Our Little Blue Cottage.

Our New Home.

If you just recently started following our business, we bought a house over a year ago to hold onto instead of flip. It is a quick bike ride to the Village of Pinehurst and is in an area that is developing nicely. We love the idea of George walking to school one day too, as the Pinehurst elementary school is being rebuilt nearby.

To save some money, we decided to rent the house out for one to three years. We knew it was a fixer upper, but didn’t realize how much it was until we had tenants living there full time. To say our tenants were extremely patient is an under statement. To say we didn’t save a single dime within the first year of owning this house is also an understatement. The house needed to be almost entirely re-plumbed while our tenants lived there. We had to replace a dishwasher, faucets, etc. While we had a good handle on flipping houses (as electrical and plumbing were typically redone off the bat), we were pretty clueless about renting out properties. Fortunately, we had a kick ass Property Manager, Mary Margaret, owner of Merit Property Management. She and Jim were certainly very busy getting the house up to livable standards in the first few months.

Once we worked out the kinks, our tenants asked if they could extend their lease when it came time to renew. I thought they were crazy, but I was pumped. Within the first few months of renting, they had re-graveled our entire driveway, built a little garden box in replacement of where an oil tank used to be buried, revamped our landscaping, and painted mostly every wall in the house Agreeable Gray by Sherwin-Williams. Not to mention the house was in its peak clean state.

But all good things must come to an end because our tenants decided to buy the house next door! This left us with a tough decision to make—whether to move in ourselves or rent it out to a new family. It goes without saying the bar was set extremely high for future tenants. Jim has repaired various rental properties over the past couple years, giving him a firsthand experience of what an awful tenant looks like. We knew we may not luck out again.

So, we decided to officially move into our house this past October. The house is relatively old (as we found some old knob and tube wiring), but it had seen some electrical and aesthetic updates especially in the 80s. We did some research at the Tufts Library in Pinehurst and discovered this home was actually owned by golf course designer, Donald Ross, at some point and was originally named The Sperry Cottage. It was also in another part of the Village of Pinehurst, but was relocated during the 50s.

We love that this house has so much history and character and can’t wait to restore it.

Our little blue house! (Before the new gravel driveway)

And without further ado, here is a mini tour of the place in all its vintage glory:

The Kitchen.

What we plan to update:

Currently the kitchen floor has some sloping so we will want to fix the structural issues before we really get down to renovating in the future. We will probably slightly extend the back of the mudroom area to the left of the kitchen. The back half of the kitchen actually contains both dining and laundry so we will want to relocate the laundry area into the mudroom without drastically changing the footprint of the home. We love that this home is quaint and don’t want to get too crazy with extensions. The red/pink wallpaper was super rad (most likely from the 80s) however had seen some wear and staining over the years. Our tenant ended up painting the wallpaper before we moved in so we will need to address that down the road. We recently discovered that there is heart pine under two layers of linoleum flooring. This is likely going to be a headache to properly restore, but we are up for the challenge.

What we love about this space:

We love the character of the swinging solid wood door leading into the kitchen. We also love the archway separating the kitchen area from the dining/laundry and will aim to salvage this feature when renovating down the road.

Laundry area strategically cropped out of photo.

The Living Area.

What we plan to update:

Mostly aesthetic updates especially addressing the mismatched flooring. Half the room is quarter sawn heart pine and the rest is regular pine (you can even see in photo below). We will also revamp the fireplace. There is brick behind the sheetrock above the mantel; however it is not pointed as nicely as the brick that is exposed.

WHAT WE LOVE ABOUT THIS SPACE:

The wood burning fireplace (after some aesthetic updates of course)!

Just need some aesthetic updates in the living area.

The Master Bedroom.

what we plan to update:

The master is currently on the first floor next to the living area; however we are converting it into an office space for the time being with only one kid. Where we lived previously, all my artwork and company paperwork was strewn about the entire home so I want to be sure to contain all of it somewhere, especially in a significantly smaller house.

What we love about this space:

The solid wood doors and antique hardware. And all the windows on the lefthand side of room (not pictured).

Those solid wood doors and antique hardware!

The Guest Bedrooms.

what we plan to update:

Again, mostly aesthetic updates -- new paint, light fixtures, etc.

