Milwaukee Journal Sentinel Feature

A few weeks ago, I was contacted by the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel to have a reporter come out to the house and do an interview for the paper.  They were interested in our home renovation story, and also the Renovation Roadtrip we participated in last October.  The timing was a little stressful since we had JUST refinished the upstairs floors and the house was a hot mess, but it all turned out great.  Ok, we are still looking for stuff that I shoved into random closets....but anyway, the story is in the paper today!  Check it out HERE.

Oh, and I really wish I had worn a different sweater.  You just can't remember to suck it in all the time, right?  

There are also lots of links to the Roadtrip, I hope Meryl and Chris are ready for the traffic!  Thanks to Jackie Loohauis-Bennett and Rick Wood for coming out to Racine and giving this blogger a thrill!  

Huffington Post Feature

Hey everyone, I hope you had a wonderful new year!  We went out with my brother and his lady for NYE while my mom watched the little nugget, and it was divine.  There was champagne, party head gear, and sequins involved. Here is a photo to prove that I did not fall asleep on the couch at 10pm as initially planned...  

Ok, this doesn't prove the time, but I assure you if you could see my raccoon eyes you would know this was about 5 hours past my normal bed time...or, 2am. 

Enough about my shenanigans.  I wanted to share a link to a Huffington Post Home feature on our kitchen!  Amy contacted me before Christmas and asked if she could interview me for a little post on the kitchen renovation, how could I say no?  You can check it out here.  

ps - I love how the first comment says that our kitchen is entirely underwhelming.  Awesome! 

Huffington Post Stylelist Feature!

I was contacted by Diana at Huffington Post 'Stylelist Home' to do an article about refinishing floors.  To say I was flattered is an understatement, I was thrilled!  While the article how-to is not as detailed as my blog post, it covers the basics...check it out here.

ps - the article states that I would use water-based stain if I could do it again, but she actually meant to type 'water-based poly' due to the faster dry time and non-yellowing properties.  Unfortunately, we started with oil and now we have to keep using it to match the rest of the floors. 

Guest post!

Hey peeps, Liz at It's Great to be Home has my guest post up today!  Yes, I realize it's very late at night, at least in Central time, but I'm a little busy 'getting married in a week'....so yes, I'm a bit late!  Please go check out the post here, all about how much I love hooks because I'm lazy. 

Also, I wanted to show you our outfits for Wacky Wednesday this week...the challenge was complementary colors (opposites on the color wheel)...

...I chose orange and blue, my favorite combo!

Jean slid her tiny ninja body into some delicious purple and yellow attire.  We were colorful and 'business sexy,' don't you think?   

We didn't plan the nude pumps, I swear.  I also find it funny that our shoulders have no hope of meeting up in this pic!     

Apartment Therapy, the love is mutual!!

I was told by a helpful reader that my coat closet redo landed on Apartment Therapy today.  What an awesome surprise!  Since this feature is so soon after the veggie bin makeover feature, I think it's safe to say that Apartment Therapy and I are officially 'going steady.'  Check out their lovely post here!

I've been featured!

Hey, I just found out that Re-Nest posted about my veggie bin makeover.  I had no idea until I got an email from a lovely new reader.  Check it out here! 

I've been featured!

Hey folks, check out Kirsten at 6th Street Design School's 'Friday Feature' today - it's my house!  She did such a great job, I love it.  Friday smooches to you all!

See the feature HERE.



Great reads

Did everyone survive the Christmas madness?  I sure hope that your eggnog hangover isn't too bad.  Just wanted to let you all know that fellow blogger Jennifer at Rambling Renovators has featured my little old blog in the first installment of her end of year 'Great Reads' post.  Isn't that sweet?  Pop over there and check out her favorites!

I'm a winner!

My friends over at One Project Closer have named me the best renovator ever picked my art room renovation as their weekly winner in their 'Before and After 2010' contest supporting Habitat for Humanity! 

The contest runs for the summer, and anyone can submit a project to the One Project Closer team at beforeandafter@oneprojectcloser.com.  Every week, they choose the best submission and that person gets to choose a $50 gift card to Home Depot, Lowes, or Amazon. Plus, they make a $100 donation to Habitat for Humanity in the winner's honor!  I always spend at least 1 day per summer sweating profusely on a Habitat build in my area, so this is a very cool prize.  Winners of the weekly contest also get entered into an end-of-summer showdown where readers can vote for the best Before and After, and the winner will get another $150 to the home improvement store of their choice.  I will be doing my best to blackmail votes out of you lovely folks when the time comes, trust me! 

I submitted the art room project because it involved a little of everything: some building...

some mitering and nailgunning (yeah, I can make up words around here)...

some staining and polying, along with some wine spilling....

plenty of sanding, priming and painting....

and of course, decorating.  Check out the post over at One Project Closer here!  And if you missed my original post about this room, be sure to click on the photo on my sidebar, all the juicy details (including a cost breakdown) are there. 

PS - definitely enter your own before and after, there are still a few weeks left in August!

I'm one project closer

Last week I had the pleasant surprise of being asked to be part of One Project Closer's Community Blogs list.  One Project Closer is a site run by four friends (two married couples, isn't that awesome?) that features tips, advice, products, reviews, how-tos, tools and amazing projects.  They have a large following and mostly link to blogs that contain impressive DIY projects.  Me?  Impressive?  I'll take it! 

I'm thrilled to be linked on this site, these DIY couples tackle all kinds of things from installing replacement windows to framing with steel studs.  And as a 'community blogger', I'm in good company with some familiar (and ever-inspiring) blogs:

Not to mention all the other DIY and Home Improvement sites I have been perusing.  I hope you will check out One Project Closer and their Community Blogs page to see all the great sites that they link to!

PS - The community blogs are on their home page, but only the first four (newest) entries are visible, older entries can be seen here.  

My Dressing Room is featured on Design*Sponge!

THANK YOU to Grace and the other contributors at Design*Sponge for featuring my dressing room (along with a seriously cute nursery!) on their site today.  I'm thrilled and very honored! 

Check out the post here.  For new visitors, I'm so happy you came to check out my blog.  Please let me know if you have any questions or feedback about my renovations!

I've been 'Reader Redesigned!'

A big thank you to John and Sherry at Young House Love for featuring our back-breaking patio project on their blog!  It was definitely the hardest thing we've ever done to our house, harder than refinishing our hardwoods, renovating our stairs, and adding chair rail and picture molding to our dining room.  I can put together a little cheat sheet on how we did the patio, if there is any interest?

And to those new folks who are stopping by my blog from YHL, welcome!  I love new readers like I love wine.  And that's a lot.  Well, if you keep reading my blog you'll figure it out....

Cheers!
Sara