apropos) which consists of Tanqueray gin, passionfruit, lemon, and Hawkes cider. It tasted like candy, so good!!

I was always hesitant to visit London because I heard the food was so bad but we enjoyed everything we had. Of course we avoided traditional British pub food. Our first night we ate at an asian fusion restaurant – Yuu Kitchen. It was sooooo delicious! Here are the chicken wings, gyoza, and the best cauliflower I have ever had in my life!!! Words cannot describe.

As I mentioned, our hotel was in the artsy part of town. Lots of street art and they have a really neat mall made entirely out of shipping containers, but my favorite part was the tinsel walkway, so fabulous.

The second day in London we went to Windsor Castle. I really, really wanted to go to Buckingham Palace but they aren’t open to the public in November, whaaaaa. But, Windsor Castle was beautiful. Unfortunately, you can’t take pictures inside but you can outside! The photo below of me standing next to a small, red door is actually a London Post Office box. Of course I had to get a pic with one of those. We rode a high speed train for the first time on our way back to London. One of the employees told me this train goes really slow (110 mph) compared to other trains in Europe (over 200 mph). Hey, based on what we have in the states this was pretty impressive.

The second night for dinner we went to a steak place, Flat Iron. They have a disclaimer on their menu to not steal the cool cups the drinks come in and the knives, lol. You know we had to get a picture.

The third day in London we did a “Secret London”tour.

This is the smallest police station in the world as far as they know. It is no longer used as a police station though.

This street is supposedly one of the inspirations for Harry Potter. It was a cute, little alleyway.

An artist who was concerned when cameras were posted throughout London,  decided to critique “Big Brother” by putting plaster noses throughout London in random places.

This gas light is one of the few remaining in London which was actually lit by human gas/waste back in the day. Ewww

We toured the National Gallery, Portrait Gallery, and my favorite the Tower of London. This is where the Queen’s jewels are stored. You can’t take pictures but her crown has a 100 carat diamond in it, spectacular! There were multiple crowns and scepters, so stunning. Additionally, they have medieval towers, circa 1060.

The last day in London we went to see a show, The Lion King. The costumes were amazing, a visual astonishment. The story is ok, I mean, it is based off of a Disney movie.

The last night in London we ate at a delicious Italian restaurant, Gloria. It was the one place I wanted to eat while we were in London and OMG I think I might have had the best pizza I have ever eaten in my life!!! And the restaurant was so cute!

Overall, I liked London and definitely want to go back again. There is so much we still haven’t seen. I don’t think Adam was as crazy about London – it was like any other big city except the buildings are older and the people talk different. I guess it wasn’t exotic enough The one thing I really disliked about London was the smoking. Everybody smoked and I guess I am spoiled living in DC, for a large city not that many people smoke.

I’m thinking about booking a trip to Turkey for our next adventure. Hey, I gotta have something to look forward to.

I’ll leave you with some selfies – this is mainly for the parents.

Sooooooooooooooo, I’m living through a renovation right now. Don’t ask me how I feel about that!!! But,  floors are 99.8% done. Now, we are focused on the kitchen. I thought we had everything planned out but we have run into a design dilemma. So, here is the deal-ee-o.

Our kitchen has 9 foot ceilings. We bought 42 inch cabinets. In a normal height kitchen 42 inches goes all the way to the ceiling; with a 9 foot tall ceiling, not so much. Now, we have about an 8 inch gap between the top of the cabinets and the ceiling. Here’s a couple photos of what I am talking about.

I’m so frustrated we didn’t properly plan for the 9 foot ceilings but this is a great lesson for future remodels. How do we resolve this huge, horrific problem (yes, I’m being over the top but I can’t stand the gap)?? Two options stand out as a resolution. We can rip all of the upper cabinets out and buy two sets of cabinets (two short ones) to stack on top of each other to get the cabinets to go to the ceiling. See photo options below.

Second option is to build a soffit and frame with fancy crown molding. See photos below.

Which option would you choose? Due to costs we are going to build the soffit and add nice crown molding to address the gap. I think the end product will look nice but it is another project we weren’t anticipating and it puts us further behind schedule, UGH.

Hopefully, my next post will be a finished kitchen. On a side note, one of my favorite things about moving besides the short commute and not having to rake leaves this fall is the decorating I’m getting to do. I am redoing the dining room and both bedrooms. I’m so excited!! Bye until next time.

The kitchen!!! Here are before photos of our condo kitchen. I think moving forward I’ll refer to the condo as Stonegate. So, we have Spotswood House (our country home), Yorktown (the house we just sold but are still living in for a few more weeks), and Stonegate, the condo.

