July | 2014 | This Old Colonial Home

July 26, 2014
by This Old Colonial Home 1 Comment

Garage Sale Scores

If you’ve been following my blog, you know by now that I love a good garage sale, yard sale, estate sale, etc. I go through the classifieds of the local paper every Friday morning to see where sales are happening on the weekend. I also get a weekly email for estate sales in my area. I don’t get a chance to go every weekend, but I try to make an effort when I can. And lately I’ve been snatching up some pretty good stuff!

A few weeks ago I snagged this wooden rustic-looking mirror at an estate sale.It was $20 and I thought it’d be perfect for our entryway. However, once I got it inside the color didn’t really go. I’m now in the middle of painting it. (Look for that post soon.) I think it’s still a bargain when mirrors tend to be $50 and up!

Yesterday I stopped at a sale on my way home from work that I had seen going on the day before. I managed to get this white medicine cabinet for only $10! We could use one in our upstairs bathroom. I thought it might need to be spray painted but it just needed a good cleaning. Now we’re just hoping it fits in the space above the toilet. Even if it doesn’t, I can always resell it.

Oh I also picked up these two Christmas pillows for $5 total (Christmas in July)!People always seem to be getting rid of decorations, so yard sales are a great way to find a bargain. Plus can you ever have too many Christmas decorations?! Well, maybe if you’re Clark Griswold!

And then just today I was running around town doing errands when I passed a garage sale. I went around the block and came back around to check it out. You never know what you might find! And I’m glad I stopped. I walked away with this cool bottle and this pretty sweet book shelf for only $15!!I’m still not sure what I’m going to do with it yet. But I liked the wood and metal of it too much to pass it up for that price! We’ve got a lot of house to fill so I’m sure I’ll find a spot for it somewhere.

What treasures have you come across lately?

July 20, 2014
by This Old Colonial Home 3 Comments

Double Driveway

We’ve never really understood the design of our driveway. It goes up to our one-car garage at an angle instead of straight in.I suppose the previous owners just wanted to have a nice flower bed alongside it. But for Jamie and I who don’t have green thumbs — hence the overgrowth in the above picture — we wanted something that was more functional. So we decided to have the flower bed dug up and then widen the driveway to fit two cars across.When we bought the house we pretty much knew this was something we wanted to do. During the fall and winter months our town doesn’t allow overnight street parking so they can do leaf and snow removal. And since I get home first and need to be out first in the morning, the swapping of cars got old pretty quickly. So finally last week, the company we hired came in and took care of the job!Unfortunately, borough codes restricted us from taking the driveway all the way to the edge of our property (stupid), but we just filled the remainder in with decorative stone from Home Depot.The important thing is it’s now more functional and better fits our needs. And it doesn’t look too shabby either.What projects have you done to make things more practical and useful?

July 10, 2014
by This Old Colonial Home 6 Comments

Final Piece

You’d think with it being summertime I’d have plenty of finished projects to share with you. But that’s not quite the case. My husband and I have been spending our free time traveling and doing summery things (i.e. barbeques and relaxing) and not too much around the house.

But just so you don’t think we’re completely lazy, there is one minor thing worth noting. I FINALLY picked out curtains for the living room — which makes the room done!! It’s something that I’ve had in the back of my mind since at least March. That’s when I bought curtains from Home Goods that I thought I liked, but really only liked the price (2 panels for $16.99). I only just returned them this past weekend. Oy!

I had also picked up curtains from Lowe’s that later got returned. And then I bought 2 other curtains from Lowe’s in the same pattern but different colors. I even took a survey on Instagram (@oldcolonialhome) to get some opinions. Why is this such a tough decision?! Of the 2 I chose these! And I love them! I thought I would want blue to pick up the other accents in the room, but the brown/green ones ended up looking better in person. The best part about being indecisive? The price came down! All 4 panels cost less than $60 total after tax!! I’m so happy this is done. It was the very last piece to the puzzle. The living room is completely finished! Check mark! And in case you missed it, our living room is also “award-winning.” 😛 I entered a contest on Pinterest — #PinItToWinIt by HouseHunt.com. All you had to do was post before and after home improvement pictures to become entered to win a $50 gift card to Home Depot, and they ended up choosing my entry! Fun! You can check out their article here.

Jamie and I hope to accomplish a few more projects this summer … unless the dog days get to us first! What about you — do you plan on using the warmer months to get stuff done or to slow down a little?