Knee Deep In A Lake Somewhere...

Heading to Smith Mountain Lake for the week...seriously the most picturesque lake ever!!! Catch ya on the flip side!

-Meghan

PS Click here to have a little laugh over our plea for a new kitchie!

Design Services

A lot of people have been asking about my design services. Therefore, I've decided to run a little promotion on my online consultations. I will offer my e-consulting services for the following prices:

One Room E-Consult: $48

Two Room E-Consult: $88

Three Room E-Consult: $128


For an online consult, you simply email me pictures and measurements of your home, photos of furniture you already have, design elements you wish to incorporate, and anything else we deem important. Once I receive all the information I need, I will e-mail you a completed design including a simple floor layout, color plan, idea board, source list and tips to install the design. 

If you are interested or would like more information, please email me at meghan@meghanstroebel.com

Thanks again for all the support!

-Meghan

Master Bedroom Remodel

I'm not sure if I already mentioned it, but my father-in-law is an amazing woodworker and furniture maker. Before my in-laws retired, he had made a beautiful bed out of tiger maple. After they moved, they no longer had room for the frame, so we luckily snatched it. It is absolutely gorgeous and insanely comfortable. However, all the furniture we currently have in our room does not compliment it at all. Therefore, I obviously need to completely remodel our room! Here is a before shot of our master bedroom (sorry about the quality of the picture):

And here is what I am thinking for the remodel...

And...of course, I have already started. I found the lamps at Homegoods over the weekend and ordered the yellow ikat pillow cases. I created, framed, and hung our children's silhouettes over our bed. I made them in Photoshop and printed them out on regular paper, but here is a tutorial if you do not have an editing program. For side tables, I am thinking about recreating this Ikea Rast Hack, but painting them completely white. I also have a bookcase that I want to paint in one of my favorite gray colors, Rustoleum Smoke Gray. The walls of our bedroom are already painted in Benjamin Moore Gray Cashmere, also one of my favorite gray colors! It is slowly coming together...I promise to post more pics later...sorry my husband is still sleeping so I can not get any current ones right now. 

-Meghan

Upstairs Bath

After we moved into our house, one of our first projects was the upstairs bathroom. It was gross. It had a Pepto-bismol pink sink, toilet, and bathtub. And, they had painted the walls a slightly lighter Pepto-bismol color. The tile, a shiny black, was chipped and and outdated. There was even a sink sprayer attached to the tub faucet!!! It was a mess...I mean, just look at the before pics:

We knew we had to tackle the bathroom immediately, I was 7 months pregnant and refused to use it in its current shape. So, we had several contractors come to look at it, all quoting us over $10,000 to fix it up!! Ten G's.....ya right! I did some research, and found Miracle Method. A lot of families in the DC metro area recommended them, so I decided to give them a try. Instead of removing the tile, they use a special high chemical spray paint to refinish existing tile, bathtub, sinks, etc. They gave us a quote for just under $1,700 to refinish the existing tub and all wall/shower tile. We decided to replace the floor tile, sink, and toilet ourselves (and by ourselves, I mean my husband). The refinishing was so easy, they came on a Monday morning and we were able to start using the bathroom by Wednesday evening. Note: I did have to leave the house during the spray and stayed out for 24 hours, but I was being extra cautious since I was pregnant.

Over the next 8 weeks, my husband removed all the existing floor tile, lay new tile, and installed a new mirror, sink, and toilet (everything was purchased from Home Depot). I was SERIOUSLY impressed with his work, considering he barely knew how to hammer a nail in the wall properly. He literally went on Amazon and ordered a bunch of Home Improvement books, studied them, and YouTubed the process as he went. We went with a tan paint color, Benjamin Moore - Elephant Tusk. The total cost of the entire remodel ended up being around $2,500, saving us over $7,000 for the original quote. There are some little details we need to finish, but overall it ended up absolutely lovely. See for yourself:

-Meghan

Basement Remodel!

We recently finished our basement and I finally had my sister Ali take all the "after" shots. Here are some before pics...(WARNING: Very Very Scary)

I swear, that was actually my basement. We literally had to demo to the studs. It was a pretty long, gruesome process, but I can finally say it is almost complete. We still have some art to hang and I am working on refinishing dining chairs, otherwise, here it is:

One of the biggest transformations was the stairs. We decided to refinish the tops of the stairs and paint the rest white. Before, there was different color 70's carpet stapled to the stairs with MOUNDS of dirt under it. It was awful!! For the floor tile, we really wanted to go with a larger tile, so we found a great 18" one from Home Depot. 

I wanted to create a little spot for our musical instruments. My husband loves playing the piano and has always dreamed of learning electric guitar. For Christmas this year, Santa brought him his first Fender. It really is a good looking piece, so we wanted to have a special spot for it. He already knows Everclear's "Santa Monica" by heart...

We knocked down the bar that was originally in the basement and turned the it into a little dining area. The chandelier was a total bargain from Overstock and looks so elegant. We kept the stainless steel sink, I just love its industrial look, especially in contrast to the chandelier. I owned the round table already and simply painted it in Rustoleum High Gloss Smoke Gray, which comes in a spray paint. I'm currently reupholstering chairs to go with it (will post later).  

We purchased all new windows and could not decide if we should get a new door. We ended up keeping the original door and refinishing it. It turned out great and the color of the wood next to the walls is a great combination. The walls are painted Sherwin Williams Comfort Gray. It is a gray with a lot of green and blue undertones. 

I'm still playing around with the layout of the entertainment area. My husband bought a HUGE 3D television on Black Friday (...Black Friday, something that rhymes with Friday). It was really hard to find an entertainment set for underneath that fit the space. I finally found two dressers from Craig's List that work perfectly. The blue ikat chair is from Target and I think I am going to buy one more for the space. I got the coffee table for free from Craig's List. The sofa was a hand-me-down from my father and step-mother and the pillows were from One Kings Lane. The tufted blue leather chair belong to my husband's grandparents. It is a beautiful piece of furniture that ended up inspiring a lot of the color scheme I used. My sister is living with us this summer and has been using the basement as her bedroom so we have her full size bed. Once she moves out, we want to keep a bed down there so the room can double up as a guest room. The herringbone duvet on the bed is from Urban Outfitters and the mirrors above the bed were also a Craig's List find. 

The laundry room has become of my favorite rooms in the house. The washer and dryer are from Home Depot and are monsters. I think I eventually want to build pedestals for them like this. The utility sink has been a blessing and the faucet is from Overstock. The walls are painted Sherwin Williams Coppen Blue. 

The bathroom was a little bit of a headache for my contractor. I had a pretty specific idea in mind and a very small budget. I originally ordered a different console sink and completely misread the dimensions. It ended up being way too big, so we had to find a smaller sink. We finally picked out a simple pedestal sink, faucet, and toilet from Home Depot. The marble floor tile and the white subway tile are from Home Depot as well. The photographs do not even do the tile justice, it is GORGEOUS. The exposed shower faucet took a ton of work to put in, but was totally worth it. The shower size is a irregularly large, so my contractor and I had a pretty difficult time finding glass doors that fit. Everything came together in the end though and looks absolutely breathtaking. Somehow, my contractor dealt with my craziness, although I'm sure there were times he wanted to bury me behind the drywall. His crew did an amazing amazing job and we could not be happier with it!! 

-Meghan