This morning before I left for work, I checked on my deer only to find them covered in dew. I figured that would definitely mean I would have to redo them and I was prepared to come home and tell you that there would be no deer reveal.

Well, the deer faked me out. When I got home, they looked just fine! No marks from my failed attemped to move them while they were still wet, no dew marks and you could hardly see that weird stain seepage I mentioned yesterday. I was all set to sand them this weekend, but I think they’ll do just fine 🙂

I stuck them on the entryway table to take pictures, but I liked them there since the table has been lacking in the accessories department for months. I decided to add books that represented both my and Mike’s websites… so we have decorating and lyrics 🙂

I decided to angle the books rather than put them flush against the wall. They just looked better that way.

Who knows if they’ll stay here once we finish up the entryway and finally find a white lampshade. I think it would be fun to spray them an interesting color someday (ala Antonio from Design Star’s pink geese), but I’m liking my new display so far 🙂

Since I was standing in front of a mirror and I promised to try to include more pictures of myself, I couldn’t resist.

Sorry guys, I really tried to take myself seriously, but it didn’t happen. I mean, I was standing in front of a mirror with a camera… what is this 2005? Plus the mirror has a smudge. And I’m wearing the shirt I sleep in. It’s the thought that counts 🙂

Anyway, I’m in the midst of another entryway project so I’m keeping it short tonight. Hopefully I’ll finish it this year this week…

Update: here is the before picture of the deer again, so you don’t have to click back to the previous post 🙂

Mike and I are officially on staycation! We have the next 3 days off from work, since we planned a trip to Florida but cancelled it to be home with our sick kitty. While my idea of a good time is working on the house, we know it would be best for us to get out and at least pretend we’re on vacation. We have a beach day planned for one day, a Yankee game/NYC trip for another and one day is up in the air.

But, if I were to stay home? I have a running list of small projects I’m itching to tackle in the very near future (most of which originated through Pinterest :)) I think this calls for a rainy day list! ::drumroll::

1. Washer Monogram

(via Decor and the Dog)

Michelle from Decor and the Dog created this from an image I saw floating around Pinterest a while ago. She happens to have the same last initial as me, so I kind of got to see it all personalized!

2. Gallery Wall

(via Decor Chick)

Mike and I have had Ikea frames hanging around forever now, just waiting to do our gallery wall(s) in the entryway. We’re planning on doing downstairs, up the stairs and upstairs and I cannot wait. Emily from Decor Chick recently created one and I’m currently in love with her version.

3. Lyric Wall Art

(via First Time Fancy)

I spotted the original version of this on Pinterest, but Kerry from First Time Fancy’s was the first DIY version I saw. Since I like to paint and a good chunk of Mike’s life revolves around lyrics and their meanings, I couldn’t think of a more appropriate piece of art for us!

4. Patterned Frosted Windows

(via 7th House on the Left)

I’ve wanted to frost our entryway mini-windows since we moved in, but I’ve been afraid of it looking cheap. Ashley from 7th House on the Left posted the perfect solution this week- she made a frosted pattern which makes it look oh so high end! I was so excited about this one that I printed out her template immediately. I love me some quatrefoil.

5. Living By This

(via here found on Pinterest)

I really want to take some time these next few days to breathe and enjoy life. The past month has been an absolute emotional rollercoaster for us. Last week we were told that Darwin most likely would not beat his cancer, which left me devastated for about 2 days until I realized how happy the little man is. I then felt like I had to hold my ish together for him, since he’s way stronger than I am and is acting fairly normal. He did well at the vet tonight and finally gained some weight. His kidneys are back to being physically normal this week, though they are still not functioning. We left him at the vet overnight for some extra treatments, so I am currently feeling like a giant (but actually little) piece of me is missing. There is still little hope that his kidneys will kick in, but all we need is a little hope to keep our heads up. For now, we’re doing everything we can to make sure he stays as happy as he’s been this week. What’s tearing me apart? Cancer. What’s holding me together? Darwin and his miraculous attitude and will to live. I shall focus on the latter. Thank you Pinterest 🙂

Regardless of what I check off this list for the rest of the week, it will be a productive one. If not for the house, for my sanity (only after I pick up my kitten from the vet tomorrow and attack him with kisses!!)

ps- if you see me tweeting anything but pictures of a sandy beach please yell at me…

No, mom, this entry title does not mean Rebecca is knocked up.  I wouldn’t tell you via the blog; I’d do on Facebook instead.  Or via an email.  I’m not sure yet, I’ll let you know after our 5-year plan to have kids.

