House a Home

I am loving my new car! I ended up getting the Kia Soul "!" model, in the metallic black ("Shadow") color. It is really cool because the metallic in it is actually red. I got a heck of a deal! We definitely went at the right time. It has upgraded hounds-tooth interior and a sunroof, which is awesome. In the past I have not really been a 'driving with the windows down' kind of girl, I mean let's be honest that doesn't work well with long hair. However, the sunroof adds a new dynamic and I love it. It is so nice and relaxing to ride around town. It's also got bluetooth which is a feature I am surprised that I use so much. I hate the bluetooth ear pieces and have always thought it was weird, but the car version is really nice to be hands-free even though I probably look weird talking to myself.

So, as I have mentioned before, Jake and I have pretty much been very slack with decorating our house since we have moved in. We didn't have as much time as we would have liked to get things ready before we moved in. Lately I have really been wanting to do more with the house. I would love to paint the bathrooms, and put up framed mirrors instead of the builder mirror sheets. We also need to get up lots of artwork, and I am hoping to slowly but surely do that.

The other big project that Jake and I want to do is to remodel our kitchen. You would think that since it is what I do for a living, this would be easy. To an extent it is, however it really challenging to find good premade cabinets. I do not deal with premade cabinets at work, and ones that I have found at Lowe's and Home Depot really do not impress me. Here is something similar to the look we are going for:

We have a similar kitchen layout and coloring. We have the glass slider on the right wall, and door to the garage where this one is. Instead of an island, we have a peninsula that we are going to add coming off of the left wall. Our flooring is light laminate hardwood like this, and we want some sort of dark (not necessarily cherry) cabinets. The countertops are going to be light/medium tone quartz, and a light onyx backsplash (these were easy to choose from work!).

The new Martha Stewart line at Home Depot has some really nice character to it, and it is so new that they do not have any kitchen displays, only the sample boards. From reading reviews online, as much as these cabinets have in design details, they lack in structural integrity and quality. They are already more expensive than they should be just because they have the MS name, and they are built standard with 3/8" particle board instead of 3/4" plywood (which you have to pay even more to upgrade to). There are also horror stories of everything coming in wrong or damaged, and taking forever to replace. Lots of extra time to deal with other people's mistakes is something that I do not have, working 6 days a week. After lots of research, a new store called Cabinets To Go is opening up in 2 weeks in Charlotte and I think that is seeming like the most promising thing so far. Of course, that could change when I go there and see the quality of their products, but from the information on their website I am keeping my fingers crossed! Jake wants to get this remodel done sooner rather than later to get all of the wedding gifts that we have piled up in the dining room into the additional kitchen storage, and I am not complaining! We are just hoping to keep a good budget so that we can still do the back patio this fall. I love being an interior designer, and feel so blessed that we will get great discounts to allow us to get these projects completed.

Aside from that, we are looking forward to a fun night tomorrow going to Thirsty Thursday at the Charlotte Knights stadium. We are going with some friends from church, and I am using a voucher that I bought off of Living Social a few weeks ago :) I haven't been able to do a whole lot of couponing lately but at least I am still on the lookout for bargains! We bought the "Voucher for 2 field box tickets and one appetizer from the Budweiser Brewhouse from Charlotte Knights" for $15, a 59% savings. www.LivingSocial.com

Goodnight!