16 hours ago
When we were first married, the upstairs of this house was the only part of the house that was finished, but boy, did it look different.
Rough hewn, yellowing wood, which was actually house siding, on the ceiling.
Raggedy carpet from wall to wall.
Old, beat-up wood trim.
The cheapest doors you can buy at the home improvement store.
Dirty white walls.
A bathroom that was not worth noting.
No overhead lighting in the bedrooms.
An old kitchen with white laminate countertops and no dishwasher.
Windows that would barely open, and a sliding glass door that let cold air through in the winter.
But it had a gorgeous wood stove and vaulted ceilings. The bones were good.
My dad helped us update the kitchen, because that was just necessary. We lived in one of the upstairs bedrooms until Wyatt was born and we moved downstairs. I painted the walls, trying to put a bandaid on a house we couldn't afford to fix up yet. And we just dealt with it, for 8 years.
Finally two years ago, we decided we were staying, we might as well make this place somewhere we would like to live! Most of the work was concentrated on the upstairs, for obvious reasons.
What did we do?
Ripped out the carpet and put new (fake) wood floors in.
Tore out all the trims and doors, and replaced all of it.
New windows, and a new sliding glass door.
Covered up the ceiling with white planks (which did a ton to brighten it up, let me tell you).
Repainted everything a brighter color.
Remodeled the bathroom.
So basically, we redid everything except the kitchen (which had already been redone) and the wood stove (which really can't be improved upon).
I really wouldn't necessarily recommend doing all the work yourself, which is what we did, because it was a miserable, crazy few months. But we saved a bunch of money, and it finally looks the way I want it!
A few notes:
You'll notice the couch is green and the chairs are tan in a few photos. The pictures were taken before I bought new couch covers a year and a half ago. If you follow me on Instagram, you've seen the new covers. I'll put a few updated pictures at the end so you can see, but that's why not all the pictures match!
Bathroom not pictured because the lighting is horrible in there and it's terribly hard to take a good picture of it, but trust me, it's nice now.
So that was what it looked like right after our remodel, but a few months later I got a few new couch covers. I didn't feel like re-taking all the photos, so here are just a couple more recent shots to give you an idea of how it looks a slightly different now.
Here's the linkup - share a post with photos of your house, and add it below!
I used to be of the school-should-not-start-until-after-labor-day-what-is-wrong-with-you-people persuasion, but this year, we are starting school on August 20th. I just wanted to give us a little more wiggle room. That means our first day of school is a mere three weeks away, as of the typing of this post. While I'm intending on doing a post about my curriculum picks for 2nd grade, right now I have my hands full trying to find pockets of time to get everything organized and finalized for the year!
So, I thought I'd just share a few of the resources for homeschool planning that I've been loving lately.
The Lovely Homeschool Course - I snagged this homeschool planning course earlier this year for a great deal, and it has been 100% worth the money. The course comes with editable PDF files to help you plan out your year. Last year, with having a baby in the middle of the year, we mostly kept things flexible, which was what we needed then. But this school year, I was hoping to develop more of a routine. This course is letting me plan things out while still letting me leave room to be flexible, so it's just what I needed.
Better Together - This is a book written by Pam Barnhill, all about "Morning Time". If you haven't heard of Morning Time, it's something many homeschool families incorporate into their day. If you have a homeschool friend, ask them if they do Morning Time, and you'll sound like you know what you're talking about. Basically it's a time to gather together for Bible reading, singing hymns, memorizing Bible verses, reading books together, or whatever else we want to do.
Morning Time is something I really want to incorporate into our daily routine this year - what I love is that this would be a time for all of my kids to learn something together, even the littlest ones. As they grow, I think it will be a wonderful tool to connect as a family, even as I have a large range of ages. This book gives some practical tips for morning time, as well as addressing the "why" of it all, and it's making me excited to get started in a few weeks.
Simply Charlotte Mason - Stay tuned, because a post about my curriculum picks for 2nd grade is coming, but this year we decided to try out a local co-op. We will meet with other homeschool families once a week, and the little kids will do some activities related to the subjects of literature, history, and science. It'll be fun social time for all of us. The downside is that we have to at least kind-of-sort-of keep up with the curriculum they pick. I have my own curriculum I'll be working through with my kids this year, but we'll also have to go over what we're learning at co-op.
They picked the Middle Ages to study for history this year. Now, you have to understand that the Middle Ages has never been my personal favorite period of time to learn about, and the curriculum they picked is okay but...well, a little dry. I'm actually not looking forward to it, and that's a problem for me. My whole philosophy for elementary-level History education is that if we aren't enjoying it, we aren't doing it right.