What we love about this space:

The built-in dressers! A great way to help address the limited storage space issue as the rooms, although cute, are tiny. We will likely rebuild these and properly insulate down the road, though.

Both guest bedrooms have built-in dressers that allow more space for living!

The Office Nook.

what we plan to update:

We plan to swap out the upper cabinetry for some open shelving so the space seems less claustrophobic. Jim is excited to turn this into a fly-tying and office space for himself.

What we love about this space:

The fact that this feature even exists.

A cute little open area on the second floor to the left of the stairs.

The Exterior.

what we plan to update:

In terms of landscaping, we want to improve the circular drive in front of the home. We think a front porch would also be a nice feature since it's across from the baseball field. Instead of a shed in the back, we plan to build a secondary, small accessory building for Jim's workshop and possibly an art /hobby studio above it. We will eventually eliminate the not-so-aesthetically-pleasing back deck and replace with a stone patio.

What we love about the exterior:

The adorable wooden window boxes. The fact that the exterior is cedar shingles. And the unique white picket fence (pictured above).

The window boxes on the second floor are simply darling.

Back deck will likely be eliminated to accommodate a higher end-looking patio.

A New Guest Suite

The Need.

We are your stereotypical 30-something millennials who "live at home" to save money. Even though we have a house we could theoretically move into at this point, we've opted to instead save more money, rent it out, and wait until my parents kick us out of their house basically. Now that we have been fortunate enough to provide a grandchild, I doubt our eviction will happen any time soon. #chessnotcheckers

My parents' house is a really cool home built and decorated in the 1980s. The previous owners designed and furnished everything. It has not been updated aesthetically since the 80s.

Our current freeloading domain is the upstairs and it has technically four guest bedrooms and one bath. Oftentimes we will have families come visit (filling all four rooms up) so sharing one bathroom can be a bit challenging. One of the larger bedrooms was going to become George's nursery too so guest space was becoming limited. We also knew once George arrived, we would have more frequent and longer term guests. My parents, when they bought the house back in 2008, always wanted to convert a postage stamp-sized guest bedroom and adjacent unfinished attic space into a larger guest suite with full bath. So, with George's impending debut we all decided to take this challenge on.

The goal was to start in early October (once we finished / listed a flip) and have it completed by end of December. I naively thought with a baby on the way we would have the drive to finish in a timely manner because who wants to renovate where you live, especially with a newborn? Well, we had the motivation, but of course there were a couple minor starts and stops along the way. Mostly due to the fact that subcontractors didn't want to work around Thanksgiving and Christmas?? ODD! (Don't forget to always consider holidays when coming up with timelines—not everyone is a psychopath making cuts for hardwoods 8 months pregnant around Christmas!)

The Plan.

The existing tiny guest bedroom only had the space to house one twin bed. We previously used it as a "gym" when it was not needed as a guest room. I can count the amount of times we worked out in this room on one finger.

Our gym aka the room that stored gym equipment.

The skylights in this guest room are very interesting and unique. They provided light to both this room and the garage below. We knew they would sadly have to be eliminated if we were going to add a full bath. The door in the back of the room leads to the unfinished attic space. Both the door and wall would need to be demoed to combine the attic space and little bedroom into one large guest suite.

The attic space next to the room would obviously not only need to be a finished space for a bed, but also would require a large window for egress.

In our past flips, we did not need to consult an architect or designer to figure out the best layout as those updates were very straightforward to us. With this project however, we knew we had to hire a professional in order to make this space fully and appropriately functional.

With an architect, we determined that we would need to steal space from the other adjacent bathroom upstairs (more specifically its linen closet) in order to have more square footage to create a full bath for the new guest suite. We would also need to eliminate the existing skylights, frame out flooring, etc, so that there was more living space since the new bathroom would be taking up quite a bit of it. And since the skylights had originally provided light to the garage, we had to work with an electrician to add new lights down there as well.

Because we lost the existing bathroom's linen closet, we then converted the little guest bedroom's into one. That meant we had to close up the closet opening in the old guest room and create a new one facing out into the adjacent hallway for everyone to be able to access. And since the guest suite is on a different level, we had to frame up a new closet floor to be level with the new hallway access. Kind of confusing to explain, but I guess you can understand how this was not a very straightforward process of just plunking a bathroom into a space, throwing a bed in there too, and calling it a day.

