Ok, before we start talking about a kitchen makeover, I have to share with you a funny video we created about how much I want to meet Joanna Gaines when I go to Waco in May! If you could take a look and share on Facebook or on YouTube, it would mean so much to me!!
I’m pretty sure it’ll make you laugh so take a couple minutes to check it out! We all need to laugh more. :)
For this week’s kitchen makeover, I wanted to show a two toned kitchen makeover from a home in Brunswick. Here’s the kitchen before:
We painted the top cabinets Calm and the bottom cabinets Chelsea Gray by Benjamin Moore. We also added new hardware. It freshened up this kitchen so much!
You can use our Contact Us form or check out other kitchen projects on our For Sale page. We’ll need to see a picture of your kitchen, a list of how many doors and drawers there are, and were you are located to email you an estimate. This change ups the value of your home and gives you a whole new look at a fraction of the cost of new kitchen cabinets!
Also, check out our store for new furniture available this week:
Please sign up for our weekly newsletter by adding your email in the little box below my picture.
Happy FunCycling Friends, Sarah ;)
If you like what you see, please like FunCycled’s Facebook page to keep up to date on the newest finds, vote on colors and give your input on our creativity. We also offer interior design, kitchen cabinet painting, and custom built tables, barn doors, and furniture. We can deliver for customers in upstate NY and also help you ship throughout the US. Send us a note with what you would like using our contact page. Or buy something that we’ve already designed from our online shop.
Sometimes the story behind our projects are worth sharing because they are filled with so much love and joy. This story started over 4 years ago when Nancy and John came to us about building a custom table for their home. What I thought would be a typical table order turned into anything but that. Nancy was so kind and thoughtful. She would fill my phone with encouraging texts and would never be hurt if I couldn’t get back to her right away. She would constantly say, I just want to share what’s on my heart for you, but never feel like you need to reply. I always would reply (of course), but sometimes it would take days. In 4 years, she’s been only kind and encouraging. To say the word ONLY seems so small, but finding a friend like that is a rare treat. One table turned into at least one piece of our furniture in almost every room of their house. It also turned into monthly coffee dates with Nancy and the gift of a sweet, sweet friendship. She loves to talk designs together, she brings gifts for my kids, brings me lunch while soaking up every word that I say about how life is going… the good and the bad, and adds joy to my days. If I ever need a pick me up, I’ll open our texts and scroll up to encourage my heart. So, this is my turn Nancy. To say a public thanks for everything you are… beautiful from the inside out. You’re sweet, gentle, fun loving, kind hearted, and very, very good at being a friend. I’m so thankful for the gift of your friendship in my life. 💕
Nancy and her family loved perusing antique shops while enjoying the Northeastern coast. Nancy and her mom found this buffet at an antique’s store in Maine and fell in love with it. They even found someone who was willing to drive it back to the capital district for them and that sealed the deal! Nancy and her mom refinished the buffet to bring it back to life so this piece holds a special place in her heart. Nancy’s mom is no longer here on earth, but her memories will never be lost and pieces like this remind Nancy of the special trips and time with her mom. That’s one of my favorite things about redoing furniture with a story. Our clients can cherish those beautiful memories but also transform their furniture into a styles that works with their new designs. Nancy has a great eye and wanted to switch things up bit by painting it black.
Here it is before:
We painted the outside with Benjamin Moore’s Black, lightly distressed it, and sprayed it with a protective clear coat. If you want to see how we paint furniture, check out our How to Paint Furniture post. Ready for it??? Here are the afters for you!
This buffet was done as a custom order, but you can check out some of the many new pieces on our For Sale page:
There is a box at the top right of this page to enter your email address to receive notifications by email when I post something new on this blog. Please sign up today!
Happy FunCycling Friends, Sarah ;)
If you like what you see, please like FunCycled’s Facebook page to keep up to date on the newest finds, vote on colors and give your input on our creativity. We also offer interior design, kitchen cabinet painting, and custom built tables, barn doors, and furniture. We can deliver for customers in upstate NY and also help you ship throughout the US. Send us a note with what you would like using our contact page. Or buy something that we’ve already designed from our online shop.
