The Potter & His Clay: Laundry Room & Half Bath

We've been working so hard on the casa these past few weeks. On Sunday I watched the Bachelor wedding and it was the first time in 2 months I've sat down to just relax. We finally got all of the walls/trim painted which was a huge feat. I've also been working on a lot of little updates around the place. We really only have big things left like buying rugs, new couches, a new bed...those kinds of things that take time and saving. But for now I want to show you my laundry room and half bath since they're totally finished and a few sneak peeks of other things that I've been working on.

Before:

After:

Before:

After:

First I want to point out the beautiful smooth ceilings. They're one of the most beautiful sights I have ever seen. Especially after what we've gone through with getting them to look like that. Our closing date kept getting pushed back which delayed our workers on starting this massive project so they weren't done on move-in day. Definitely not their fault but it was a pretty interesting situation. Definitely a story to tell the grandkids.

Here are a few pics of that process:

Soooo the day we moved into our house this is what it looked like:

We slept here in the living room/office amidst all of the dust on an air mattress since our bedroom was still a huge mess and they were still working on it:

So we had no where to put all of our stuff right! All of the furniture went in the garage for a week and our boxes went in the den until other rooms were accessible. This was before they sanded and painted the ceilings so there was still work to do all over the house.

Andddd a few days after we moved in:

After going through this 2-week long process and trying to live in it I'm even more thankful for the way they look now. Having them smooth is such a relief. We struggled for a few weeks with whether or not we wanted to go through the process and whether or not it was worth the money we spent on having it done. If you had asked me during the process if it was worth it I probably would've said no. But now that the 523902 layers of dust have subsided I'd say it was totally worth every cent. I would've regretted it forever if I didn't do it. It totally changed and updated the whole look of the house. We love our new ceilings!

Moving on. I struggled with the color of the walls for a while. I wanted to paint the dining, kitchen, 1/2 bath and laundry the same color. I originally picked out 1 color for the whole house minus our bedroom. It was Benjamin Moore Berkshire Beige. I painted it in Matt's office first and loved it in there but there's no way I was going to paint it anywhere else in my house. It was darker than I thought it'd be and in some angles it was kind of green. Definitely not the look I was going for for the whole place. I eventually decided on Sanddune by Benjamin Moore in just those 4 rooms. It's a great neutral color. It has a gray side to make it more modern and a brown side to play down the gray so it won't be too trendy and something I'll get sick of in a year. If that makes any sense at all. The paint man at Farrell Calhoun found the color for me after trying to convince me to paint my kitchen burnt orange. It's a nice cozy color. The whole house had been freshly painted when we bought it but the neutral color they chose had a peachy undertone that definitely was not for me (although you can't really tell in the pics). Plus they painted latex on top of enamel paint on the trim everywhere so guess what! It all had to be repainted since it would peel off if you looked at it funny.

I really don't like the oriental-looking cabinet doors all over the downstairs with the design in them. So 70's. We plan on changing them out eventually. They're in the den, bar, kitchen and laundry room. That project, however, can definitely wait a while. They're great for now.

The laundry was pretty easy. I switched out the fixture (well...had my dad switch it out) for a simple hanging bulb. I've had my eye on a clothespin fixture I saw on Pinterest/Young House Love for a while now and I seized my opportunity. It was a cheap project too! About $20 total.

Here's the link:

http://www.younghouselove.com/2011/08/320-pins/

I used a different type of chicken wire. There's was more linear and mine is more like, well...chicken wire. I still love it though. It definitely makes the room interesting.

Supplies:

Light fixture (Got mine for $7 on Amazon)

Chicken wire (Home Depot or Lowes for about $7)

I used 3.5 bags of clothespins (Walmart or any craft store for $1 a bag)

Extra wire for hanging and binding (appx $2)

More pics!

The half bath was a simple upgrade as well. I scored the oval mirror at Hobby Lobby for $35 and I got the artwork at TJ Maxx about 5 years ago. I had to buy a little towel holder and I installed it myself. My dad had the light fixture in his garage that he so generously gave us. It's so nice having that 1/2 bath off of the kitchen. We don't know what to do with all of this space!