Spotswood House

Consider this the start of a new series…secondhand find of the week. Ever since we bought Spotswood I have been on a mission to find everything we furnish it with secondhand. It has been such a fun and addictive process. I probably spend at least an hour a day scouring Facebook Marketplace, Craigslist, and Letgo. If I find something I can haul by myself for $50 or less I literally cannot say “no”!

Some of my favorite searches are West Elm, Crate & Barrel, World Market, Pottery Barn, industrial, pillows, retro, and wall mirror. I really only need a couple more things for our new house – king bed frame/headboard and a tv stand but that doesn’t stop me from shopping for literally everything else. It has gotten so bad that I will buy something and then find something I like better and buy it. Right now I have two dining room tables and two full size beds. I got rid of one of my two stoves, thank goodness because my house is overrun with furniture.

I have shown you some of my curtain finds but I will save my latest curtain purchase for a later post. I will start with two pillow covers I purchased that I literally have no need for but had to have for $10. Below, you will find two pillow covers from Crate & Barrel I purchased. They didn’t have the pillow inserts but no worries I have plenty of those….I’m sure every decorating addict has the same problem. Aww, I just love the graphic pattern. What you can’t see is the fabric is raised creating a high dollar look. Right now the pillows are sitting in our small bedroom at Spotswood and I may leave them there. I have tons of finds to share and can’t wait for the next item to share next week.  – Lindsey

 

We are getting to the point where we REALLY need to start making decisions about the future kitchen. We made our first trip to the tile store and our indecisiveness kicked in. It is so hard to make kitchen decisions without actually seeing them in real life. We have toyed with the idea of having an all-white kitchen – we stayed in an Airbnb carriage house in Bluffton South Carolina and they had a super cute white kitchen. Here is some of tile I found that I think would make a cool kitchen backsplash.

The beige tile (on the left) is really pretty but I’m not a beige fan. The  dark blue subway tile (on the right) adds a pop of color but it may be too dark.

The blueish grayish tile (on the left) is pretty. I like this one. The tile on the right is so unique but I think it would be too busy as a backsplash.

The art deco tile (on the left) is absolutely stunning but what you can’t see is the price, $130 sq ft. I just can’t justify that price. I like the marble diamond pattern but I think I want a little bit more color.

The grayish tile (on the left) is my favorite. I really like the unique pattern and the color is subdued. The black and marble tile (on the right) is too graphic.

This is probably my second favorite tile. I’m just not sure if the tile is too busy.

In addition to tile backsplash  we looked at tile flooring. We have never had tile in a kitchen before, always wood. But we want tile for this house for the low maintenance since we may use the house as an Airbnb.  The one thing I will say is I definitely have a “look” I like. All of the tile below is very similar looking – natural stone concrete.

I don’t think I am a fan of planks. I really prefer the larger stone pieces. The tile on the right resembles marble. It is really pretty.

 

I like the stone on the left. It resembles concrete. The hexagons on the right are cool and modern but they don’t feel timeless to me, more on trend which I want to avoid.

The two tiles below are the same brand and company just different colors.

We are leaning towards a grayish color stone but I really want to find the perfect mix between gray and brown. We are thinking about laying the tiles in a pattern to add more interest.

I subscribe to 5 design magazines and cut out pictures all of the time of things I really like (I have lots of kitchen pictures) but this process to select tiles has made me start to second guess everything and it’s hard to visualize what it will look like put together. We want to make the right choice because the kitchen is EVERYTHING in a home. I’ll keep you posted on the route we take.  – Lindsey

 

 

We have such a bad habit of getting halfway through a project and then realizing we never took a “before” picture (first world problems) so apologies in advance for the terrible pictures.

The goal for this past weekend was to demo a shed, take down a faux water well decorative thing (no idea what else to call it), replace old beige outlets with crisp white ones, add more curtains, and take drywall down in the kitchen.

Look very close (like you need a magnifying glass) and you will see 3 sheds. One is completely dilapidated and the other two and just kinda tragic looking. They are hidden behind the decorative water well thing.

Shed is gone now. I so wish I had a better before picture because the after picture (below) looks lame.

Here is another shot of the well thing. It had to go!

All gone. Now we just have to figure out how to get the electric company to come take the 2 light poles out of our backyard.

Adam working hard on replacing outlets and covers.

The outlet looks so good now.

We hung more curtains this past weekend. I love West Elm curtains, especially back tab curtains which give the curtain a nice pleat on the front and I insist on 95-96 inch curtains. It makes standard height ceilings feels so much taller. I downloaded a new app for my secondhand purchases, LetGo, and found these gorgeous West Elm curtains for less than half the price in stores.

