June 10, 2019

Man Cave | Plans

Last week over on Insta-stories I shared a little tour of the “man cave.” I shared because we are not only planning to use this as entertainment space, but also as a space for me to shoot studio work. The kind of shoot we did with the Kain sisters.  As much as I love that studio in NoDa, it will be great to have my own space I don’t have to pay rent to use, and it will be right in my back yard! We actually ran all the plumbing to the building back in 2016 when we completed our master suite renovation. About 6 months after that reno, we bought all the kitchen cabinets for the man cave on sale with Ikea. They have just been sitting, packed in boxes since then! We have finally decided to pull the plug, and refinance the beach house (which we need to do anyway) and pull some cash out to complete this project. I’ve slowly been collecting inspiration photos over the last year years on Pinterst, so you can check that out over there if you want even more ideas of what we are thinking. This building is truly what sold us on the house when we bought it. It offered us a secondary entertaining space we really wanted to have. We were not opposed to it being a basement or bonus room inside whatever house we ended up purchasing, but having it a whole separate structure worked too. We have now been in our house 4 years, and we have done very little with this space. Jeremy finally added a double door to the shop (the new gray door you see). It was a single door, but we needed a wider ramp and door to get the riding lawnmower inside. Ready for the tour? Here she is. That red door has been like a stye in my eye for the last 4 years. If we didn’t have plans to just completely replace the doors, I would have painted them. I should have painted them 4 years ago when we moved in!!! Walking in those doors looks like this. There’s a room walled off to your left that was used as an office at one point. Looking right, it’s one big open room. The previous owner or renter put in these strange built in benches around part of the room with speakers. Needless to say, they are going in the dumpster! Looking back towards the left, you see that office, and an open space behind it. Where the ceiling fan is, will be the new bathroom. Looking towards the other front corner. Those are all the boxes of kitchen cabinets stacked under the window. Here’s a rendering I made using the Ikea kitchen planner, which I also used when we were planning our master bedroom project. This is standing outside looking in, if the walls were clear haha. The only drawback to using this program, you have to use Ikea products. So, we likely won’t get our countertop there, furniture or lighting… but you get the idea. Here is the view looking from the back right corner. The two large things, are closets. You’ll walk between them to get to the bathroom (that’s what we are thinking for now… maybe we’ll make one larger closet?) I love the idea of doing something fun and masculine with the bathroom tile. (both images found via Pinterest and are on my board linked above) Here’s the overall look we are thinking. The bar stools and cabinets we already own. The stools are from Homegoods, and the cabinets are from Ikea.  Jeremy fell in love with this chair when we picked out our sofa back in December, so it’s on his must-have list. The sofa pictured is just a placeholder, I think it would look nice, but I prefer something a little lighter since the chair will be dark and the cabinets are black. Both the sofa and chair are from CoCoCo Home. We are looking at a lighter granite counter, and probably a large stainless sink. We already have a fridge out there, it’s white, and I’m planning to paint it with chalkboard paint. The day Jeremy fell in love with the chair…. We currently have our an office/guest room in our house, and we would love to move our office out here too. Here is the current, below it is the plan. Jeremy also determined we will have to completely redo the exterior siding…. ugh. We thought we were going to be able to keep it and just paint it, but he discovered there’s no vapor barrier laid behind it, so it’s got to come down.  We have talked about vertical board and batten style siding, painted white. I’ve also got my eye on some nice window boxes! (images from my Pinterest board linked above) OK, that’s what we’ve got for now! When something interesting happens, I’ll let you know. We are hoping to get started this fall!  
January 3, 2018

I’m baaaaaaack!!!

Hello!!!!! Remember when I was sooooo good at blogging every.single.Tuesday. ?? Yep. Me too. Well, since I’m officially back at the day job today, we’ll just dive right back into blogging each Tuesday (yes, I know it’s Wednesday… but Monday was a holiday, so….) . And yes, Kate is now in daycare… OMG! Where did the last 4.5 months GO?! I miss her like crazy, but am excited to get back to productivity and for her to have more social interaction time. It’s a little like the last 4.5 months were a dream, even though I did work quite a bit… just a measly FOURTEEN portrait sessions and a wedding since October! So yeah… I have lots to blog about! But today, let’s just do a little recap of all my wonderful clients in 2017! *photos of us and some of Kate, by Lauren Jolly Photography           
July 19, 2017

Personal | Babymoon

Back in June, we did a little getaway to the Asheville area. We stayed in an adorable cottage in downtown Black Mountain that was so close to all the shops and restaurants. I hope we can make a trip back this fall with baby Kate! All images are 35mm Portra 400 We ate: My Fathers Pizza Sierra Nevada Brewing The Red Rocker Inn Biscuit Head French Broad Chocolate Company We visited: Mt. Mitchell Looking Glass Falls Blue Ridge Parkway Lookout Brewing Rock Barn Spa     
May 11, 2017