Every time Rebecca and I watch Knocked Up, one of us always brings up how we love the house in this movie.  Then we spend the next 5-10 minutes discussing why we love the house so much.  And then we spend the following 5 minutes laughing about how whenever we watch this movie, we comment on the house.  It’s a vicious cycle.

Anyways, as we watched Knocked Up the other night, I had the idea to highlight the areas of the house we love and post them!  Original, right?  Right!  So for your viewing pleasure, here are all the things we love about the Knocked Up house!  (btw, it was incredibly hard not to label Katherine Heigl in every picture).

Okay, I don’t like this pool and seating area.  I like the idea of this pool and seating area.  Got it?  Good.

Actually, is that house for sale? We want to trade up.

ps- This is our 200th post! So far we’re doing well on our list of goals we set out in our 100th post, which can be found here.

Today marks guest post number two in the whole history of The Lil House That Could! Cait did a fabulous job yesterday and today we have :::drumroll::: Tabatha from Turn Right At Lake Michigan!

I could not be more thankful for this post today. If any of you follow me on Twitter, you probably saw my frantic tweets about how we struggled to give Darwin his fluids and pills last night. Quite possibly the hardest night of my life, in terms of frustration and helplessness. It ended with a trip to the vet after midnight to have them give him his pills. But! I am very happy to report that our second night as nurses was a grand success, we got him to take his pills and administered his fluids with ease tonight. There was clearly a learning curve no one told us about.

Anyway, back to Tabatha and how I should be fanning her with palm leaves for posting for me. I first found Tabatha when I saw her glorious bold purple nursery on A Brooklyn Limestone. And the nursery started as a room for her cats. Cats? Sold! Loved her immediately. She will also be sharing her entryway plans with us today!

Hello Lil House readers, I’m Tabatha from Turn Right At Lake Michigan, and I’m here today to help out Rebecca this week. A little about me – I’m 27, and I have five cats, two kids under three, a super-sized Chihuahua, and a husband all crammed into a 113 year old Folk Victorian home (with a whopping 1250 square feet) in Dayton, Ohio, that we’ve been renovating for the past four years. Yes, while we live in it. Yes, I take donations for therapy. 🙂

Anyway, as I understand it, we’re talking entryways this week since Rebecca has been working hard on hers, so let’s talk about my itty bitty foyer, yes?

A little background on my home – it survived the 1913 Great Flood of Dayton and was moved further up the hill afterwards (along with several other houses in our neighborhood) to create a flood plain (which later became a parking lot) to where it now resides. Somewhere in the 1960s, it was bought by a Korean war veteran and his Korean wife, and they raised four(!) daughters here, spending over 40 years in the house we now call ours. So our house had seen a whole lot of the same people for a long time.

Now our foyer is a grand 7.5 feet by 5.5 feet, and is not only the first place you enter once you come through our front door, but it’s also the gateway to the living room, the dining room, and the stairs that lead, well, upstairs, to the two bedrooms and full bath that chill up there. It’s also our shoe repository, mail sorting area, leash and key wrangler, purse/baby bag drop-off, and open-plan coat closet. This tiny space does a lot for us. But before we get ahead of ourselves, let’s start back at the beginning to show what we started with:

This was the front door when we moved in:

And this was the entryway “tile” put down for a yet really discernable reason:

I can be a bit of a perfectionist, so what first bothered me about the tile was that it didn’t match up with the door properly. That, and it was ugly. So the easy solution was to remove all signs of the previous occupants, paint, and cover that tile up with a rug:

Which, admittedly, I was less than thrilled about. The wall color was supposed to be more grey than green, but once that happened we committed to it (even though I HATED it) and found accessories, like that indoor/outdoor mat on clearance at TJMaxx for $10, that at least coordinated.