The new linen closet opening. As you can see we had to frame out the closet floor so that it would be level with where our dogs are standing.

As previously mentioned, a window also had to be added for egress. The exterior is brick so we hired a professional mason to cut an opening in the brick veneer and patch it back once we installed the new window. We always hire professionals when we think things are even slightly out of our wheelhouse. While we could go the popular DIY route these days and watch YouTube videos on how to do it, it saves a lot of time and heartache to have it done by a skilled mason with the appropriate crew, tools, and experience. Totally worth the extra money spent.

Professional mason and his crew cutting brick veneer for window opening. Lots of scaffolding required.

It goes without saying we then had to frame out a closet for the new bedroom area (as we sacrificed the original one for a new linen closet in the hallway), add insulation, install sheetrock on the walls and ceilings, and install / refinish matching hardwood flooring so it was cohesive space.

Framing out some walls in the unfinished attic space. We added a custom attic door for additional storage within the eaves.

The Design.

In terms of the bathroom finishes, we wanted to design something that was classic with both modern and retro touches—ultimately reflecting each of my parents' styles. Since we don't know when we will get around to updating the rest of the home (kitchen, master bath, guest bath, etc) we also wanted the bathroom to fit with the vibe of the rest of the home, but also work with future updates. A delicate balance.

Work-in-progress herringbone tile floor.

We selected a carrara marble hexagon tile for both the shower floor and panoramic niche. We did 3 x 8 white subway tile (regal bianco gloss ceramic - now discontinued) for the shower walls all the way up to the ceiling. The bathroom floor was a little more expensive—both material and design-wise—a 3 x 12 bardiglio bianco porcelain tile in a herringbone pattern with a nero marquina black marble border.

Adding the black border around the herringbone pattern was a little complicated. We installed the herringbone first and then cut the tile with a grinder so that the herringbone pattern edges that meet the black border would be perfectly straight.

The budget for this bathroom was more flexible than our flips in the past so we could pick out more expensive finishes. We are very proud with how it turned out. It feels like a spa retreat and we find ourselves resisting using this bathroom instead of our existing one!

Floating vintage-looking sink with shelf for storage above.

Our dogs were likely the subconscious coloring inspo for this bathroom.

We didn't move the skylights up so we wouldn't have to touch the roof. Instead, we created little niches for additional storage.

The Delays.

So of course in typical home renovation fashion, there were delays with the guest suite as a whole. The biggest delay was refinishing the hardwoods. This is something we could have tackled ourselves, but we were in the process of acquiring another flip, preparing for hosting Christmas in North Carolina, and also a baby on the way.

No one could get into our house to refinish the floors until after George's due date in mid January. I would be lying if I said this was the first meltdown I had for this renovation, but it definitely was the biggest. I would also be lying if I said my meltdowns were due to pregnancy hormones, but let's be honest, I have always been known to have a good old-fashioned renovation meltdown.

Basically George made a somewhat dramatic appearance a week earlier than expected and the flooring guys came in sometime afterwards. We moved the bedroom furniture in sometime after that. I wouldn't know exactly how it all went down because I completely blocked this part of the renovation out of my mind. Looks great though, haha!

We've had a few guests stay in the suite since and it's been so convenient and stress-free to be able to have separate bathrooms and living spaces especially while experiencing all the postpartum fun of having a newborn.

Lord help us this guest suite was going to be done before George arrived.

The refinished floors in all their glory after the arrival of George.

All-in-all we are really happy with how it turned out and our only complaint was that it was not completed on time. Jim really stepped it up and finished it a week after the flooring guys were done so we could start on another flip right away.

The reason this entire guest suite came to fruition.

A Step-by-Step Guide to Repurposing Old Liquor Bottles

1. Become really behind on business finances.

2. Drink to get you through catching up on said business finances.

3. Become ashamed of how short of a lifespan the alcoholic beverage had.

4. Find solace in repurposing empty bottle into a means for rooting pothos.

Life With Having an Antique Booth

1. Receive paycheck from antique mall.

2. Deposit said paycheck.

3. Purchase new item at antique mall from different dealer that costs equal to or greater than antique mall paycheck.

4. Repeat every month.

Those all add up. That's a paycheck right there, guys.

