getting somewhere – family room update

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Family_Room_July_5

The never-ending room remodel. That is exactly how I feel about our family room update. Yes, I know we are STILL not in our master bedroom after three years but the master isn't used. We use this space all.the.time. I love this room. It is one of the reasons we fell in love with this house, but I want it DONE! We are not done, but we are definitely getting somewhere. Here is the space today with some of our most recent updates including the new windows (hurricane impact ones! woohoo!), the Henry … [Read more...]

scott olson painting in my house – and update to our ikea hack bar

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Ikea Hack Bar - Directions Not Included

Picture me doing a happy dance because I am doing an awkward one right now. This Cuban can't dance by the way. Once we refinished the bar area, we knew we wanted artwork or something to anchor the space. I used our IKEA hack bar all the time for parties or as my mantle for holidays. Using the bar as a buffet was perfect use for it but the space was so bare. For a while I was set on using a mirror at the top but Ray was not having it. I honestly thought it would be possible to find a painting or … [Read more...]

featured on ikea hackers

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Yay! The custom bar we made from IKEA cabinets is being featured today over at IKEA Hackers! If you missed the original post you can find details here and here.If you haven't yet visited IKEA Hackers you need to check it out. The creativity that I've seen on that site with IKEA furniture just blows me away sometimes. Thanks for following Directions Not Included! … [Read more...]

ikea hack bar – a diy bar from ikea cabinets – the final reveal

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We have progress folks! I gave a glimpse of what was going on in our bar last week. We used IKEA kitchen cabinets, the hanging wall kind, to create a custom floating bar. Our very own IKEA hack bar. This is where we made it to last weekend. Cabinets built and hanging and that is about it. It was a marked improvement over this but still needed some finishing touches. We went to the nice lumber yard in town and picked up some mahogany plywood. They have a great selection of wood in … [Read more...]

lay of the land – our floor plan

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I don't know about you but every time I look at the houses of bloggers if a floor plan is not available I'm always trying to figure out how the rooms are laid out. It must be the genes I get from my architect father, but I always want to know which rooms are connected to which. It really helps gauge the style of the house and flow of the design. My father might kill me for posting this horrendous floor plan but I don't have the energy to sit down and try make a perfect one. This one may be off a … [Read more...]

weekend plans – stalled project

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A while ago I hinted that we were considering making a custom bar from IKEA kitchen cabinets. Last night we drove to IKEA after work and it didn't go as planned. Do you ever have those days where nothing seems to go right? That was last night. So instead of coming home with the cabinets to make a bar, we came home with an empty bag. At least the cat likes the empty IKEA bags.So we'll be spending some more time thinking through this project and our bar will look like this a bit longer. Sigh.I'm … [Read more...]