My Home Decorating Project

The Lounge Before When we moved into this house our favourite room was the lounge. When our home was a pub, many years ago, this room would have been the main bar area. It is quite a large room with lots of windows, a set of patio doors and a huge fireplace.  The decor wasn't to our taste and was quite outdated.  It had heavily embossed wallpaper and brown patterned carpets.  The ceiling looked like it had been skimmed with a sweeping brush and the plastering had more ripples than a river.  There was also a huge, wheelchair size, mobility lift in the centre of the room that could take you from the lounge to an upstairs bedroom. Removing a mobility lift The first job we had to get done was to remove the lift, replace ceiling joists and plasterboard the large hole where the lift went through.  Our DIY skills don't span to this so we had to get a professional in.  Once the lift was removed and all the apertures made safe we were then able to get on with the proje

Our New Home We moved into our new home just over a year ago. It had been empty for around 3 years and had been left unattended during that time. The result was a very overgrown garden and a damp and cold house. When we first viewed the house we were immediately able to look beyond it's state of disrepair and see the ultimate potential. We fell in love with it! We knew it would take a few years to transform into anything like how we want it to be, but we were still excited about taking on this project. Moving into the house with young children was quite daunting. We had to prioritise the projects with the children's safety being paramount. The garden lacked fencing to secure the children, there was little heating downstairs and a boiler that was over 20 years old.  The whole house was filthy with signs of mice activity and masses of cobwebs everywhere, together with damp and mould patches. The garden was knee high with brambles, nettles and ivy everywhere. Underneath th

I decided to make a small blanket to go over one of the Lloyd Loom chairs in the pink room (when I have decorated it!) A Striped Knitted Baby Blanket To make it I used baby double knit wool in pink and white and size 5 knitting needles. I am not a great knitter but it is a simple pattern. Cast on 150 stitches 1st row - knit 2nd row - knit 3rd row - purl repeat these 3 rows until you are happy with the size. this gives a lovely ribbed chunky effect to the blanket. I continued this until it was a size I was happy with then cast off. To do the crochered trim I used a 4ply wool in deep pink and picked up each stitch with a single chain all around the blanket then I went around again with a double chain in each hole. Then I did the scalloped edge by crochering 6 double chains in 1st hole then miss a hole and then do a single chain in next hole and then miss a hole then do 6 double chains again then miss a hole then do a single chain in next hole,continue all around the

I brushed the chairs with a stiff washing up brush first to remove any dirt and dust and then vaccumed the dust from them. The first chair is a nursing chair as it has a removable seat where you can store bits and bobs. The Lloyd Loom Style Nursing Chair Before Painting ... With the seat removed ... I forgot to take a photo of the other chair before painting but this is a photo of it with one coat of paint Before painting I taped up the brass feet of the nursing chair to keep them clean and removed the seat. I have used a car spray paint in white gloss which was only £1 per tin in a local cheap shop. I shook the tins well before use and did even coats over each chair. There were a lot of fumes from the paint so I recommend opening windows or doing them outside! So far I am on the 3rd tin of paint and have managed to do 2 full coats on each chair. There were a few drips where the paint went on heavily and I used a small brush to ease these away. I think the ch

I have aquired some Lloyd Loom style chairs and an ottoman and want to re-paint the chairs in white. Firstly I need to clean the chair by using a brisque brush to remove dirt and fibres. Then hoover to remove the dust. You must be careful not to over wet the chair because it is made of recycled paper and wire. I will be using car spray paint in gloss white to avoid over clumping the weave pattern. The first chair I am revamping has already been heavily painted but the colour has aged. It has not been painted carefully and the weave pattern has been damaged but I am hoping that this won't be too noticeable if I re-spray it carefully. I will add photo's once I have finished ....

When we moved into our home the staircase was dark and dingy with dirty green carpet and drab wall colour. The handrails and spindles had been removed which made the stairs very unsafe. Before... The only aspects of the staircase that we liked were the dado rails and the existing light fitment. The light fitment... We needed to brighten up this area as there is no window in the stairwell. We decided on a light blue and white (colonial theme) which should create a lighter area. To decide on the shade of blue we bought a variety of testers and painted blocks of colour onto the wall (then wrote in pencil over each colour the exact name of the paint). The walls with blocks of paint... The first main job was to make the staircase safe to use. Our carpenter fitted spindles and banaster along the landing and down the right side of the stairs. We then lifted the old carpet and disposed of it, leaving the gripper rods and underlay for re-using. Once we