Staging: What We Learned

As we wrap up staging for Oakmont, we wanted to share how staging can really help sell a house and some tips we learned along the way.

Oakmont was a home that had many beautiful features. The dining room built-ins, kitchen bay windows, and Carolina room immediately come to mind. (Honestly if this house was in our budget we may have scooped it up for ourselves!) Unfortunately it had seen a little bit of wear and tear after its last (not-so-great) tenant.

How Staging Helps Sell.

We've always staged our flips and do receive compliments on the staging in addition to the renovations; however it's kind of difficult to equate how helpful staging is when selling a home that is already nicely updated.

So what about staging homes that have some wear and tear and can use a couple updates?

The "stats" for Oakmont speak for themselves:

The property was listed on April 1st with a tenant still in the home. It did not show well. It was then shown a few times vacant with no bites. After staging the place at the end of June (including new MLS photos), the house was under contract in less than two weeks with the first buyer to see the home staged!

How to Stage a House Well.

Here's the rundown on three important things we learned when staging a home that is not necessarily completely updated:

1. Stick to a neutral palette and style.

With clean, neutral colors, you are ensuring that you do not clash with the paint colors the seller has previously selected. In a way you may even be helping tone down some crazy colorful walls, too. If you're buying your own furniture to stage, it is a good investment to buy mostly neutral so you can ensure that anything you've purchased will look good in any house. Same goes with buying the style of furniture. You want to invest mostly in pieces that can span across a variety of styles. You don't want to buy all shabby chic-specific pieces and then use that in a mid-century modern home!

This deep red Carolina room looks especially striking with a neutral staging palette that does not compete with the wall color.

Creams, golds, blacks, and whites are the only colors in the master bedroom in order to help tone down the green walls that may not appeal to the average buyer.

Conversely, in a dark kitchen with black cabinets, it is good to incorporate some pops of color to give the area some depth.

2. Showcase the house's best features.

What features of the home really impressed you? What do you think will appeal to the buyer so that they absolutely NEED to have this house? Is it the ample sunlight streaming in from the Carolina room? An oasis with many plants may be your best bet. Is it the cute built-ins that bring extra character to the dining area? Filling those with some perfectly curated pieces will go a long way. Whatever it is that you appreciate about the house, make sure the buyer appreciates it too!

Smaller, skinny chairs so to not block the gorgeous floor-to-ceiling windows that flank the fireplace.

Translucent table and chair set does not restrict all the ample light coming in from the bay windows in the eat-in kitchen area.

Conversely, use objects such as large plants or furniture to distract the eye from unsightly (although necessary) things like HVAC returns.

3. Don't Half Ass a Space.

It's either all or nothing in our books personally. Either you don't furnish an area or you fully furnish it. Nothing in between. It looks skimpy and like an afterthought if you only halfway stage an area versus not staging it at all. If there's a huge blank wall and it's the main focal point of the room, it should be filled with something that enhances the space. That could mean simply going to an art store, buying a canvas, throwing some paint on it and calling it abstract art. All my best art is when I have a bottle of wine and am in a pinch with staging. If you feel like you're spreading 2 shelves worth of decor across 10 shelves, don't do it. Shop your home to fill the holes. I should however note there is a difference between perfectly minimalist decor versus just plain skimpy.

This artwork was brought to you by a bottle of rosé. The space would have felt unfinished without something filling that large gap between the green leather chairs.

Ultimately, staging allows buyers to visualize themselves in a space. It helps them see that you do not need a fully renovated home to be happy and make it your own!

HAVE A LISTING THAT NEEDS SOME STAGING LOVE? CONTACT US.

Glenwood Flip - Master Bathroom Update On A Serious Budget

The Plan and Budget.

The Glenwood flip was a very tight budget in general. It was the most expensive house we had acquired to date. And also happened to coincide with tax season and the birth of our first child.

In past flips, we've allocated $5,000-$6,000 towards master bathroom remodels. That is of course keeping in mind that we put a lot of our own sweat equity into these types of remodels. For Glenwood, we only had about $3,000-$4,000 allocated for the master bathroom update so we had to get creative without skimping on the high-end aesthetic we love to have.

First things first, we thought about what features are the most expensive with a bathroom remodel. A few immediately came to mind: floor-to-ceiling tiled shower, relocating plumbing, and of course, the double sink vanity itself. Well, the floor-to-ceiling tiled shower was non-negotiable. It is something that buyers expect in a newly remodeled master bathroom. We weren't about to put fiberglass anywhere in that space. The location of the plumbing had to be addressed, too. We did not like how the toilet was right next to the shower and especially how there were two separate, single vanities in different parts of the room ("before" pics below to see what we're talking about). Therefore, the layout really needed some work and couldn't be ignored.

That left us with the vanity. A decent vanity could have easily been 40%-50% of the budget itself. And we knew we wouldn't be putting in anything builder grade either so that meant we had to get creative.

The Vanity.

We determined we'd do the popular thing nowadays and convert a dresser into a vanity. There was an awesome vintage dresser at a local thrift store we had been eyeing to simply buy and use for staging, but never pulled the trigger on it. It had been sitting in the store for quite a bit of time along with a matching nightstand, headboard, mirror, and tallboy. We decided this would make the perfect vanity as the color and condition were perfect. Since it was sitting for a while, the store let us buy it separate from the set for $100. Probably not the greatest deal in all of thrifting history, but still pretty cheap in the grand scheme of things.

Vintage dresser sat with accompanying pieces for months in a local thrift store before we rescued it.

The dresser, while we could see the potential in it, had to be paired with the right sink tops, faucets, etc., otherwise it could look real hodgepodge—the exact opposite of what we were striving for. Again, it's such a delicate balance of trying to save money, but also not cheapen the look. We carefully picked out some modern square sink tops from Houzz for $62 each. We decided since we were relocating plumbing anyway that we might as well do wall-mount faucets from Amazon to further enhance the modern aesthetic. These faucets were a little bit of a splurge; however all-in-all everything was still significantly cheaper than a typical double sink vanity.

After getting everything together for the "new" double vanity (for about $600, instead of the usual $1,200-ish), we discovered that we couldn't notch out the drawers based on the location of their tracks and new plumbing so we had to get creative again. Jim decided to gut the inside of the dresser and convert the drawer fronts into doors. I was so anxious to see this in the works as it would have been a total waste if something went wrong. Luckily Jim is really good about not screwing up these types of things. Below is a video showing you the rough finish of the drawer conversion:

The Remaining Updates.

I remember when I posted the bathroom's old wallpaper on Instagram I got some playful digs from people for my plans to remove it. I can assure you it looked less Anthropologie in real life. Even if it wasn't moldy in lots of parts (and it sure was) I would have removed it anyway. From a resale perspective, you have to appeal to the average buyer. Most buyers will not want 80s wallpaper in their newly remodeled house. If it was a solid or modern pattern, maybe, but it was floral. I personally would have been cool with it sans mold, but I knew most buyers who want essentially a new master bathroom, would not. So the wallpaper went bye-bye along with the popcorn ceilings and a non load-bearing wall to open things up.

The floor, shower walls, and niche tile we got at Lowes on sale. The black shower floor tile was from Wayfair. The vanity mirrors were on sale from Target (totally purchased for staging purposes; however they looked too good in here). And lastly, the vanity light fixtures were from Amazon.

I'm still truly impressed with how amazing this bathroom turned out ESPECIALLY considering 80% of everything was purchased online instead of in person AND the fact that it was on a strict budget. I was planning the master bathroom when our son George was only 1 month old so going to a bunch of stores during flu season with an infant (and the whole lack of personal hygiene as a new mom) was not really an option. The only items I would probably never buy again were the light fixtures. They required some finagling from the electrician as they were made differently than typical light fixtures here in the US. They were also a lot more yellow in person than shown online, but it turned out aaaaaall good once everything came into place. So I ain't mad.

The Final Output.

We originally aimed to be around $3,000 for the master bathroom. We ended up spending about $4,000. We decided to use the pricey Schluter system for the shower to give the future home owner a peace of mind. Jim also decided he wanted to outsource the tiling to save on time which I really can't argue with since I was no help and mostly barking design directions from an armchair with a newborn attached to my boob.

