Tag: DIY

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Propagating Fiddle Leaf Figs- Part 1

I love fiddle leaf figs! I have heard they made very hardy indoor house plants and I just love the way they look. I love them so much, I wouldn’t be unhappy having one in just about every room of my house.

The problem? They are not cheap! You can get a really small seedling for around $20, but most medium-sized plants range anywhere from $60 – $160. And considering how many of them I want, $20 a piece isn’t really a viable option either. So about a month ago I decided to try to propagate them.

Let me preface by saying that we were lucky enough to have 3 HUGE fiddle leaf figs planted in our backyard before we bought it. So we’ve got some figs to work with. This is a shot of our fiddle leaf figs. They are way too big to transplant and bring inside – no we don’t have 20-foot ceilings.

But with so much plant to work with, I thought I’d try my hand at propagating! I am no horticulturist, but I have heard that some people have luck putting clippings in water to get roots started. So I tried that.

I cut a pretty big clipping because I thought that if I could get it to sprout roots it might be better to start with a larger plant. However I have also had luck  with just a single leaf sprouting large amount of roots over the course of a few months. Unfortunately, I didn’t follow-up with care and maintenance on that little leaf and he didn’t make it in his pot once he was relocated. This time I took 2 of these clippings and put them in vases and filled them with enough water that the stems were submerged about 3-4 inches up the stem. I’m hoping that maybe a larger clipping will be a bit hardier than the small single leaf clipping I tried before. I kept them on my kitchen table which is about 4 feet away from a large south-facing window. So they have a good amount of filtered indirect sunlight throughout the day.

Here’s a photo of the 2 clippings in their vases:


Since planting them just a little over a month ago, I have changed out their water a few times to keep it fresh and I have added 2 tablespoons of this plant food that I just happened to have sitting around:


This stuff came with my AeroGarden that I got for Christmas last year. (The best thing for growing indoor herbs and veggies)


After exactly 1 month of being in water, I already had root buds!

This was the smaller clipping after 1 month:

And the larger clipping after 1 month:

I’ll keep you posted with the progress as they continue to grow. Here’s to hoping they will one day look as good as this one!

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Our First House (Flip)

In honor of our recent closing day anniversary, I thought it would be fitting to share the before and after photos from our first ever house which later became our first house flip! Technically speaking, I guess we bought and flipped our second house, then bought our 3rd house and flipped our first house. It was a crazy 3 years! More on our Phillips Flips (home flipping stories) here.

On March 21, 2013 we bought our very first house. It was dreamy… and I mean “dreamy” in the sense that you had to dream about what it would look like one day and not what it looked like right when we bought it.

Here’s what it looked like when we bought it:

And the inside:

Check out those floors! The floors on the right of the picture above are linoleum tiles. There was 2 full layers of ceramic tile where you see the tile up there at the top and the carpet to the left was dark green. And about 8 feet inside the front door was a nice little 3-way junction where all 3 of the mixed floors met up for no real reason.

All the bedrooms had that same dark green carpet.

The kitchen was pretty small and awkwardly closed off to the rest of the house. So the first thing we did was grab a sledge-hammer and bust through some walls:

We removed the wall shown above which opened the kitchen to the entryway and a little more to the dining room over to the left.

We removed the upper cabinets that were hanging above the island which opened the headroom up a bit and made the kitchen completely open to the family/TV room.

We ripped up all of the floors to make way for light-colored hardwoods.

And then we got to work! We painted the kitchen cabinets white!

It was much more open with the overhead cabinets out of the way.

We painted the front door this fun minty color and I DIY Frosted the front windows with a little hand cut monogram in the center.

I replaced the fan in the dining room with this Maskros Pendant Lamp from IKEA and we painted the fun accent stripe wall on the side wall over there. That was SO “in” back in 2013!

We gave all the other walls a fresh coat of paint (either white or light gray).

And replaced the dark green carpet with a neutral “greige” color that we found on crazy sale at one of our local carpet/flooring warehouse places. We found just enough carpet to put in our sunken den area and all 3 of our bedrooms. It was meant to be!

I didn’t get a ton of great shots of it, but originally we had vaulted ceilings that were covered in dark wood paneling. We painted over that with white paint and it looked kind of like vaulted shiplap covered ceilings!

With the wall knocked out, the upper cabinets gone and the white paint, the kitchen looked much more open and bright!

And finally, we got around to painting the outside of the house and redoing the roof with light metal panels.

On our first ever house flip, we spent about $10K in renovations:
Flooring: $4,000 (purchased whole sale and installed by a friend of a friend)
New roof: $5,000 (we pulled our own permits and had a friend do the work for us)
Paint: $1,000 (we used a lot of leftover paint that we had sitting around in storage and we may have used plain old white primer on some interior walls- you got to save wherever you can!)