But as time passed on, the foyer bugged me more and more. We had an unfinished wood bench I never got around to painting. The walls made me angsty. (They continued up the stairs and throughout the upstairs hall area, for reference. That’s a lot of space to hate the color of, especially in our little house.) The coat hooks we installed started to fall out of the plaster walls. The cats climbed the curtains on the door. It was all just too much.

So one day, fed up with it all (and nesting while pregnant with my now 2 ½ year old son) I unloaded the space, got out a crowbar, and tore up the tile and terrible cheap parquet flooring – to find HARDWOODS underneath:

You cannot imagine my excitement. They were under the parquet throughout the dining room and under some vinyl tile in the downstairs bedroom as well. When we refinished those floors we did the foyer too, a nice dark chocolate almost black color, but that’s temporary – and we’ll get to that.

I ended up selling the bench on Craigslist as it was more of a dumping grounds than somewhere to put on your shoes, and I purged a great deal of our coats to keep the clutter to a minimum – or at least make more room for the baby-related clutter. The curtains have moved to the scrap pile of fabric in the basement and have been replaced with this:

A window decal that lets far more light in than the curtains ever did, while still allowing us some privacy. It almost looks like it should be there, right? I also frosted the windows on our tiny decorative dormer window, seen here:

After our next door neighbor informed us he could see into our house from his upstairs window. Not awesome. But now we have a ton more natural light for such a small space, which helps it feel less cramped.

However, obviously we’re nowhere near what I hope the space can become. So I whipped this little inspiration board up for you:

Let’s go over it, shall we?

#1: This is my inspiration photo, found on Pinterest. All of the components are Ikea, which I’m a huge fan of. However, I think I would want to add doors on the shelving units (or switch them out with shallow wardrobe units) so I could hide the mess that will inevitably form. I’m not so fond of the colors, but I can work that out later. Basically this sort of system would wrap around my dormer window, utilizing the height of our ceiling to maximize storage.
#2: I have this thing where I try to work stars into each of my rooms, however subtly. I also have a thing for mirrored surfaces. I’ve long since wanted a Moravian pendant for the foyer, and this one just takes my breath away. So does the price, for the record.
#3: Wherever the cases don’t cover, I really want to use paintable wallpaper to give more texture to the greater foyer/stairs/upstairs hall space. I also plan on adding decorative wainscoting, but that’s for another time. I’m still leaning towards a really great grey color, but I still haven’t really made up my mind. I love this damask pattern though – just the right mixture of traditional and fun, especially if I pick the right paint for it.
#4: I was shopping for tile for my bathroom (which we’re currently building) when I stumbled upon this beauty. I was considering a white-and-black combo similar to this for the foyer – the wood there isn’t in the best shape, and I think tile would not only be more practical, but more beautiful in such a small space. I love that it’s black on black.
#5: I actually own this! We picked it up at Ikea when the old mat had worn out its welcome, and I love it. Even if we did tile, we’d need something at the front door to catch all the gross that comes in on shoes. Again, love the black on black, and the pattern is subtle yet fun in a modern way.
#6: Lastly, I don’t remember how I came across this piece of carved wooden art, but it made me crack up. We’re lacking in art around here (I’ve been kind of busy making babies since 2008) and I think this would just be hilarious by the front door. Double entendres and all that. I’m not sure on the yellow (or the price) but I’m pretty sure I could make something similar in whatever shade would coordinate with what the walls end up.

Sources:
1) http://www.bhg.com/decorating/storage/mudroom/mudroom/?sssdmh=dm17.507987&esrc=nwhi021711&email=2114809685
2) http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=280626072722&category=103438&_trksid=p5197.c0.m619#ht_3468wt_905
3) http://www.grahambrown.com/us/product/18628/Empire+Damask+Paintable+wallpaper
4) http://www.glasstileoasis.com/item.asp?item=15669&utm_source=Amazon%2BCSE&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=Amazon
5) http://www.ikea.com/us/en/catalog/products/90121823#/40122561/
6) http://www.etsy.com/listing/60873299/shut-the-front-door-18×22-handmade-sign?ref=af_you_favitem

Of course, I would love any feedback you have – the foyer’s a little low on the priority list these days (have I mentioned we’re building a bathroom?) but it’s something I hope to tackle soon.

