Happy 4th of July! (and Happy 5th Birthday Blog!)

Happy Independence Day!  And Happy 5th Birthday to It’s a Horvath’s Life!  288 posts and counting, I’ve been blogging about my house, my garden, my family and other random thoughts from my life for five years!  Thanks for joining me here!

We decided since the weather was so beautiful (85 and sunny!) that we should host a little party for the 4th of July!  My family came and joined us for hot dogs and hamburgers, potato salad, baked beans, deviled eggs and apple pie!  Yum!  The house and lower deck were festive, decked out with all my patriotic décor. 

I even made some cute little arrangements with paper fans left over from Ruger’s Cowboy Party. 

We spent the afternoon stringing beans from my mother’s garden (goes pretty fast when five people are working!) while Papa entertained us with his guitar.  Then we had dinner and went out to play cornhole and visit on the deck.  I put more bunting on the lower deck, along with my sparkly centerpieces from our party two years ago.  I also added my Moravian star light to the string lights in the ceiling.  It’s both festive and functional!

Riley was worn out from a day of running around chasing the cornhole bags! 

After everyone left, Michael and I walked over to the town square for the local fireworks show!  Once again, it did not disappoint.  It was a great day!

Hope you all had a fun 4th of July celebration! 

Little Pretties

A random sampling of beautiful things that make me smile…

    

    

    

    

    

giant pink hydrangea blossoms, plush new pillows on the bed, dried rind flowers, pink peonies, fluffy pink astilbe, delicate purple and blue hydrangeas in a thrifted milk glass compote, my new butterfly pillow, a coral non-stop begonia, fuzzy kitten, and old books.

Hope you’re finding reasons to smile this week, too!

Ode to a Denim Chair

Way back in September I told you we were getting a new chair for the office.  Well, it is now June and I finally have possession of said chair.  The new chair is a bona fide antique that belonged to my grandfather and he gave it to my Mama since she loved it.  I, being the greedy daughter that I am, managed to talk Mama out of her fancy antique chair.  She was happy (okay maybe not happy, but willing) to give it to me since it was going to be soooo perfect in my office, and since I agreed to trade back her beloved denim chair which currently resides in the corner of our office. :) 

The denim chair is famous.  Many people have tried to steal/buy it from us over the years.  It was a secondhand chair that my mom upholstered with old blue jeans back when I was a sophomore in college.  It has knee stains and worn denim in places and over the past 11 years it has acquired a few more stains and worn places.  The backrest is long pieces of denim in different colors and the seat cushion is patchwork.  The back and sides are pieced strips and there are three jean pockets on each side.  :)  Most of the denim and all of the pockets are from Levi’s!  I had this chair in three of my dorm rooms and then it came with us to our apartment and of course onto our first house.  The back is curved and slopes down to the arm rest and kind of envelopes you, which makes it a perfect spot to snuggle in, tuck up your feet, and read.  We’ve lounged in, piled on, snuggled into and loved this chair for 11 years. Now it is time to say goodbye and pass the chair back to my mom or my sister to love for a while.

Though famous locally, the denim chair has never been featured on the blog.  Tragedy.  There is only a tiny corner of it depicted in our House Tour.  Probably because I thought it “didn’t go” with the rest of the office.  That’s why I am making the inexplicable decision to replace it with a fancier chair.  I am a strange one, I know it! 

So today let me introduce you to the famous chair, apparently also known as “Bandit’s chair”.  Okay we know that ALL the chairs in the house are Bandit’s chairs, but this one he took a particular liking to.  Even as a kitten he enjoyed sitting in the denim chair in front of the window at our apartment.

Our kitten grew up but he found that he could still fit in the denim chair…

And when we moved, he still made the chair his favorite perch.  It was situated between our desks in the office where he could keep a good eye on his humans.

Even when Bandit stretched out, he could still fit (just barely).

And after a while (once she was legitimately too big) Riley discovered that if she curled up just right, she could fit in the denim chair.  It truly is a magical chair and a special spot for a cat (or puppy) nap. :)

So it is with a heavy heart that I say goodbye to our beloved denim chair and make a space for the new antique chair.  Don’t worry, Bandit has already found a comfy spot to sleep on the new chair, too.  And if Riley decides that she’d like to try it out, well let’s just say she better keep her paws off my new velvet chair!! :) 

I’ll be back tomorrow (after a suitable mourning period) to introduce the new, fabulous chair! :)

Beautiful New Floors!

