& design

This room was the best, unexpected finish to the project. My initial plan was for this space to simply house incoming packages. I mean, that was the whole purpose behind my desperate cry for help. For years, our house had been overrun with incoming packages and local purchases. We needed a place to store it all. But, as the rest of the shop design came together, this room stayed empty. And if you know me, empty space is OK in my book! Brooke and I worked in the shop a lot whi

This is definitely a flex space. With a business like ours, it is a blessing. After hauling out the excess furniture, our second hand treadmill hung out here for a while (yep, it's in the corner there.) A couple months ago, when I came to my senses and remembered I still live in south Louisiana, my husband and I sold it. Exercise had no business in this hot box of a shop. We had good intentions but, oh well! After two years, it was clearly not going to be used. So, as I encou

Pictures can tell a much better story about the condition of this bathroom than I can. Initially, I planned to hire someone to just swap out a new toilet. I was nervous about the cost of re-doing this entire room. Like, who really needs a fancy bathroom in their workshop? But, every time I went to the shop and peeked in, I knew it would take more than a shiny, new toilet for me to actually use the toilet. The old vanity cabinet was in really rough condition. No amount of cle

The room that almost wasn't. The little bedroom in the back was the only room still full of my landlord's things. They asked if I would mind leaving the stuff there and just not use that space. Early on, this entire project was so overwhelming that I did not considering appealing that request. As the remodel progressed, I knew I couldn't just ignore it. It smelled old. It was valuable square footage. And I was fairly certain the room's purpose would reveal itself before long.

January 2017: just got the keys... Even in this rough state, I could see the potential of this room. I knew this large work table would be a keeper. Both Beverly and Karla used it while running their floral businesses. Knowing that most of my work in this room would be delicate (finish work), I wanted a soft surface. So, I bought low pile carpet, laid it out on our driveway and cut it to size. I wrapped the table top with it and stapled it on. It's like my own Hobby Lobby fra

This room was reeeeally bad. Yikes! Would you want me to store your stuff in here?! I understand this used to be some sort of cold storage for the flowers. In fact, a large section of the floor was simply plywood. The walls were still the 60's paneling over the original tongue and groove wood walls. As you can see, the paneling was never painted. The far right wall had water damage from the previous leaky roof. To The Full Construction ripped down that paneling, as well as th

"Some assembly required"...that's what this room is for. It has turned into a bit of a multipurpose room, though. The best part about this room is - waaaaaait for it................................................... ........................................................................................................................................................................................the one and only working air conditioner is in this room!!! Did I mention I liv

Crumbling fireplace, peeling wallpaper border, plug-in garage light and frilly, gold chandelier. Uhhhh. No. Everything must go! "Paint it all white!" Ok, maybe not everything. During the early stages, I really had no clue what to do with the old VCT floors. My whole goal was to make the best choices for this shop, while spending as little as possible. New flooring was just out of the question. I paid someone to level the floors from underneath the shop. It made quite a differ

Do you ever need to be reminded to breathe? No? Just me? Ok, well I needed that reminder (still do some days) throughout this entire remodel. I bought this early on at Home Goods because it spoke to me...visually, anyway, lol! Honestly, I am so over the "words" everywhere in home decorland. It's bad enough I have thoughts and to do lists racing through my mind at a steady pace all day long. The barrage of visual words (even encouraging) everywhere is too much for me. But, thi

As a reminder, below is the shop the day I was given the keys. I am not even sure I can convey the excitement I felt accepting this tremendous opportunity. During the 4 or 5 weeks leading up to this moment, I had already been designing in my heading (what else is new?). I sketched out the floor plan from memory and could finally go in and take precise measurements. When I saw how close I was in my estimation, I surprised myself. Each time I gave a visitor the "before" tour, f