Change, change, change! That’s been the motto of my life since January 1 and, man, is it exciting! Just this week, two new people have joined the FunCycled team and I’m so excited to have help! I’ll be introducing you all to the team soon. There so many exciting things ahead!!
This week, I wanted to show you a tiny kitchen update. When Brielle asked me if we could make her kitchen look good without replacing the cabinets, I was so excited to say yes!! Of course! Let’s repurpose instead of wasting and save you money, too!
We did have to build a new door because one was too damaged, but other than that, we framed out the existing doors with trim to give them a shaker style.
We painted the cabinets with Benjamin Moore’s color Whitestone 2134-60 and installed new tile!
You can use our Contact Us form or check out other kitchen projects on our For Sale page. We’ll need to see a picture of your kitchen, a list of how many doors and drawers there are, and were you are located to email you an estimate. This change ups the value of your home and gives you a whole new look at a fraction of the cost of new kitchen cabinets!
Also, check out our store for new furniture available this week:
Please sign up for our weekly newsletter by adding your email in the little box below my picture.
Happy FunCycling Friends, Sarah ;)
If you like what you see, please like FunCycled’s Facebook page to keep up to date on the newest finds, vote on colors and give your input on our creativity. We also offer interior design, kitchen cabinet painting, and custom built tables, barn doors, and furniture. We can deliver for customers in upstate NY and also help you ship throughout the US. Send us a note with what you would like using our contact page. Or buy something that we’ve already designed from our online shop.
This week, we completed almost everything in a commercial design job that started back in December. We’ve been working with the Albany Lofts at One Broadway to turn their conference room into a co-working space and meeting space for their tenants and staff.
Here’s how the room looked the first time I saw it:
They loved the designs we created in the past that mixed modern and industrial. So we created a design board incorporating some of both style for them. Their company logo is teal so they wanted to make sure that color was part of the design. Other than that, it was a blank canvas and boy was that fun.
I like to start by finding out if there are any historical items in the space that we can include with the design. Whether that’s to make furniture out of or decorations. They didn’t have any items to create furniture out of but they had a lot of old prints. We took the prints and had them matted and framed in oversized 2’x4′ gold frames. I loved the contrast of the black and white pictures with modern finish and colors.
We took the large pillars and actually had them stand out by painted them with Benjamin Moore’s Black and painted the walls and the walls are Harbor Gray AC-25.
One of my favorite parts of this design was the hand made Albany string art sign that we ordered. It’s so beautiful!
Commercial design has exploded for us since January 1st so you’ll see plenty more projects soon! I couldn’t have done it without the help of my design assistant, Kelly! She’s been an absolute God-send!
If you have a business and would like us to help redesign your space, please use our Contact Us Form to request our services.
Check out the furniture available online as well!
If you’d like to purchase any of our one of a kind furniture, check out our online FunCycled Furniture Shop.
Please sign up for our weekly newsletter by adding your email in the little box below my picture.
Happy FunCycling Friends, Sarah ;)
If you like what you see, please like FunCycled’s Facebook page to keep up to date on the newest finds, vote on colors and give your input on our creativity. We also offer interior design, kitchen cabinet painting, and custom built tables, barn doors, and furniture. We can deliver for customers in upstate NY and also help you ship throughout the US. Send us a note with what you would like using our contact page. Or buy something that we’ve already designed from our online shop.
Today at lunch, I’m leading a discussion on Embracing Failure: Taking risks and learning from mistakes for the Rensselaer County Regional Chamber of Commerce Wonder Women Mentoring Luncheon. I thought I’d share a little bit about of that talk with you today, too. I don’t want you to feel left out. 😘 When they gave me the topic they’d like me to talk about, my first reaction was… what will I even talk about? It’s not because I haven’t failed at things in life… far from it. It’s more that I don’t believe I view failure like most people do. Most people see failure when they see little balances in their bank accounts, or from not landing that big sale they had hoped to, or because they watched the company they dreamed about crumble before them. I get that thinking. I really do. I most often view failure from the perspective of life as a big picture. Follow my thinking for a minute. In the end of my life, will I have done my very best to use the talents God has given me? Did I teach my children to love, work hard, be kind, show grace to those who view things differently than we do? Am I being a friend/spouse who brings joy and happiness into a room, shows up when it’s important, sees the pain in their eyes and asks about it instead of ignoring it? I know that’s not what they had in mind when they asked me to speak so I don’t think I’ll bring this up, but I do want to encourage all of you… try to keep the end in mind because it’s helpful in adding healthy perspective for today.