Enter Simply Charlotte Mason. I remembered that they have recommended book lists for every historical era, for every age group, so I checked out their list for 2nd grade level Middle ages, and I am relieved to find some fun supplementary books to add in to our read-aloud rotation that look more interesting to me! If I'm more interested, my kids will be more interested, and we'll all be happy. Basically, Simply Charlotte Mason is my new go-to for books to make boring subjects interesting.
The Read-Aloud Family - Speaking of booklists, I'm relying pretty heavily on this book when picking read-aloud books for our morning time. And if you haven't listened to the Read-Aloud Revival Podcast, get yourself over to iTunes and get inspired!
This article about Loop Scheduling - Sometimes I have too many ideas and not enough time. There are all kinds of books and resources I want to use, but if we tried to use each of these every day, we'd be doing school until dinner time (or later), and that's not reasonable. When I read about loop scheduling last year, it made so much sense. I have a whole list of "extras" worked out, things I want to loop through every couple weeks, and I'm really looking forward to incorporating subjects and activities we wouldn't be able to get to otherwise!
This post from my blog friend Elisha about her homeschooling method - Read through the article - basically that peaceful, joyful tone that Elisha is hitting is my goal for our homeschool, no matter what method/curriculum we are using!
That's all I have for now, stay tuned for a curriculum post coming up...sometime soon!
When we bought this house, the basement was unfinished. When I got pregnant with Wyatt, we decided to tackle the project and we finished it right before he was born!
Still, for a long time we let the downstairs sit empty, but when I was pregnant with Clarice and decided I wouldn't be continuing to work, I saved all my pennies to decorate this basement family room. This is the door we most often use to come into our house. It's also the door that guests most often use. I wanted to make sure people were walking into more than just an empty room.
A few months later we repainted and got the rest of the furniture. Two years later, I'm still happy with it. If I had to do it over, I might just go with a more adventurous couch color (my tastes just keep getting more colorful), but the rest would stay mostly the same!
I took these pictures two years ago, and the only things that have changed are the purses hanging by the door, and the piano-mantel, which I update periodically.
We mostly use this room for the occasional movie, and Derek works down here on the days he works from home. Just in case you are wondering: the square prints on the chicken-wire bulletin board are from Artifact Uprising and Parabo Press. The rest is a miss mash of stuff from Hobby Lobby, Walmart, Target, and Ikea!
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The text signs are particularly special to me (from House Of Belonging, in case you are wondering). The one above the blue cabinet has my favorite verse from the hymn "O Glorious Day". I wanted more on our walls that symbolized who we are as a family and pointed us back to Christ. This hymn verse communicates the Gospel and refocuses us on eternity, and I love that it's hanging on our walls now!
"One day the grave could conceal Him no longer,
One day the stone rolled away from the door,
Now He arose, over death He has concurred!
Now He's ascended, My Lord evermore!
Living He loved me, dying He saved me,
Buried He carried, my sins far away!
Rising He justified, freely forever!
One day He's coming! O glorious day!"
The second sign on the piano appealed to me because the quote spoke directly to my heart. The reason we almost moved is that this house is very small for our big family, and we go through periods when we feel discontent. But this quote reminds me, whenever I look at it, that there are good parts to living in a small house too.
I recently learned this quote is from an old country song called "Little Houses" by Doug Stone (oh, I miss that good ole country music!). I looked it up on Spotify, and it's super-sweet, and almost feels autobiographical for me. We moved into this house as newlyweds, and brought all our babies home here, and even though it feels small, it's full to the brim with noise, and laughter, and love. So I've come to love our little house over the years.
"Love grows best in little houses,
With fewer walls to separate,
Where you eat and sleep so close together,
You can't help but communicate.
And if we had more room between us,
Think of all we'd miss.
Love grows best in houses just like this."
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Here's the linkup if you want to join in!
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Here's the linkup if you want to join in!
What I couldn't figure out was what color to paint it.
In the mountains, most homes have lovely cedar siding, maybe even with log accents. This house had none of those things and needed paint. But as a young newlywed with no experience picking paint colors, I had no idea what to choose. What was a good color for a mountain home?
I ended up going with a pale green, with darker green trim, but I was never completely satisfied with it.
A couple years ago we undertook a major remodel after realizing that moving wasn't in our near future. If we had to stay where we were, it was finally time to put some effort into making this house look the way we want, to make it comfortable and pretty for however many years we would be here. Most of the projects were on the interior, but I felt like the outside needed to match the newly polished inside.
I chose Le Luxe by Behr. Derek taped up the trim and started spraying the outside of our home, and I have to say, we were both terrified. It looked so...dark! It looked almost black! But we persevered, added the white trim, and in the end I loved the color so much. Now our house not only looks polished, it's the perfect color backdrop for my instagram photos!
