guest house | Beneath My Heart

January 24, 2010

10:54 pm

January 24, 2010 By 112 Comments

If you want to enter to win a $40.00 stamped jewelry giveaway,

click HERE! (Giveaway ended 1-29-10)

****************************************

I wanted to share with you how far we have come on our guest house. I am still not finished with some of the decorating details, like curtains and such, but we’ve come a long way, baby!

I have also added to this post 6 links to some of my favorite DIY projects that I completed for the guest house. Be sure to check those out as well.

This is our detached garage that we built about 4 years ago. We built it with the intentions of turning the top part into a guest house.

The red door takes you into the garage. Directly inside you will see our black “school house” door that leads to the guest house. We got this door at a Habitat store for ten bucks! It was solid wood and had a glass pane missing. So my husband installed a new piece of glass, painted it black, and added hardware. I love it.

The picture below is a “before” shot of the steps. We used pine for the stair treads and white bead board for the stair risers. We stained the steps a “Provencial” stain from Minwax.

Here’s the “after” shot of the steps…

We used some tile we had left over from the guest house bathroom to make the entry way.

The next two pictures show the “before” picture of the hard wood floors. The floors are made of 9 inch New England pine, tongue and groove, wood planks from Lumber Liquidators. We used the “Provencial” stain from Minwax again. My wonderful father-in-law helped my husband build this beautiful black bannister and also installed our hard wood floors. Thanks, Pop!

The right side of the room is where we planned to put the den.

Here’s the “after”…

This is the left side of the room where we wanted to install the kitchen.

My husband built some cottage style open cabinets…

He also made me a plate rack which I love! Then we painted the whole thing black.

We added corbels underneath the black cabinets. The white cabinets on the bottom were old cabinets we had leftover from our old kitchen island in our house.

I wanted some shelves on the side of the sink for baskets, so my handy hubby built some.

The picture below shows the baskets we added to the shelves and the cottage style doors that my husband made as well. We got the sink at a Habitat store for $7.00! It’s perfect!

My husband also tiled the countertop. It turned out fabulous! The backsplash is travertine tile that we got at the Habitat Store for a few dollars. The larger tile we got at The Tile Shop. The black hardware is from Lowe’s.

Then I added my white dishes that I got mostly from Goodwill.

The chairs for the kitchen table were a Goodwill re-do too. You can read about them HERE.

And I made the burlap tablecloth, and you can read about the tutorial HERE.

The light we added in the kitchen is from Lowe’s. We purchased a the black fan without a light because we couldn’t find a black fan that I liked. I wanted the old school house look. We found a light kit at Lowe’s with the old school house globe that we attached to it. It’s exactly what I wanted!

The picture below is the “before shot” of the opposite side of the room.

Here it is now…

I got the little chair from Goodwill for $6.50 and recovered it in burlap. You can read about that project HERE.

The white coffee table was also purchased at Goodwill for $6.50, and I painted it white. You can read about that HERE.

The couch still needs to be slipcovered. I am working on that! :) I got it at Goodwill for only 25 dollars. Right now I just have it covered with a white matelesse.

The next picture shows the door leading into our guest bedroom. We got that door from my sweet sister-in-law when she was re-doing her home. It was a green color, so we painted it white and added a oil-rubbed bronze door knob.

The next picture is a “before” shot of the guest bedroom. (We still had the kitchen cabinets in the room at this point.)

Here it is now…

I am hoping I can find a cute little desk to put under that window. I would like to paint it black and distress it.

The furniture in this room used to be natural wood, and I painted it white. You can read about that project HERE.

The white dust ruffle was a $2.50 purchase from where else but GW.

The chandelier was given to me by my mom. It used to be silver, and I painted it black.

Here is the “before” picture of the bathroom…

I haven’t done much in this room except to make a unique headboard towel holder. You can read about that project HERE.

This is the armoire that I painted white. It sits right outside the bathroom and stores towels and blankets. I got the wire locker basket at a yard sale for $5.00. I am on the look out for some more!

Well, that’s it!

I didn’t show you the laundry room because I still have a lot to do in there.

My goals for the guest house are:

1) Make shelf for laundry room.

2) Make shower curtain for bathroom.

3) Find mirror for bathroom.

4) Create curtains for each window.

5) Slipcover couch.

I am taking my time on the above list because I have some pressing projects that I need to get done over in our house!

Thanks for taking my little “Guest House Tour”. I hope you enjoyed it!

I will be linking this post to:

Metamorphosis Monday at Between Naps on the Porch,

Make it for Monday at Cottage Instincts

Mak
e Your Monday at Twice Remembered

DIY Day at A Soft Place to Land

Get Your Craft On at Today’s Creative Blog

Show and Tell Wednesday at Blue Cricket Design

Transformation Thursday at The Shabby Chic Cottage

Saturday Night Live at Funky Junk Interiors

Have a Blessed Week!

Share on Tumblr

This might be my favorite project ever!

January 7, 2010

12:24 pm

January 7, 2010 By 101 Comments

Hey, ya’ll! This might be my favorite project ever because it is like nothing I have made before!

I am linking this to…

I showed you this picture on Tuesday as a little “tease”.

I found these at Goodwill. Aren’t they gorgeous? I feel in love with them and had to get them. It is a headboard/footboard set for a twin bed. There were no rails to go with it, but that was okay because I didn’t need them….I had other plans.

