It seems like it’s been awhile since the big shelter blogs featured something truly frugal yet fabulous in depth…today is the day! Morgan Satterfield’s place made me feel right at home….most items in her place cost under $100…..girl after my own heart! Maybe she’s my sistah from another mistah.
She even has an Etsy shop where she cycles out when she rearranges or overbuys. We have the same taste in tchotchke as I saw a few familiar items…so I’m off to start shopping before you get there…
I’ve been lonely for my birds since the scavenging raccoons made off with ALL 3 of my bird feeders in the night a few weeks back. This will have to do. I’m thinking the raccoons will have difficulty following the eightfold path….
Metal finally arrived late Thursday, so Friday the first panels went up….what a difference.  To be honest, just the house wrap and the edging already made the house look better so this is indeed progress. FINALLY, I’m really able to visualize the whole thing done now and I’m pleased as all get out about it.
Wrapped and Ready
Wrapped and Ready
Contraption for Bending the Metal
How Many Dudes Does it Take….
My Heroes…Dale and Barry at the First Run of Metal
This is an excellent DIY. A smidge Ikea hack, a LOT of nice carpentry skills. This is from Matt at Rancho Rehab, who is restoring a Cliff May House. He documents the process and materials very well here. Nicely done…
I’ve long wanted to post some items from Worlds Away, but didn’t because they sell to the trade only….but who says you don’t have a tax ID? What the hell do I know? Anyway, they are launching their new designs for the season and have just posted them here. Designer Lauri Jones has been introducing more MCM inspired pieces over the past few years and I, for one, am a fan. Here’s my 2 picks as personal faves of the season.
The Crosby - $799 WholesaleThe Mondo - $195 Wholesale
If you are in the Memphis, TN area, you HAVE to go to their outlet…it’s a daunting, obscenely cluttered place…but it’s well worth the dig if you have the patience to see past 8 foot high shelves of casserole dishes. It’s open to the public (no tax ID required) and you can often score items with minor imperfections for less than the wholesale price.
Since I started the blog after we’d already moved in, I will try to fill in a few renovations we had to complete prior to living here…mainly, the floors and the “cottage cheese” ceilings. Messy stuff we couldn’t live in so we cranked out a few key changes to the house back in August.
The ebony stained hardwood floors have naturally made the biggest impact on the overall look of the house. If you’ve seen the before shots of the whole house…there was enough green carpet for an entire putt putt course in this place… and it was old and smelly. There was a LOT of floor to lay since we were replacing the kitchen linoleum, dining room carpet, living room carpet AND stairs all with hardwood. We hired this one out and if you live in the Nashville area….I HIGHLY recommend Verchota Floors. They are unbelievable to work with…moving to a new city meant having start over with my list of good subcontractors, and these guys really impressed me…keepers!
There was a herringbone parquet in the entry and in a strip along the living room butting up to the green carpet. I kept it only in the entry as a small homage to the original house…and it cleaned up so well -it would be rude not to!
We used white oak flooring which was stained ebony. They achieved this by wetting the floor with water to raise the grain, then applying the stain so more of it was absorbed into the wood. This is a CRUCIAL step in getting a dark stain to saturate properly…so they told me. It worked because I love how they turned out. We used a grey berber carpet in the bedrooms and playroom for sound and softness. It would have been nice to lay the hardwood everywhere, but budget and kids whining for carpet won out for now.