Most mountain homes still have cedar siding, but I have to say, I love the way this color looks for a mountain/forest home. It brings to mind stone or slate, it doesn't match the surroundings, but it goes. I love the way it turned out!
(These photos were taken two years ago, in the fall, obviously. Look how tiny my babies are, and how much Clyde looks like a Charlie Brown character!)
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If you follow me on Instagram, you saw that I invited you all to join in on sharing photos of your house over the next month! I'm running a linkup, just because it might make it a little more fun (or if you are on Instagram, use the hashtag #bloglandhometours). Share photos or even stories of your home, write as many posts as you want and organize them however you want, and come share them here so we can all check them out! No need to link back here unless you want to, but I do reserve the right to delete links that do not fit this linkup. I'll share the same linkup in each post, so come back and share on any of my house posts for the next month or so! I can't wait to see everyone's homes! It's like we're all having coffee at each other's houses!
(This new metal print is so cool! Thanks to Artsy Couture for sending me a metal photo print to review.)
Do you ever wonder if it's narcissistic that we decorate our houses with pictures of ourselves?
A few years ago I heard someone mention how it could be narcissistic to decorate with photos of yourself, and for a long time I wondered if maybe that was true. I can certainly see how decorating with photos could become narcissistic, like those movie characters who live alone and have a huge canvas of themselves adorning the wall above the couch. But still, I don't buy that decorating with photos has to be a narcissistic thing.
I've put more thought into it, and even read about it in recent years, and I personally think there are a few good reasons to decorate with photos of your own family. This is what I think:
1. Decorating with photos adds to a feeling of solidarity between family members.
I think about decorating with photos differently now that I have kids of my own. I think that for kids, seeing pictures of themselves with their family on the wall reminds them that they aren't alone - they are part of a bigger unit, a family, and that means something. They play an integral role in a family, they are woven through the collective family memories that photos represent. They can look at the walls and visually see their place in the family. In my opinion, that can't help but add some security, knowing your place in the world by being able to see it on the walls.
2. Photos are memories.
I went to my parents house for the 4th of July, and my sister and I stood looking at an old vacation photo from when we went river rafting. I mentioned something specific that I remembered about that day, and she mentioned something she remembered, and there we were bonding over a shared memory because of a photo on my parents' wall. I'm the type of person who doesn't really remember things until I see a photo - and then a whole cascade of memories floods in. Not everyone is like this, certain personality types are much better at remembering and honoring the past in their hearts without any external reminders, but personally, I need the photos around me to remind me.
3. Photos can be modern "remembrance stones".
Remember how the Israelites crossed the Jordan River, and God told them to stack twelve stones from the river bed? When their children asked about the stones, they could tell them of the Lord's faithfulness to Israel. Well, to me, photos on my walls are something like a modern equivalent to that. I want to work on this more in my home, by putting photos on the wall that are not only the perfect family photos, but photos that I can point to and say "Remember when God did that?" He has been faithful to our family in many ways, and I want the photos on my wall to not just serve as an anchor for bonding and memories in my family, but also a way to point back to God's faithfulness.
Now, on to some practical things...
What is your favorite way to decorate with photos in your house?
Personally, I am constantly changing it up.
-I have small, square prints on a bulletin board above Derek's desk.
-We have a wall collage of canvas prints. Two of the pictures are of Derek and me from our 5th anniversary (they probably need updating since we just hit our 10th!), and there are smaller canvas prints of each of the kids' newborn pictures.
-I had pictures hanging along our stairwell, but I recently took those down because I want to re-do that wall. I'll update when I figure it out.
-A metal print on my piano-top (which is basically my version of a mantel display, since I don't have a mantel).
The metal print is the newest addition to my photo decor - Artsy Couture recently asked if I'd like to check out one of their products and sent me this gorgeous metal print! In case you haven't heard of metal prints, the photo is actually printed on a thin sheet of aluminum. The colors are supposed to be brighter and sharper in printing with this method.
I ended up picking a beach photo from our vacation that I knew was not perfectly focused, but I was so impressed when the print came at how crisp it was anyway! The colors really are gorgeous and vibrant, and it kind of has a certain glow about it that I am assuming is an effect of printing on aluminum. I love the way it turned out, and it looks just as good as I thought it would on my piano-mantel.
Bonuses to printing on aluminum: it doesn't get retain dirt like textured canvas might, and there is no glass to break if it falls!
I poked around on the Artsy Couture website and they have a ton of options - not just for metal prints, but canvases, wood prints, traditional prints, cards, photo books, etc. They also happen to be having a sale on large prints that ends tomorrow, so if you are interested, hop on over there and check it out!
What do you think? Do you decorate with photos or not? What are your reasons, if you have any?
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