We ended up selling this house for $16K more than we paid for it which was a $6K profit on the sale alone. We also rented it out for several months during some of the transition time while we were in between houses and we made a total of $11,700 in rental income. So all-in-all we made $16,700 on our first flip.

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Backyard Renovation Updates: Demolition Progress, Next Steps & Bad News about our Trees

Last week we learned that aluminum costs way more than we thought. We got a price quote for the entire rebuild of our second story deck which includes demo of the current deck and stairs, custom built, water sealed storage under the stairs, a full rebuild of the stairs and second story deck as well as having all of the upright posts wrapped in cedar. The aluminum roof quote which includes demo of the current aluminum roof and installation of new aluminum roof as well as screening in the second story deck was nearly 2 times the cost of the deck quote and about 4 times more than we were expecting. Before we got the quote for the aluminum, we were thinking that we were very close to having the money saved up to cover the whole project. Now, we are certain that we don’t have enough cash at the moment, but we are plugging on. We’re going to take each item one step at a time and if this means that we have dirt as the ground covering for our bottom floor for a few months, while we save up, then so be it. Maybe we will let Piper experience the fun of mud-pies once it starts getting rainy around here.

While we did have a bit of sticker shock from the aluminum roofing quote, we decided to keep the momentum going and continue to move forward with the renovation. Right now we’re simultaneously working on finalizing the drafts and getting architect’s approval on our rebuild while we are DIY demoing the bottom deck.

Anyone need some old wood? We are not quite halfway through the bottom story demo and this is our output. Thinking that perhaps one dumpster won’t be enough to hold everything! 

Speaking of our DIY deck demo, here’s what we’ve done on that so far:


It’s definitely coming along. We still need to demo the main area under roof and then we have to tackle the shed back there.

Here’s another shot of the deck we have left to demo:

(Featuring our newest addition to the indoor house plants! I found this guy at Lowes this weekend and brought him home as our first medium-sized floor plant/tree. Hoping he enjoys our family room as much as we do.)

In other news, The Tree Lady came out this weekend to talk to us about our oak trees. She had amazing insight and I learned a ton in just the 15 minutes she was here. I highly recommend her if you’re looking to trim/remove/save your trees and are located in Winter Haven, FL or surrounding areas! The main reason we brought her out was to talk to her about trimming up the tree in the picture above (not our newest little guy – that big live oak to the left). One of the large branches that’s currently stretching out above our current roof needs to be removed completely in order to make way for our new roof plans. We plan to push the current roof up to the same level as the second story roof so that from the second story you can look down into the main patio area. So we needed to make sure that we could remove the branch without killing the whole tree – because my dream was to leave the tree there and work our patio space/concrete floors/aluminum roof around it. The good news is we can cut the branch with a 60-ish% chance of survival for the tree.

The bad news is, the only  ground cover we can put back down this close to the tree is more deck. The concrete we want would be ruined within a few years because the roots of the live oak would try to surface and push up through the concrete. So after serious thought and discussions about potentially changing our whole deck plans to accommodate this tree, we decided with heavy hearts that we will remove the whole tree instead.

Fun fact: when you look at a tree’s canopy (the large green part at the top), the root system of that tree will be 2.5 times bigger than the canopy.

So that means that this tree right here is already growing big surface-level roots dangerously close to our house’s foundation and while it may not be an issue right now, we can surely expect it to be an issue in 10 or so years. So even though 10 years sounds like a lifetime away, we determined it would be in the long-term best interest of the house/deck/future homeowners, to remove the tree.

As we plug along on our demo, the first official contracted step of the backyard renovation is taking off today! Our aluminum roofing guy is coming out to demo the roof. After he takes the roof down, he will determine how much (if any) of the aluminum panels can be reused and we are hoping that once the demo is finished, we will learn that the majority of pieces can be reused for our new roof which would save us a considerable amount on the roofing quote. More on that next week.

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8 Low Maintenance House Plants – From Someone with a Black Thumb

I recently got a question about what type of house plants I have in my home. So I thought I would go into detail about what I’ve had that’s lasted. I’m no horticulturist, so this post will not be delving into the ideal living situations or advice on achieving maximum growth, but rather sharing the plants I have had that are able to survive with very little work.

These are the most low maintenance plants you can get, so if you have a black thumb (like me) but still want to green-up your home, these are the plants for you!
Note: Succulents are not on this list, because I have had my share of succulents and killed them all.

