Fireplace: The Big Reveal

Well, we did it. We painted the fireplace. Perhaps that seems sudden to you, since I was just posting about my back on forth on this matter. That's how we do things in this house... once we get an idea in our heads we jump in with both feet. And don't look back.

Actually, that parts not entirely true. I look back. A lot.

It was a Saturday morning, and we were cleaning the condo. Our son had been asleep for an hour already, but I emerged from the laundry room with a paint brush and a quart of white paint in hand.

"What are you doing?" Matt asked warily.

"Gonna paint the fireplace," I replied casually. I started dabbing the paint on, and five minutes later Sebastian started mewing from his crib. I looked at the drippy, half painted bricks, and looked back at my husband in horror. "Crap! What have we done?"

A few nap times and bedtimes later, and the fireplace was complete. I was really unsure about it, but of course, once you paint brick there's no turning back. Thankfully, as soon as the last stroke was brushed, I was smitten. I love it. It's fresh, clean, and brightens up the living room considerably. I think it also helps tone down the cover overload we have going on here. Without the additional colors of brown, rust, and mustard, our pale green walls, birch wood coffee table and entertainment center, and primary furniture and artwork can really stand out.

Fireplace Before:

Fireplace After:

So here's how we did it:
1) First, we cleaned the brick. We didn't have soot problems, so we just used soap and water to clear the dirt and grit away.
2) Thought about priming it, but didn't have any primer, so we skipped it. Most people advise primer, though.
3) Start painting! We did it by hand with a brush, so we could get into the grout more easily. You can also roll on paint with a thick-napped roller. It took us two coats and a little touching up. We used Dutch Boy Cabinet and Trim paint in Stone Arrowhead. This is the same color as our trim and cabinets, which gives it a cohesive look.

Spiffing up our fireplace has really inspired me to continue making home improvements. I'm really excited to update and refresh our condo.

To Paint, or Not to Paint

Painting our brick fireplace has become my new obsession. Well, that and planning my son's 1st birthday party (which is in one month!), but that's for another blog, or another post. Every day I seem to waver on what to do with the brick. In fact, my opinion can change hourly, depending on the light in our house. When it's sunny I kind of like the brick. When it's darker, I want nothing more than to cover up that splotchy brick with a coat of glossy white paint.

A co-worker of mine may have swayed me in the "paint" direction, with this blog post she dug up: http://restyledhome.blogspot.com/2008/08/brick-by-brick.html

The second fireplace down has a very similar green to what our living room is painted. So now that I have a visual of what it would look like in my place, I think I'm going to take the plunge.

Before and after pics soon!

Condo People

My last couple of posts have made me start thinking of the difference of condo people vs. house people. I never quite know which category I fit into. Obviously, I live in a condo now, and at one time I thought buying a condo was a good idea. But I lust after houses, so that must mean I'm a house person… right?

When you think of your typical condo people, two images are conjured. The urban, young couple who eats most of their meals out, walks everywhere, works long hours and has their BlackBerries attached to their ears at all times. They buy an airy, downtown loft condo where they can walk to all the trendy restaurants and hip shops. The other image: the retired, empty nesters who sell their house and downsize. They are more likely to buy a condo in a quiet neighborhood, but close to things by car. They're interested in simple, one level condos that are neatly landscaped. Maybe two bedrooms so they can have a space for visiting grandkids and a sewing or exercise room. Most of the people in our association fit this demo to a tee.

When you think of house people, you probably think young families. Perhaps in the 'burbs. They drive an SUV or crossover with car seats in the back. They have a dog. They spend many a weekend at the Home Depot working on their next project.

But us? We're young, but we have a family. We're decidedly not hip anymore. We don't work long hours, and while we like a walkable neighborhood, we want it to be close to parks, libraries and grocery stores, not bars. We live in the 'burbs, technically, but so close to the city, where we spend a lot of time. But we're not above the suburbs at all. I love me some Target, and we're known to hit up the chain restaurants nearby us. No dogs for us… we have cats.

So maybe we should live in a neighborhood full of houses, where we can garden and play in the backyard. On the other hand, maybe being condo people is best for people like us. We are both working parents, and as any working parent will tell you, our time with our son is so precious. Instead of maintaining a house, we get to write a monthly check and sit back and let the association take care of it. That frees us up to spend time with Sebastian, walking to the park or entertaining friends.

