guest bathroom reno

let me take y’all back and remind y’all of the guest bathroom ‘before’ photos: whoever “installed” this vanity didn’t know what they were doing…

vanity removed, paint added to the walls and the ceiling.found this vanity on sale at lowes and chris was able to install it without any trouble. shower curtain from target and bath rugs from bed, bath & beyond.found this awesome mirror at homegoods for under $100.all we have left to do is change out the faucet, light fixture and add some storage shelves to the wall.

front door update

time to change the colors of our entryway. let me remind y’all of what the front door/entryway looked like when we bought our house:how did someone ever think this combo was a good idea? peach walls, berry wallpaper, green tile, plus, look at the lighting and how it made everything look yellow…

i picked out several color samples from home depot and started testing them out on the door. i went a little crazy and ended up covering the whole thing.and then one more coat…changed the hardware, added a rug from homegoods and a light fixture from the west elm outlet (30% off) and we have a new entryway!

popcorn ceiling removal

we’ve been dreading this day since the day we moved in… the day we remove the popcorn ceilings. everyone told us to hire someone else to do it but why hire help when we are capable of doing it ourselves? it took patience and a lot of time but we got it done and our ceilings look wonderful!

step 1: covering the floors. we would have done the ceilings before the floors were put in (it would have been a heck of a lot easier) but we needed the floors done before we moved in all our furniture so it worked out this way.step 2: spray down the ceilings with water. we started with one side of the house and worked our way over to the other half.step 3: start scraping. i recommend plastic putty knives instead of metal ones because if your ceilings are a little too wet, the metal will tear through the drywall.step 4: clean up!

laundry room reno

let me remind y’all of our laundry room ‘before’…   we removed the wallpaper and popcorn ceilings with a water sprayer and plastic putty knives. then we pulled out the old cabinets and got to painting. for most of the house, we went with the classic BEHR premium plus ultra paint in dolphin fin from home depot. for the ceilings we chose BEHR premium plus ultra paint ultra pure white flat. primed the cabinets with kilz 2 white multi-surface primer and used BEHR premium plus pure ultra white semi-gloss for the top coat and screwed the cabinets back onto the wall once dry.

we still have some work to do but we’ve made a lot of progress.

laundry room: inspo

            : pinterest

searching for small laundry room inspiration. our laundry room is a laundry/pantry combo and is tucked away in a small space just off the kitchen.

flooring options

chris and i thought long and hard about what type of flooring we wanted in our home. we have two dogs which helped us narrow down our decision. our top options were concrete/cement, hardwood/bamboo and tile. here is some inspiration:and here is what we ended up choosing:a wood grained tile from floor and decor.

i wanted the same flooring throughout our whole house to make our home look bigger instead of separating each room. i had the idea of having the tile put in at a diagonal or the herringbone design instead of horizontally to change up the normal look of everyday flooring. because of cost and time, we went with the diagonal design. we hired a tile installation contractor who was referred to us by our realtor. i will not name the company because we didn’t have the greatest experience with them. after over a month of labor, our floors are finally finished. the installation wasn’t exactly what i had asked for, but the floors are beautiful and not many people notice the errors that were made during the install. the tile flooring is easy to clean, modern and puppy approved.

our home: before photos

chris and i needed a house, and we needed a house fast. we only had a couple months before chris started medical school which left us really only one weekend to look for a home. we took a trip out to san antonio for the med school’s ‘welcome weekend’ and looked at almost 10 homes in one day. they were awful. all of them. it was saturday night, we were leaving sunday morning. we were driving around to pass time and drove by a house that wasn’t even listed yet. the for sale sign was just put up, we called our realtor and told him to do whatever he could to show us the house in the morning before our flight. sunday morning we got the call, drove back to the house, did the quickest walk-through ever, made an offer, and within a few weeks, our offer was accepted! we didn’t see the house again until today. when we did the walk-through, i didn’t even notice all the projects and renovations that were in store for us. lots of work ahead but we can’t wait to see how we can transform this space into something of our own. here are the ‘before’ photos of our home, enjoy! pictured: 3 bedroom, 2 bath, single story home.  

our first home

our honeymoon is unfortunately over but we are anxious and excited to move into our new home. after a lot of stress, we did it, we bought our first house together!