1. Sansevieria (AKA Mother-in-law’s tongue or Snake Plant)

We have 2 of these in our home. The one pictured here has been sitting in this same spot for over a year (and it’s still alive!). I picked up this plant about the size that it is now from my local garden store and literally just transferred it into this empty pot. I didn’t add dirt or fertilizer. This pot doesn’t drain (since it resides indoors) and I usually think to water it once every week or two. It doesn’t sit in front of a window and I haven’t taken it outside at all, but you can see in the picture that it’s in a room with some indirect sunlight that comes from the window in the opposite corner. It hasn’t grown much, but it’s survived and I haven’t had to pull off any brown leaves. It also doesn’t wilt at all. So I’m happy to say this one wins the award for the number 1, easiest plant to care for.

2. Aloe Vera Plant

We have a small aloe plant in our kitchen that has survived 3 moves and is now happily living in our landlocked, windowless kitchen with no direct or indirect sunlight. I have moved it to a window sill for a couple days at a time, maybe 3 times in the 1 1/2 years that we have lived in our current home. This is an easy one to keep alive and there are so many good uses for aloe too. The only thing I learned (the hard way) is that too much water will make the leaves brown on this one. Ironically, the only plant I think to water regularly is the one that does better with the least amount of water. This one sits right behind the faucet on our kitchen sink, so it’s the easiest to keep watered, but I learned to keep watering to a minimum with my aloe.
Pineapple planter from CB2.

3. Pothos Plant

Can I just say that these vine-y plants are my absolute favorite right now? They are cheap to buy and because of the ever-growing vine, they add a lot of green to the room with relatively no work. We’ve had this one sitting on our piano for over a year now. It has done well with being watered once every couple weeks. It’s taken a couple longer stints with no water and I noticed some browning around the leaves and vines and I just watered it a couple days in a row after that and it greened back up. Overall this is a pretty easy indoor plant to take care of.

Disclaimer: As I was googling the official names of these plants for reference, I read that this one is actually poisonous to cats/dogs/small children if its eaten. We have all 3 of those living in our home. The article I read did say that a small amount ingested is not fatal, but just tends to make pets/babies sick, but I think it’s worth mentioning. The good thing about this plant is that it looks best sitting up high on a self with the ivy trailing across or down and you can also hang it to avoid any possible mishaps with your pets or babies.

4. Philodendron

These are very similar to the pothos plants. I think this is technically called a “golden philodendron”. They also have them in a darker green color which makes it even harder to tell them apart. These tend to be a little bigger than pothos plants though. I bought this golden philodendron at the same time that I bought the previous pothos plant. They were almost exactly the same size when I bought them and this one has grown much faster and much bigger. I water this one even less than most of the other plants I mentioned above because this one sits in the back corner of our family room so it gets forgotten often when I am watering the other plants in the entryway. This one hangs in front of a window, but because the window faces out to our covered back porch and shaded backyard, this one probably doesn’t get much more sun than the ones in my entryway. This one has definitely grown and stayed alive with very little work. I have had to trim some brown leaves every now and then probably just because I don’t water it as much as I should, but overall this one is very black-thumb friendly.

5. Peace Lily Plant

This is a picture of my peace lily (above). When I bought it, it had a few of these pretty white flowers (pictured below)

This plant is a natural air purifier! I’ve heard that the more light your peace lily has, the more it will bloom with the white flowers. Since I’ve been keeping mine inside with minimal indirect sunlight through the window in our entryway, it hasn’t bloomed at all, but it is still alive and growing. Every now and then a leaf will turn brown. So I just pluck it off and water it some more. This plant has proved to need a little more watering than the others I have shared thus far. The good news is that this one lets you know when it needs water by wilting. So whenever I notice it looking wilted, I water it and it perks right back up. It’s been very hardy in that sense. Even though this one does take a little extra watering, I’m including it on the list because it’s a hard one to kill. As long as you don’t lock it in a room where you’ll never see it and if you keep a reasonably good eye on when it starts looking wilted, this one will pull through.

6. Air Plant

I’m including these on the list because they are generally easy enough to keep alive, although as a disclaimer to cat owners, I’m convinced that cats have the magic touch to kill these puppies. Perhaps its the fact that they slightly resemble spiders, but our cat has killed 2 out of 3 of them. When I first got this plant, I bought 3 identical ones and not only has my cat managed to knock over 2 out of 3 of them causing the concrete planter to literally disappear (I’ve pulled every piece of furniture out of the entryway to paint the walls and the mini concrete planter still didn’t turn up), but she ripped one apart and the other I saved, but it died outside of its little personal planter. So i’m not quite sure what the trick is to these, but I’d say you’re probably better off if you don’t have a crazy cat in your house. The lone air plant has done well. I’ve had this one for about 9 months. When I think to water the plants in the entryway, I just pull this guy out of the concrete planter and submerge it in the water for about 10 seconds, then I take it out and let it air-dry. Barring any CATastrophes (pun intended) these make good indoor house plants.
I bought these plants with the concrete planters from Frae and Co’s Etsy shop.

7.  Plastic Succulents

I know I said I wasn’t including succulents in this post, but these are plastic succulents. And no, that isn’t a species of succulent, it’s just the material they are made out of – as in, non-living, “fake” houseplants. They aren’t air-purifying, but they are hypoallergenic (as long as you keep them dusted). I wasn’t planning to include any fake plants in this post, but then I stopped by Target yesterday to pick up a few things and I found these babies in the discount section – you know, that little area right off to the side with tons of $1, $3, and $5 items that tricks you into spending $30 on small trinkets/decor/kids toys because everything is such a steal? It gets me every time. But $3 a piece for these?!? I was very close to buying 10 of them right there! I’m proud to announce that I only bought 3 of them and I haven’t gone back to buy more… yet. I seriously love succulents, but I just don’t understand all these people saying that they are easy to take care of. I have had probably 15 different types of succulents in my home just in the last year and a half and not one of them remains. So for now, I’m giving up hope on succulents and enjoying these maintenance-free $3 beauties.

8. Fiddle Leaf Fig

To be fair, I don’t technically have one of these inside my home yet, although I have heard good things about these making nice houseplants. I absolutely love the look of these and seriously want one in just about every room. Buying a mature one gets pretty pricey – I’ve seen prices ranging from $50 – $150 for one about the size pictured above. Fortunately for me, our backyard has 3 giant ones growing in it right now. Now I know it’s a bit different, but the trees we have in our backyard have not been touched/trimmed/watered/dusted since we moved in and although they have had the natural elements to help them along, they seem to be easy enough to keep alive judging on how much they’ve grown outside in just 1 1/2 years. To give you an idea here’s a before and after picture of them:

Before: This picture was taken in July 2015.

After: This picture was taken in January 2017

It’s a little hard to tell, but you can see that they have grown immensely if you check out the height in reference to the deck railing on the left. I’m currently attempting to propagate a couple clippings from these – pictured below:

I clipped off a decent sized chunk of leaves and it’s currently sitting in this pot of water. I’m hoping to encourage some root growth from this and then planning on transferring it to a pot with soil. I’ll keep you posted on how it goes, but if these grow even half as well as they have outside, then I’ll be happy I included them on the list. Also, I’m looking forward to possibly multiplying my fiddle leaf figs without dropping $50+ on ones from a garden store. I’m saving this post from Balcony Garden Web as a reference for caring for my fiddle leaf figs once they get potted.

What other indoor house plants have you had success with? I’d love suggestions on ones that I can add to my low maintenance indoor collection!

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A Bold Entryway Makeover

When we first moved into this house, every single wall was painted in this flat beige color.

I am definitely a fan of neutrals (although I usually prefer cooler tones like crisp white and light grey) but this bland entryway was a little too neutral for me. After tackling all the must-have projects on our fixer-upper (i.e. furnishing it with appliances, new AC, new windows, updated electrical and plumbing) we were finally able to work on the fun stuff – PAINTING and DECORATING!

I’m naturally drawn to light colors. I like when rooms feel bright and open, but with this small semi-sequestered entryway room that led into the rest of our bright and open house, I really wanted to go for a bold entrance. I toyed with a bright color. I also considered neutral walls and painting our antique piano yellow (or another fun eye-popping color like that), but I was worried I might regret painting the original wood on our piano, so I decided to go bold with dark walls instead.

I settled on a dark Navy with an eggshell finish. We used Sherwin Williams “Pitch Cobalt” which is kind of a grey-ish Navy. I almost always opt for a Satin finish with paints, with an occasional semi-gloss or high-gloss if I’m going white because it brightens the room up more and is easier to keep clean. But since I was going so dark in here, I thought it would be nice to keep the shine down and let the color speak for itself – so eggshell it is!

I added some greenery to our piano (plus a couple floor plants) because you can never have too many house plants! More on our house plants here.
(Note: in the previous picture, you can see more greenery than usual on the piano. I’m in the process of attempting to propagate some clippings from our fiddle leaf fig trees and I forgot to move them off the piano before snapping the “after” shot. They don’t normally sit there though. I’ll share more on how that goes later!)


Chair: All Modern

We framed the window with these sweet white curtains from All Modern and they are the perfect contrast to the dark navy walls.

We used gold/brass accents on everything and kept some of our costs down by getting our curtain rods from Target. They weren’t exactly the style I wanted, but they were about $100 less than the ones I loved from West Elm, so I was happy enough with these. We picked the “brushed nickel” finish which doesn’t match the gold exactly, but it’s close enough that you can’t tell without closely studying it – and we don’t know anyone who is 10 feet tall, so I feel confident that no one will be putting their face up to our curtain rods anytime soon.