While this was the cheapest bathroom remodel we had ever done, it is our favorite by far. The before-and-after pictures are quite astonishing. See for yourself!

Need some guidance on a bathroom remodel with a budget? Contact us!

Before: very outdated single vanity and fixtures.

After: converted dresser into new double sink vanity. Non load-bearing wall taken down to open things up, too.

Before: outdated almond-colored fiberglass tub.

After: floor-to-ceiling tiled shower. With the elimination of a wall, a door no longer crashes into the shower.

Before: random outdated single vanity outside master bathroom.

After: toilet replaces random single vanity. Knee wall replaces full non load-bearing wall—ultimately increasing the size of the master bathroom.

You can check out more photos from the Glenwood Rehab here.

Habitat for Humanity ReStore Circle of Life

I love buying and transforming unsightly things from Goodwill, Salvation Army, and Habitat for Humanity ReStore that people wouldn't even give a second look. It's especially exciting when I use part of what I buy (at a good price mind you!) and then donate what I don't use back to these stores. Here is the step-by-step process of what my latest ugly purchase at Habitat for Humanity ReStore looked like:

Step 1: Find hideous faux plant arrangement at your local ReStore.

Step 2: Be judged by your husband as it's brought up to cashier. Take mental note that husband leaves you in store to pay for it by yourself so he can discreetly load into pickup.

Step 3: Have your mother who never questions your design decisions stop dead in her tracks upon viewing your new purchase.

Step 4: Gut the thing like a fish, delicately set aside remains.

Step 5: Have minor meltdown when realizing peach cowgirl boot of all things is glued to basket. Separate carefully.

Step 6: Stick new plant in basket. Debate for hours whether or not you want to keep rope detail. Decide you can cut it off at a later date.

Step 7: Donate the remains back to ReStore. Circle of life complete.

I should also note that I wasn't done shopping when I found this thing so I wanted to carry it up immediately to cashier for them to hold in fear that someone else would see the potential. Jim quickly assured me that "it would still be here" when we were done. He was not wrong. (That doesn't mean I didn't take the tag off when he wasn't looking to ensure it was ours muahaha).

The before. That's a peach cowgirl boot with beads coming down the side. Yee-haw no.

The after. Still debating whether to keep the rope, but once it's gone it's gone and I don't like that kind of commitment right now.

A New Name For A New(ish) Business

Hello!

You're probably stopping by after we dropped a huge bomb on Instagram that we've changed our name, the direction of our business, and actually have a freaking web site with something called a "blog." So let's walk you through all that nonsense.

The Name Change.

This has been in the making for a very long time. If you didn't know, we used to call ourselves "Slygho." It was a unique spelling we came up with for the county in Ireland, Sligo, in an effort to stand out. In fairness, if you searched "Slygho" on Google, we were the only thing showing up in the results so there's that (but Google would also be like, "Uh guys, did you mean 'Sligo'?").

So why Sligo? Sligo is where Jim's grandfather is from and he is the reason Jim is a carpenter today. The different spelling has been confusing as all get out, though. We can't tell you how many times people are like, "Uh, what's a 'Slygho'?" Or stumble over the pronunciation and/or spelling. Or even avoid saying our company name all together so to not flub it. I always think back to that movie I was obsessed with in the 90s, That Thing You Do. The band, in an attempt to be witty, called themselves "The Oneders" (pronounced "The Wonders"), however people kept calling them the "Oh-needers". And when the band started gaining traction, Tom Hanks had to set them straight and say quit confusing people and spell your name right, fools.

I digress...

Well one day Jim decided he despised the name Slygho and wanted to change the spelling back to the proper "Sligo." But I was very hesitant. Why? Especially if I didn't like the spelling myself? Because we had lots of equity in that name. People were starting to know us and associate our quirky name with our great work. If you know Jim, he's usually a super laid back person, but is a force to be reckoned with when he wants something badly. After I told him I didn't agree with him—that we basically made our bed and had to sleep in it regarding our company name—he created an Instagram account called "Sligo Construction" in which he had 0 followers, but spent all of his efforts trolling me on the original Slygho account by sending me DMs about how I'm a poser and how we need to change the name—LOL. Here's Exhibit A of our private conversations for your viewing pleasure. It's been severely edited down as my Mama reads this blog.