Perhaps my dream of something bigger and better is getting in the way of seeing what's right in front of me: that I already live in a place that's perfect for me and my family. Our quiet, wooded neighborhood next to trails, schools and parks appeals to the side of me that yearns for space and nature. Our small, easy to maintain condo unit in bright, modern colors appeals to the on-the-go, city gal in me.

Maybe I don't need to cram myself, or my home, into a category. Maybe it can just be what it is, which is home.

Spring Fever

The beautiful, warm weather continues, which has given me a case of spring fever. I've started daydreaming about the many projects I want to do around the condo: declutter and have a garage sale, paint the fireplace a creamy white, and fix up the deck.

I have big plans for the deck this year. We barely used it last year, as we were home with a newborn baby and doing nothing but feeding and sleeping. But this year, oh, I have plans. I want to nail lattice to the sides of the deck to block out the view of the ugly dead tree and protect our son from falling through the slats. Then I want to plant leafy green plants, vines, flowers and herbs. I want to spend afternoons on the deck, with Sebastian playing with some outdoor toys, and then evenings after he goes to bed relaxing out there with a glass of white wine and a book. Ahh.

In reality: it's never going to happen if we can't even get started, and to get started we need the lattice.

Damn you lattice. It's been the bane of my existence all weekend. We went to Menards, and actually bought three panels, 2'x8', to bring home and fit along the deck, which measures 5'10" and 13'8". We bring it out to the car, and there's a slight problem. Eight feet is just a wee bit too long to fit in the back of a Saturn. After a few futile moments of trying to cram it in, we bring it back into the store to see if they will cut it. Everyone looks at us like we're crazy, and so, we return the lattice and go home empty handed. The next day, we go to Home Depot and ask them if they will cut it for us, and they tell us it's "against store policy."

Sigh. Apparently there's no way to get lattice home without a truck, and no one will help us cut it, which we really would benefit from since our tools aren't exactly the most sophisticated.

So what did we do? I went shopping instead and bought some sweet little ceramic birds to display on the fireplace. Because clearly we're condo people. I can handle decorating my living room, but trying to do some basic landscaping completely confounds me.

At least the birds are springy.

Breaking the (By)Laws

One of the things I constantly bemoan as a condo owner is the inability to grill out. We have a deck, but we aren't supposed to have grills. However, the weather in the Twin Cities has been unseasonably warm, and I was craving some freshly grilled brats for dinner.

We dragged out the smokey joe, and grilled on our teeny little deck. I spent the whole time pacing the halls, just waiting for the association president to come knocking on our door. Or the police. Okay, I'm a little neurotic.



In the end, no one found out, and we had a delicious dinner of jalapeno and cheddar brats, with grilled asparagus and tomatoes. But, I'm not sure we'll be grilling again. I'm a stickler for the law, and our condo rules are in place for a reason. I was just to nervous about it to really enjoy it. Just one of the many reasons I'd probably be better as a homeowner instead of a condo owner.

Have you ever broken the rules in a condo or apartment?

Our Home: A Tour

The goal of this blog is to turn buyer's remorse into love for my condo through the power of positive thinking. And what better way to stay positive than to show you all the hard work we've put into our condo so far?When we bought our place, it was a sea of beige and orangey oak. There was nothing stylish about it, and it lacked personality. I still have some issues with our condo – namely the layout leaves much to be desired, and the living room is downright awkward. But when you compare how it looks now to how it looked the day we got the keys, the difference is night and day.

Come on inside! We had a month of overlap where we still lived in our apartment, but owned the condo. So there were many days, nights and weekends spent putting in new floor, painting walls and trim, and stripping wallpaper to whip this place into shape before we moved in our furniture. We even added a personal touch to our front door. Matt bought me a door knocker in the shape of a cat from Restoration Hardware as an early birthday present. He installed it while I was at work, and when I came to the condo after work to do some painting, I saw my gift. I like the way the door knocker plays off the letter of our unit, "C." It gives it a little personality. Thankfully, our association doesn't mind a little personalization.

When you first step into our condo, there's a small front closet and space to take off your shoes. The previous owners had white Berber carpet here, which was very dirty and made no sense next to the beige wall-to-wall carpet.

Here's what some butter yellow paint and 20 square feet of wood laminate from IKEA did to the space.