We replaced a silver, outdated wall sconce with this one from All Modern. In the “honey gold” finish.

I painted this thrift store entry table with some light grey paint that was leftover from our master bedroom renovation.

That white umbrella holder we snagged on sale from All Modern.

As well as this round mirror.

And my favorite spot in the room is the corner that houses these framed photos of our girls. It’s the first thing you see when you walk in the door, and there’s just nothing better than being welcomed by squishy little sleeping babies am I right?

Photos by Petal & Vine Photography.
Gold frames from Hobby Lobby.

We still have a few more things on our dream board for this room including: recovering the old chair in the corner, buying a new entryway rug and getting a new front door, but we’ll take that one day at a time.

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DIY Instant Photo Accent Wall

I had some fun with this quick and easy DIY project today.

I recently received one of these Fujifilm Instax Mini 8 Instant Camera‘s as a gift and I have since been documenting some of my favorite moments of our family.

My camera-shy 2 year-old loves it and actually poses for the pictures because she is so excited to see them print out and watch them develop.

We had this blank white wall in our kitchen. At one point, it housed a small array of framed pictures and art and then around Thanksgiving-time it became our wall for seasonal decorations that changed with the seasons right up to Valentine’s Day. I wasn’t particularly keen on continuing the seasonal decorations by filling my wall with green shamrocks or multi-colored Easter eggs. So I decided to use my new gift to create a collection of family photos to fill the space.

It was easy enough to do. It took about 5 minutes (after I snapped and collected all of the photos). This is the camera I used:

I needed 2 packs of film for this project. Each pack comes with enough for 10 photos and my project used 16.

I had some cute wooden push-pins that I thought about using to hang the photos, but I decided I’d rather keep the simple, straight lines of the photo grid instead. So I adhered the photos to the wall with good old Scotch tape. I lined them up as straight as I could (without using a ruler) and the tape allowed me to continue to adjust if one of the pictures looked crooked.

The final product: A DIY Instant Photo Accent Wall with some sweet family moments!

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Our Backyard Renovation Plans

I’m finally putting pen to paper on our plans for our backyard, and man is it getting real! We have been saving up for this project since we finished buying our Christmas gifts last year (around mid-December) and we have been planning and getting inspiration for our backyard renovation since June 2015 – when we moved into this house. We’re planning to share all the details of the entire process right here for you to follow along, but for starters, we wanted you to see the “before” photos and share a little bit about our future and upcoming plans for this space.

Welcome to our backyard:

As you can see, the backyard is full of decking- literally. With the exception of our side-yard, a few flower beds and our long concrete driveway, our backyard is almost entirely solid wood. There was a “pool” when we moved in. And by pool, I mean that technically we had an above ground pool that was built into our raised deck, but it could be more accurately described as a broken-down plastic hole used for frog and mosquito breeding. So this was one of the very first things to go. We ripped this all out piece by piece which left us with a giant hole on one side of our yard that can be seen below:

It’s a really unappealing look – not to mention very unsafe for little kids. We’ve been living with this hole over here for almost 2 years now and we are finally ready to tackle this backyard renovation project.

First, we are demoing EVERYTHING! Literally every non-living structure in our backyard is getting ripped out, with the exception of this completely unfinished mother-in-law apartment- which we also have big plans for, but that’s another post for another day.

We recently decided to do the demo of our backyard ourselves instead of paying someone to do it for us. It’s proving to be a slow and arduous process that’s taking even longer than normal because we are having to fit the time in somewhere between our day jobs and parenting 2 little ones under the age of 3, but we are looking forward to getting the most bang for our buck! You can read more about the beginning of our DIY backyard deck demo here.

As of last night, this is how far we had come.

Like I said, it’s a slow process, but even a little progress is still progress, and I’m okay with that.

Once we finish the demo, we plan on rebuilding this second story deck in the same dimensions that it is currently.

The things we are doing differently with the rebuild include ensuring that the posts holding it up will be in the right spots. You can see in this picture below that the second story hangs past the posts that are holding it up and there are no additional supports to the part of the deck that’s hanging over. So those posts will be moved to the corners of the deck to support the entire second story properly.

We will be eliminating a few of the posts holding up the deck as well. Right now we have 4 posts going across the main part of our deck. We will be eliminating 2 of the 4 posts so that the only remaining posts will be the ones on the corners of the upper deck and around the edges where the roof needs to be supported. In the photo below, you would only see the post on the far left of the picture (but it would be moved out to the corner of the deck instead of in the middle).

The floor joists supporting the deck will also be built closer together- they are currently 24 inches apart which is not considered “to code” for the 2 X 4’s they are supporting. We’re going to install modern industrial railings around the upper deck and stairs.