Exhibit A:

And that's us in a nutshell, folks.

So it was determined that we should just go in a completely different direction from Sligo—something that could be relevant to both of us. Jim came up with the name Crawford Modern. To simply put it, Crawford is our last name and we have a passion for giving older things like homes and furniture a modern edge. I'm good with that.

So what gives about our new business direction?

The Change in Business Direction.

If you don't know by now, we've been flipping houses for a couple years in Moore County (you can read more about our beginnings here). In the past year, however, the market has gotten super crazy. It's good when we're selling a house, but it's challenging when we're trying to buy one. To be transparent, our budget for procuring homes and fixing them up to our standards in this area is starting to not cut it. We are getting outbid a lot more these days. We don't want to spend more to simply buy the house, thus resulting in doing the bare minimum / cutting corners when renovating. We want to be able to continue buying homes and putting in higher-end finishes and custom touches. We enjoy standing out from most of the builder-grade flips in the area. Maybe that's a silly way to approach things in terms of flipping, but we honestly can't put our name on builder-grade flips. It isn't for us. We know we could always get our realtor license(s) to save on profits or even get some investors, but that doesn't happen overnight. So we finally determined that we would take a little break from flipping homes for a bit and explore more opportunities with the connections we've made along the way. We're always trying to adapt and evolve, I suppose!

So what exactly do we plan to do? Home renovations (pending Jim's GC license) and staging will be our main focus; however the plan is to dip our toes in a little bit of everything, such as:

Home renovations
Staging
Design consultation
Interior decoration
Flipping / investment property consultation
Custom woodworking
Art
Photography styling
Antique booth(s)

. Anything else you think we can do for you? Drop us a line.

The Web Site.

It's been a long time coming; however we finally created this web site to showcase our portfolio and also provide more details of our process through the blog. While Instagram is a great platform for sharing pretty photos, we're hoping to share a little bit more behind the scenes of what we do and experience—the good, the bad, and the ugly. It will not be all pretty Instagram squares here. We will be transparent about the not-so-fun aspects of renovations and flipping. We will even share our screw ups so you can learn from them as well. We're also hoping to show a little bit more of our personality (sass).

We hope you enjoy and find some inspiration here on this site!

Antique Corbels Get Nekkid

There is a special place in heaven for those with the patience to strip furniture down bare and refinish. We are not those people. In fact, we are [I am] the worst when it comes to refinishing things. It's like I forget that "refinish" has the word "finish" in it. I don't understand how DIY bloggers say they did a refinishing project for a "couple hours" "one weekend" [hugely exaggerated air quotes] and it comes out looking like Sistine Chapel level of masterpiece. We have so many "refinishing projects" in our garage it's kind of embarrassing. I've started just unloading one at a time in our booth at Pastimes for someone else to inherit the madness. There's a three year limit for holding onto things, people. If it's still sitting in your garage after three years, I think it's safe to say it ain't ever getting done.

Anyways, when we started rehabbing our latest flip, we wanted to give the kitchen a special, unique feature. Something you can't find in another remodeled or new-build home in the area. I had been eyeing these antique corbels at Pastimes for a year. Normally I'm all for chippy old paint, but I didn't like the color that they were. And the chippy vibe wasn't going with the whole modern, clean look of this house. Once the price dropped on these bad boys—and conveniently while we were discussing design plans for the peninsula—I took it as a sign. A sign that maybe this would be the first refinishing project I'd actually accomplish since this kitchen remodel depended on it, ok guys?

Here is what the corbels looked like before. The layers of paint were like an onion and the struggle was definitely real.

Well. Let's just say I started the process, but Jim had to rescue me from my embarrassment. I seriously have a problem. And yes, I'm sometimes one of those annoying spouses who has some grand project idea and loses steam only for Jim to have to swoop in and finish it. Once I realized that there were many layers of paint underneath the ugly brown I knew this was out of my wheelhouse. Plus I'm going to throw in the whole "having to care for a newborn" excuse, too.