To your right, there is a formal dining space. The previous owners were using it as an undefined office area/catch all for clutter and junk.
We painted a yellow accent wall, added a chandelier and returned this space to a dining area. This is one of my favorite changes. Now that we're parents of an 11 month old, though, we might be making the formal dining room over into a more multi-functional space. As much as I like displaying my grandmother's crystal, my son might have other plans for it!

Through a small doorway from the dining room is the kitchen. This kitchen is mainly why I agreed to buy our condo. It needed the most work of any room in the house, but it's the room I now love the most.
Ugly wallpaper, ugly linoleum, ugly cabinets.

Oh yeah, and a super ugly light fixture!We spent most of our month-long renovation fixing up the kitchen. We tore down the wallpaper, which took us forever! We had to scrape off the top layer using a knife, then remove the second layer with fabric softener. We made MANY gouges in the drywall while scraping, so we then had to patch and sand.
We painted the walls a cheery red, and then tackled the ugly oak cabinets, painted them a creamy white. We also swapped out that ugly brass light for a square, funky IKEA lamp that we rewired.

A few fixes came later – namely the wood laminate floors we put in this past winter – but we think the results were pretty dramatic, don't you?
The rest of the house might not seem so dramatic after that, but we did do some fixes.

The living room was bland and white.
We painted it a pale green.
This is where we will be focusing our attentions in posts to come. I have visions of painting the fireplace white, purchasing new, more grown-up furniture, and working on the layout.

Down the hall, and to your right, is our bathroom. This was another selling point of the house for me. I loved the deep whirlpool tub.
We painted a light blue and gave this bathroom a Hawaiian theme, based on my love for the islands.
Across from the bathroom is my son's nursery. It's gone through a few changes, from a boring bedroom when we bought it, to an office/guestroom to a cheerful little boy's room.



Finally, we come to the master suite. We have a huge space here, which is great, and sometimes annoying too. I'd probably trade a bigger master bedroom for a bigger, less awkward living room, but at least we have the space to add a window seat and little office area, now that we lost our office to make room for the nursery.

When we bought the house, this was yet another boring white room. The seller was keeping bunnies in the master closet!

We cleaned up and painted a rich pumpkin orange color. Our décor for this room was sort of Moroccan inspired.
I used to really love it, but I'm starting to grow a little tired of this room, and want to lighten it up a bit. But do I want to go through the hassle of repainting such a dark color? Right now I'm leaning toward trying to make the orange work by adding some lighter accent pieces, like artwork and linens.

And finally, our last room on the tour, the master bathroom.
Sorry to disappoint, and end on a low note, but I hate this bathroom. We've tried to give it a face lift by taking down the grungy shower doors, giving the cabinets a fresh coat of white paint and putting in a new light fixture, but it's still just bad. You can't see the shower in this photo, but that's the big problem area.

Some day we will put in new tiles. Someday.

So that's it! That's the place we call home. We've tried to make it seem like a spacious house and not a smallish condo, but there's always room for improvement. But when I think of where we began when we were on our journey as new homeowners, we've come a long way!

Adventures in Vacuum Shopping

A couple weeks ago our vacuum started shooting sparks at us (yes, sparks), so it was time to buy a new one. I can be a bargain shopper to a fault, and am often drawn in by what is cheap, only to find out that cheap things are, well, cheap.

So we decided to bite the bullet and splurge on our vacuum this time. After all, we do have wall to wall carpet in our condo, and a little boy who loves to find the one thing the vacuum left behind and put it in his mouth. We set our budget at $200. No $40 number from the Target for us this time. A local radio station I listen to is always running ads for a local vacuum shop, so we decided to check it out.

We were originally interested in purchasing a reconditioned Dyson there, for $199. We were aiming for quality, but we have a budget too, and just couldn't afford a brand new Dyson at $300 and up. We test drove the Dyson, and the salesman directed us to the Riccars, a simply designed, made in the USA vacuum. They had a range of prices, from $199 on up to $800. We tested the Riccar, and it picked up dirt just as well as the Dyson. Even though I've always been a fan of Dyson's sexy designs, some reviews I've read say they're a bit overrated. The Riccar didn't look as fancy, but that was what intrigued us, especially my husband. We tend to like things that are simple without a lot of bells and whistles and useless buttons. The Riccar had a hose attachment, and that was it. The salesman gave us an extra year on the warranty, and an extra filter. The service at the local place was really great.

We plunked down our cash card, and are now proud owners of a high quality vacuum. I've been giddily vacuuming everything.