Better After

10 In living room

Living Room For Improvement

If you ever wanted to know the definition of eye-sore, look no further than this fireplace. It is literally hurting my eyes. And soul. It pains me deeply. Obviously something needed to be done about it, and there was clear need for some storage in the room too. Thankfully Kara came along and rescued it with paint, cabinets, a wall-length mantle, not to mention a huge helping of fresh n’ hot style. Behold!

Notice the glimpse of the kitchen in the edge of the picture? Well, that got a makeover too. How genius was it to extend the hanging shelf all the way to the counter to define the space, yet not close it off by keeping it open? Did that sentence even make sense? It’s early. See more from Kara on her blog Kara Paslay Designs.

September 17, 2012 By Lindsey @ Better After

9 In tables/dressers

Boys, Boys, Boys

We don’t often get to see many manly makeovers. Men are usually less concerned with mod-podging vintage sheet music inside their dresser drawers or finding the perfect shade of aqua to repaint the laundry room light fixture than we ladies are. So let’s hear it for the boys today, because here are a few aimed their way:

Jeannie at Living, Loving, Crafting did some racing checks on this dresser top, which seemed like not that difficult of a task to achieve with painters tape … until I really thought about it. Wowza.

Meg at Never a Dull Day did up this table for her husband as a ‘Congrats on getting your BS!” present. She used his favorite team’s logo as inspiration and gave it a weathered-old-sign kind of look. Nailed it. (That’s an appropriately manly thing to say, right?

And finally, Amy at Queen Of The Crazies had some fun with this dresser for her son. I’m pretty sure the drawers labeled “ammo” and “explosives” actually contain things like “underwear” and “jammies,” but his friends don’t have to know that. I bet he loves it, I know my boys would!

This post brought to you by:

Sweet deal going on right now from our sponsor Blush Accessories:

Two Tee-Shirt Extenders for the price of one!

I love mine, I wear it all the time.

Hurry, they’re going fast!

September 14, 2012 By Lindsey @ Better After

7 In desks/hutches/buffets

Lindsey + Hutch = Luv Foreva

I think I posted a white hutch makeover just a few days ago, but I don’t think you’ll mind seeing another one. Unless you mind seeing honey-colored wood being painted over. In that case, you probably mind much of what goes on on this blog. Or, if you mind awesomeness. In that case, I can’t help you. Because Andrea’s hutch here is pure quality-grade awesome and I’d put it in my own home in a heartbeat. I’d invite it for dinner and let it sleep in my bed, that’s how much I love it.

Check out more on her blog Andrea + Chris + Our Chaos.

This post brought to you by:

Sweet deal going on right now from our sponsor Blush Accessories:

Two Tee-Shirt Extenders for the price of one!

I love mine, I wear it all the time.

Hurry, they’re going fast!

September 14, 2012 By Lindsey @ Better After

9 In outdoors

Coo-coo For You

I looked at this redo from Amanda from Mommy Is CooCoo and bemoaned, “Why can’t I ever find anything like this?!” Then I remembered that I actually HAVE found something exactly like this once, at a little vintage shop in Sugar House, in Salt Lake City. And it looked very much like the before, and I thought, “Wow, what a piece of crap.” Oh, what a silly fool I was.

September 13, 2012 By Lindsey @ Better After

5 In other rooms

Let’s go to the movies! Let’s go see the stars!

Going to the movies is usually a majorly disappointing experience for me, and here’s why: For one, it’s freaking expensive. If we take our family of five to the movies and share one popcorn, it’s around $50! And then, you usually end up sitting next to someone who won’t turn off their phone, or a bunch of immature teenagers throwing candy at each other the whole time, or OHMYGOSH THAT PERSON IN THE SEAT BEHIND ME WHO PUT THEIR BARE FEET NEXT TO MY FACE FOR THE WHOLE MOVIE I AM STILL VOMITING IN MY NIGHTMARES.

So, I can totally get behind the ‘home theater’ idea. Laura at Top This, Top That recently updated hers to look less like a theater, with the black walls and gold fringed curtains, and more like a relaxing, homey home. Home – that place where everybody knows your name, and the only bare feet touching you are your own.

September 13, 2012 By Lindsey @ Better After

7 In tables/dressers

Immaculate Construction

Buckle up your tool belt, because today’s makeovers involve more than just a simple coat of paint. They require things like hammers and nails, and the imagination to see what a pile of boards has the potential to become. (Plus the skills to construct them. That helps.)

Like this project from Better After reader Kim that started life as a few boards from Home Depot and three crates from JoAnn’s. But with the addition of casters, brackets and a coat of gray wood stain, she created an industrial coffee table!

This one requires even more imagination. Brie at Darling Doodles had a big, empty entryway and was determined to do something about it. She liked a certain entryway bench she saw in a magazine, but for $299, she knew she could do better. She ended up saving $279 and Frankensteined one herself with plywood and some old tables parts that were headed to the dump! I think it looks sturdy and sharp and even better than the $299 version.