Oh, The Inspirations!

Howdy folks! Hope everyone had a fabulous week and weekend! 

The hubs and I have been a pair of busy bees over here with a few different things going on. One of them being our new little kitten Bailey. We've only had her for about a week and a half, but we are already in LOVE. I will spare you the pictures {because I seriously have like a billion} but she has really been such a little blessing in our lives. Even my hubby loves her and he's not even a "cat person", so you know she's got to be great! I'll just say this... I've been playing fetch with her all weekend... yes, like a dog. Too funny. Anyhoo! I'll move on to my {real} post and stop blabbing on about Bailey;) 

So a few weeks ago I posted about what the hubs and I would like to do to our house. One of them was our factory cart coffee table, and that turned out to be a success! A few other things I had in mind was a DIY ladder and also revamping our living room fire place mantel. Well... of course, I got distracted and were only able to check off one of those projects from the to-do list. Since then, I've had TONS of other ideas for our home. One of them being a {new to me} guest bathroom. I'm totally crushing on the color Navy right now, so naturally I decided to apply that crush on our guest bath. I started {and finished} painting the bathroom this weekend - YAY! I'm still not done accessorizing, so the reveal post is still to come. Look out for it soon though! It will be a navy, white, and coral inspired space. Here is a sneak peek!!

A few other things have been lingering in our brains as well. For the hubs, it's mainly been sprucing up the front and back yard. For me, I've still been fixated on sprucing up our fireplace and living room. It's not that I'm unhappy with the way everything is now, it's just that things can always improve;) Here are a few of my inspiration gatherings for our living room. 

The above design board is what I would call my {DREAM} living room. The couch is from Pottery Barn, and the set of wicker chairs are from Pier One. I have been drooling over these pieces for a while now. I initially wanted the Sea Grass sectional from Pottery Barn, but thankfully was given a very helpful warning from my bloggy friend at {Puttin' on the G.R.I.T.S}. She did not have a good experience with the sectional and gave me a nice fair warning. Not sure if I ever would have been able to afford the sectional anyways, but always nice to know I wasn't missing out on anything!!

Here is a picture of that particular sectional:

It's beautiful, but it seems it's a bit impractical. Which means, no thank you! Here is a close up of the comfortable and stylish Pottery Barn Couch over at {Puttin' on the G.R.I.T.S}. So pretty AND comfy looking!! There are a few imitation sofas at HomeDecorators.com. Scroll down for more pictures.

Below are a few of the HomeDecorator.com versions. They range from $1,000 - $1,500 which means they are about the same price as Pottery Barn (or depending on the PB fabric grade you choose) a few hundred dollars cheaper. I've never ordered from HomeDecorators.com, so I'm not sure on the quality of their furniture. Have any of you ordered from them? If there ever comes a day when I actually do buy a new couch, I would love to know if their furniture is good quality.

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I would love to one day continue to push the Navy, Coral and Seafoam color scheme in our living room (hence the Polyvore design board), but that all might be for another day. For now, my biggest and most desired dream starts with our fireplace. As much as I like the simple painted brick we have currently, it can seriously be SO MUCH BETTER. This is what I would realllyyyyy love for it to look like:

It's just perfect. Literally no other words than pure {perfection}. I'm thinking the stone work of something like this would most likely be in the $1,500 price range. Hopefully the hubs and I would be able to do the wood work ourselves, but who knows. It's just a dream as of now, so I guess we'll just have to wait and see. Has anyone done a DIY project like this before?? I'm desperate to know if it's possible to do it yourself for cheaper. I wouldn't need the mini barn doors above the mantel because that is where our flat screen would be, so mainly just the stone work. Any comments would be a great help!!

Here is what our fireplace and mantel look like now. Not terrible at all, but wouldn't that stone look so so pretty???

Wow I really didn't realize how much I had on my mind until I typed it all out! I was going to talk about our outdoor inspirations today too, but I think I will save that for later this week;)

So have you been busy with any summer projects?? I don't know how it happens, but somehow I just continue to get more and more ideas and don't know what to do with them all. So much so that I push back other projects! It looks like I need to get my projects in order! I hope everyone had a wonderful weekend! 

Who I'm linking up with this week: