In last week’s update, I showed you the deconstructed bathroom – with the old pedestal sink, light and mirror removed. Next up was painting… we knew it would need at least a couple of coats of primer to cover up the bright orange paint. Here’s how it look after the first coat of primer:

And here’s the final color – Sherwin Williams SW7005 “Pure White” – after two coats of primer and two coats of paint:

With the paint complete, I assembled the navy blue vanity. I attached the base upside down the first time (should’ve read the instructions – face palm!), but I got it right on the second try.

The back of the vanity is open for the plumbing, but our existing pipe sat an inch or two too low. Fortunately, Scott was able to cut a notch out of the back to make it fit perfectly around the pipe. This will all be hidden behind the vanity doors, so it didn’t have to be perfect.

With the vanity in place, we used Loctite Mirror, Marble & Granite to affix the small piece of backsplash quartz to the wall.

Next Scott installed the new light fixture. The vanity has a black metal base and gold handles, so I chose a light fixture with a mix of black and gold to tie in both finishes.

Hanging the light first allowed us to then decide on the correct placement for the mirror. We wanted to make sure it wouldn’t look too high above the vanity, or too low compared to the light.

We still need to caulk along the back edge of the countertop, and where the backsplash meets the wall, but that will be quick and easy.

With the major elements installed, it’s time for me to work on the finishing touches. I need to get frames for the art (I’m thinking gold), and I still need to create three of the pieces of art – but that’s the fun part! Will it all get done by the deadline? That’s still questionable, but I’m just impressed with how much we were able to accomplish considering we didn’t start until week 6!

One Room Challenge

As a quick reminder, between now and November 18th(-ISH), we’ll be transforming our basement bathroom from bold but boring into a lighter and brighter space with a lot more style, and I’m doing alongside more than 200 other talented designers as guest participants in the One Room Challenge. The ORC was started by Linda Weinstein of Calling It Home, and Better Homes & Gardens is the official media sponsor. If that sounds familiar, it’s because this is my ELEVENTH time participating in the ORC.

In Case You Missed It…

If you want to see where we started and where we’re going, check out the before photos of our basement bathroom, as well as the design plans.  You can also find a round up of all ten of my prior One Room Challenge makeovers at the end of the week 1 post.

The post Basement Bathroom Makeover: Week 7 {One Room Challenge} appeared first on Blue i Style.

This week, I’m joining 10 talented bloggers to help you get ready for the new school year. I’m sharing all the details about my art cart on wheels, and they will each be sharing their fabulous back to school organizing projects throughout the week, as well. I’ll continue adding links at the bottom of this blog post!

At this time last year, like many families, we were prepping for a semester of school from home. I shared our remote learning cart and showed you how we organized our school supplies, Chromebooks, headphones, and much more. I was blown away by how much you all loved our rolling school cart, and it reminded me that I should share the details of our rolling art cart.

This post contains some affiliate links. If you purchase something I recommend, you’ll pay the same price, but I may receive a small commission.

Both of my boys have always loved to color, draw, and create. It all happens at the kitchen table, so I needed to find a way to keep their art supplies close at hand without letting them take over the kitchen! I turned to one of my favorite organizing tools… a rolling cart!

I own quite a few rolling carts, and they all look and function just about the same. The Container Store rolling cart I used is nearly identical in size and style to the popular IKEA Raskog carts, but it was a bit easier to assemble by myself.

Whether you’re creating a Container Store art cart, an IKEA art cart, or a Michaels art cart, the most important thing is to organize kids’ art supplies in a way that will be easy for them to find what they need and to clean up after themselves!

This plastic caddy makes a perfect crayon and marker organizer! It provides eight sections to sort out lots of different art supplies, and the handle makes it so easy for kids to carry it to the table and put to back when they’re done. It even stacks (as I’ll show you below).

One of my favorite features of this crayon organizer caddy is the removable dividers. I removed the back center divider to make room for my boys favorite stencils – the ones they use most often.

After initially starting with just one art supply caddy on the top shelf of our kids’ art cart, I realized I could double our storage and create room for additional, smaller art supplies and accessories by purchasing a second, stacking caddy. In order to stack them together, the lower caddy can’t have anything talk in it, but it’s perfect for erasers, pencil sharpeners, tape, scissors, and more!

I bought these aqua art supply caddies from The Container Store, but unfortunately they’ve since been discontinued. I did, however, find a very similar stacking caddy that’s sold in sets of two.

These aqua file boxes make the perfect coloring book organizers. I could have definitely selected cheaper file boxes (these were a bit of a splurge), but since I knew from the start that this art supply cart would be on display in our kitchen for years to come, I decided it was worth it to select organizing supplies that fit my aesthetic.

Not only does the aqua color look good with our decor, I also like that these file boxes are very durable, and not translucent. Many of the alternatives I looked at were transparent or semi-transparent, but I didn’t want to feel like all of the coloring books were on display in the kitchen. Additionally, most of the non-transparent file box options were made of cardboard, and I knew that wouldn’t end up holding up over years of use from my boys. The investment paid off, because we’ve now had these file boxes for several years, and they look as good as new.

I use these same aqua file boxes to store drawing paper on the art cart as well. I used my Cricut machine to cut vinyl adhesive labels, which I added to the front and sides of each file box, making it easy for the kids to find exactly what they need. Labels are also a really effective way of making sure the kids put things away in the right place as well.

To save space on our art storage cart, I used zippered pouches, rather than file boxes to contain the boys stencils and stickers. If we had more stencils or stickers, the file boxes would have worked well, but for the size of our collection, the pouches easily held what we needed without taking up extra space. Of course, I also loved that the aqua zippers matched the file boxes. They no longer sell these in aqua, but the version with the black zippers is the same in every other way.

Purchased individually, the best deal I’ve found on these pouches is at The Container Store, but if you want to buy them in a larger quantity, you can get a great deal on sets of 16 or sets of 24 with a variety of rainbow colored zippers Amazon.

When it came to art cart organization, the one thing I didn’t label was the crayon organizer caddy. I knew that the art supplies in this caddy would change and evolve over time, and I didn’t want to have to change and update the labels. You’ll notice that the crayons, markers, and colored pencils in this photo (taken a few years ago) are different from the art supplies currently in our art supply caddies in the more recent photos. Now that the boys are older, for example, I give them access to more markers (although the Sharpies I still keep out of reach and only allow them to use with supervision, because… permanent!).

When the boys do use Sharpies, we always put a mat underneath to ensure that we don’t end up with their drawings bleeding through onto our white kitchen table. I simply cut two pieces of thick, plastic shelf liner for the boys to use under their drawings. When not in use, I store these shelf liner drawing mats in the drawer with all of our placemats. {Check out this post for lots more tips on creative uses for shelf liner.}

Our rolling art supply cart lives in our kitchen year round, throughout the school year and the summer alike. Of course, I do love that this art caddy on wheels can be rolled away into our pantry or coat closet if I want it out of sight for a party {remember the days when we used to actually entertain?!}, but since the cart is organized and looks nice, it stays on display in the kitchen nearly 365 days a year.

Our kitchen chalkboard wall gets lots of use throughout the year as well. We create large countdown calendars for Christmas and birthdays on this chalkboard, and of course the boys also have free reign to draw on it to their hearts’ content. Since we used magnetic primer under the chalkboard paint, this wall is also a fun place to display the art work that the boys bring home from school.

In all, our cart holds: 2 stacking art supply caddies, 5 file boxes, and multiple zippered pouches. I love having everything the boys need to get creative all in one place.

I hope our rolling art cart helps you with how to organize kids art supplies. If you’re also looking for tips on organizing additional school supplies, like laptops and iPads, headphones, school assignments, and more – check out organized rolling homework cart (which also lives in our kitchen throughout the school year).

GET MORE BACK TO SCHOOL ORGANIZING IDEAS

The Organized Mama :: SKG Designs and Style :: Kate Decorates :: Global Mindful Journey :: Small Stuff Counts
Simple Joy with Ann :: The Modern Minimalist :: Practically Perfect :: The Tidy Dad

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As I mentioned at the outset of the challenge, we actually completed this playroom refresh early because it was a Christmas gift to our boys, but I always like to walk you through each step in the process.

During week 1, I showed you the before photos of the room, which was originally Beckett’s bedroom before he and Cooper began sharing the room down the hall. I talked about what was working and what needed to change in order to turn this bedroom into a playroom / hangout space for our growing boys. Then last week, I shared my tips for choosing playroom furniture that balance style and function.