Let’s swing back into the business side of things though; what do we do with failure?? How do we handle a job where they don’t choose our company? How do we handle trying to make a new product and no one buys it? How do we accept when things just aren’t working with a staff member who we thought would be the next best manager? I like to explain small business like this. Small business is like walking on a road filled with adventures, life, and unexpected turns…. then you hit a wall. When you hit that wall, you can decide to stop walking that road, turn around, or jump over that wall. After you jump over the wall (you jump because you’re an entrepreneur and you love a challenge), you keep walking and enjoying the adventure. Then you walk into another wall, but this time it’s too tall to jump over. So you have to decide if you’re going to turn around or build something to get yourself over that next wall. So you learn new skills, build a ladder, create a community to help you… and so on and so on and so on. It doesn’t really ever stop. It just become one new challenge after another. In time you learn that a challenge or failure is ok, you grow stronger, and you look back and are thankful for what all of those walls have taught you. You see how much stronger you are, how much you’ve learned, how many wonderful people you’ve met along the way. So in the end, I don’t look at walls like failures; I view them as opportunities for growth. I learn so much every day. Whether it’s from losing money because I thought something would be a good investment and it wasn’t, or losing time because I didn’t plan adequately, or losing sales because I didn’t learn how to interact with all different personality types quickly enough. It’s not failure; it’s really isn’t. It’s an opportunity for doing better with more wisdom next time. That actually makes you more valuable because you’ve learned what doesn’t work.
Michael Jordan said it so well, “I’ve missed more than 9000 shots in my career. I’ve lost almost 300 games. 26 times, I’ve been trusted to take the game winning shot and missed. I’ve failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed.”
Listen to me. Every. Single. Time. that voice whispers in your ear that you’re a failure, I want you to align your perspective with truth. The truth is EVERY SINGLE person makes mistakes and fails. Many times, it’s not even their fault. You are the person who will take that “failure” and flip it into an opportunity to try something new, or try it again, or never do it again – if it is a bad move. “Failure should be our teacher, not our undertaker. Failure is delay, not defeat. It is a temporary detour, not a dead end. Failure is something we can avoid only by saying nothing, doing nothing, and being nothing.” – Denis Waitley
If you were at the event, here’s the link to the video about how to handle stress that I told you about: How to Make Stress Your Friend
Keep on trying and keep your head held high. With no risk comes very little reward.
I also know you love to see pretty things… so let me share a bedroom set that we just added to our store this week. I love taking vintage pieces and adding barn wood to create one of kind dresser sets!
If you’d like to purchase this set or any of our one of a kind furniture, check out our online FunCycled Furniture Shop.
If you’d like this blog post in your email weekly, please sign up by adding your email in the little box below my picture.
Happy FunCycling Friends, Sarah ;)
If you like what you see, please like FunCycled’s Facebook page to keep up to date on the newest finds, vote on colors and give your input on our creativity. We also offer interior design, kitchen cabinet painting, and custom built tables, barn doors, and furniture. We can deliver for customers in upstate NY and also help you ship throughout the US. Send us a note with what you would like using our contact page. Or buy something that we’ve already designed from our online shop.
When we recently closed on our 1805 Repurposed Idea House, the list of what needed to be done was so long that it would even scare Santa away… and Santa knows how to read long lists. 😂
We knew that we COULD do most projects on our house, but SHOULD we do most of the projects?? We started by deciding what should be passed off to someone else because of time or risk. We’ve learned over time that often leaving a project in the hands of a professional really will save you time, stress, and often money. It sounds expensive up front but if you were to count in the time and cost for trial and error, often you can come out ahead by hiring a professional.
