Wednesday, September 4, 2013

Birdsong Cottage: And yet more adventures in single wide mobile home decor...

Good morning friends. As promised, here are a few more photos of the latest accomplishments up at Birdsong. I promise you, these will be the last for a little while!

One of the things that bothered Mr. Perch the most about this place was some of the electrical wiring. In the following "before" photo, you can see the front door to the left. This is a shot from the kitchen into the living room (remember the ugly gold paint?). The white ceiling fan above was right in your face when you walked in the front door. (Well, it's actually a side door that goes to the porch.). In any case, we could not understand why someone would put a ceiling fan over the breakfast bar, not centered, and so close to the entry, and remove the original lighting that was once over the breakfast bar. Not to mention that the light switches you see to the left of the door had one switch going to the porch fan and outside light (both of which go on at the same time. Really? You can't have the fan on unless you light up the whole porch? This will be corrected one of these days!) and the other switch going to, well...nothing! So Mr. Perch took down the fan (we will instead put one centered over the living room), and rewired the whole thing the way it was originally. Or, at least the way we think it was originally, according to our neighbor, who has the same unit.


Now, when you come in the front door and click the switch, this is
what you see. A beautiful oil-rubbed bronze fixture with
Edison bulbs over the breakfast bar...


...and beautiful even with the lights turned off...


The silver chandelier over the table was replaced with this one...


...and here is a shot of it turned off.
In the background you can also see the pretty new knobs
on the cabinets...


We also have the matching pendant light that will go over
the counter between the sink and stove, but the botched
wiring for that scene will become a future story!

We also began working on the bathroom. Hubby decided to use up the leftover baseboards (not shown in these photos) in the bathroom, and since we are stuck with the ugly mobile home paneling throughout, we are going to let it work for us instead of against us.

He put up a chair rail, and I began painting it,
and the walls underneath it, with white
semi-gloss trim paint.
 It will act as wainscoting, with the top portion being
painted a deep shade of greige. 
Yes, we already have the shower curtain, towels, and such! 


Here you see the funky lemon yellow that was
on the walls when we bought this place..


Completing the bathroom will be our next step, as will be beginning to paint the trim work and doors throughout. 

Well, that's it for awhile on this subject! Have a wonderful day.

8 comments:

  1. Not tired of these photos at all...love seeing the before and after and all the work you two are putting into making this your own...style and decorating! LOVE the new lighting...truly gorgeous. And yes, work with the "problems" like the paneling vs. working against them. Heavens, that's just plain good advice for life, yes?? As for why people do things that make no sense -- i.e. putting a ceiling fan where the previous owners did, after removing lighting that "worked" where it was...the ideas some people come up with never cease to amaze and you scratch your head thinking "how do you function in every day things?" hee!!

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    1. Mr. Perch and I both had a good laugh over the last sentence of your comment. We were indeed scratching our heads a lot up there wondering the same thing. I think "taking the easy way out" would best describe previous "improvements" to that place. And it seems like a lot of the changes had taken a place quite some time ago. I wonder if future owners down the road will be thinking the same about us!! Hmmm...
      XO Sue

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  2. Glad I provided entertainment..lol!! ;) And honey, I seriously doubt that any future owners will be wondering about why you have done what you have -- it's all gorgeous not to mention functional. I think you can remove yourselves from the category of "head scratching"!! :)

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  3. Hi, I love your blog. I somehow found it while googling for interior design photos. Where did you buy the new light fixture with the Edison bulbs? I love it. Your home is so pretty.

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    1. Hi, Sherry. Thanks for reading my blog! The kitchen lighting is from Lowe's, and is from the Allen + Roth line of home decor items. Thanks for you compliment! XO

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  4. My husband and I just purchased a 99 singlewide and will put some of your design ideas to work. It looks like such a daunting task to me but we will take one step at a time. You are an inspiration, thanks.

    Linda

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    Replies
    1. Hello, Linda. Thanks for reading my blog. Your home is 30 years newer than our sweetie, so once you get into the work it will likely not be that daunting. I would love to see photos someday of how it turns out! Happy holidays!!

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