DIY Show Off – Patio installation and makeover

Back of the House Gets a Transformation:

Still a lot of overgrown landscaping to tackle but our home when we bought it.
Hard to see from the distance, there were two single doors with awnings. Ugly. But I could see potential which is a good thing most of the time, except that “potential” doesn’t happen over night! Right away, we installed two sets of French doors. I love them! It changes the entire look of the back of our house. However, the old sidewalks didn’t line up and we lived with it for 2 years.
And take a look at the old light fixtures. Yuck!
We decided to put in a concrete patio off the back of the house. However – the concrete part wasn’t DIY. It was way too big of an area and required professionals.

Here’s another before shot (that’s the nasty carpet Mr. DIY tore out to reveal hardwood floors):

Before (after installation of French doors, the concrete sidewalk didn’t line up anymore). We also just removed some shrubs from this area which makes it look really messy here:









We got some new furniture (the table/chairs go under the grape arbor when it’s completed). Mr. DIY changed out the lights for me to give it an updated fresh look.

Again – before:

After:

2011 updates:

 

We also hung window boxes to help disguise the old upstairs windows to help pull the main level and upper level together. You can’t see the window boxes well in the pictures…but here is what they looked like before they were hung:

My House Number Flower Pots were featured in Better Homes & Gardens 100 Decorating Ideas for Under $100!

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Tragic Sensation – Behind Green Doors

Dramatic blog post title?!  Well, that’s what it is. A dramatic tale of a tragic entry turned sensational!

The Blog:  Tragic Sensation

The Project:  Painting front door chartreuse!

It IS dramatic.  In an awesome way.

I am in love with these doors.  The chartreuse was a bold choice but it definitely makes a stunning statement….

because the doors before

were really quiet and said hi.  Now they welcome you with a smile and a “Hello!”

More pictures and steps at Tragic Sensation.  I love the wreaths too.  And the fleur de lis.  Talk about a grand entrance!  🙂

Guest Blogger – A Penny Saved

I‘m finally back home but still adjusting to actually being home so one of my favorite creative DIY’ers and bloggers, Britt from A Penny Saved has shared an easy but amazing before and after transformation. Thanks Britt! I love the new blue/gray/green accents and they make a huge difference!

Here is her post:

I am a huge fan of the DIY ShowOff and all the great ideas that make their way here. It’s such an amazing way to share (and borrow!) crafty ideas and projects. Thanks for dreaming it up and pulling it off for all of us readers, Roeshel! I am very excited to guest-blog on such a great site and to share one little color tip that made a huge difference at my house:

We moved into our current house about a year and a half ago now. So far we really like it. It’s our first experience living in a less-than-seventy-year-old-house, so we’re loving the lack of maintenance and all the time a new house frees up so we can do fun projects. One of my only complaints about this house: the color scheme. Exterior and interior. We’ve pretty much taken care of the camel-orange color that was painted throughout the interior, so I decided to tackle the exterior.

It wasn’t bad looking, but I am very much a cool color person. The warm color scheme outside really messed me up because it just didn’t fit with our pretty much entirely blue-gray interior. I felt like I couldn’t really decorate the outside of the house with the silvers and blues I use inside at Christmas because they didn’t go with the beige and red. My red fall wreaths blended into the doors too much, and the yellow forsythia wreaths I use for spring made me think of McDonald’s against the red. Nevertheless, I thought it would be years before I could do anything about the outside, seeing as it was brand new paint and it would cost some major $$$$ to repaint the entire house.

Then one day I noticed that if you just looked at the main paint color without the red against it, it really wasn’t that beige. It was more of a creamy taupe. The red was just throwing everything off, making it look more like a warm color. I got really excited (and things tend to happen pretty quickly when I’m excited) so before I knew it (and before my poor, unsuspecting husband could make it home from work!) I had this:

It’s amazing how changing up an accent color will change the entire appearance of a house. The whole outside color scheme looks much cooler and calm. And my wreaths look so much better against the new blue-gray-green color.

Do you have a room/space/house whose color scheme needs a little tweak? Have you thought about just switching up the accent color to give the whole space a new look??? Might be a much cheaper, easier route than repainting the whole area!

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Thanks for voting you guys! I appreciate it!

I will announce the winner of the CSN Giveaway in the next day or so! 🙂