house Archives - Page 3 of 4 - The Sarcastic Blonde

home, home inspiration, house, Lifestyle

:: low expectations ::

July 7, 2016

I’m out for another sure to be disappointing day of house hunting,

and will have some Coffee Talk gossip for you tomorrow!

It still amazes me how photos and listings can look like one thing, and when you arrive somewhere it’s completely not what you expected.

I decided to prepare for another day in the car getting car sick from staring at my phone and directions and pics and stats, by looking at celebrity homes for about 2 hours last night. You know…. to help keep my expectations low 🙂

a few inspirational homes for you below!

Anderson Cooper’s Brazil Vacation Home

Bette Midler’s Pool House

we’re really hoping to find something like this today….. fingers crossed…..

or if that’s not your thing,

Bette Midler’s Manhattan Home

because seriously this one is insane

Tyra Banks Beverly Hills Pad

I’m sure we’ll get ceiling height just like this……

Taylor Swift’s 38K per month Rental in NYC while she renovates

because she is renovating the 20 million Tribeca home

Cher’s Mega Mansion

I really want to make a cheesy “Do you believeeeeee in _something about her house_ ?” comment but I’ll refrain……

Tom & Gisele’s California Home

home, home inspiration, house, Lifestyle

:: home renovation : bed + bath ::

May 17, 2016

First of all, thank you for sweet words yesterday!

And don’t worry – the move doesn’t mean I’m not blogging anymore! If anything, come June 1 I’ll have a bit more time to be blogging and getting back to regular posting.

Kip and I initally tackled the kitchen cabinet project because it is something we had always wanted to do.

next, we moved on to bigger things.

oh I jest.

With the basement, we were super happy with it as it was. It had the extra living space, fireplace, and a large side space (with huge walk in closet) that Kip used as his home office.

We had a huge walk in laundry room, and from the moment we looked at the space – before we had even moved in – Kip had said we should make the laundry room a bathroom and take the side space + closet and make it a bedroom. That way it would take our 2 bed 1.5 bath to a 3 bed 2.5 bath without sacrificing any living space.

We never did it because we simply didn’t need to. Why spend the money when we had 3 floors with plenty of space for the two of us.

But then when it came time to think about moving and selling, we knew it would be smart move.

So, we bit the bullet. And I channeled my inner Jeff Lewis and ran with it.

seriously though is taste is way too modern for me, but damn do I love him and when is Flipping Out coming back on!? or even better, Interior Therapy?!

It was a circus, as you may remember me posting about.

2/3 of the basement was destroyed and covered in saw dust, and the other 1/3 was tarped off like Dexter’s crime lab yet still has 90 pounds on saw dust on everything the tarp was supposed to be protecting.

and let me just say, spending practically every night at a Home Depot store until closing time after work for like 10 days straight was not my idea of romance.

We had contractors for the large part of the project, but thank goodness for my handy husband because many nights were spent fixing things and re-drywalling when a not-so-great job was done. And then, after the contractors were done, he did all the molding and all of the painting and dry-walled probably 1/3 of all of it. I contributed of course, but I can’t pretend to even have done half of what he did. But DAMN I had no idea how much work it would be (when trying to save where we could). Patching nail holes and painting – especially the glass french doors – took so much more time and work than I ever knew.

OH, and he replaced the whole deck in 3 hours one Sunday too.

SO. I don’t have the best before photos because they literally decided to start the next day after we met with one of the contractors so the basement was half way destroyed already.

:: BEFORE ::

the before photos are the listing photos from the previous owners when we bought the place.

you know me, never prepared with pics when I need em!

I can’t find any right now that show how we had the back part laid out.

But, where the previous owners have the large wooden piece under the window is where we had kips desk against that back corner wall, and the walk in closet before renovation was behind that.

:: DURING ::

framing out of the new wall, for the bedroom, with the old walk in closet ripped out in the back

laundry room gutted and ready for bathroom

we moved the washer and dryer to underneath the stairs {and were able to keep them side by side instead of having to switch to a small stackable which I was super excited about}.

we had to pick out tiles twice (two nights in a row after work, we had zero time and weren’t given much warning for things so we had to do it quick) because our first picks were too slippery for the shower floor and then something else with the other one, but I love what we ended up picking out.

:: AFTER ::

I have one photo from my phone, the others are the listing photos.

ignore the treadmill in my photo we hadn’t moved it yet and I was SO excited to finally have it back in action to watch my shows on.

I was also so happy to have a couple of those black mirrors above the mini-fridge hung because those were my favorite in my old apartment when all five were across our back wall. (They are my Ballard Designs knock off from Target, but they are a pain to hang all 5 level, so they hadn’t been hung in our new place the last two years)

ANYWAYS.

There it is!

I have no problem being honest and saying I was in love with our place before the reno, and I am completely obsessed with it now.