So… we looked through the list and decided on dumping all our rehab loan money into the roof, concrete slabs in the workshop, electrical work, windows, and new furnaces. Sometimes projects like that can be hard to to invest in first because you don’t see much of a difference after all the money is gone, but it’s so important to make sure those types of projects are done first so the more cosmetic jobs are being built on solid, safe innards.
Lots of people have asked me how we’ve finished so much on the house already so I wanted to share a few tips we’ve learned along the way.
1. Once the inspection on the house was done, I started making calls for quotes on all of the major projects. I booked all of the projects to start the day of closing. That’s a little risky if anything fell through but we were pretty confident that this was a solid sale and didn’t see anything that would delay or stop the purchase.
2. Get a couple quotes per project – it’s always good to know the pricing differences between contractors. I don’t always go with the cheapest contractor. Some projects are worth risking that, but I weighed experience and recommendations over cost. To be honest… The cheapest contractors caused the most headaches and had finished products that were problematic. The most expensive contractor was the absolute best one we worked with. He showed up on time, had helpful recommendations, and was professional. He was worth every penny.
3. Take time to ask your contractors what they would do if it was their house. This was something I’ve learned from owning an interior design and contracting business. Often a client doesn’t really want to know what would be best, they just want us to do what they think would be good or cute. I’ve learned how helpful it can be to ask contractors their opinion before the work starts. On the first day of the project, before anything was ripped out, I walked through with most of the contractors and said, this was our game plan but what do you think would be best. In a couple cases, we changed the plans and it worked out really well.
4. Follow up – a lot. Another thing about some contractors is that they don’t show up on time. Or at all. So we needed to be a little persistent to follow up and follow up and follow up again.
5. Scope changes – ask to be notified of price changes. One thing we didn’t do well was asking ahead of time to be notified of price changes to the original scope. That meant on the final day of some projects, we had sticker shock because we didn’t realize some of those changes cost significantly more than originally quoted. Sometimes a contractor won’t tell you and you’re stuck with no options to keep it within budget.
6. Don’t finish paying until the work is done. Most contractors (FunCycled included) requires some type of deposit to start the work; that’s fair and expected. We paid one contractor in full before the job was done and that was a big mistake because he didn’t care that much about coming back and finishing the job. Lesson learned there, too!
7. Try to have as many projects as possible done at the same time. I know budgets often restrict multiple projects, but if you are getting a rehab loan for the work, plan to do as much as possible at once. You have to be there so often to check work, answer questions, pay contractors, and do other projects, it’s just easier to have everyone there at the same time.
Another overall tip for projects… If you’re redoing a house with your partner, go out on a date with a pen and book to write down all of your priorities and make a list that you both agree on to be the priorities when you start. It’ll change a bit as unexpected projects come up but it helps clear up so many differences you may have and it’ll hopefully avoid an unnecessary fight. For example… my first priority was removing the gross black carpet from the bathroom. Barf! When I said that, John said… no way. Our priority is the kitchen! We each made our lists and then decided on which things we could compromise on and agree to do in order. Side note, the carpet is out of the bathroom. Hahaha.
I hope this helps you with your future projects!! Thanks for following along on this journey with us! You’re the best FunCyclers I know!! xoxoxo
There is a box just below the picture of me to enter your email address to receive notifications by email when I post something new on this blog. Please sign up today!
If you like what you’ve learned here, I’ll also be speaking on March 5th at the Wonder Woman Luncheon for the Rensselaer County Chamber of Commerce. “Learn how to amplify your voice and be heard. Join top women professionals as they share their experiences at this popular event. Attendees will get to experience three 20-minute roundtables, sparking lively and candid conversations about career challenges and solutions. You get to select mentors to meet and discover their strategies for success. Learn from other professional women to discover the wonder woman in you.” Register here.
Happy FunCycling Friends, Sarah ;)
If you like what you see, please like FunCycled’s Facebook page to keep up to date on the newest finds, vote on colors and give your input on our creativity. Last but not least, let us customize a furniture piece for you. We create custom furniture and will deliver for customers in upstate NY and also ship throughout the US. Send us a note with what you would like using our contact page. Or buy something that we’ve already designed from our furniture for sale page.