After 6 rounds of Citristrip, sanding, and probably getting lead poisoning, the antique corbels were completely bare, no thanks to me. And they looked gorgeous! We are definitely people who much rather have the natural wood show than covering everything in chalk paint and we definitely think it paid off in this kitchen.

Antique corbels in their final resting place and looking perfect with all the other natural wood elements in this home.

Little House Gets a Big Decor Makeover

Our client, okay my Uncle, recently moved into a super adorable rental property on James Island. He wanted to get it decorated nicely, but on a strict budget and within a three-day weekend timeline because we'd have to come in from out-of-town. My Aunt (Uncle's sister) and us rose to the challenge. I mean, who doesn't love thrifting for three days straight especially when it's on someone else's dime amiright?

Because of the super tight timeline, my Aunt and I started obsessively analyzing the photos of the rental property in advance and picking out items in our area before making the trip down to Charleston. Kind of risky without really knowing measurements of the space, but somehow it worked out pretty seamlessly. I can't stress how important it is to take nice photos of a property whether you're selling or renting. The photos of this home looked pretty rough and dark. If I said we weren't worried about pulling this off looking solely at the photos I would be lying to ya. (If you don't want to read the whole decorating process, you can now skip down to the before and after photos below).

Anyways...

We instructed my Uncle on things to order in advance like brass floor lamps from Target. My Aunt made a great point that instead of spending money on end tables plus lamps that it would be best for both the space and budget to just do floor lamps on either side of a sofa.

We established a theme and colors we wanted to pull through in terms of decor. We were thinking a "relaxed bungalow" vibe but it quickly evolved into a more "vintage meets modern bungalow" by the time we finished shopping in Charleston.

My Aunt found a lot of free items in advance of the trip. She's going to be mad that I'm saying this on the interwebs even though she's probably the only one reading this, but there's a little treasure trove of a dumpster in an apartment complex near her where people leave delicately-used items they no longer need for others to enjoy. She ran into a woman who was moving and leaving a lot of great things behind. I can't remember everything my Aunt got from this generous soul, but I know there was a faux tree, a bunch of little decorative items, and planters. I found a brass and glass console and a really cool vintage painting while thrifting in my area, too.

We had a pretty solid start—just needed the important things like say, a place to sit and sleep. Oh, and a good-looking coffee table to tie it all together.

Once we got to Charleston, we started by hitting up all the Habitat for Humanity ReStores, Goodwills, etc in the area. Anyone who thrifts obsessively knows these stores are a hit or miss. In order to be successful you really have to go frequently or just have sheer luck finding something absolutely fabulous at the right time. I've been unbelievably lucky before, but also have gone weeks without finding anything good. Unfortunately we didn't really cross off any of the large items on our list—just a few decorative items here and there. Also, finding a mint condition, good-looking sofa or a large neutral rug at one of these types of stores is basically seeing a unicorn—at least for me.

So we ended up getting a lot of the bigger pieces like the sofa and rugs at At Home, HomeGoods, and Target. By the third Target we visited, Jim said screw this, tapped out, and went fishing or something. 3-day marathon decorating trips ain't for the faint of heart.

I also even spent time after all the shops were closed by drinking lots of wine and painting some quick black and white abstract pieces to fill some shelves on a budget. Good thing my wine drinking wasn't a part of the budget otherwise I would have drank my Uncle out of house and home. Anyone else get a little, ahem, carried away with drinking when they're doing something creative like painting or writing?

So with my drunk art drying, the only thing left to get was the coffee table. We knew this piece was crucial in making this place look absolutely fabulous. This is where we found that unicorn I'm referring to. We were at a local consignment store and found one of the best damn looking coffee tables we've ever seen. It was definitely a bit of a splurge, but totally WORTH IT. It really made the place have a high end feel without [totally] breaking the bank.

All in all, it was a very successful trip. The before and after photos speak for themselves.

And without further adieu...

Before: rental listing photo of living area.

After: sofa is in the location of where previous renters' TV console was. Check out that super fine coffee table!

Before: rental listing photo of kitchen area.

After: toning down the parquet flooring with large neutral rugs.

Before: rental listing photo of living area with view of built-in shelving.

After: built-in shelving gets some custom artwork (read: free).

After: more built-ins redecorated on a budget.

Like what you see? Check out more "After" photos here:

James Island Bungalow