This week, I’m talking about the actual process of transforming the space. The first thing we did was to haul out the toddler bed, the kid-sized leather chairs, and the dresser. The toddler bed got passed along to a family member, and the dresser is going to my parents’ cabin.

Next, we brought in the new couch that we purchased for the space. At just 52″ long, this loveseat (affiliate link) is the perfect size to fit the space vacated by the toddler bed. We purchased it during a holiday sale, and paid less than $250. Our boys are generally pretty responsible and take good care of things, but at this price point, we won’t have to stress about how this couch holds up over time. Nonetheless, I’m really impressed about how comfortable it is!

After assembling the new couch, we carried a storage cabinet from the basement up to the new playroom, and then started moving some of the boys’ toys upstairs.

The three picture frames along the argyle painted feature wall held photos of a little Beckett that I hung when we first decorated his toddler room.

Since this space will now be used by both boys, I wanted to update the frames with more recent photos of both of them. In keeping with the menswear theme of the room, I decided to use photos of each boy dressed as a dapper 100-year-old man taken a year apart on their respective 100th days of 1st grade.

With the new furniture in place, the new photos hung, and toys filling the room, it was time for me to organize and style the room to get it ready for the big reveal. I can’t wait to show you the finished space next week!

The other seven talented bloggers participating in the New Year New Room Refresh Challenge are nearing completion of their rooms. See how their rooms are coming together at the links below…

Casa Watkins Living // Up To Date Interiors // House by Hoff // Our Fifth House // Jeweled Interiors // Blue i Style // Domicile 37 // Delineate Your Dwelling

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Thank you to Office Depot for sponsoring this post.

When I was a kid, I counted down to the holidays and time seemed to move so slowly it felt like we’d never get to winter break. As an adult, between running a business and parenting, it feels like I blink and the holidays have come and gone. 

This year, I’m trying hard to slow down and simplify a bit so that I can really enjoy the season and create lots of memories with my own kids.

It’s easy to get overwhelmed by the holiday to-do list, but this year, I’m cutting down on my errand running madness and shopping smarter. 

Last month, I partnered with Office Depot and OfficeMax to share some time management tips for busy momprenuers. As a small business owner, Office Depot and OfficeMax is my one stop shop for all of my business supplies, and during the holidays it’s so convenient to also be able to mark my personal to dos off the list at the same time. I really appreciate the convenience of being able to print my holiday cards and ship my gifts from the same place that I’m already shopping for my business needs.

On a recent stop at Office Depot to shop for a 2020 planner and pick up some large scale photo prints for a client decor project, I found myself also filling my basket with wrapping paper and spotting gifts that would be perfect for just about everyone on my holiday shopping list.

My blogging besties … check!

My tech loving husband … check!

My art supply loving six year old … check!

My creative maker sever year old … check!

My kids’ teachers … check!

I found so many great gift ideas that I thought it would be fun to create a One-Stop Shopping Holiday Gift Guide with some of my favorite items from Office Depot and OfficeMax. I invite you to join me in cutting down of some of the holiday errand running madness this year, and I think you’ll be surprised how many people on your shopping list you can check off in this one convenient stop.

GIFT IDEAS FOR CO-WORKERS AND FELLOW BOSS BABES

• Stylish On-the-GoCord Organizer
• Ivory EllaNotepad
• IvoryElla 2020 Planner

My blogging besties are pretty easy to shop for because they love and need most of the same things that I do. We all often work on the go, so I know they’ll appreciate the super cute, black and white striped cord organizer case that I’ve added to the list.

Like me, my fellow boss babes are also major list makers and planners, so I was thrilled when I came across the line of Ivory Ella products at Office Depot and OfficeMax.

Not only are these calendars, planners, and notepads practical and super cute, Ivory Ella works along side Save The Elephants and donates a portion of their profits to support elephant conservation and efforts to sustain elephant populations. I love giving a gift that give back!

