Our Home Renovation
In December of 2021, Quinn and I bought our first house. We just had our first baby, Adeline, in October and it was such an exciting, but exhausting, time of life. We had been married for about 3 and a half years and had recently graduated from BYU. Quinn got his first post-grad job and I had been working at mine for about a year and a half, but was on 4-month maternity leave, trying to decide whether or not I wanted to go back after my leave was up. I worked at an influencer marketing agency and it was a really high stress job where the pay did not equate the stress. I always had a love for interior design and just never felt like it was possible to go out on my own, but as we were house-hunting, I just kept feeling this itch to renovate every house we looked at. No matter how new or old, I felt there was a lot that could be done to them.
When we first walked into this house, not knowing the listing price, I had already dismissed it. It was dark, dingy and outdated and not to mention, it felt really small and cramped. Every single room we walked through, I felt more and more defeated knowing that in order for me to like this house, it would take a lot of work and a lot of money. I kept making comments to Quinn like, “We’ll need all new floors and carpets” or “We will have to completely demo this bathroom” or “We would need new countertops, new paint and new hardware for everything in the kitchen” hoping to dissuade him from even thinking about going for this house because I knew we didn’t have the budget for all of that work. Well, much to our surprise, at the end of the tour we asked the owner how much she would want for it and let’s just say the number was not at all what I expected to come out of her mouth. It was at the bottom of our budget, meaning we could have the budget for all the renovations I listed off after all. Needless to say, I immediately walked through the house again with a more open mind, daydreaming about what this space could be for our new little family. So today, almost one year after purchasing this home, I will be taking y’all on a tour.
Our Entryway
As you can see, when we first bought this home it was really dark and outdated. Dark floors, dark walls and boob lamps galore. And to make matters worse, they had a mixture of carpet and sheet vinyl on the first floor. We tore out the sheet vinyl and the carpet and Quinn laid a light oak vinyl plank throughout the entire first floor to have one cohesive floor and to brighten up the space. In addition to laying all new floors, we painted all the walls, baseboards and ceilings. We also added new light fixtures to replace the outdated boob lamps.
PAINT SOURCES
Walls & Ceilings: BM Swiss Coffee @ 75% strength
Baseboards: Custom Color
SHOP THIS ROOM
Our Powder Bath
This is the only room on the main floor that has a different paint color than the rest of the house. I wanted to achieve a more traditional coastal look in here so I went for this beautiful light blue color. We switched out the pedestal sink for a small vanity with a white marble top. To be completely honest, this is my one regret in this space. I wish we would have splurged for a little bit nicer of a vanity and gone for a more veined marble look instead of just plain white. I feel like it would have given this room much more interest. But I still feel happy with what we did considering our budget. This is one of those hard lessons you have to learn now to grow and I’m glad I learned it early on so that I won’t make that mistake again.
PAINT SOURCES
Walls: BM Glass Slipper
Vanity: BM Revere Pewter
Wainscoting: Custom Color
Baseboards& Ceiling: Custom Color
SHOP THIS ROOM
Our Living Room
The floors and walls are the same throughout the main level to keep everything cohesive. Since we painted the walls white, I wanted to incorporate some warmth back into the room so we added these bamboo blinds and replaced the old white ones. We also updated the boob light in here to a more modern flush mount.
PAINT SOURCES
Walls & Ceilings: BM Swiss Coffee @ 75% strength
Baseboards: Custom Color
SHOP THIS ROOM
Our Dining Room
The main change we made in this space, besides the already noted floors and wall color, was taking these 70’s vertical blinds off and adding a some light curtains to make the room feel bigger, taller and brighter. The other significant change we made in here that made a huge difference was replacing the outdated chandelier over the table. As much as I love brass and will be incorporating it throughout our homes in the hardware, I wanted add some contrast here with the matte black light fixtures.
PAINT SOURCES
Walls & Ceilings: BM Swiss Coffee @ 75% strength
Baseboards: Custom Color
SHOP THIS ROOM
Our Kitchen
Can you believe how different this looks? Sometimes I forget the power of paint! Just by painting the cabinets, it makes a huge change. And although that’s not all we did, it would’ve made such a big impact if we had chosen to go that route. This was the most expensive room to reno because we replaced the old formica countertops with quartz but I am so happy we did. It made such a huge change looks wise and quality wise. The countertop we chose in here is one of my other reno regrets. To save money (and i’m talking around $1k in savings), we opted for the plain white quartz with no veining. At the time, we just didn’t have it in the budget and I thought, “Well, anything is better than what we have now”, which is absolutely true, but in hindsight, I would have spent the extra money to get some veining and cut back elsewhere in the budget. Aside from looks, this plain quartz scratches so easily and the scratches stick out like a sore thumb. Luckily, the scrub right off but I still wish I made a different choice. In addition to the countertops and paint, I DIY’d this grey-blue herringbone backsplash and I think it adds just the right amount of contrast and interest to the space.
