Living Room Redo

Introducing Part 3 of my quest to redecorate our house one room at a time. After Kaitlynn's bedroom and the master bedroom, we moved on to the living room.

First, I thought I'd throw in some before-the-before photos of the living room. When we moved in our house 3 years ago, we noticed right away that the previous owners LOVED white tile, rust-colored grout, and peach walls. It was everywhere. We managed to replace the flooring with nicer tile and hardwoods and the walls with warmer colors before we moved in. (Except in the master bathroom, which is BEGGING for a re-do. But that'll have to wait for another day!) So here you go, the "Before the Before" pics:




Those 2 empty niches on either side of our fireplace drove me crazy. I always wanted built-in cabinets but the contractor and I couldn't agree on a price, plus I didn't have a good idea of what I wanted. Several months ago, I finally saw some built-in cabinets (thanks, Katherine and Jim!!) that inspired me for what I wanted, so I contacted the contractor again. And AGAIN, we couldn't agree on price. But lo and behold, he called me out of the blue this fall and we came to an agreement.

So here's the "Before" from before the cabinets were added.


During the cabinet construction.



Finally, the "After".


I couldn't be happier with the cabinets! Not only are they SO much prettier than the emtpy niches, but they have added a ton of storage that we are always lacking in this house. Now the only problem is finding just the right accessories to put on display, but that's a good problem to have!

On to the next project in the living room....the couches. Jeff and I bought these couches over 5 years ago. They are still in great shape, EXCEPT for the back cushions. I never could figure out what was wrong with them, and then it hit me. After years of THIS type of abuse (see below), well, you can understand why the couch cushions were completely smushed and disfigured.



I wasn't ready to replace the couches, so I looked into getting the back cushions re-stuffed. Hopefully this will give us another 3-5 years out of the furniture. They look good as new!

Here are the befores of the couches:




And here is after the re-stuffing:




Another update I made to the room was to replace the ceiling fan and entryway light fixtures. I am not a fan of brass fixtures so they had to go. But with 18 foot ceilings, they were NOT easy to replace. Luckily our favorite contractor saved the day, again. With a REALLY big ladder.



Here are the fixtures before. (Again, why do builders install brass??)




And here are the afters.




Much better! Now on to the last project: adding gas logs to the fireplace. We had gas logs in our last house and I've really missed them, both for ambiance and that extra heat in the winter.

Here is a before of the fireplace:



And here is the after.



Phew! Another room done! I admit that I am loving the progress in the house so far (although my hubby might say his wallet ain't lovin' it too much!) Ha!