On December 3rd, we signed our names on a line around a table full of lawyers, mortgage brokers, and a realtor. I can’t tell you how much it meant to have the best support around us when we bought this house.
They aren’t paying me to say this, but I have to tell you all about the amazing people who made the process seamless for us.
Mike Rankin from ClearPath Mortgage Solutions is an absolute rock star. This is the 2nd house Mike has helped us get a mortgage for and I couldn’t recommend him any higher. If you need a mortgage, he’s your guy!
Elena Furciniti is the paralegal for attorney Paul B. Sheer. You can email her at admin@pbslegal.com. She went out of her way to make this day so smooth for us! She had my back from day one and was on top of EVERY little detail.
Also, I know everyone has a real-estate agent that they know and love, but if you want someone who’s as kind as can be, has a big picture perspective, and knows how to negotiate a deal, MaryGrace Katonah is where it’s at! She helped me so much with the sale of our 1805 Dream House.
We closed on the house at 10am and at noon, we had 4 contractors installing a new roof, furnaces, electrical, and poured concrete slabs. I love adventure and learning new things, but learning to love change has evolved in me over time through seeing how risk can be rewarding and fun. Ten years ago, I would never have taken the risk of buying a fixer upper while still owning a house that wasn’t even under contract yet, and balancing a huge project while running a thriving business. Never. Ever. Ever. I would have told you that I hate change actually and that I’m happy with my steady tiny paycheck and never wanted to move. John has taught me the value of risk, the joy that comes from trusting in God alone to provide, and the faith it takes to challenge and pursue a dream.
Driving to the Repurposed Idea House, I cried, and cried, and cried some more. I wasn’t sure if I made the smartest decision of my life or if I’d end up regretting it more than anything. There were so many unknowns, so much to do; would I end up hating all the work? Would my kids resent all the time we’d have to invest into this project? Will I go broke making it beautiful again? As the thoughts came in my mind, Look Up Child started playing in my car. It was like God swooped down and reminded me to look up. He’s right there in ever tired day, every overwhelming moment, and every family decision. He’s got this. He loves me more than I know. He loves my family more than I do. The decision was made, now lets make the very best of it.
So in I went to meet with the contractors. I walked into the kitchen to find that our delightful neighbor had left gifts for my kids and beautiful old pictures of the house for us. Bring on the tears again, but it was happy tears. Knowing that love was poured into this place and I was near a neighbor with a kind heart made me so happy. I mean, look at this beauty!
The previous owner, Eleanor, was born here 95 years ago and has lived in this farm house her whole life. On December 3rd, for the first time since 1805, the keys for this home were given to someone outside of the family. They were placed in our hands. We will make this beauty shine again, Eleanor, room by room. Through sweat and I’m sure some tears, we’ll take this gift and give it our best work. Reviving the old through as much repurposing as possible.
In the months and probably years to come, I’ll be sharing our adventures and projects from this house right here on the blog.
There is a box at the top right of this page to enter your email address to receive notifications by email when I post something new on this blog. Please sign up today!
In other news. last week, ACE held it’s February #CreativeEconomyMixer at Darn Good Yarn in Clifton Park. NYS Assemblywoman Carrie Woerner led an engaging discussion with Darn Good Yarn founder Nicole Snow and me, with a focus on Women and Entrepreneurship. I was thrilled for the opportunity to talk about women in business and what it takes to build a successful business.
Happy FunCycling Friends, Sarah ;)
If you like what you see, please like FunCycled’s Facebook page to keep up to date on the newest finds, vote on colors and give your input on our creativity. Last but not least, let us customize a furniture piece for you. We create custom furniture and will deliver for customers in upstate NY and also ship throughout the US. Send us a note with what you would like using our contact page. Or buy something that we’ve already designed from our furniture for sale page.
How are you? This past Saturday was move in day! Our Repurposed Idea House is packed to the brim with boxes and furniture. We looked at it and said… ready or not, here we come! We were so blessed by our family, Grace Fellowship church family, and friends (and strangers) from Waterford Wesleyan Church who came to help us move. We couldn’t have done it without you and we were humbled by your joyful spirit as you did trip after trip for our home and workshop items.
