Every Girl Link-Up || Home DIY

I so look forward to Astleigh's and my Every Girl Link-Up Thursdays! They challenge me to create something pretty, something worth sharing with all of you! Last week, I saw that our link-up "Home DIY" was coming up, so Steve and I quickly brainstormed a project to accomplish. We are ALL about DIY in this house. It's all that works with our budget. Plus, we love putting the work in and feeling that sense of pride when it's done!

Steve found this little sewing table a few weeks ago on the street. It was pretty scratched on the top, it was missing a knob, and part of the mechanisms needed to hold a sewing machine are missing. We decided that it would make the perfect little table for the entryway of our house! We haven't done a thing to decorate our hallway and staircase there, and I thought it was time to add a piece of furniture and some decor to the space.

Here is the pretty little table before we touched it.

Steve sanded it down enough to take the sheen off and rough up the surface a little bit. Someday he may fit a board into the space left by the missing sewing machine so that we could have it open.

 

We had leftover white paint from our fireplace, and the table took two coats.

 

And here it is in its new spot!

We found aged bronze knobs and a cabinet pull at Lowe's to replace the previous hardware. (Square knobs are here. Pull is here.)

I added a pumpkin from our garden, an apple-scented candle, and a little glass pumpkin for a seasonal touch. My goal is to not let it become cluttered :)

The little white table is so perfect for our entryway! Steve has another dumpster furniture find that I'll have to share in the coming weeks :)

If you've got a Home-DIY post to share today, grab our graphic below and link up!

And remember that October 8th, Astleigh and I will be sharing our Halloween Touches around our homes. Join us!

An InLinkz Link-up

A Fresh Front Porch

A couple of weeks ago, Steve and I set out to paint our front porch. One of the previous owners had chosen a deep red color for the floor, and it has never been our favorite look. Worse than the color, the porch was so dirty that we barely used it. We tried sweeping it and power-spraying it, but it couldn't get clean. We eventually decided to paint it a neutral gray color to give it a facelift. We bought the paint quite a while back, and it was the encouragement we needed to actually get the project done before the weather got cold. We love how it turned out! Take a look:

 

While Ephraim was taking a nap one day, we let Nolan help us with a paintbrush.

 

We gave Nolan outlines of numbers to fill in. He was a good little helper besides a few missed paint strokes on the brick. ;)

And the finished look!

We're enjoying a fresher, cleaner porch! We currently don't have the budget for more porch furniture, but wouldn't it be gorgeous with a little extra seating?! 

Home-design-loving friends, do you have any other ideas for how we could better enjoy this space?

Every Girl Link-Up || Fall Decor

 September has arrived, and we are transitioning to fall at our house. I am never ready to let go of summer, but decorating for fall has gotten me excited about the upcoming season. This week in Pennsylvania, our temps are in the mid-eighties (the highest they've been all summer), and I am soaking in the warmth. Before I know it, we'll be pulling out the jeans and flannels, baking all things with pumpkin flavor, and cuddling up under blankets, and that doesn't sound too bad either ;)

Today's installment of Astleigh's and my Every Girl Link-Up is FALL DECOR. As per usual, I decorated our mantel, my favorite decorating space that is the only surface my boys still can't reach in our house :)  The colors that I focused on are a bright apple red and a soft orange. And I am pretty fascinated with pumpkins right now, so they're my main theme.

 

The adorable wooden-twig pumpkin with a string of lights is from Michael's. I just bought it on Sunday after Astleigh tempted me with a photo of hers on Instagram. It looks so beautiful lit up in the dark!

The three real pumpkins you'll see in these photos are from our garden! There are five total pumpkins that have grown this year, and the photos don't really show how big they are! All five are the same tall and skinny shape. They composted from the pumpkin that I grew last year, and I'm guessing they each weigh around 20 pounds!

 

The "Well, Hello Beautiful Glorious Fall" print was found here. I thought the little gold, glittery leaf was perfect!

The red leaf bunting is from Michael's, and it pops on our newly white fireplace. The leaves look so realistic to me, which I love.

 

I bought a few bags of fall M&Ms to fill an apothecary jar. The two red candles are Glade's limited edition "Apple Tree Picnic" that I picked up at Walmart the other night.

I've had the "Fall is Fabulous" pumpkin print for a couple of years, and I found it here.

Funny story. . . we cut these black-eyed susans from our yard yesterday morning and brought them inside. I thought I heard a fly buzz out of them, but I didn't think much of it. Later, I found THREE bees on our bay window, angrily trying to get back outside. They must have been asleep on the black-eyed susans! It took me a long time to get them out of our house without getting stung, and I've learned my lesson to check wildflowers before bringing them inside! What ended up working? Fly-swatters dipped in honey and then thrown out the window once the bee attached. ;)

We finally got our butcher paper roll back up after painting our walls a couple of months ago. The writing is based on Psalm 107:37: "They sowed fields and planted vineyards that yielded a fruitful harvest."

 Do you have a fall decor post to share? Grab our graphic and link up below! I can't wait to see how your homes are decorated for the season!

Our next link-up will be September 24th, and we'll post about anything related to Home DIY projects! Click here to see the rest of the year's topics.

An InLinkz Link-up

My Favorite Room

What is your favorite room of your house?

For Andrea’s Show and Tell series today, I wasn’t sure which room I was going to pick. With sleep at a minimum, I sure love every minute I spend in my bed, but my bedroom isn’t my favorite room in our house. I live to eat, but the kitchen isn’t the room I’m most happy in. I think I’ll go with our LIVING ROOM.

I spend a lot of time in the living room. It’s where I blog in the evening hours. It’s where we cuddle up and watch TV at night. And it’s the room I most love to decorate. The boys can’t reach the mantel, so I have free reign with it! The built-ins and the yellow brick are beautiful to look at as they are, and they become really fun with any holiday or party!

The mantel is in a simple décor stage right now. I recently took down all of the Valentine stuff, and I’m transitioning toward spring.

Funny story. . . yesterday I left to have lunch with a friend, and when I came back—Steve had painted the wall above the fireplace! We have talked about painting the whole room gray (it is an old beige that is desperate for a new coat of paint), but we had no set plans for actually going through with it soon! I was so surprised! I really love the color and dimension it adds to our space!




To the right of the fireplace, we have a bay window with a seat where beautiful morning sunlight streams in.



The room is not wide, but it is extra long. In the middle we have the windows shown above, an extra door leading out to the wraparound porch, and a table so we can work while the boys play or watch TV.

And then at the other side of the room, we have this:

I’ve said this before, but it’s as if this section of the room were made to have a baby grand piano!

My mom was subbing in a school last fall when one of her friends mentioned that she knew of a FREE baby grand that needed a home. My mom said that I would definitely be interested, and passed on my number. A week or so passed, and I figured someone had already snatched up the piano. But then I got a call!

The piano was only a mile away, and Steve and I excitedly went to check it out. Then we immediately said that we’d take it! Based on its serial number, we believe it was made between 1930 and 1935.



The owner of the piano (her name was Olga) passed away in her home at 103 years old! She attended the Philadelphia Conservatory of Music, studying piano in the 1920s. She spent her life as a mother and a music teacher at elementary and high school levels. She was married to a surgeon here in our town, and he passed away in 1976.

Anyway, I know this piano must have been her pride and joy, and I am thrilled to have one that has such a sweet history :)



Both boys love pounding the keys! I can’t wait to teach them how to play someday!

I hope you see why this is my favorite room. We are making great memories here!

Here are a few of my favorite photos of the mantel all decorated:

Thanks for visiting today!

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