Personal | Nursery Update

Well, as suspected, I haven’t been able to stay on track with the One Room Challenge with my travels and work… but we have made progress!! The only thing truly up in the air at this point is the light. I ordered one, it arrived and it’s tiny! So, back it goes and the search continues.  Check out my other posts here and here! Curtains: The curtains have been finished and hung! I finished them a few weeks ago, but had to wait on the curtain brackets to arrive… then for Jeremy to help me hang them. I am ecstatic to say, they were hung yesterday and are PERFECT! Crib: The crib has been assembled for months (we actually assembled it 2 days before finding out we were pregnant!) but of course the linens took time. They are all in, and I found the perfect blush pink pillow to add to it (just for pretty purposes). The white pillow is from my stash when we sold our old house a few years ago. Roman Shades: The fabric arrived last week and I took it over the the seamstress, hoping they are finished quick because I’ve been SO excited about this piece for months! Dresser: We decided to paint the dresser white! The painter is a little backed up, but it will be completed by July. So…. just pretend the dresser is white, kthanks. Glider: We hit the jackpot! A friend told me about the Transit Damage Freight store in Charlotte, and how they carry the chair we were interested in, the Natasha chair from Best (they can order all Best Chairs, if you’re local!). They didn’t have it on site though to see, and I wanted to tush test it before ordering. We found it in another shop, liked it and decided to go for it. The shop we saw it in was like $600 just for the chair, but at Transit Damage, we got the chair and ottoman for $501! We got it ordered on Saturday, and it should be here my mid June. We ordered it in navy. I also found a little white side table at HomeGoods to have next to the glider. A little perch for water, phone, bottle, etc. Art: I went up in the attic searching for prints I made in high school (and didn’t find them) but did discover an 8×10 print from my first birthday! I hung it over the crib, and will get one of Jeremy to hang with it. I may take them down and re-print them in black and white instead, we’ll see. I still have to get the blanket framed and hung in the acrylic sheets. I think it’s going over the dresser. Sources: Dresser & Crib (vintage), Chair & Ottoman, Rug (old from TJMaxx), Side Table (HomeGoods), Curtains, Trim, Shade Fabric, Curtain Rods, Curtain Brackets (purchased from eBay), Hamper (Marshalls), Crochet Flamingo, Acrylic Sheets & Hardware BEFORE: The navy & white stripe bin is being used as her hamper. Pretend the blanket is framed and hung above the dresser, and there’s a changing pad on the dresser…. and the dresser is white with acrylic hardware…. #useyourimagination *Just imagine the navy glider & ottoman where the buggy is! Still to come…. roman shade install, order & install new chandelier, delivery of glider and ottoman, frame and hang blanket over dresser… paint dresser…. eeek! Only about 14 weeks to go until she’s here! We’ve also got our maternity, hospital and newborn sessions booked!
June 10, 2019

Man Cave | Plans

Last week over on Insta-stories I shared a little tour of the “man cave.” I shared because we are not only planning to use this as entertainment space, but also as a space for me to shoot studio work. The kind of shoot we did with the Kain sisters.  As much as I love that studio in NoDa, it will be great to have my own space I don’t have to pay rent to use, and it will be right in my back yard! We actually ran all the plumbing to the building back in 2016 when we completed our master suite renovation. About 6 months after that reno, we bought all the kitchen cabinets for the man cave on sale with Ikea. They have just been sitting, packed in boxes since then! We have finally decided to pull the plug, and refinance the beach house (which we need to do anyway) and pull some cash out to complete this project. I’ve slowly been collecting inspiration photos over the last year years on Pinterst, so you can check that out over there if you want even more ideas of what we are thinking. This building is truly what sold us on the house when we bought it. It offered us a secondary entertaining space we really wanted to have. We were not opposed to it being a basement or bonus room inside whatever house we ended up purchasing, but having it a whole separate structure worked too. We have now been in our house 4 years, and we have done very little with this space. Jeremy finally added a double door to the shop (the new gray door you see). It was a single door, but we needed a wider ramp and door to get the riding lawnmower inside. Ready for the tour? Here she is. That red door has been like a stye in my eye for the last 4 years. If we didn’t have plans to just completely replace the doors, I would have painted them. I should have painted them 4 years ago when we moved in!!! Walking in those doors looks like this. There’s a room walled off to your left that was used as an office at one point. Looking right, it’s one big open room. The previous owner or renter put in these strange built in benches around part of the room with speakers. Needless to say, they are going in the dumpster! Looking back towards the left, you see that office, and an open space behind it. Where the ceiling fan is, will be the new bathroom. Looking towards the other front corner. Those are all the boxes of kitchen cabinets stacked under the window. Here’s a rendering I made using the Ikea kitchen planner, which I also used when we were planning our master bedroom project. This is standing outside looking in, if the walls were clear haha. The only drawback to using this program, you have to use Ikea products. So, we likely won’t get our countertop there, furniture or lighting… but you get the idea. Here is the view looking from the back right corner. The two large things, are closets. You’ll walk between them to get to the bathroom (that’s what we are thinking for now… maybe we’ll make one larger closet?) I love the idea of doing something fun and masculine with the bathroom tile. (both images found via Pinterest and are on my board linked above) Here’s the overall look we are thinking. The bar stools and cabinets we already own. The stools are from Homegoods, and the cabinets are from Ikea.  Jeremy fell in love with this chair when we picked out our sofa back in December, so it’s on his must-have list. The sofa pictured is just a placeholder, I think it would look nice, but I prefer something a little lighter since the chair will be dark and the cabinets are black. Both the sofa and chair are from CoCoCo Home. We are looking at a lighter granite counter, and probably a large stainless sink. We already have a fridge out there, it’s white, and I’m planning to paint it with chalkboard paint. The day Jeremy fell in love with the chair…. We currently have our an office/guest room in our house, and we would love to move our office out here too. Here is the current, below it is the plan. Jeremy also determined we will have to completely redo the exterior siding…. ugh. We thought we were going to be able to keep it and just paint it, but he discovered there’s no vapor barrier laid behind it, so it’s got to come down.  We have talked about vertical board and batten style siding, painted white. I’ve also got my eye on some nice window boxes! (images from my Pinterest board linked above) OK, that’s what we’ve got for now! When something interesting happens, I’ll let you know. We are hoping to get started this fall!  
January 3, 2018