i personally have been looking forward to this day for a long, long time. this is the reason i started this blog. since i was younger, i have alway had a passion for interior design. i always had to paint my room, decorate it with the cutest decor, create diy projects, and pick out and rearrange my furniture at least once a month. i became obsessed with hgtv and pinterest, always wanting to own my own home so i could create a space with my own style and artistic touch.

so here it starts… our journey to renovate this home built in 1993. popcorn ceilings, wallpaper, shag carpet, red paint, laminate counters, vertical blinds, you name it, it’s probably in this house. i can’t wait to learn and grow as a designer and there is no better place to start and our own home.

we’re married!

chris and i married on may 30, 2015 in oakdale, ca in front of 250+ of our closest family and friends. it was the best day of our lives and we couldn’t have pictured it anymore perfect than it was. i knew i wanted to plan a wedding that was a little outside the box and that was unique to chris and i. since we both lived and met in berkeley, we wanted to bring some of our favorite things from the city to our small country venue. i knew i wanted everything in our wedding to be mixed and matched, a bit nontraditional, and inspired by the places we lived in. one of my favorite colors is gold. i believe it is both masculine and feminine and mixed with our rustic barn venue, would bring some elegance and beauty. for the dresses, each of my bridesmaids chose a gold sequin dress and picked styles that fit their body type, not the traditional same dress, same color.we decided to go with navy blue as our accent color. why else? because chris and i both went to cal. cal colors: navy blue and gold. i found my florist in berkeley whose boutique was next door to the building where i worked. our flowers were perfection. the tables, bouquets, and especially the inside of our venue. i designed my arbor, my dad built and welded it, and my florist brought my vision to life with the most beautiful display i had ever seen. one of my favorite parts of our wedding was our food. chris and i love our date nights and one of our favorite places to go were the food truck events in and around berkeley. we decided that we needed some of these trucks at our wedding so we made it happen, they were a hit! we chose burgers and fries, chicken and waffles and grilled cheese and mashed potato balls. we also went with a local live band from oakdale for our cocktail hour entertainment.and just a few other details for our day…
venue: galas family barn – oakdale, ca
dress: lazaro, style 3415 ivory/gold
food: grilled cheese bandits, opie’s gap truck, the waffle roost – bay area, ca
dessert: rocko’s ice cream tacos – san mateo, ca
flowers: gorgeous & green boutique – berkeley, ca
bridesmaid dresses: mace’s and nordstrom
groomsmen suits: jos. a. bank
dj: george gonzales, sounds in motion – modesto, ca
photographer: alicia gines photography
live music: live again – oakdale, ca
make-up: jocelyn burchall – modesto, ca
hair: lindsey dovik – manteca, ca
wedding registry: zola.com
invitations/stationary: laura joseph, paper and honey – etsy.com

c a to t x

: marissa adcock @xoxo_marissa

as i write my first blog post, i can’t help but think about all the memories i’ve made in california over the last 27 years, but the most special year was this year, 2015. i am engaged, moving my life halfway across the country, and starting a new adventure in a whole new city i’ve never been to.

i was born in modesto, ca (pop. 205,000) and lived in escalon, ca (pop. 7,000) until i was 14 years old. it was time for a change, and by change i mean a 10 mile drive down the road to the next town over, oakdale, ca (pop. 21,000). for those of you who don’t know me, one thing that everyone who does know me knows i grew up playing softball since i was 7 years old. it consumed my life, pitching lessons almost every day, tournaments year-round every weekend, recruiting trips, coaching and camps. i ended up receiving a full-ride scholarship and played 4 years of collegiate softball for the university of california, berkeley and graduated with a bachelor of arts degree in practice of art. after i graduated, i met my (now fiancé) chris, who also attended cal and played football. from when he was little, chris always knew he wanted to be a doctor so we were committed as a couple to be open about where life would take us together after undergrad. chris pursued his passion to attend med school and applied to schools all over the west coast and texas. we were engaged dec. 2013 and are planning a spring wedding for may 2015. we will fly straight from our honeymoon in hawaii, to our new home in san antonio, tx (pop. 1.4 million) where chris was accepted by the university of texas health science center of san antonio to attend medical school.

today we leave berkeley, ca (pop. 116,700) which has been my home for almost the last 9 years. we cannot wait to see what God has planned for us and we are so excited to see what the future holds.