We bought another set of curtains which I was so excited to find at Home Goods. Unfortunately, they don’t match the bedding and they are rod pocket – not my fav. The curtains in this room have come down and have been returned. They are very pretty but rod pocket. The quest for curtains in the “owners suite” continues.

So, I saved the bad news for last. We made so much progress by opening up the kitchen and adding a beam in the ceiling. We wanted to continue the momentum and take the drywall down. Everything was going smoothly…

When we got to the third wall we hit wood rot. And then we found termites. Adam thinks he has the termites removed/contained but we need to bite the bullet and get it looked at by a professional. So after all of the progress we made we now have a termite problem to deal with. I am exhausted. More to come soon – Lindsey

 

 

Fourth of July makes me think of hamburgers, hotdogs, swimming pools, family get togethers or in our case extra time to spend on our home remodel. We have been working feverishly on Spotswood House and are extremely thankful to have an extra set of hands this week (thanks Chris and Pam). So, here is what we have been up to.

Windows:  I guess I didn’t pay much attention but about half of our windows are painted white and the other half are the natural wood color. Natural wood windows are beautiful, especially if you are into Craftsman Style homes but our house is a little bit on the modern side so the wood windows look REALLY out of place.

Before:  This picture was originally taken for the floors (which are beautiful) but look at those out of place wood windows.

After: Doesn’t it look so much lighter, brighter, and cleaner?? I love it.

Floor vents: Seriously, why am I talking about floor vents. Well, it’s the little things that matter and our original floor vents were nasty. A quick trip to Home Depot solved that problem. I hope I don’t have to point out which vent is the old one (the one on the bottom).

Window panels: So I have to admit my favorite part of the remodeling process is the decorating and I really haven’t had the opportunity to do anything until now. I found these amazing West Elm panels on Facebook Marketplace for like $21 and found the perfect matching curtain rod at Home Goods for like $17.  These are in our tiny “Misty Coast” back bedroom. I really need to try to get a better shot, this does not do them justice.

Flush mount light: In our tiny back bedroom we had the most generic flush mount light, so ugly. I found a new Restoration Hardware flush mount light on Facebook Marketplace for $100. It makes a world of difference and matches the curtains above perfectly.

Before shot on the left, spiders living inside light on the right

This just confirms how bad my picture taking skills are! The flush mount light looks way better in person.

Kitchen: Our goal  was to open the kitchen up to the living room. In order to make this possible we (and by we, I mean Adam) had to remove the fireplace smack dab in the middle of the kitchen and insert a beam to hold the walls up. This task would not have been possible without the help of Adam’s parents.

Before: The fireplace is behind the drywall right in the middle section of the cabinets.

During: Walls down, fireplace still up

After: Walls out, fireplace out, and beam in. Wide open space ahhhhhhhh

 

Adam and his parents make a cameo in the shot above.

We just had a dumpster delivered today so lots more remodeling to come. Until next time, Lindsey

So my favorite paint brand is Benjamin Moore and we have our primary house covered in it but for our Spotswood House we decided to go a different route. We happened to be in Home Depot (because where else would we be) and I went on a paint chip binge and it was so much fun! Hope Depot just also happened to have a rebate on their Behr paint so we took the plunge.

Above left is our small bedroom before paint. I have no idea what color is on the wall but it resembles spoiled milk. With only one window we needed to keep the room color light and bright. We ended up going with “Misty Coast” (see above). I think the name fits the color perfectly, it literally looks like a misty coast.

Our back bedroom was RED (see below). Here is the color we chose for the bedroom, “Nature’s Reflection”. This is probably my favorite color, a perfect mix of blue and green.

The front bedroom was a soft green and we ended up selecting a very similar color, “Mild Mint”. I absolutely love a pale green color. Our neighbor’s house in Jacksonville, FL was painted a soft green with white trim and black shutters. It was so beautiful.

For the living room and dining room combo we wanted to go with a gray tone. Out of all the colors this is the one I’m on the fence about. I feel like it is a little too light and has a purple undertone, definitely not the look I was going for. This color is “Platinum”.

When we were picking colors for the house we thought we were doing a good job of picking different shades but when you see the colors together they look so similar, good grief.

What is your favorite paint color? Until next time….Lindsey

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I’m sure you’re wondering where the name Spotswood House came from. It all started with a visit to Montpelier, President James Madison’s estate, located in Orange, VA (where our house also happens to be located). We were touring a new exhibit, The Mere Distinction of Colour, which chronicles the lives of those enslaved at Montpelier told by their living descendants. One of the artifacts was a ledger of slaves living on the property,  and one of them was named Spotswood. As soon as I saw that name my heart skipped a beat.  It is the coolest name, kinda like a debonair British spy or an artistocratic dog, Spotswood Alistair Windor IV.

