Category Archives: Guest Bedroom

How Many Pegs Can a Pegboard Peg?

Really, how many pegboards do I need in my house? Answer: quite a few. Houses as old as mine weren’t exactly built with storage in mind. I guess folks in the twenties just didn’t have nearly so much stuff, and we modern residents have to get creative to keep things from getting too cluttered. So after we had a pegboard cut to size to address our storage problem in the office last week there was no way I was letting the 3′x4′ remnant go to waste. I had big plans for that sucker.

In a cruel twist of irony our house actually has a huge closet that makes the other two (that’s right, only three closets total in this joint) look like shoeboxes. It’s unmanageably large, actually. And the long and narrow dimensions aren’t doing us any favors.

As you can see, we pretty much rely on it to serve the functions of a shed, garage, and attic all in one, none of which we actually have. Technically, we do have an attic, but it’s not floored and the entrance is barely big enough to squeeze a person through, much less a bunch of stuff we want to store. So all the stuff that would go in an attic (or in some sort of utility storage like a garage or shed) gets tossed in here instead. We’ve got rarely used items and Christmas decorations tucked up under the stairs, all of our tools perched in the spaces between the studs, paint cans and random crap lining the top shelf, and spare lumber piled up near the back. Some people who live here have a bad habit of leaving the most recently used items near the entrance, though don’t ask me what the ice chests are doing there because we haven’t used them since last summer.

This closet has some big organizational problems. Bigger than I was willing to tackle on this particular day. But I was willing to take one small step: I was going to hang up that piece of pegboard. I marked out where I wanted it to go and Nick drilled holes for it right into the studs. We didn’t need to attach small pieces of wood behind it like a pegboard usually requires since the studs were exposed like this. Very convenient.

Then we screwed it into the wall. Easy peasy. While I had Nick handy I had him move some things around so there wasn’t such a logjam at the front of the closet. The big stuff got pushed to the back so it was still accessible but out of the way. The barstool, in case you’re wondering, is what I use to climb up and access the top shelf. I’m not quite as spritely in my pregnant state and have recently started abiding by a self-imposed ban on climbing up on things, but I don’t have anywhere else to put the barstool anyway, so it stays. Maybe I’ll find myself standing on it again in another six months or so.

We just attached the pegboard to those three studs furthest from the camera. It wasn’t quite long enough to stretch across all four studs so we had to choose one or the other, and I was thinking the further back in the closet it was the better. I suppose I could have scooched it over a bit more so that it was centered across those three studs, but I didn’t.

I picked up this assortment of pegboard accessories at Lowe’s last week for about $7. It was kind of hard to tell what it all was poured out like this, though. I remember from the pegboard at my old house that those black things are to help secure the hooks to the board, but I always found them kind of useless.

I decided to hang all the hooks up on the pegboard so I could see what I was working with.

Then I got started hanging my stuff up. These heavy, dangerous, precariously perched tools were pretty high on the priority list.

Ta-da! I feel much safer and less stressed walking into this place now.

Look how nice and neat everything is! Y’all just have no idea how happy this makes me. It’s like a little organization island in a sea of chaos.

There’s still a lot of empty space on the far side of the pegboard, but all I’ve got left is small hooks. What I really think I need next is some hanging baskets and bins for all the small stuff, and maybe some sort of contraption to hang screwdrivers and pliers and whatnot.

There’s still a ton to be done in this closet, not the least of which is some serious purging. But I’m taking babysteps, people. Babysteps.

Ch-ch-ch-changes

When I first started blogging, I thought maybe it would be fun to document and show off all the home decor and crafty projects I ‘d be doing anyway. I had no idea that my little project-completing engine would be hurled into overdrive. I’m so motivated by the desire to always have more new and interesting projects to share with y’all! I’m awestruck when I think about how many projects I’ve tackled just since I started blogging.

Can you believe that this was my entryway for the first year that we lived in this house?

And just look at it now (sporting a new bench and shelf)…

I took the porch from this…

To this (after I added a mailbox,painted the door, added plants, brought in art, stripped the original hardware, and finally spray painted the deadbolt to match the knob and lockplate)…

In the living room, I made a zebra-print floorcloth, constructed a shelf out of a floorboard I found on the side of the road, brought in a vintage quilt, made a pouf, and am almost done reupholstering the wing chairs. (not to mention some smaller projects, like a throw pillow, some wall art, and patterned coasters)

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The dining room isn’t quite as dramatic, probably because I’d already brought in the dropcloth slipcovered sofa, leaning bookshelf, blue painted dresser, and floating wall shelves before I started blogging. But even with all that work already done I’ve tweaked it by switching out the coffee table and painting it mustard yellow, creating a set of eclectic dining chairs, and swapping the tablecloth for a fringed burlap runner.