If you don’t follow our Facebook page, you have to see how the guys opened up our ceiling to fit furniture upstairs!! Part 1 and Part 2
Also, the widow company had a cancellation and could install all our new windows the same day so we moved around 28 new windows getting installed!
For this week’s Tuesday’s Treasures, I wanted to show you a couple custom built tables that we’ve made this month. It’s been a while since I talked about the fact that we build custom tables so I thought it was about time!
If you’d like to custom order a table from use, please use our Contact Us form! You can see more of the second example here.
There is a box at the top right of this page to enter your email address to receive notifications by email when I post something new on this blog. Please sign up today!
Happy FunCycling Friends, Sarah ;)
If you like what you see, please like FunCycled’s Facebook page to keep up to date on the newest finds, vote on colors and give your input on our creativity. We also offer interior design, kitchen cabinet painting, and custom built tables, barn doors, and furniture. We can deliver for customers in upstate NY and also help you ship throughout the US. Send us a note with what you would like using our contact page. Or buy something that we’ve already designed from our online shop.
How’s your week going?? We are getting ready to move to our new FunCycled Repurposed Idea House this weekend so we’ve been busy packing and prepping the house to be at least livable! I can’t wait to show you all the projects we’ve been working on. Please be patient with me as I have been too busy to edit or write about anything much while we do this move… I’ll be back to myself more in March. Pinky swear. ;)
This week, I’d like to show you a dresser makeover that I adore. Here’s the dresser before:
We painted the outside with Benjamin Moore’s Slate Teal, glazed it, and sprayed it with a protective clear coat. We also needed to do a lot of veneer repair on this piece. If you want to see how we paint furniture, check out our How to Paint Furniture post.
Ready for the afters:
This dresser was done as a custom order, but you can check out some of the many new pieces on our For Sale page:
There is a box at the top right of this page to enter your email address to receive notifications by email when I post something new on this blog. Please sign up today!
Happy FunCycling Friends, Sarah ;)
If you like what you see, please like FunCycled’s Facebook page to keep up to date on the newest finds, vote on colors and give your input on our creativity. We also offer interior design, kitchen cabinet painting, and custom built tables, barn doors, and furniture. We can deliver for customers in upstate NY and also help you ship throughout the US. Send us a note with what you would like using our contact page. Or buy something that we’ve already designed from our online shop.
How are you? I hope you’re keeping warm on this freezing cold week in upstate Ny! We’re keeping busier than normal – slow season? What’s that? So thankful for the support you all have shown in the last 7 years. We love working with you and creating new spaces with through repurposing old and adding a spark of new.
For this week’s makeover, I’m sharing a kitchen project for a lake house where we painted the cabinets and added new tile. Here’s the kitchen before:
We painted the main cabinets Stoneington Gray by Benjamin Moore. We also sprayed the cabinets with a protective clear coat and added new hardware. Then we installed all new subway tile with dark grout. Ready for the after?
We also lightly distressed the cabinets which is a nice treat to show!
We also added barnboard to the back of the island. Yummy!!!
Would you like to transform your kitchen for a fraction of the budget? We can send you an estimate by email! You can use our Contact Us form or check out other kitchen projects on our For Sale page. We’ll need to see a picture of your kitchen, a list of how many doors and drawers there are, and were you are located to email you an estimate. This change ups the value of your home and gives you a whole new look at a fraction of the cost of new kitchen cabinets!
Also, check out our store for new furniture available this week:
There is a box at the top right of this page to enter your email address to receive notifications by email when I post something new on this blog. Please sign up today!
Happy FunCycling Friends, Sarah ;)
If you like what you see, please like FunCycled’s Facebook page to keep up to date on the newest finds, vote on colors and give your input on our creativity. Last but not least, let us customize a furniture piece for you. We create custom furniture and will deliver for customers in upstate NY and also ship throughout the US. Send us a note with what you would like using our contact page. Or buy something that we’ve already designed from our furniture for sale page.