"I love this house. This house is warm in the winter, cool in the summer, and looks spectacular with Christmas lights. It's a great house. I never want to move. But the thing I think I like best about this house are the voices I hear when I walk through the door." -Father of the Bride

Friday, March 20, 2015

January 2013- Mud Room

We enter our house 99% of the time through our garage, which is off the kitchen.  Right when you walk in from the garage, there is a small mud room with cabinets, a sink, and an extra "beverage" refrigerator.  There is also access to the backyard through the mud room.  It's a great little room, perfect for kitchen overflow, pets, and of course, mud, boots, and coats!  Everything was very old in this room- laminate cabinets, an ancient (HUGE) refrigerator, the exterior door.  I had always dreamed of putting cubbies for the kids in this space, and in the winter of '13, it became a reality.

Before pics of the mud room:




And after demolition:



New cabinets going in:



(The black paint on the right side of the above picture is both magnetic and chalkboard paint, I painted one on top of the other.  It took many many coats to become effective, but works great!)

Cubbies going in (Brian the carpenter built them):





Tuesday, March 3, 2015

Fall 2012- Office

Right after Holden was born, in September of 2012, we decided to update our "office", the room right off the foyer, opposite the dining room.  Prior to this it contained a large desk and sports memorabilia on the walls.  We knew we one day wanted to make the basement really nice, and decided that all the sports stuff could go down there, and we could make the office a nice, comfortable, attractive "sitting" room.  I don't have pictures of what it looked like before we started taking everything down, but these are the "befores" once the reno was in progress:



And once the paint was finished:




The color is Benjamin Moore "Kangaroo", which is also the color in Cooper's room.

And this is the room today:


I framed the kids' pictures myself!  Rug and window panels are from Pottery Barn.  Furniture is from Jordan's.

Welcome Baby Holden!

In August 2012 we welcomed baby Holden James Hamel.  He's 2.5 now and the funniest, most loving little guy!


Sunday, March 1, 2015

Cool pic I took at Christmas this year, December 2014.


Spring 2011- TV/Toy Room

I just realized I forgot a major renovation from the spring of 2011!  It wasn't major in terms of work involved, but it was major in that it went from being a room we rarely used to a room we spend a large amount of time in now!  Behold, the converted drinking game/useless junk room becomes...the TV/playroom!  I've mentioned this room in the past on the blog, it's off the back of the house and connected to the living room by 2 sets of French doors.  It's fully heated, has lots of great windows, and other nice touches like a chair rail and crown molding.  It also had a tile floor, which, before we had children, made it the perfect indoor beer pong/flip cup room.  We had lots of fun during parties in there.  It has speakers that connect to our sound system too.  The room before the reno:



In order to make it a comfy TV and toy room, it needed carpet, paint, and to lose those ancient Roman shades.  We were able to have carpet installed right on top of the tile, and our carpenter Brian built an amazing corner window seat/toy box in one corner.  It's seats flip up to access the toy boxes, and I had cushions made to fit it's unique dimensions.  We had the room painted and had a TV mounted on one wall, and purchased a sectional from Bob's Discount Furniture.  It's a great room, and keeps all of the kids' toys in one place.







The room furnished and completed:


And the room today:


Bit of a side note here.  I'll never forget the first time I saw Home Alone.  I was 10 years old and fascinated by the McCallister family home in the movie.  I dreamed of maybe living in a house like that someday...

Spring 2012- Cooper's New Room

Moving on to Winter/Spring 2012….In December of 2011 we learned we were expecting a sibling for Cooper, very exciting.  In Feb of '12 we learned it was another boy, yippee, brothers!  This also meant that Cooper was going to gain a new bedroom, and give the nursery to his little bro.  I had always had in mind that he would get the guest bedroom at the front of the house, opposite ours.  This is what it looked like up until that point:

We gave the furniture to Shane's cousins and began the transformation!  I wanted to keep the beige color, and add classic primary "boy" colors…red and blue, specifically.  And I wanted it to be sporty and fun.




The furniture, rug, and curtain rods are all Pottery Barn Kids.  The comforter came from a Polo outlet, and the neat vintage sports ticket prints above the bed I found online.  Curtain panels were $20 each at Bed Bath and Beyond!  Wooden blinds with the navy bindings are from an online blind store.

This room also possesses it's own, small bathroom.  It had pink, tiny floor tile (it reminded me of the ladies room at the Hyannis Filene's in the '80's!) and a strip of pink and purple tiles in the shower.  Also, lovely pink walls.  That would not do for my little boy! :)

Before!




After!

This was also when I found the tile guy I have now used a few times, and his work is nothing short of remarkable.  His name is Francesco Greco, and I really think of him as an artist!  For this particular bathroom, since it was such a "minor" project, he suggested just leaving the pink floor tile, and he tiled right over it.  It's not something I would do all over the house, but I figured it was fine for just a small bathroom, and certainly saves on not only cost, but also the mess of demolition!  Comical tidbit about this shower….it has never been used since it's been re-done.  Cooper is still too young to shower alone, and we have another shower for guests to use.  I remember Francesco telling me not to use it for a few days after he was finished…no problem buddy! 

Summer 2011- Kitchen Slider

I just had to sit here and think about the order in which we did projects since 2011.  I know it's not that important, but I like to know!  Fortunately, for my next post, I saw little Cooper in one of the pictures, and since the pool is open and it looks BEAUTIFUL outside, I know it was summer of 2011.  This update was to the 3-window door unit we had in our kitchen, leading to our patio.  It was very old, made of wood, warped, and the screen and track was broken in more ways than one.  The middle was a hinged door, and the side two panels were stationary.  We decided we preferred a slider, just to eliminate the door swinging in and hitting the kitchen table and chairs, and taking up unnecessary room when opened.  This is what it looked like:

There was a bit of drama in selecting a new door, because the new fiberglass sliders (which we definitely wanted, as they don't need to be painted, and they don't rot, etc) could not support a transom (that strip of glass above the door) of our size.  After some discussion, our awesome door guy Donnie (who has now done lots of door projects for us) came back with an idea to split the transom into 3 separate units above each door panel.  The result is AWESOME, I like it even better than before!  I feel like the 3 "lights" are more stylish and visually appealing than just the simple strip that was there before.  Another aspect of the new door we love, beyond it being a slider, is that all the window panes are INSIDE the glass- no painting necessary, and no way for children to pull them off!






Spring 2010- Outdoor Improvements Continued

Okay so where I left off was with the outdoor improvements back in '11, which included the stonework and new exterior lights.  I'm going to make the next several posts quick ones so I am not overwhelmed with catching this blog up.  Here are the (not so much anymore!) new lights, along with the awesome-oso wooden 104 sign (I always wanted one of these!).