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There are lots of smaller projects in here as well, like the paper garland on the dresser, the fabric flower pillow I made using a brooch that I wore with my wedding dress, and the acorn silhouette I made just last week.

The kitchen is woefully stagnant. Nothing has changed at all, but I’ve got big plans for this space, like painting over the fleshy beige, adding some upper cabinets on either side of the stove, and opening up that awkward pass-through to create a casual eating area. I just gotta save up some moolah, which isn’t easy when I’m always blowing through my monthly home improvement budget to fund more projects to blog about.

The laundry room was so sad before I started blogging that I didn’t even include it in the original house tour. But Nick and I painted it blue and switched out those awkward cabinets for some open shelving that spans the full width of the space, adding tons of personality and function.

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Upstairs, in the master bedroom, we got new bedding, reupholstered the hope chest, painted the armoire and chest of drawers, made a little chalkboard message area, put curtains on the fifty billion windows, added flair with some homemade throw pillows, and brought in some art.

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Even the rooms we’re not really focusing on got a little love, like new hardware in the guest room

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Some fabric organization in the office…

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And a new shower curtain (with ribbon detail), bath mat, and art wall in the downstairs bath

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I’ve been a busy lady these last seven months! I just can’t believe how quickly things have changed. The whole house just has so much more personality now. A few years ago, I couldn’t have cared less about home decor. But something about having a house awakened the creative bug in me and I’ve had so much fun discovering and refining my personal style (luckily I had a rental house to practice on first-imagine lime green bedroom walls and all my stuff from college. I’m glad those days are behind me). I’m sooooo excited to see what the house looks like six months from now. Maybe I’ll finally have saved up enough dough for some upgrades in the kitchen? Or be decorating a nursery (for the child I have yet to conceive)? Only time will tell, but you can bet I’ll be blogging about it.

P.S. check out the house tour page for more pics of each room!

Be My Guest

For the first time ever in the history of Living Well on the Cheap, check out our guest bedroom.

I’m a lucky lady to have this awesome vintage bedroom set. It was in the room my sister and I always slept in at my Nanny and PawPaw’s house when we were kids. Shannon inherited it (I got Nanny’s diamond engagement ring), but there’s no room for it at her place and I’m happy to give it a home for as long as she’ll let me.

My Nanny was a fan of the upgrade, and I remember sometime in my childhood she switched out the original hardware for these glamorous white pulls. I’m quite sure she had PawPaw do the actual chore of switching them. I don’t think Nanny ever wrapped her manicured fingers around a screwdriver. She was much fancier than me. I must’ve gotten my do it yourself attitude from my Grandma Sandy. I can totally picture her wielding a power tool.

But everything old is new again, and when I found the original knobs in a vanity drawer I decided to switch them back in.

Obviously the larger white pulls caused some uneven changes in the color of the wood. I’ve decided to wait and see if it evens itself out.

I only found nine of the old pulls, leaving me one short. I decided to use the opportunity to use a fancy Anthro knob on the armoire door. I could never stomach the cost of outfitting an entire set of drawers in Anthropologie’s eclectic goodness, but since I just needed one pull here I figured I could splurge. I stopped by Anthropologie after work yesterday and picked out four knobs to try.

I think that this green glass one was really meant to be a hook, but it looked like it could work as a door pull as well so I decided to give it a shot.

This pink knob was feminine and sweet.

I really liked how this one covered the discolored area from the old pulls.

The ceramic white flower was pretty.

So, which did I end up going with?

The one with the metal backplate! It relates well to the other pulls but still feels a little extra special. And, of course, the fact that it covers up the discolored area is a nice bonus.

I was so enamored with the green glass pull that I decided to use it as a hook on the back of the closet door. The other two knobs (the pink glass and the white flower) will go back to Anthro.

A few of the old/new knobs were missing bolts, so I need to pick up a few at the hardware store before I can switch out the ones on the vanity. I can’t wait. I’m really happy with the new look on the armoire. It’s a little more authentic vintage and a lot more my style.

Inherited furniture is the best. Funny fact about this set: the bed is not a standard size. It’s bigger than a full, smaller than a queen. I use queen-sized linens on it and they’re just a little big. One of these days I’ll invest in a fluffy featherbed to fill out the fitted sheet a little more, but it looks like I’m stuck with the original mattress and boxspring for life. They must not make ‘em like they used to because I can’t imagine a boxspring made today still being good 40 years from now.

Have you ever done something simple to update a piece of vintage furniture? Or restore it to its roots?

P.S. Those framed photos above the armoire are my Nanny and PawPaw. Nanny passed away in 2004 and PawPaw now lives in the Texas panhandle with his wife, Edith. I don’t get to see him much these days so it’s nice to have those photos up to remind me of them.