I love the simple black iron railings here from Jordan Iverson Signature Homes

I also love the mixed metal and wood in these railings from Atlantis Rail Systems.

As part of our re-build of the second story, we will be gutting this outhouse- yes we have an outhouse and yes, it is plumbed and officially counts as a 1/2 bath for our home.

It also moonlights as a nice nesting ground for the local squirrels, opossums and small rodents.  So we will be removing it and replacing this spot with a very nicely sealed and (hopefully) waterproof custom storage area that will extend all the way under the stairs.

We originally wanted to do a composite decking solution for our stairs and deck, but after researching and weighing the pros and cons, we ultimately decided that we would rather save the money by doing a wood deck and painting and sealing it. We also made the decision to commit to the yearly maintenance of re-sealing that’s required to keep a wood deck in good condition. We’re planning to use standard pine for the deck and paint it a medium grey color similar to this deck featured on Atlantis Rail Systems website.

But we plan to use cedar posts for all of the supports that we’re going to seal with a clear sealer so we can see the natural wood accents like in this photo from 2Modern.

We are also planning to re-structure and slightly extend the aluminum roof above our deck area. Right now we have 2 different roof lines: one over the second story and another that begins at the top of the railing for the second story and angles down to the end of our deck. You can see what I mean in the photo below:

We are planning to move the bottom roof to meet up with the upper roof-line and also extend it out to go the full length of the upper roof. We are also going to extend the roof across the side of the house a bit to cover the stairs and help keep them from being hit directly by all the elements- which, in Florida, really just includes sunshine and rain. You can see below how the stairs are uncovered right now.

We’re also going to screen in the upstairs balcony and add a door for access to the stairs and another door on the other side for easy roof access in place of the gate we have right now.

Once all of the building/painting/roofing/screening is finished, we will have our concrete guy install some simple polished concrete that will span the entire bottom level for the area that’s under the roof.

We like a medium grey but with natural variations and something with the natural shine of polished concrete (not high gloss). We like something similar to the floors in this updated farmhouse by Archizer.

Or the concrete in the photo below featured in this article by Homedit.

Finally, once we finish everything above, we will frame everything with some minimalist, low-maintenance landscaping and some grass for our dogs.

Phase 2 of the project will include outdoor kitchen plans, a bar, a mounted TV and furniture- but we’re just wrapping our minds (and our budget) around phase 1 for now.

Still left on our to-do list after we finish the demo:

  1. Finalize our drawings and get the architect to sign-off on the final building plans for our second story balcony and stairs.
  2. Pull the permits for the entire project – we will save money by doing this ourselves rather than having multiple contractors pull permits for their own pieces of the work.
  3. Finish collecting quotes for the rebuild of our second story deck, the pouring of our first floor concrete, the rebuild/restructure of our aluminum roof covering and screened in second story balcony.
  4. Bring in dirt to level out our backyard and fill in the holes
  5. Have our aluminum guy demo the current aluminum roof (We’re attempting to reuse anything we can from our current roof since it’s in good condition- so we’re letting the expert handle this part of the demo)
  6. Build the 2nd story balcony and stairs
  7. Rebuild the new aluminum roof
  8. Paint and seal the wood decking on the balcony and stairs
  9. Pick out, order and install some modern iron railings for the second story and stairs
  10. Screen in the second story balcony
  11. Pour and finish the concrete on the first floor
  12. Re-work the backyard landscaping and lay down some sod

We’ll be checking these off our list one by one and keeping you updated as we make our way through it. We hope you enjoy following us throughout this process. You can subscribe to receive email notifications of our updates on our home page.

Update: For more on the plans and status of our backyard renovation, check this post out.

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Upcoming Mini-Project- a DIY Window Bench and Shiplap Built-ins

“DIY Window Bench and Shiplap Built-ins” – it’s a mouthful I know! You probably think I’m crazy for calling this a “mini-project” but it just pales in comparison to our backyard renovation project that we are contracting out ourselves. The multi-faceted home project that is our backyard renovation comes with lots of DIY demoing, pulling permits and coordinating architects, builders, aluminum specialists, concrete crafters, tree-trimmers, electricians, painters and more (details on all the big plans we’ve got for our 2-story backyard renovation later).

For now, I’m day dreaming about this much smaller DIY project that I have finally wrapped my head around. Ever since I saw this post from Chris Loves Julia detailing these gorgeous shiplap covered built-ins, I’ve been trying to figure out how I could fit something like this into our home.


The most obvious spot for this would naturally be this wall in our family room that our TV sits in front of (not mounted on).

