New Lighting

Last fall, I went on a Craigslist selling spree to get rid of a bunch of stuff we no longer needed.  Old furniture, toys, etc.  I had already replaced two of the chandeliers in the house – the powder room and the small hall outside our bedroom.

Since 3 of the 5 chandeliers in the house were from the same collection and all 5 went together, I wanted to sell them all at once.  I decided to go ahead and post them all, even though I didn’t have replacements for 3 of them.  It worked out perfect cause I ended up selling our master bathtub chandelier to one woman and another woman bought the other 4, all in the same day.  However, that left us with no lights in the Foyer or Dining Room.  I had a good idea of what I wanted, but finding something at a price I could justify was a challenge.  I ended up ordering 2 from the same company with 20% off in a pre-Christmas sale.  I had actually seen the foyer light in a local store a while back.  The dining room light came before Christmas and the foyer light came after New Years.

The foyer light is the Stanton by Capitol Lighting in Polished Nickel.  It has twice as many lights as the old fixture and is really bright with the halogen bulbs I put in it.  It’s a little large, but I think it looks fine.  The walls are Behr Sculptor Clay (PPU5-8) – my Benjamin Moore Revere Pewter alternative – with Behr Silky White on the trim and ceilings.

I’m done decorating the foyer except for possibly adding a shallow table/cabinet along the wall, if I can find one I like.

The word collage is something I had in our old house and wanted to recreate here.  It is based off of this template and I cut it out of vinyl with my Silhouette machine.

The Dining / Piano Room still has some details to finish, but it’s mostly done.  The chair and chaise came from Home Goods and I painted their legs high gloss black to match the piano.

The Dining Room walls are now Behr Atlantic Shoreline (PPU13-4) with Behr Silky White on the trim and ceilings.  I may still add some more trim to the ceiling just to spice it up a bit.  I’ve been trying to find pillows, or fabric to make some, for the chairs.  I also need artwork or something for the walls.  I can’t decide whether to use one of my one photographs, a mirror or something completely different.

I also need something to store my piano music – either a cabinet for this room or it could go in the foyer cabinet, if I find one.  I’m not 100% thrilled with the layout of the piano room, but I haven’t been able to come up with anything better.  I prefer the piano to be somewhat out of the way so it’s not walked by constantly.  (The layout of our house is a big square, so we cut through this room a good bit).

For the chandelier, I wanted something not over-the-top, but with a touch of glamour.  I wanted something fairly simple and not too busy.  It also needed to compliment the foyer light (and vice versa).  I decided on the Alisa 9 light chandelier from Capitol Lighting.  Since both lights are made by the same company, they have the same polished nickel finish.  I considered getting the smaller 6-light version of the chandelier, but I liked the look of having two tiers.

The crystals and “candle” bases are all heavy glass.

I’m not exactly sure what is next on my project list.  I’ve been working on several ideas, so we will see.  I’m hoping to use the money I made selling our old stuff to put wood floors in our bedroom and get rid of the carpet (the only carpet on the first floor).  I started working on renderings and drawings of the pantry as I would like to remove the wire shelving and make better use of that space.  David gave me the fanciest Dewalt miter saw for Christmas along with the stand for it, so the pantry would be a good project to break that in.  I also still want to build some shelves for The Kid’s Room.  We have also been looking at new office furniture which will kick off the redecorating of my craft room.  New furniture for the office means the old stuff will move to my craft room upstairs and I have big plans for that – refinish the furniture in a fun color and finish, paint the walls and possibly modify the daybed we have in there.  I’m currently using my mom’s writing desk which is nowhere big enough for the computer, my cutting machine and everything that goes with it.  Moving the office furniture up there will give me a ton of surfaces to work on.  That is one room where I look forward to having fun with and making it all “me”.  Stay tuned cause I’ll be sure to post about whatever ends up next on the list!