Spotswood also happens to be the name of everything in the area. You have Spotswood Trail, Spotswood Baptist Church, Spotswood Elementary School, Spotswood Lodge – an 11 acre farm located in Gordonsville, VA that rents from $800 per night, and then the man himself, Alexander Spotswood, for whom all of this is named after.

Alexander Spotswood was  Lieutenant Governor of Virginia from 1710 – 1722. He was also Deputy Postmaster General from 1730 – 1739. When he “retired” he had over 80,000 acres of land in Virginia. He is known for exploring land beyond the Blue Ridge Mountains and established what was perhaps the first colonial iron works.

The man, the myth, the delapidated house

So we settled upon Spotswood but the name sounded so solitary, it needed something else. Manor was way too fancy, Cottage sounded too dainty, Farm was misleading (we only have one acre after all), and Hill it is not, we are on flat land. The only thing that fit was “House” and thus our home became Spotswood House. I love the name more and more each day.

What would you / have you named your house?

Here he/she is. White aluminum siding at its finest! Our Little Shop of Horrors is 3 bedrooms and 1 bathroom situated on one acre of land. It has good bones once you rip off the Florida room and carport.  This is a pretty bad angle and we have since cut the grass and applied some weed treatment. Why stop now, here’s the rest of the house.

Here is the kitchen looking in from the back door / mud room. On the other side of the kitchen is the dining room.

More of the kitchen. Look at those beautiful floors…not sure if they are vinyl or linoleum. Not to give too much away but we plan to rip the wall out with the cabinets and open the kitchen up.

Here is the kitchen looking in from the dining room. The back door which leads to the Florida room is straight ahead. I have been trying to give away the refirgerator on Craigslist for the past 2 weeks but nobody wants it…it works

Here is the living room dining room combo, looking from the living room into the dining room. Spoiler alert – the corner wall cabinet in the dining room has been ripped out.

Dining room looking into the living room.

Here is the front bedroom. This will eventually be the master room, or owner’s suite if you want to be politically correct.

Another shot of front bedroom. We repainted this room almost the exact same color (we’ll chronicle in a future post). It is a real pretty soft green.

This is the back bedroom, directly behind the front bedroom. Why, why, why would you paint a room that doesn’t get much light red?? And then they didn’t trim it out so the top of the walls are navy. Yikes!

The prior owners were kind enough to leave us that big, bulky bookcase unit. It has already been torn out.

Here is the third bedroom, the smallest of the three and in need of the most work. In the bottom left of the picture is a lovely futon bed left by the preivous owner. It has since been removed.

This bathroom is so tiny but we don’t really have an option to reconfigure without losing a bedroom. We will be completely redoing this room.

This is the Florida room off the back of the house, which will be coming off. The floor is plywood and there is mold and rotten wood. It smells wonderful…

This is the back entrance to the house and the door directly in front leads to the kitchen. There is a huge hole in the ceiling if you look close.

Laundry room – this room will be reconfigured

Back of the house – Florida room will come off and be redone the right way.

This is the backyard. It goes back a pretty good distance. There is a gazebo in the background and a weird fake well thing in the foreground.

This is the front of the house looking toward the street. We are right off a country highway so it isn’t very busy.

After writing captions for each picture I find myself asking, “why did we buy this place????” This is a big job! But we have already made a lot of progress and I have been having so much fun shopping on Craigslist and Facebook Marketplace. And we throw in a winery visit here and there so maybe things aren’t so bad.

What do you think of our Spotswood House?

 

 

Thanks for joining us on our first home renovation adventure!

Your home should tell the story of who you are, and be a collection of what you love brought together under one roof.- Nate Berkus

My husband Adam and I started going to Virginia wine country a couple times a year which eventually turned into a couple times a month. Then we decided to do something spontaneous/crazy ( I think we watched too many epidsodes of Fixer Upper and thought “we got this”) and we bought a second house in Orange, Virginia.  While we live and work in the DC metro area, heading to the country is our relaxing getaway.  You can feel your blood pressure immediately decrease (but not in a creepy, passout kinda way) as you enter the beautiful countryside with horse farms and wineries.

To “justify” the home purchase, we told ourselves we would turn the house into an Airbnb, and if everything goes as planned, lol, we will turn this place into a money making machine. But let’s not get ahead of ourselves, our Spotswood House is in need of a MAJOR exorcism, I mean renovation. So as not to spoil the fun, check in next time as we reveal our little diamond in the rough.

Adam and I at Pippen Hill Winery in Charlottesville, Virginia.