Unfortunately that wall is not a candidate for built-ins or a mounted TV (not yet anyway). We call it our mystery wall because we can’t figure out what all is behind it. No amount of studfinders on this planet could help us identify the studs- or lack thereof. We discovered from looking up old photos in JP’s realtor MLS system that there was once a fireplace behind that wall and during a few failed attempts to mount our TV on it, we learned that there is also some combination of metal, concrete or brick and electric wiring that may or may not be active. And frankly, I’m just not ready to open up that can of worms (or that wall) just yet.

So with no other real “tv walls” in our home, I just set that little dream aside until I stumbled across this amazing window seat last night from House Updated and the wheels started turning.


The plan is to build something similar to the shiplap covered built-ins with the natural wood shelves from CLJ (Chris Loves Julia) combined with the gorgeous window seat and storage drawers by House Updated.

Can you see it? If not, stick around and I’ll share the final product with you soon!

The furniture that’s currently in our playroom is going to eventually be refinished and sealed so it can be repurposed for outdoor seating once our backyard renovation is complete. So we will be in need of some extra seating in our playroom once the couch and chairs move to the back (covered) deck and im thinking a window seat will be the perfect place to start.

I already found this dreamy daybed cushion from Urban Outfitters – Link here.


And the good news is the dimensions for this cushion make it nearly perfect to fit just under the window in our playroom.

So the wheels are turning and plans are already in the works to build our window seat/built-in shelves around this- hopefully it’s as comfy as it looks.

Now to decide if we should go with a black or grey cushion. Which do you like better? Comment below!


Here’s the window we’re talking about:

And also I need to pick out some baskets/bins to fit in the bottom shelf/cubbies on either side of the bench to house lots and lots of toys for the girls. Once I decide (and order those) I’ll be designing, drawing, making my shopping list, and working on framing things out over the next couple of weeks. (Yes, I said weeks. Let’s be real, that’s the quickest I can get this stuff done with a 2-year-old and a 3-month-old and a full-time dayjob)

I’ll keep you all posted on my progress!

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5 Reasons we are NOT Using a General Contractor

When this process started, I thought that a “general contractor” was just the fancy term for a person who was licensed to build things with permits and stuff. That just goes to show how much we actually knew about construction! We originally planned to have someone do our entire backyard transformation for us, and of course we first went to some general contractors to get quotes. It didn’t take long for me to realize that a “general contractor” is actually someone who charges you to get quotes and juggle all the people that have to come together to build something. The “official” definition of a general contractor is,

“[Someone who] is responsible for the day-to-day oversight of a construction site, management of vendors and trades, and the communication of information to all involved parties throughout the course of a building project.”

Don’t get me wrong, I am certainly not undermining the value of this position and I can only imagine how important it would be to have a general contractor for any major build. However, for a backyard deck demo and rebuild, it seems a bit excessive and after our first quote of $50,000, downright crazy.

Here’s why we chose not to use a general contractor on our backyard transformation.

1. Steep Price Tag – We are just literally not able to spend $50K on a backyard makeover. So we have already started cutting and shaving items off our “dream list” and one of the first things to go was the general contractor.

One thing that we will not be cutting from our “dream list” is how we plan to incorporate one of our backyard live oaks into the deck plans! 1. I can’t bear the thought of taking down the tree with all the little bird nests nestled up there. And 2. Live trees worked into the architectural design of outdoor spaces are seriously one of my top 5 favorite things. How can you not love this?


– And this beauty designed by Dana Pacific Landscape in California. Hats off to you Dana.


2. No Time Crunch – I can see the value in having a project manager overseeing the building, scheduling the workers and making sure that each piece of the puzzle fits in right where it belongs. I know the process would be quicker and more efficient if we had a general contractor running the show, but frankly we aren’t in a time crunch. We don’t have deadlines, we’re not rushing to get our backyard ready, and I would rather take my time and live in a construction zone for a little bit longer if it means saving big bucks on this transformation.

3. I Know a Guy – I get that one of the benefits of having a general contractor is being able to use their connections to get the best prices/quality work, but we already know a guy- we know a handyman who’s offered to help us with some of the big demo pieces for a steal of a price. We know the best concrete guy in the city shout out to No Boring Concrete in Lakeland, FL. We have a couple builder friends, and when all else fails, social media is the best avenue for getting some solid recommendations for local businesses. So even though it might take us a little longer to weed through the quotes/reviews/options, we’re already halfway there and willing to put in the work.

Check out some inspiration from our concrete guy’s previous projects!

Aren’t these concrete countertops dreamy? Check out the built in herb planters – makes me wish we had a wall of windows in our kitchen!


And just try not to drool over this modern wood accent on these concrete counter tops! No Boring Concrete did these for one of Lakeland’s new coffee shops (Concord Coffee).


