Weekends 6, 7, 8, and 9- Let There Be LIGHT! (MEGA-post)

Last time I posted I apologized for my weekend update being so late.  I don't know what to even say about the tardiness of this post!  Haha!

I will say, I have been extremely busy the past few weeks.  Sometimes when I get this busy, it is better for my sanity to drop some of the guilty pleasures in my life like stalking people on facebook and blogging (baha!), and give my full attention to the other tasks at hand.  However, because I enjoy looking back at our house progress (and I'm sure you all are dying see the progress and know what was keeping me so busy, right?  ;) ), I will give you a quick run-down on what has been going on.

Let's see here...

Between weekends 5 and 6:  I bought 33 yards of fabulous fabric to make window coverings for the main living areas in our new house.  Everytime I'd go to the FM store, I'd get so distracted and throw all of my design plans out the window.  I finally realized I needed to set an "inspiration" in stone, and I found this picture:

It's sideways....Oops.  I tried to fix it, but it didn't work, and I'm not trying again because I have better things to do :).  Anywho...I love it.  It is just the cover of one of those paint color pamphlets  Not what I was originally going for, but is definitely what our new house needs to look like.  It is lighter and airier (thank goodness!) than our current "look," yet very similar.  It has some of Wes's nice/expensive, dark wood vibes and some of my light and airy, assymetrical and creative vibes.  I think the detail I loved most was the fabric on the pillows.  I looked all over the place for similar fabric with no luck.  Then one day, I drove by the FM store and just pulled in to the parking lot (no, it was not my intended destination)  The first fabric I saw was this:

I love the similar colors and the pretty design!  Though it is not excact, it is definitely close enough for me!  The FM store had just gotten a new shipment of fun fabrics.  I also found these beauties amongst the new fabric and fell in love:)

I will use them for the curtains for the kitchen, laundry room, living room, and the red will be in the dining room.  I love how they have a rough texture but an elegant design...just perfect!  Can't wait to get sewing!

Weekend 6:  CAN LIGHTS!  Lighting is the thing that has taken up the most time the past three weekends.  Here is a semi-before picture of the basement.  We only had the two lights that are shining on the fireplace in this picture.  Needless to say, at night, it was super dark down there!

Not anymore!  The lights made such a huge difference in the basement.  We are now kinda can-light-happy:)  We are adding them everywhere...and loving it!  

 He also added 3 canlights and the wiring for 4 pendant lights around the bar area in the basement.  He actually removed a wall sconce and a plant light in that crazy brick wall thing and used the wiring and the switches for the new lighting:)  The can lights are hanging, and the wires will be connected to the pendants once the drywall finishers finish the ceiling and the walls.  (We don't want them to get nasty:))

Isn't it pretty!?

Between Weekends 6 and 7:  I spent much of my time planning a reunion with my friends from high school.  Also, Wes took a couple days off of work to help build a cardboard box maze for a youth event at our church.  I helped them a little on Friday.  It was SO FUN!  Sadly, we had to miss the actual event.  I heard it was AMAZING and I think 8 kids got saved!  Praise the Lord!!!

Weekend 7:  We did not work on the house at all because we were having a blast in Branson!  I do not have a good picture to sum up the weekend, sadly, but it was so wonderful to see everyone!  There were 15 of us total...a mix of high school buddies, their spouses, and their babies.  It had been several years since I had seen most of them, but we decided that must change.  I'm thinking our reunion is going to be an annual thing!

Between weekends 7 and 8:  We finally got our current house on the MLS!  I cleaned a lot, and Wes installed a new stainless steal dishwasher and cleaned the garage a bit.  I feel it looks cluttered and unimpressive online, as there are pictures of the INSIDE of my closets and pantry! Yikes!  Hopefully, someone will see beyond the pictures and come check us out!  No one has looked at it yet, but I've been keeping it nice and tidy!!  It's kinda funny, I don't think it looks a whole lot different than it has the past year, but every time people come over (like...every single time someone has visited) they comment, on how certain things are so clean, or it feels so much more open.  I did't think that much had changed (furniture is the same...I didn't re-organize the closets or pantry...), but maybe I'm a bigger slob than I thought!  Haha!

My cousin, Missy, came over one day.  She has been watching cake shows on TV, and wanted to learn some cake tricks, so I baked some cup cakes and she baked a cake and we dug into my 5 gallon bucket of frosting:)  Not to shabby for her first try, huh?  ;)  They look awesome!

Weekend 8:  We shopped a lot on weekend 8.  We picked out our granite for the counter tops and tile.  Wes also did a lot of plumbing and ripped out the tub in the basement and put in a new one.  It looks a lot worse than it did before, so I don't have before and after pictures.  He also scraped all of the popcorn off of the ceilings in the entire basement.  It was MESSY!  He also got rid of a lot of our trash.  That sounds like a minor thing, but when you are doing this much demolition, it is a BIG job!  I'm sure he did more, but it was a less "noticable" weekend.

After weekend 8, I had an absolute ball buying pretty things for the house!  Wes's mom and I went and picked out the specific slabs of granite we thought would be best (because each slab is a little different), and found lots of other goodies!  If you are doing any type of construction project and are in Springfield, you must know about Creative Associates.  It's amazing, and you can find great deals!  Here are a few of my finds:

Most of them are iphone pictures, so they are not the greatest.  I just love this slate herringbone tile.  The plan is to use it for the backsplash.  It is only $4.90 a square foot!  My second choice was $17!  Yikes!  The smallest square tile is a sample of our granite.  There is more color and movement in the larger slabs, and the bottom tile is the tile we chose for the flooring and for the showers.  It is not travertine, but is the best imitation travertine we have ever seen.  And at only 1.50 a square foot, for a very rich look, we'll take it!  Wes is super excited because it comes in 20X20 tiles, which means he can throw up about 15 tiles, and an entire shower will be finished! 

Pictured below is one of the things I'm MOST excited about!  There was a battle raging in me...between oil rubbed bronze light fixtures and brushed nickel.  I love brushed nickel, especially in bathrooms, but I felt many of the rooms needed some grounding (something "solid") with all of the light colors and white I will be using.  It needed some dark elements.  Then I found this beauty.  It is a mix of dark antinque gold (but looks more like a pewter) and brushed nickel.  Now I can use darker fixtures and brushed nickel, depending on the needs of the room, and these lovely things will tie everything together!  I think I'm going to lose the lamp shades, though.  This particular chandelier was a little over $50 and is BEAUTIFUL!  I got one for the dining room and one for the master bathroom, and a giant version of it for our entry way.  Can't wait to see them up!

The fixture pictured below is for the office/future nursary.  It is the dark pewter color.  $68! LOVE!

And we got 2 of these lovely fixtures for over our soon to be giant and amazing island in the kitchen.  They remind me of Restoration Hardware, and have bubble glass!  $49!  Ahhhhh!!!!  I looked at lights for the rest of the house at Metro Builder's Supply and Lowe's after finding these great deals and was appalled by the prices.  Sadly, I will have to suck it up for the bathrooms and some of the other rooms because Creative Associates was lacking when it came to brushed nickel fixtures. 

I also made a cake for a kid from my church.  It should have been easy, but turned into one of the most stressful cakes I've ever made.  I used colorflow, and I guess I didn't give it enough time to dry, or mixed it wrong, because it did not solidify.  I had to carefully cut the wax paper around the designs and put it on the cake because everything was breaking.  It looks great in the iphone picture, though! 

Last weekend (Weekend 9) Wes's dad and brother came over and helped.  It was so nice of them to sacrifice their time.  They did a lot of drywalling in the bathrooms, and Eric cleaned and organized a TON!  Cleaning is something we have a hard time keeping track of  because it doesn't FEEL productive when we have SO much to do!  It is, however, extremely necessary, so it was nice of him to take care of that icky job.  And for those of you who don't know, Wes's dad is an exceptionally professional drywaller, so our walls are looking GREAT! :)  Wes also added can lights to the kitchen.  Now it can look like daylight in the middle of the night. 

 Much better with more lights!

 I didn't mention that the past several weeks I have mostly been bashing out all of tile in the house.  I think it is pretty much all gone now.  Sometimes I get violent.  In one such case, I knocked a huge hole in backsplash of our kitchen and made a grand discovery!!! 

The huge and awkward bump-out in the wall in the laundry room is being used as a ginormous vent! (the picture below shows the bump-out on the left wall)  Wes said we can definitely make it smaller, and add some space to our cramped laundry room!  Yay!  We also think we will probably be able to add some sort of a nook in the wall.  I'm thinking at the very least we will be able to add a much needed hanging rod and some shelving for cute baskets, but I'm dreaming of a small bench with shelving and a hanging rod.  :)



And that's about it.  Really.  Haha.  Thanks to those of you who stuck around to read the whole thing!  We have a lot going on this week.  Hired professionals are making their first appearance and I only have one non-house related plan, so it should be good.  Can't wait to see what happens!