I happily paid $25.00 for the set and went home.

I have been trying to come up with a creative towel rack for my guest house bathroom. My guest house is a little more cottage-y, so I like to decorate with more of a vintage feel.

I was blog-surfing the night before I found these beauties, and I saw a post that got my wheels a turnin’.

Jenn, at Livin’ the Simple Life made a coat rack out of a headboard. She also made the bench below it. The girl is crazy crafty and you must visit her blog!

projects 055

I just loved her coat rack and thought it was super creative.

When I saw the headboard and footboard at Goodwill the next day, I knew it must be fate!

One of those babies were destined to become my towel rack for my bathroom.

So here’s what I did…

After holding both the headboard and footboard up against my bathroom wall to see which one “fit” best, I decided to go with the headboard.

My bathroom in the guest house is not very big, but this headboard was going to make a big statement!

First I had to cut the legs off the headboard, so I used my hubby’s Skil Saw.

She’s lookin’ good already!

Now some of you may think I am crazy for painting this beauty. I know some of you would have left her alone. But I’m not sentimental like that. I needed her to be white, so white she would be!

Now I needed to prepare the surface to paint. Instead of sanding it with sandpaper, I used a liquid deglosser to do the trick. It is soooo easy. Just pour it on a cloth and wipe it all over the wood surface!

I let that dry, and then I began painting. My paint of choice is this little quart of Valspar paint. It can be found over by the spray paint cans at Lowes. There is a sign above it that says something like “high performance” or “extremely durable” paint. The workers at Lowes suggested we use this on our kitchen cabinets and we did. We love it!

So I used a brush to paint in any of the grooves.

Then I used my roll brush to paint the smooth surfaces. (No I am not left-handed, I just needed my right hand to take the picture!)

Here she is after 3 or 4 coats…ahhhhh….

Here’s the hardest part of the process…

let it dry.

It’s very important to let it dry REAL good before sanding.

Luckily, I got something in the mail to distract me.

I have a special bloggy friend, Kim at My Domestic Bliss, who sent me this HUGE block of Hershey’s chocolate. She’s precious!

It was sooooo good!

(I know I’m looking a little rough in this picture, but give me a break girls, I’m in the middle of a project!)

That thing was bigger than my head!

The boys got into the action as well. Oh yeah, baby!

Let’s re-focus, shall we? After the paint was good and dry, I used my sanding sponge to sand the edges of the headboard.

There’s no rhyme or reason to this step. Just sand as little or as much as you’d like to get the look you are after.

When I cut the bottom of the headboard off with my Skil Saw, it left a raw edge that needed a little work. I needed to fill an obvious groove in with some wood filler.

I just pushed the wood filler into the groove with my finger and the let it dry.

Then I used my sanding sponge to sand it to a smooth finish, and it was ready to paint.

To get a more “aged” look, I like to cover my white paint with my favorite glaze, Valspar “Mocha”.

I used a paper towel to cover the headboard with the glaze.

Then I used a damp paper towel to wipe it right back off. (See left side of headboard.) I love the way the glaze got in the “groves” on the headboard and brought out so many of the details.

Now I needed to attach my hooks. I found these cute little hooks at Hobby Lobby for half off. I bought 3 hooks for $1.50 a piece. Total=$4.50! I also got these wood screws at Lowe’s for a buck or two.

I attached the hooks with the wood screws.

It’s getting pretty late in the evening at this point and well….

Yep! I did it. There goes my New Year’s resolutions to eat healthier! Thanks, Kim! ;)

Oh well. It was worth it.

As you can see, the silver screw does not look very good with my black hook, so I got a little black paint and dabbed it on the screw.

Perfect!

I bought some heavy duty mirror hangers at Lowes to mount the headboard on the wall. They were a dollar a piece.

Now I did make the headboard by myself, but my hubby helped me hang it on the wall. It was very heavy (like a large mirror).

When you are hanging something this heavy, you need to make sure that you hammer the nails into the studs in the wall.

My husband insisted he help me with this part, which was fine by me.

We found the
studs in the wall and measured the distance between them. Then we attached the hangers on the back of the headboard the same distance apart.

We hung it on the wall and I feel in love.

It’s exactly what I wanted.

But I am bummed at how my pictures turned out. There is no window in the bathroom, so I had no natural sunlight in which to take the pictures.

Notice the beautiful natural light right outside the bathroom.

This is a piece of the bedroom furniture that I painted this summer. I’m storing the towels and blankets in there. I found the adorable locker room basket at a yard sale for $5.00. It’s perfect for storing the little wash cloths. My sweet mother-in-law bought me these new white towels for our guest house.

Now into bathroom…

I love the way it turned out. (Though I don’t think these pictures show it’s true beauty. My walls are a pretty tan, not mustard yellow!))

And now for a parade of pictures…

I loved this project because it was a little “out of the box” for me, which made it tons of fun. And it brings the uniqueness I was looking for in a towel rack.

Now I still have the footboard…hmmm….

I will also be linking this post to

Transformation Thursday at Shabby Chic Cottage,

Furniture Feature Friday at Miss Mustard Seed’s Creative Blog,

Saturday Nite Special at Funky Junk Interiors, and

A Home Accents Party at The DIY Showoff,

Blessings!

Share on Tumblr