Changes at Aloha Cottage

Well it's been 3 months since we bought our first house together, aka "Aloha Cottage". The hubby and I  decided to spend two years traveling and taking away jobs (he works in Film and TV) so we could save up a deposit for a house. Our plan worked and after about 6 months of looking for a house online we found this adorable little cottage a stones throw from the Thames. It still feels a bit like a holiday cottage every time we come home, but that's a good feeling right?!

My hubby and I have big dreams for our little place. We decided to call it "Aloha Cottage" in honor of both of our heritages, English/Hawaiian. It's a definite upgrade from it's former name of Warren Lodge, sounds so depressing, we are doing our best to change the feel of the house.

Recently I have spent loads of time online looking for furniture on ebay, so far we have had some fantastic purchases. Two leather sofas, a dining table and chairs, a beautiful star lamp, photos to come!  It's coming together slowly but surely. We have plans to try to change the entry and extend the back, take out a wall dividing the kitchen and dinning room, also add on a bedroom downstairs, turning it into a 3 bed house. We have started tackling some basic redecoration ourselves, one of the upstairs bedrooms is mostly done amazing what a little elbow grease and some paint can do.

It went from this....  BEFORE (check out that hideous light fixture, and the insane amount of wallpaper/paint scraping we had ahead of us!)

and this........

Uggghhh the carpet is just SO bad! So glad we could get it replaced!!!!

To this......... AFTER

We did get the eaves professionally skimmed by a plasterer, but the rest was all us, oh and the carpet was put in by our lovely neighbor, who is a flooring guy (Yay for good neighbors)! The wardrobe was an ebay purchase, as well as the lights. It still needs a few finishing touches but for now it's a great little room, and when I say little I mean little. With the double bed in it you can see how small it actually is. I can not wait to get the second bedroom done, although my husband wants to rip out the door way of the bedroom across the hall and install a sliding door just so that we can gain a few more feet of unused hall space, I think it's a brilliant idea but hopefully not too expensive. These pictures were all iphone photos so they don't totally do the space justice! I will get some better ones next time we are down there, but they give you an idea of what it looks like.

I always love a good before and after don't you! Can't wait to share a few more with you. I think there will be a lot of changes happening at our little cottage, watch this space!

making stuff

 

It's always fun to make cards, in this one I stuck one of my crochet flowers onto the painted pressie. It gives it a nice 3D effect. Plus I have so many of those flowers I am always trying to find good uses for them.

Paintings by Stephanie Bolton

A while back I did some pictures for a local artist and friend of mine Stephanie Bolton. Shes a super cool girl and a really great artist. She used a bunch of my photos as inspiration for these paintings. I love the way they turned out, her vibrant use of color and bold lines make you feel like your walking through a beautiful garden.