4. I Know What I Want – The more I talk to contractors/architects/pool guys/handymen/painters etc. about my vision for our home, the more I realize that what I like and what I want is not the “norm” around here. I don’t know if it’s the modern, mid-century vibe that throws people or if they just don’t understand implementing something with clean straight lines and a minimalist approach, but I just can’t rely on a GC to be able to get quotes and carry out my vision on this whole project. I know what I want, but no one else seems to! And let’s be real, some things are bound to get lost in translation right? It will feel good to know that I can control who does what and I can take each person step by step to see my vision and make sure expectations are clear (plus possibly save money by doing some things ourselves!)

Speaking of DIY, we’re thinking about DIY-ing our own privacy fence once we get things cleared out. Check out this chalkboard privacy fence some friends of ours found at The Bearded Pig in Jacksonville, FL! I love the clean, modern style plus the bonus of a lifetime of family chalk drawings. It could also double as a handy scoreboard for outdoor games, seasonal murals, birthday decorations, practicing ABC’s… the possibilities are endless!


5. We Learn More – We are admittedly not experienced in construction work, building things, cutting things or any other number of home projects. I’ve learned a few things from watching my dad over the years and JP knows even less than I do. So we’re really learning as we go. Not having a GC will require us to be involved in every aspect of our backyard transformation, and we are bound to learn a few things. We will be more hands-on and by default able to take some notes and get some good tips for more DIY projects in the future – which will all be thoroughly documented right here of course!

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A DIY Backyard Demo to Kick off our Backyard Makeover

Today we started demo on our backyard deck. It was a total sporadic, impulsive decision that is completely characteristic of my husband. He went to the gym to get in a quick workout while the girls were napping and came back with a circular saw that he had borrowed and picked up from my parents’ house. He proceeded to walk right outside and start sawing our deck and pulling up boards. (In case you missed the memo, we have big plans for our backyard space- but we’ll share more about that later)

Here’s a little more on the story behind this impulsive (yet wonderfully frugal and DIY-ish) decision to demo our own deck:

When we moved into this giant and beautiful fixer-upper that we call our home, 90% of our large backyard was full of decking that had probably once looked amazing. However when we moved in, the wood boards were rickety and on their last leg. They were borderline unsafe to walk on and certainly not “family friendly” for a family with a soon-to-be toddler. Imbedded in our deck was a run-down above-ground pool that was serving as a breeding ground for frogs and mosquitos and any number of other green slimey organisms. We decided that needed to go as soon as possible. We hired a handyman to rip out the pool piece by piece and the rim of deck immediately surrounding the pool which left us with a couple steep drop-offs on the side of our deck and a large hole full of dirt on one side of our yard. We have been living like this for a little over a year and half. So we have had plenty of time to dream up what our backyard will one day be.

After tackling the non-cosmetic “required” fixes in our home and several months of planning and saving (and a forth-coming tax return), we are finally ready to redo our backyard. So first things first, we need to demo what we’ve got before we can build new stuff. Our first quote to demo our backyard woodpile was $14,000. -yes, JUST the demo! If your mouth dropped when you read that, then you share my sentiments exactly. When we were shopping around for quotes, we didn’t know what to expect or what standard prices for this kind of stuff would be, but we definitely never dreamed the demo alone would cost $14,000. This demo includes TONS of decking, a second story balcony, outdoor stairs, an outhouse [yes, someone built and outhouse in our backyard] and a large wooden building that was at one time used as a dog pen and/or fish cleaning station, but it is all JUST just wood.

So we set out for some cheaper options…

We reached out to some handymen to get demo quotes and we found a guy who quoted us just $3,000 for the demo if we could provide a dumpster. All-in we were looking at $3,500 to completely remove everything made of wood (barring the live oaks) and that was something we could stomach.

We began to move forward on quotes for the build of the 2nd store deck, the polished concrete that’s going to make up the ground floor, modern steel railing for the stairs and top deck and dirt/sod companies to fill in the rest of the yard. All the while we have been saving.

Fast-forward to this afternoon. My husband shows up with a saw and says, “babe just think what we could do with $3,500!”

Okay! You got me. Have at that deck with your saw that you’ve never used before. Just don’t lose any fingers okay?

Here’s JP making the first cut. He’s standing in the hole that used to be home to the above ground pool and surrounding deck that I mentioned earlier. Now you can visualize the “unsafe” edges I was talking about right?


Look at him go. There’s nothing sexier than a man with initiative and determination am I right? He spent about 20 minutes outside and this was the result:


Pretty good right?

There’s still a lot of work to be done, but we’ve never been so determined. Now that we have seen just how easy it is to pull this stuff up and add to that the promise of saving at least $3,000, this decision seems like a no brainer.

Feeling good about the plans ahead. More on our Backyard plans and the inspiration behind it coming soon!