I’m baaaaaaack!!!

Hello!!!!! Remember when I was sooooo good at blogging every.single.Tuesday. ?? Yep. Me too. Well, since I’m officially back at the day job today, we’ll just dive right back into blogging each Tuesday (yes, I know it’s Wednesday… but Monday was a holiday, so….) . And yes, Kate is now in daycare… OMG! Where did the last 4.5 months GO?! I miss her like crazy, but am excited to get back to productivity and for her to have more social interaction time. It’s a little like the last 4.5 months were a dream, even though I did work quite a bit… just a measly FOURTEEN portrait sessions and a wedding since October! So yeah… I have lots to blog about! But today, let’s just do a little recap of all my wonderful clients in 2017! *photos of us and some of Kate, by Lauren Jolly Photography           
July 19, 2017

Personal | Babymoon

Back in June, we did a little getaway to the Asheville area. We stayed in an adorable cottage in downtown Black Mountain that was so close to all the shops and restaurants. I hope we can make a trip back this fall with baby Kate! All images are 35mm Portra 400 We ate: My Fathers Pizza Sierra Nevada Brewing The Red Rocker Inn Biscuit Head French Broad Chocolate Company We visited: Mt. Mitchell Looking Glass Falls Blue Ridge Parkway Lookout Brewing Rock Barn Spa     
May 11, 2017

Personal | Nursery Update

Well, as suspected, I haven’t been able to stay on track with the One Room Challenge with my travels and work… but we have made progress!! The only thing truly up in the air at this point is the light. I ordered one, it arrived and it’s tiny! So, back it goes and the search continues.  Check out my other posts here and here! Curtains: The curtains have been finished and hung! I finished them a few weeks ago, but had to wait on the curtain brackets to arrive… then for Jeremy to help me hang them. I am ecstatic to say, they were hung yesterday and are PERFECT! Crib: The crib has been assembled for months (we actually assembled it 2 days before finding out we were pregnant!) but of course the linens took time. They are all in, and I found the perfect blush pink pillow to add to it (just for pretty purposes). The white pillow is from my stash when we sold our old house a few years ago. Roman Shades: The fabric arrived last week and I took it over the the seamstress, hoping they are finished quick because I’ve been SO excited about this piece for months! Dresser: We decided to paint the dresser white! The painter is a little backed up, but it will be completed by July. So…. just pretend the dresser is white, kthanks. Glider: We hit the jackpot! A friend told me about the Transit Damage Freight store in Charlotte, and how they carry the chair we were interested in, the Natasha chair from Best (they can order all Best Chairs, if you’re local!). They didn’t have it on site though to see, and I wanted to tush test it before ordering. We found it in another shop, liked it and decided to go for it. The shop we saw it in was like $600 just for the chair, but at Transit Damage, we got the chair and ottoman for $501! We got it ordered on Saturday, and it should be here my mid June. We ordered it in navy. I also found a little white side table at HomeGoods to have next to the glider. A little perch for water, phone, bottle, etc. Art: I went up in the attic searching for prints I made in high school (and didn’t find them) but did discover an 8×10 print from my first birthday! I hung it over the crib, and will get one of Jeremy to hang with it. I may take them down and re-print them in black and white instead, we’ll see. I still have to get the blanket framed and hung in the acrylic sheets. I think it’s going over the dresser. Sources: Dresser & Crib (vintage), Chair & Ottoman, Rug (old from TJMaxx), Side Table (HomeGoods), Curtains, Trim, Shade Fabric, Curtain Rods, Curtain Brackets (purchased from eBay), Hamper (Marshalls), Crochet Flamingo, Acrylic Sheets & Hardware BEFORE: The navy & white stripe bin is being used as her hamper. Pretend the blanket is framed and hung above the dresser, and there’s a changing pad on the dresser…. and the dresser is white with acrylic hardware…. #useyourimagination *Just imagine the navy glider & ottoman where the buggy is! Still to come…. roman shade install, order & install new chandelier, delivery of glider and ottoman, frame and hang blanket over dresser… paint dresser…. eeek! Only about 14 weeks to go until she’s here! We’ve also got our maternity, hospital and newborn sessions booked!