GIFT IDEAS FOR TECH LOVERS

This list of gift ideas for tech lovers runs the gamut, with items for work, home, and play:

• TUL Charging Notebook
• Smart Garage Hub
• Water Bottle Bluetooth Speaker
• Super Ball Interactive Drone

My favorite item on the list is one I just had to try out for myself after I spotted it in the store… I mean, a girl’s got to make sure the gifts she’s giving are as good as they look, am I right?! 

I’m a sucker for a good notebook, especially one that allows me to rearrange the pages, choose from lined or graph paper, and add colorful divider tabs. But a notebook that also charges my phone?! I’d never even imagined such a thing. But the leather-bound cover of the TUL Wireless Charging Notebook does just that. It has a wireless charging spot on the cover for iPhone and Android smart phones. 

I take a lot of photos, so my battery is always low. Now I can charge my phone while I’m sitting in meetings, or even during flights, without a needing to find an outlet or deal with the tangled cord of an external battery charger.

After testing it out for myself, I can’t wait to give the TUL Wireless Charging Notebook as a gift to all of my tech loving friends and family members!

GIFT IDEAS FOR KIDS & TEENS

For kids who love drawing and art, like my younger son, the art supply options at Office Depot and OfficeMax are endless. But the gift ideas for kids and teens don’t end there. Here are some other unique and creative gifts they will love:

• Juku 3DPrinting Pen
• Juku Music MakingCoding Kit
• Scholastic STEAM Maker Kits
• Polaroid Instant Camera
• Karaoke Microphone

GIFT IDEAS FOR TEACHERS

In my role as PTA President at my boys’ school, I’ve talked to a lot of teachers about what they really want to receive for the holidays, and the consensus seems to be that while teachers appreciate all the gifts they receive from students and their families, what they really need most are practical gifts. There are certain supplies that the teachers at our school seem to run out of the quickest, including all the colors of Sharpies and dry erase markers.

In addition to basic supplies, here are a couple other unique ideas for useful classroom gifts:

• Label Maker … because what teacher wouldn’t love a more organized classroom?!
• Cling Document Sheets that allow teachers to show off artwork or display a documents. The Static-stay technology allows these sheets to adhere with no tape, push pins or magnets required.

I hope this one-stop shopping gift guide gets you started in the right direction and helps you to simplify your holiday season a bit this year. Let’s all aim to spend less time running errands and more time enjoying this happiest time of the year.

This is a sponsored post written by me on behalf of Office Depot, but all ideas and opinions are, as always, my own.

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We also purchased all of the furniture!! Yay! We’ll start assembling the couch in the next day or two. Once that’s done, I’ll actually be able to start pulling the space together a bit, which I’m really looking forward to.

The post Rooftop Retreat: Week 3 appeared first on Blue i Style.

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Every spring I tell myself this is the year we’re going to finally turn this rooftop deck into a space our whole family can enjoy, and every fall I lament that another year has gone by and we still haven’t used the space. But there’s one sure way I know to get a project done, and that’s the One Room Challenge! So I’m jumping in to the ORC for the 9th time, and five weeks from now, we’ll have a finished rooftop retreat just in time for warm summer nights!

For me, that means sharing encouragement and commiseration with lots of fellow designers… for you, that means endless inspiration for every room of the house in every style! All of the participating bloggers share the links to their weekly progress posts on the One Room Challenge website, so you can find all of the ORC progress posts and final reveals in one convenient place!

The post Rooftop Retreat: Week 1 appeared first on Blue i Style.

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Copper Bottom Flower Vase	Mason Jar Terrarium
Vintage Light with Hobnail Base	Chalkboard Mason Jar Vases
Painted Mason Jar Vases	Mason Jar Bottle Opener
Vintage Ball Jar Centerpieces	Vintage Mason Jar Lamp
Silhouette Candle Jars	Mason Jar Jack O’Lanterns

Don’t get hung up on the trendiness factor… as long as YOU like it, the mason jar trend can live on! Just get creative and use these versatile glass jars to create something perfect for your home.

The post {diy with style} 10 Reasons the Mason Jar Trend Lives On appeared first on Blue i Style.

The Hive Welcome Home kit gives you everything you need to get started with home automation, including the Hive Hub, a Hive Active Thermostat, Hive Active Light bulbs, Hive Active Plugs, Hive Window or Door Sensors, and a Hive Motion Sensor. You can then add on additional lights, plugs, and sensors to fit your needs. Using the Hive app, each of these components work together to create a smart home ecosystem – for example, the motion sensor can turn the lights on, or the door sensor can tell your thermostat to adjust the temperature when you arrive home. 