You know what they say:

“do everything you always dreamed of doing to your home in the last two months of you living there, so that your last two months of living there it is completely destroyed, and then when its finally done and perfect looking and everything you could have ever wanted in your dreams, sell it to someone else so that they get to enjoy it and you don’t.”

no? that’s not what they say?

Oh.

just kidding. kind of. but now we know what we are capable of and can do it all over again in a new house that we will love even more!

{haha JUST KIDDING I seriously am not painting anything I don’t know how my husband got me to do 746 hours of manual labor after coming home from work……. I seriously need a break from renovations and construction of any kind. or even just like a hammer for that matter.}

OH. but one nice aspect to this was I looked like a cute twin of Jo from Fixer Upper every day because I wore my red hunter boots all over the house with my jeans and pretended I was, like, super handy and helpful.

home, home inspiration, house, Lifestyle

:: kitchen cabinet DIY ::

March 21, 2016

like I always say, just call me Martha!

as I mentioned last week, we finally tackled a big DIY that we have put off for the year and a half we have owned our condo and painted the kitchen cabinets.

I had been hesitant, not only because of the amount of work, but because I was afraid they wouldn’t turn out well. I also thought we had to use a sander to strip the finish off and I was dreading all of that dust.

When we were at Home Depot picking up paint samples for the walls, a customer was buying this DIY cabinet kit and raved about it.

The cost of the kit is a mere $65. We had to buy a couple brushes and things but the total cost of this renovation was definitely under $100 and was completely a sweat and hard work cost and basically no money.

I can’t believe for the amount of money how great the finished product looks.

I only wish we did it sooner!

but it definitely was A LOT of work. my knees would have bruises from kneeling and painting so often.

I knew the project would be a lot of hard work and take time, but I did greatly underestimate it. Taking all of the cabinet doors off, removing all of the hardware, tempting out cabinets, taping off everything with the blue tape – just the prep to start took time.

tips : Draw a picture of the kitchen and label all doors and drawers with a number. Mark each door with that number on a piece of blue painters tape and keep it taped to the floor in front of the cabinet while you paint it – otherwise, who knows what went where.

Then, there is a three step process for the cabinets

1. The de-glazer to strip any finish off of them and get them ready – this part took a lot of elbow grease and was the worst part of all of it. Hated it.

2. Three coats of the base paint. Which when you have to do each side of a cabinet door and wait hours for it to dry before you can flip it to the other side adds up.

3. A coat of protective top coat to seal it all.

We had cabinets downstairs in the basement living area and upstairs in the guest bedroom.

Those of you with a garage or actual extra space – it’ll be much easier!

Living in the city, garages and space to put everything and do the painting is nonexistent.

please ignore any “styling”, as in, no styling. we have been moving things from one place to another for projects and there is crap all over the place at the moment 🙂

:: BEFORE ::

:: DURING ::

:: AFTER ::

It’s made such a change – it’s so much brighter and feels so much bigger.

and looks so much prettier too of course!

Next up, painting the kitchen and living room.

who knew finding a basic grey or neutral or beige or whatever color was so impossible (oh wait, I did, because I’ve read about it on blogs for years. and newsflash : they are correct.)

come back tomorrow where I’ll tell you about sitting next to James from Vanderpump Rules at dinner on Saturday and NOT GETTING A PICTURE WITH HIM BECAUSE I SUCK.

that’s pretty much the whole story, but come back tomorrow anyway……..

home inspiration, house, Lifestyle

:: makeover monday : master bedroom ::

February 22, 2016

I finally finished the makeover of our master bed and couldn’t be happier.

I loved our Crane + Canopy bedding from the start – silky smooth, with amazing little details like a zipper closure instead of the annoying buttons and ties to keep the duvet in place. But I needed to find some little details to really complete the look.

(or as my husband would say, I needed to find more giant pillows that we do not sleep on and small pillows that serve no use except to fill our floor at night. yep. preach)

here was the bed before, with just the new sheets, headboard, and mattress.

To switch things up, I switched the duvet to the printed side. I have been flipping it back and forth every month or so, so that way it’s like a constant new look.

I added three large navy euro shams, and had been searching and searching for something with a pop of red when I came across the Cuddles Please pillow. We also have the Chicago skyline picture above the headboard from Minted that I love.

Crane and Canopy Page Blue Bedding c/o

Cuddles Please Pillow (now 40% off!)

Navy Euroshams (steal of the century)

Minted Chicago Print c/o

One Kings Lane Headboard (63% off!)

more pics below!

thank you to crane and canopy for the beautiful bedding that I absolutely love!

home, home inspiration, house, Lifestyle

:: bedroom updates ::

November 17, 2015

:: master bedroom updates ::

there are two new additions in the casa, one small and one large.

we have a new pop of blue with the throw pillow from Crane & Canopy.

when I got the e-mail alert that it back in stock, I jumped online to order it.

