Suite Retreat

Shawn and I have grown accustomed to constantly shifting things around to move on (and on) with renovating Villa Terrace, but not having our bedroom for the past THREE months was the worst so far. Shawn dubbed our newly renovated bedroom the Suite Retreat cuz it's OUR refuge...I love it!! Here are some pics of what it used to look like way back when... (March 2004)


...including our former closet (if you can call it that)...this is now GONE.


After I found out I was prego with little Ry, Shawn and I decided we should replace the heavy blue color above with a mellow green (below). The unfortunate result was a very gray/green that felt more like we transported ourselves into a college dorm w/cinder block walls. This was taken June 2006. You may not notice, but the former french doors are gone, replaced with a sliding glass door and outside of that a balcony was added.


I have to share some pics of what our hallway/former bathroom has looked like for the past year and a half...(yes, the tape on the floor covers holes into very scary territory).


Now (May 19, 2007) transformed into an almost fully-functioning walk-in closet with oak flooring (and walls).


Here is the new hallway (May 19, 2007)...with more STORAGE that is soon to be filled!!


It's hard to imagine that something like this would take three months, but when you take into account the demo (of which there is lots) and then the rebuilding of walls; the purchase and hanging of doors, the few trips out by the electrician; the drywall hanging, texturing & sanding; the installation of the oak planks, sanding then varnishing of the floors; and of course the painting which took me a better part of one week to finish two coats on the ceiling and walls in all three rooms and then painting the slats on the linen closet doors-what a nightmare! Even with all my time spent painting, Shawn still contributed two ( 3 hour) evenings getting the Shinto (brown paint) onto all of the trim work that was cut and put up on Saturday (another all day affair).

But the end result (and lack of a life outside the house) is worth it now that we are able to enjoy the new Suite Retreat (May 20, 2007)...



We picked very warm green-blues for our bedroom and hallway and a bold bamboo-ish green for the closet. I LOVE them all...but mostly I am just happy to walk upstairs into our retreat because it's quiet, warm, relaxing and so long in coming!!