Before and After

It's taken me a few days but I'm finally going to show you some before and after photos of the new carpet. First, let me just say that this would not be my first choice for carpet color! I would prefer something more neutral but when we bought this house it had a blue-gray carpet throughout the entire house. I never liked it from the beginning and we always planned to replace it but just couldn't agree on what we wanted to do or when we wanted to do it. So the blue-gray stayed and I just tried to decorate "around" it....by that, I mean I tried to ignore it! Well, when we finally got around to replace the downstairs carpet we decided it would be a good idea to stay with the same color so that the upstairs wouldn't be too different from the downstairs....so I still have blue-gray carpet....it's just new and a bit shaggier!



This is the family room before....we had everything out except the big furniture. This was just before the installers arrived.



This is the family room with the new carpet in but not stretched yet.



This is the office area before. As many of you know, we had a leak in the slab back in September and had to pull the carpet up to do the repair. That set us on a path of re-doing the house and we used this room mostly as a work area and place to keep our tools while we painted and did other house repairs and re-models. We put our computers in the dining room for all that time! It was a bit of chaos around here for several months....and probably will be for a few more since we're going to be selling this house.



This is the same area after carpet was installed.



HB added a return to the desk area. We just have to finish off the back.



It has bookshelves inside....which aren't organized yet! Just have stuff crammed in to get it out of the way! In fact, none of the shelves are organized as yet. Most of the stuff above the desk is HB's and he hasn't gone through any of it yet.



This is the other side of the office. Nothing has been "decorated" yet....no pictures have been hung, no curtains, nothing!! It's just the bare bones right now. I will show you things as I go along.



This is the dining room right before they stretched the carpet and hid the seams. I hope to replace that hideous light fixture, too. Another one of the things I've disliked from the beginning!! I do love the pot shelf above the doorway/arch. It's always fun to decorate that area. And again there is nothing in the room at this point.

I'm thinking of using beiges and soft golds to tie in with the blue. The family room walls are a gold color and the living/dining room is creamy so I think bringing in some beiges/tans....something in the brownish family will help pull the blue into the room and make it work. Our furniture is in the tan/brown color range too. I'm hoping I can use a few shades of blue in pillows, throws, etc to make it all look like it works. If anyone has any ideas throw 'em out there and let me know.

So there you have it....before and after. But the chaos still continues! I'm trying to remain calm in the midst of it all.

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I received some very special mail yesterday but I have to get photos of it so I'll probably be posting it later today.

Here are a couple of ATCs I made yesterday....






This is the string technique taken from Artist Trading Cards Workshop.


This one is dark blue felt.

I did several more but they don't sit flat on the scanner so I'll have to try to get photos of them.

That's it for now....but be sure to keep watching this space for photos of my incredible mail!!!