I’d like to thank Rebecca for letting me guest post for her, and my family and I send out our deepest heartfelt good vibes to her family, especially Darwin. Tell him Bailey, Max, Roxy, Nubbs, Antonia and Cheech give him all cuddles and licks and purrs (well, Cheech doesn’t purr, but you catch my drift …) and we all hope he gets better soon. And thanks to you Lil House Readers for hanging out with me today!

Okay seriously, my guest posters are killing me with the inspiration boards. I have never done one of those. Teach me your tricks please? My readers are getting used to this 🙂

I love the shut the front door sign (it obviously inspired this post title) and that wonderful star fixture. I’m also happy to hear that I don’t have the only cat that climbs curtains, as Macky recently pulled our dining room rod out of the wall (that’s what happens when you’re 20 lbs of cat…)

Thank you again Tabatha, isn’t it amazing how she managed to write a guest post with 2 kids and 5 cats AND a dog? I haven’t even found the time to put on makeup this week! Stop by her blog for some more from her!

My first guest poster this week is ::drum roll:: Cait from Hernando House! Cait is one of my very loyal blog friends who always takes the time to say something nice around here. We started blogging around the same time, so she holds a special place in my heart as a part of the class of 2010. Maybe someday we’ll have a 25 year class reunion and meet up at the punch bowl…

Anyway, here’s Cait with her entryway plans! (You like what I did with that title? Taking a break has made me witty… or delirious… it is questionable at this point) 🙂

Hey y’all, I’m Cait and my husband and I blog over at Hernando House. I’m so happy to guest post for Rebecca & Mike today, their blog is one of my daily must-reads! I’ve enjoyed watching their house evolve. I thought since Rebecca & Mike have recently been tackling their entryway, I’d show you my entryway.

this is actually a nightstand

Our house was built in 1955, and it doesn’t have a true entryway, at least not in the same sense as a lot of newer houses. Our front door opens directly into our library, which was the living room when the house was built. To make a “landing spot” for things we placed a nightstand next to the door and added a hook for keys, a small metal basket for outgoing mail (which was once mistaken for holy water by a friend’s toddler), a bin for shoes, a small bowl for spare change, and a rug to help define the area. To the right of the door we hung a HomeGoods mirror that I painted (Valspar’s La Fonda Grassy Knoll), and we started a gallery wall of door pictures (most of those are from Katie Bower).

I should add that the late afternoon sun made the yellow a lot more “gold”.

This worked for us for about a year and a half, but there was never really a good place for my purse or our reusable bags, we needed some more shoe storage, and during the winter our dining room chairs were constantly draped with jackets. We decided to put a console along the wall opposite the front door, and add a coat rack to the right of the door. Ever since we moved our hutch back into the dining area (which was longer ago that I like to admit to) we’ve used a couple of stools as a placeholder for our console.

one day a DIY version of the West Elm Chunky Console will go here

This is what we’ve come up with so far:

We’re planning to remove the tile and paint the wall it its own color to help define the space. I’ve been coveting this Frameless Arch Mirror from Lowe’s ever since I saw it on their website, and I’ve been thinking about putting it over the console table we build. The inspiration for our coat rack is from Kara Paslay Designs, her husband Tim made it for her, and the inspiration for the console is the West Elm Chunky console, which is no longer available. Something like this Pottery Barn Beachcomber Basket would be great beneath the console for shoes, our current bin is too small. We also need a new door chime for our doorbell, and this one from Amazon looks nice. We hope to put a wall sconce above the over the console, but we haven’t decided exactly what style yet (the one show is from West Elm).

Thanks again to Rebecca and Mike, and I hope those of you who don’t know me will stop by my blog!

Yes, go stop by her blog… now 🙂 Mike and I considered making our own version of that West Elm chunky constole when it was still around. And you know I love a good shoe basket and I’m trying to work out a solution for our own entryway. Doesn’t Cait make great moodboards? She has more… at her blog 🙂

And no, THANK YOU Cait, for giving me a few spare hours to breathe tonight!