Last week was my birthday so this past weekend my family came and helped install my birthday present! :)  I told you were were getting new floors for the den a few weeks ago.  And now three weeks later, here is the final result! 

Before I jump to the after pictures, I just want to highlight the installation process so you can appreciate the hard work involved (Thanks Josh!).  First things first, we tore up the carpet and foam underlayment.  Some glue scraping and vacuuming came next.  Then the floors sat all lonely and empty for a while.  Then Mr. Laminate Installer Extraordinaire (AKA my brother-in-law Josh) arrived!

He showed us how to lay out the new underlayment and tape the seams (with duck tape).  I was qualified to help with this step.  You always want to run your underlayment perpendicular to the flooring so the seams don’t coincide.  We decided to run the flooring parallel to the longest wall even though that meant it would run crosswise in the hallway.  Oh well. :)

While we laid out the underlayment, Josh cut off all the door trim moldings with a fancy saw.  This way the flooring can slip under the trim and look perfect!

Then it’s time to lay out the flooring, beginning in a corner and running out from there.  This is a floating, click-together floor so you use a nifty little tapping block to secure each piece into the groove left by the first one.  Josh made it look easy, but I didn’t get to help with this step. :)

Proceed laying pieces until you reach a wall or doorway at which point you have to cut things to fit exactly right.  Skill required. :)

He did a lovely job cutting out for all the doorways and trim. 

I love how the wood runs under the door and into the closet.  Seamless (ish). :) 

And when he was all done with the flooring, he quickly cut and installed shoe molding around the room to cover the seam between floor and baseboard.  The only place we broke the rules a smidge was around the fireplace.  You are technically supposed to cut a groove into the brick/mortar of the hearth and slip the wood into the groove so it looks seamless.  I really didn’t want to rent a saw to cut this, so we opted to use quarter round here, too, even though it is “not recommended”.  Whatever.  The white trim sticks out here so I’m thinking I might get the shoe molding to match the floors for this part.  Or I’ll paint it.  Haven’t really decided if it’s that important yet.  :)  Anyway, after the shoe molding went down, we vacuumed (some more) and then mopped before bringing all the furniture back in. 

Luckily I had a bunch of helpers on hand to move furniture.  :) Hooray!  Everything looks awesome with the new floors. 

I spent the past day and a half reorganizing all my stuff and decorating for fall!  And vacuuming… and mopping.. haha!

Here’s the other side of the den in a never-before-seen perspective.  I was totally standing on the coffee table for this shot.  :)  But see how nice the floors look from this angle?!!  The pretty little rug was a birthday gift from Mama.  It’s a nice anti-fatigue mat from Lowes.  It’s nice and cushy where I stand for cutting and ironing.

The floors are really easy to clean but incredibly hard to keep clean.  The dark stain shows every speck of everything… and in this house, that’s a lot of things.  Especially pet hair.  Guess I’m gonna get to be good friends with my Dyson.  :)  I am planning to get a runner for the hallway in an effort to stop some of the dirt from spreading.  I threw this one down from the laundry room.  Luckily Bandit seems to like a rug here… maybe he’ll just lay there instead of on my cutting table or couch. :)  Maybe?

Since Bandit has the best view of the new floors, I’m gonna let him take you on a brief tour… 

Let’s begin in the foyer where you trip people on the way down the stairs to get your dinner served to you!

Around the corner… gosh, it’s so clean it’s ridiculous!  I need to make a mess!

And past the laundry room (unless it’s dinner time in which case you stop there first) into the den.

Then you jump up on the table and get situated right in Sarah’s sewing spot.  Keep an eye on the stairs in case someone comes down with food…

Ack!  Too much glare, just scooch over and sit on the other side where she’s laid out her next project.  Much better. 

I’m glad to see Bandit enjoys gazing at the new floors. I know I do.  Now you know you want a before and after comparison!!

Now to find a rug! :)

P.S.  Fall Mantel Decorating post will be coming soon! :)

P.P.S.  Thanks to Josh especially, but also Hannah, Mama and Michael for all their help in installing the new floors.  I am so excited!  And I love vacuuming! haha!