PAINT SOURCES
Cabinets: BM Simply White
Walls & Ceilings: BM Swiss Coffee @ 75% strength
Baseboards: Custom Color
SHOP THIS ROOM
Our Master Bedroom
This is probably my favorite room in the house. I wanted it to have a luxurious coastal vibe and I feel so happy with how it turned out. We added some picture frame moulding and sconces and I feel like it gives off a hotel vibe.
PAINT SOURCES
Walls & Ceilings: BM Swiss Coffee @ 75% strength
Moulding: BM Swiss Coffee @ 75% strength
Baseboards: Custom Color
SHOP THIS ROOM
Our Master Bath
I wanted to continue the luxury hotel feel from our master bedroom into this bathroom to really tie it all together. We replaced the exisitng dark sheet vinyl with this gorgeous white marbled porcelain tile from Floor & Decor and then added this traditional white double vanity with a carrarra marble top and finished it off with some polished nickel hardware. To warm the space up a bit, I added a 2-light brass sconce in the middle with these beautiful brass mirrors from Target above each sink. I am in love with how it turned out!
PAINT SOURCES
Walls & Ceiling: BM Swiss Coffee @ 75% strength
Baseboards: Custom Color
Adeline's Nursery
It is pretty amazing to me that these two are the same space. The very first thing we did after moving in, was tear out that dingy brown carpet and replace it with this plus light grey carpet and I think the difference speaks for itself. I am so happy with how this nursery turned out for Adeline. I wanted it to be feminine with a touch of traditional coastal so we added some picture frame moulding to the bottom third of the wall and then pink pinstripe wallpaper to the upper half of the wall and I am in love with how it turned out. I brought in lots of different textures and textiles to warm it up and give it that perfect little touch of coastal that I was going for.
PAINT SOURCES
Moulding: Custom color
Ceiling: BM Swiss Coffee @ 75% strength
Baseboards: Custom Color
SHOP THIS ROOM
Our Kids Bath
I wanted this bathroom to coordinate with Adeline’s nursery and play off the feminine touches and light and bright space so I found this gorgeous white vanity with a marble top on sale at The Home Depot and I think it was the perfect find for this space. I switched out the hardware with this polished nickel and added the polished nickel sconces to either side of the round brass mirror to mix some metals in this space for a more high-end look. Additionally, I added that beautiful aged brass faucet and aged brass towel oval and toilet paper holder to add some more warmth to the space.
PAINT SOURCES
Walls & Ceiling: BM Swiss Coffee @ 75% strength
Baseboards: Custom Color
Claire's Nursery
About a year after finishing our first daughter’s nursery, we welcomed our second daughter into our family and I wanted to make sure each girl got her own space and not only that but I wanted both spaces to feel feminine yet unique. For this nursery I really wanted to do a non-traditional girls nursery and use light blue. The very first thing I knew I wanted was this beautiful blue dresser, a Serena & Lily dupe DIY project I did. So I created the whole nursery around that one dresser. I paired it with this feminine Rifle & Paper Co. blue hydrangea wallpaper and then added this bead board to go about halfway up the wall and then painted it a soft blue. I brought in lots of different textures and textiles to warm it up and give it that perfect little feminine touch that I was going for.
PAINT SOURCES
Walls & Ceiling: BM Swiss Coffee @ 75% strength
Wainscoting: BM Glass Slipper
Baseboards: Custom Color
And that’s a wrap for now. If you are following along on Instagram, you know that we have just started our very last room remodel for the year and that is our master bath. If all goes well, we will have completed that before the end of the year as well so stay tuned for the reveal. And after that, we still have a few more rooms to redo, but i’d say 9 rooms in 1 year is pretty good for now. Thanks for stopping by and supporting this small business of mine. It truly means the world. I hope you’ll continue to follow along as we renovate the rest of our home and others in the coming years.
