Renovation | white house black shutters

Painted Burlap Bulletin Board and Dining Room Reveal

posted on: February 27, 2013 30 Comments

Recently, we painted our the beat-up, thick wood trim in our 77 year old home in hopes that it would brighten and update the space. And boy did it ever! I’ve already shared the huge difference painting the trim made in our living room turned mom cave. I couldn’t believe the transformation the paint made in our dining room and wanted to share it, but I needed a little something in the wall art department. And yay, I finally figured it out this week, so here it is. I was struggling to find … [Read more...]

Filed Under: dining room, DIY, free projects, furniture, painting, pinspired, renovation, wall decor

Mom Cave Makeover Reveal

posted on: February 8, 2013 61 Comments

bright, colorful, and happy #MomCave #before and #after with #LaZBoy and whitehouseblackshutters.com

Are you ready for my mom cave reveal? You are not going to believe this after. Does that even look like it could be a room in my house?! When I first talked about creating my mom cave, I thought it would be fun to have its own little corner in my family room. But as I tried to work amongst the chaos, it just wasn’t happening. I decided to take over and transform our rarely-used living room into my own little space. It is away from the TV, the kitchen, the toys, but is still only a few … [Read more...]

Filed Under: decor, DIY, furniture, Living Room, painting, renovation, SPONSORED

How to Tackle a Project When You Have Kids

posted on: January 25, 2013 5 Comments

Recently we tackled a huge painting project around here that took two weeks and involved almost half of our house. We have three kids (3.5, 2.5, and 1) but try not to let that stop us from tackling home projects. I’ve been asked by several people how we can did it with them around. It’s tricky and not how I would want to live life on a normal basis! But if you space your projects out and don’t head from one thing to the next, knocking a project out in a weekend or three, or in a month, … [Read more...]

Filed Under: DIY, life with kids, renovation, simple tips, talking to you

We Painted Our Trim White

posted on: January 23, 2013 29 Comments

There’s a project I’ve been wanting to tackle for the three years that we’ve lived here, and it’s finally done. Well, almost. Two weeks ago we dove into the project and didn’t look back. We primed all of the trim in the living room, dining room, and hallway (here’s a house tour with the rooms). It took a whole week. This past weekend we gave the trim the first coat of paint (Valspar Bistro White), the second, painted the living room walls (Valspar Stillness), and took off all of … [Read more...]

Filed Under: decor, DIY, Living Room, OUR HOME, painting, renovation, talking to you

Floor Plan of Our Home

posted on: October 11, 2012 9 Comments

Many people have been asking for a floor plan to get an idea of the flow of our home, so I made a rough sketch of the first floor: As you can see, we have two bedrooms and one bathroom. The previous owners also used the living room (which is open to the dining room) as a bedroom. The space is really well laid out and has a great flow to it, and you’d never guess that it’s only 1400 square feet. Well, maybe. Yeah, it actually does. ;) There are two parts to our house: the old part built in … [Read more...]

Filed Under: DIY, OUR HOME, renovation, talking to you

Giving Our Landscaping the Lumberjack Treatment

posted on: September 13, 2012 15 Comments

Let’s start at the beginning, shall we? Here’s a picture from when we first took a tour of our house, August 2009. WOW. 3 years ago?! This is why our blog is called white house black shutters (even though our house is not white). We had old, dirty white siding that I thought we’d freshen up with new white paint, and I envisioned adding black shutters. The bushes and landscaping were outdated, but not too shabby. Here’s the house after we replaced the siding and windows, no shutters … [Read more...]

Filed Under: 2012 goals, DIY, outside, renovation

Second Hand Family Room Makeover

posted on: July 24, 2012 39 Comments

Okay. I’ve been holding out on you guys. The family room remodel. Never posted it. But I made Doug hang the map over the couch last night just so I could post this for you. Cause I love you. So I’m going to zip my lip for a million pictures and just let you look at my new, completely remodeled, and almost all second-hand family room. Of course there’s still stuff we need to do, but whatever. HERE WE GO. New floors. Eeep! you’re going to hate me when I give you … [Read more...]

Filed Under: family room, garage saling, renovation

Foyer Reveal

posted on: June 11, 2012 11 Comments

It’s been a long and hectic last few months, especially this past week. Just after he had finished hanging new doors, and I was finishing up the caulking, Doug broke his foot Saturday night while starting to clean up the tools. Sigh. Maybe this is a sign from God that we need to stop with the rush! rush rush! –ing, and slooooow down. So instead of telling you what I still need to do, I’m going to show you how AMAZING this new foyer looks. This was the first real project we’ve done that … [Read more...]

Filed Under: foyer, projects, renovation

The “Before the After” Pictures

posted on: June 6, 2012 13 Comments

I’m not going to just lead ya into the after (although that would be fancy). We are 95% of the way done! Foyer rebuilt, old floors up, heat registers moved, new floor down, walls painted, doors replaced, trim painted, trim hung, stairs, railing, and floor registers stained (as of last night). We still have to caulk the trim, touch it up, throw a coat of poly on the stain, and move the furniture back, and that’s it! And plant our garden. OOPS. Foyer: We are also replacing the doors … [Read more...]

Filed Under: 2012 goals, family room, foyer, kitchen, renovation

Foyer of the Future

posted on: May 10, 2012 23 Comments

I’m sorry I’ve held back. I’m super in love with the floors. I clean my kitchen and vacuum every night so it looks all shiny. I don’t have to dodge doors while walking in and out of the house (I never even knew I did that). But things have been a little nutso around here. I’m not gonna act like I’m the first person living through a renovation, or the first person with three kids living through renovation. And I’m NOT COMPLAINING. But it’s tough! Doug took a week off and is now … [Read more...]