Through a combination of a Hive Door Sensor, and a Hive Motion Sensor, and a Hive Active Light bulb, I can now monitor our garage from anywhere, and I feel safer going out there to get things from the fridge and freezer or take the the trash out at night. {Can you spot the fridge and freezer? They are covered in a patchwork of paint swatches!}

Taking it one step further, I was also able to install a Hive Active Light bulb in the ceiling fixture, and with just a few swipes of the Hive app, I set it up so that the when the door sensor recognizes that the door has been opened, it turns the light on in the garage.

After setting up the Hive Active Light bulb in our garage, I wanted to be able to control some of the lights inside the house as well. For a while now, we’ve had the lights in our living room plugged into an old-school mechanical timer so that they are always on at night whether we are home or not. But the location of the outlet is hard to access when we want to reset the timer, and I’ve never really liked that the lights come on and off at the exact same time every day since I know that as a home security measure, a varied schedule is much better.

The living room lamps don’t use a standard sized light bulb, though, so we couldn’t simply swap out the bulbs for Hive Active Light bulbs. Instead, I plugged the lamps into a Hive Active Plug. 

Using the Hive App to control the Hive Active Plug, I can set a different set the lamps to come on and off on a unique schedule for each day of the week, and I can also turn the lamps on and off anytime right from my phone.

I also added a Hive Active Light bulb to the lamp in the boys’ new shared bedroom.

The boys want to sleep with this lamp on at night, but this lamp is not set up for a three-way bulb since it has a single on/off switch on the cord, and any bulb that is bright enough to give them good light for reading and playing during the day is too bright for sleeping at night. The Hive Active Light bulb solved this problem, because it’s dimmable. Not only can I control the brightness of the bulb with just a tap of my finger, I can also set a schedule so that the lamp provides full light during evening play and story-time, and then automatically dims to lower light at bedtime. Talk about making mom’ing easier!

Our house has two furnaces – one for the basement, first and second floor, and a separate one just for our master bedroom/bathroom up on the third floor. Fortunately, Hive offers a plan that comes with two Hive Active Thermostats.

Let’s talk about the Hive Active Thermostats that we installed up on the third floor. I’m so excited about the convenience of being able to control the heat and air conditioning in our bedroom without having to climb two flights of stairs each time!

There’s a simple compatibility checker tool on the Hive website that asks a few simple questions to determine if your existing wiring is set up correctly for the installation of the Hive Active Thermostat. In the case of my wiring, the compatibility tool was inconclusive, and it directed me to send an email to Hive Customer Service for further guidance. I couldn’t believe how quickly they responded to my inquiry, and I was even more impressed by how thorough and helpful they were! They asked me to snap a photo of the wiring for my existing thermostat so they could look at it. 

They noticed that we had one unused wire in our current set up, and they believed that wire was the one needed to power the Hive Active Thermostats, but they advised that I should have an HVAC electrician do the quick install just in case any wiring needed to be adjusted. 

As much as I would have preferred to DIY the thermostat installation, I was so grateful for the guidance of the customer service team since safety always comes first! We scheduled an HVAC electrician to come out {a regular electrician won’t do this job for you}, and he confirmed the wiring was compatible and showed me what I need to know to do the job myself when we are ready to add a second Hive Active Thermostat on our main floor.

I love the sleek design of the Hive Active Thermostat, but you might have noticed that it’s square rather than rectangular like our old thermostat. I was worried about how big of a hole we would find in the drywall when we removed the old thermostat, and whether the Hive unit would cover it, but it turns out that Hive was already one step ahead of me. In the box, they provide a rectangular backplate that can be used for just this situation!

How great does the new Hive Active Thermostat look in our bedroom?! So sleek and modern compared to that old, clunky white box!

Ok, now let’s talk function! The Hive Active Thermostat has a digital screen that appears when you touch it, so you can adjust the temperature right here without needing to use the app {perfect for the middle of the night when we just want it a little warmer or cooler}…

This is a sponsored conversation written by me on behalf of Hive. The opinions and text are all mine.

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