So, the kitchen doesn’t look that bad right? From a distance, no, but up close it is pretty bad. As you can tell from the photos, it is pretty small. But we are going to open it up and put much nicer cabinetry in.

Here’s what the kitchen looks like right now.

We spent two days putting the kitchen cabinets together. Geesh, we bought a lot of cabinets! But, I had to have a lazy susan, pull out drawers, and a trash can cabinet (I will never not have a trash can cabinet again. It is my absolute must in a kitchen). Gotta give Adam his propers!

After two days of cabinet building, here’s what we have…cabinets galore, overtaking every inch of the space.

There are still so many things we need to consider for our kitchen remodel. I still haven’t chosen the sink, we decided to buy a stove in addition to a new refrigerator but we haven’t purchased either yet. I still have to pick out countertops. But, I have started an inspiration board of some of the things we are working through. Here it is:

Isn’t that removable wallpaper to die for?! We’re going to take baby steps and put it in the pantry. I also LOVE the backsplash. We bought it months ago just because…you never know when you’re going to need backsplash tile, LOL. It is going to look perfect in this space and it is my favorite color – blue, green, gray. And, yes, I am going to succumb to gold hardware. Hope I don’t regret it a year or two from now. Stay tuned for more updates. Lots happening between now and mid-October.

While we are in the middle of trying to renovate our condo, we decided that a very quick weekend trip was in order. As I have mentioned in prior postings, I collect portraits. I found two I wanted – or absolutely had to have in Connecticut and NYC so we made the trek last weekend to pick them up. In less than 24 hours we came home with three new portraits, LOL.

We started our trip on Friday night after work; drove to New Jersey, stayed the night, and then on to Danbury, Connecticut. Quick side note, tolls are insane! I think we spent $40 on tolls. Thank god we have an E-Z Pass, otherwise the tolls would’ve been even higher.

Ok, so here is what all of the fuss was about.

Meet Priscilla. I found her on Marketplace about a month ago. I asked the seller if she would ship the portrait but it is quite large and probably would’ve been cost prohibitive. So, I checked everyday to see if the painting had sold. Finally, Adam and I decided to make the trip and get her and we are so happy we did. I absolutely love, love, love this portrait.

I had my eye on another portrait in NYC. I have been watching it on Marketplace for about 6 months. I think it was fate because she was still available when we made our trip and I picked her up too. I don’t have a name for her yet. As you can see, there is a little bit of damage to the portrait but I think it adds character. And, we only paid $9 for it.

We had some time to kill while we we were waiting to pickup our New York gal, so we parked …we found street parking right outside the apartment of where we picked up the New York portrait. We wandered around Hell’s Kitchen and stumbled upon a street market/garage sale/flea market and found another portrait! I move much slower than Adam when we go antiquing so he was way ahead of me. He spotted another female portrait. Long story short, we bought it too. I don’t have a name for her yet either.

So, you’re probably thinking I’m crazy, and yes, that is probably true. But, i just can’t help myself.  I am up to 7 portraits; 6 female and 1 male.

Ok, enough about our wacky travels but I will admit, that was such a fun, exhilarating trip. We stopped in NYC at 10:30 am, picked up our portraits, ate lunch, and were home by 6 pm.

Here’s an update on our condo remodel. We thought we found the hardwood floor we wanted but the more we looked at it, the more orange it looked. Thus began our quest for non-orange floors. I posted a picture of the floor in a previous post but here is a refresh. This is Toffee Oak. It doesn’t look orange in the picture because the lighting is bad, but it definitely has an orange tint to it.

We have been to multiple flooring stores now. This is just a sampling of the samples we have. Part of the problem is we have a tight deadline and most stores don’t keep hardwoods in stock. I think we are leaning towards the wood on the top right but don’t quote us!

We have painted almost every room in our condo. I swear, we are constantly painting. I’ll give you a sneak peak of the guest bedroom (before photos below). The prior owner put some weird treatment on the wall. It looks like multiple paint colors and then the paint was scratched off to add depth. I had to take a sanding sponge and scrape everything off all of the walls  and then we had to prime the walls before we could paint. If you look closely, we were blessed with a stencil on the ceiling (yes, that was sarcasm). So, lucky us, we get to repaint the ceiling too.

It’s hard to tell how dark the paint is in the pictures above because of the camera flash but with only one window in the guest room, we definitely had to brighten it up. We liked one of the colors we put in Spotswood so much we used it again in the condo. Of course, we’re still not done. Need to cover a few outlets, paint the ceiling, and the closet. I think I’m going to try removable wallpaper in one of the closets.

We have been at the condo every night after work and all weekend long. I can’t wait until we finish round one of renovations (new kitchen, new hardwood floors). Stay tuned for more updates.