Now, I need to find something NOT BLUE pillow wise to use but I keep going back and forth and back and forth and can’t make up my mind. I want two square/euro square sizes, but what color?? or print??
because at the moment I’m most likely to just throw some of a tried a true favorite on there:

monograms for days.

send ideas please and help a sister out!!!

and the BIG addition that I had no problem deciding on is…….
our beautiful new artwork from Minted above our bed!

I was like “I’m gonna get something fun and colorful and spice up the bedroom and….. YEAH”

and then I was like “Oh my goodness the most neutral, subtle photo of Chicago I’ve ever seen and it matches our neutrals in our bedroom perfectly I’M SO BORING AND I LOVE IT”

I knew when I saw the skyline at sunset that I had to have it!

For the frame, I went with the ‘whitewashed french farmhouse’ and I love it. The frame is so beautiful and all of it perfectly complements our bedroom wall color.

This was the color of our walls when we moved in, but we love the color.

We found extra samples in the laundry room and have identified it as Sherwin Williams Lazy Grey. I highly recommend it; it’s beautiful at night and with lots of sunlight.

Kip is like “soooo does somebody need photography lessons for Christmas?”

Hey! You try taking a picture in the daylight without getting any reflections of your TV or your fan or your bed-head self with the camera standing on the bed or anything!

Besides, maybe people think my awful pictures are great… don’t people love reading blogs with amateur photos?? ….. I jest, I am awful and yes get me photography lessons 🙂

Thank you to Minted for the beautiful print!

as always, all thoughts and opinions are my own.

We used them for our Christmas cards last year, and will be doing the same again this year. Their customer service and quality is top notch!

home, home inspiration, house, Lifestyle

:: home updates : master bedroom ::

October 12, 2015

some bedroom inspiration pictures from my pinterest

we have had some exciting home updates since returning home from Italy.

you may remember when I shared about how our mattress was long overdue for a an upgrade; I was basically sinking in to the middle of the mattress and could feel the springs in my back. We’d wake up with back pain, it was a nightmare!

so kipper finally agreed (finally. seriously. I gave an ultimatum) we needed a new mattress and that we might as well upgrade to a King size bed and I was SO EXCITED.

thanks to all of you, we learned about Tuft + Needle for affordable mattresses.

the king size is only $750, free shipping, comes vacuum sealed in a box, 100 day money back guarantee if you don’t like it.

we figured we might as well give it a shot and WE ARE OBSESSED.

even when sleeping on the floor for a few nights, it was our best night sleep in weeks if not months!

we have talked about our mattress every day since we got it about a week and a half ago.

we literally talk about the mattress like its our newborn child; it’s really sick, but thats how in love we are with it.

with a new mattress, we of course needed new everything else – bed frame, headboard, bedding, duvet, EVERYTHING. even though we saved with the mattress, everything else was really adding up!

luck was on my side, because right when we were ordering the mattress Michelle from Crane & Canopy reached out about their incredible bedding.

I had already fallen in love with their bedding (every time I pinned a bedroom to my inspiration board it seemed the bedding was theirs!) but we didn’t want to get new bedding until we finally got the new bed.

There were so many styles that I loved and had a hard time deciding, but I was so excited to receive their beautiful Page Blue bedding.

I love the look of all white bedding, like we had prior, but I wanted something with some navy blue in it. The Page Blue was a perfect fit because it is reversible, all white on one side, and a beautiful small navy print on the other side.
From the moment it arrived, I was in love.

The packaging was adorable, with a sachet of lavender for a soothing night sleep. I could smell lavender coming from the inside of the box before it was even fully open!

It has completely refreshed the look of our bedroom – it is so crisp and clean and the pops of blue are beautiful.

I like to use hydrangea to distract from my poor photography 🙂

is it working ???? ……….

The fabric feels extremely luxurious, and the little details – like hidden zipper closures and corner ties show the attention to detail and the amazing quality. (The zippers were amazing, I couldn’t believe how quick and easy it was to get the duvet cover inside!)
All of the quality but with an affordable cost!

Our first few nights we were sleeping on the floor while we waited for the boxsprings and bed frame, and then this weekend our headboard arrived way earlier than expected from One Kings Lane!

I love that with the Page Blue duvet we can do all white, all navy, or a combo of both to constantly change up the look of the room. 3 looks for the price of 1!

{One Kings Lane Headboard}

I snapped these pics, but keep in mind there clearly is no styling or anything at all. Our art that was above the bed no longer works, so we need to find something to put above the bed, get some knick knacks for the nightstands, and I want to get a navy throw pillow and some Euro shams still too!

Updates to come soon!

Crane and Canopy has so many incredible designs. A few of my other favorites are below.