One of the selling points when we purchased our house was the deck space: there are two sizable patios. One patio is grey stone and very large, situated off our pantry and kitchen. The other patio is wood and elevated, located off the sunroom, and gets the best, most even light.

For the stone patio, we’ve added a barbecue and intend to add a dining table and seating area. On the back patio, I’d like to add some chaise lounges for soaking up that summer sun.

I’ve been busy sourcing furniture, and frankly, have been shocked at the expense of seasonal furniture. So far, Craigslist has unearthed few options, but I’m not giving up too easily. I want both spaces to be tied together by black, white, grey and wood – much like our interiors spaces. I’d love to incorporate some vintage pieces to bring in some character and chic textiles, along with twinkle lights and lots of candles.

Here’s some of the inspiration photos I keep coming back to ogle:

An outdoor project by Pencil and Paper Co. – Love, love, love that wood + white with a pop of blue. That wood table with white metal chairs is such a great combination.

Another project I’ve loved for a long time is Kristin from Hunted Interior’s back deck. The black and white striped outdoor drapery, verner panton chairs and wood table are fantastic.

It’s going to take me some time to source all the furniture, but I can’t wait to have a deck space we can enjoy all spring, summer and early fall.

When we first walked this house, I was a bit disappointed that the kitchen had been remodeled and aesthetically wasn’t quite us. But, since we’ve moved in and made some cosmetic updates to the kitchen, I’m feeling a lot more content with the space.

We started off by swapping out the pendant lights for a fresher design mixed with ceiling medallions that bring character to the space (I wrote about that over here).

Next up was painting the walls the same Benjamin Moore Paper White as we went with in the living room. We’re planning on taking down the wall between the kitchen and dining room this spring, so I didn’t want to have to repaint when the spaces are joined.

We swapped in new, bright white electrical outlets, switches and dimmers throughout the space. And replaced the old school recessed can lights with more modern and less intrusive LED retrofit recessed lighting throughout. And then we hung a vintage mirror I found on Craigslist before we even moved into the house, which we spray painted glossy white, in place of the mirror that was originally hanging on the wall. The mirror really helps to open up the space visually, so bringing in one that was more reflective of our style was critical.

All in all, the updates make me grateful for a modern kitchen with relatively new appliances. At our recent housewarming party, I was curious to see where guests would cluster, and surprising to no one, the kitchen was the hub. It definitely got tight along the peninsula, so I’m certain that taking down the wall is going to open up the space tremendously, both in terms of light and flow through the space when we’re entertaining.

Beyond what we’ve done, I’m considering swapping in new handles and door hardware, but not entirely certain it’s necessary. I’m also noodling on whether to paint all the mullions in our house the same black as our interior doors, because few things scream high-style to me than black windows.

The next project I want to tackle in here is whitewashing or German smearing the not so pretty stone tiles. The tilework is relatively well-done and if it was the only thing I wasn’t feeling in the kitchen, I’d rip them up and replace them with something lighter, like a herringbone subway tile, but since there are a lot of future changes in here and a lot of other projects going on, it doesn’t seem like it’s worth the effort.

Our house is pretty traditional aesthetically, but I would consider my style to veer more towards the edgy, glamorous side than to classic traditional, so I’ve been trying to toe the line and keep my bolder inclinations in check. Every day, I contemplate painting my window mullions black, because there honestly isn’t anything more chic than black windows (in my humble opinion).

I’ve gotten the go ahead from Cory to paint them black if I want, but I’m still a bit hesitant about how it’s going to look. So I’ve pulled my favourite rooms that feature black mullions:

Source: Carter Kay, HGTV

Source: Honestly WTF

Source: The Design Co.

And I did a little photoshop magic to see how it would look in the dining room, and I’m totally digging the contrast. Next up would be adding some roman shades – maybe bamboo or maybe linen? And those brass chairs are dying for new upholstery.

We’re not quite ready to overhaul the floors in our house, but it’s definitely a future upgrade. I can’t help myself from obsessing over herringbone wood floors. While I recognize that it’s become a bit trendy, the pattern is so classic, reminding me of old-world Paris. My love affair with herringbone actually began a decade ago when my parents gutted their house and laid herringbone stones in their entryway – ever since I’ve been smitten.

Currently, I’m dreaming about laying white oak herringbone throughout our living room, dining room and soon to be open concept kitchen, with standard white oak planks laid in the front hallway and continuing upstairs. That being said, there are a ton of factors at play, with cost being a huge driver. But, I can’t help dreaming about bringing these classically chic floors into my home.

First up is Emily Henderson’s new kitchen, which features the exact floors I’m pining for in our house.

This new build hallway by Cuisimano Architects is just amazing.

These floors give me all the feels, as seen in Domino Magazine.

The floors in Danielle Moss’s new kitchen is swoonworthy.

Enjoying a few lazy hours at home before heading back out to enjoy the ☀️ Can we talk about my new painting from @angelasimeoneartistnashville? Her pieces are beautiful and affordable so naturally, I wanted to share her work with you. See more at angelasimeone.com Framing: @framebridge #dmosshome #mycb2 #cratestyle

A post shared by Danielle Moss (@daniellemoss_) on Feb 19, 2017 at 12:00pm PST

It’s taken longer than planned, but we’re finally making some tangible strides in the sunroom. As a quick recap – the sunroom had served as our interim storage room since we moved in, where the long narrow space and gross beige carpeting was doing the room no favours. We painted the wood paneled walls bright white, as well as all the trim, ripped up the carpet and replaced it with inexpensive vinyl tiles. Long-term, I’m still on the fence about the best way forward with this room, but until we redo the flooring on the main floor of the house, we wanted to make sure we got ample use this space. As mentioned previously, I’m trying to weigh the economics of vaulting the room in the sunroom and widening the opening against taking down the wall between the sunroom and living room / dining room entirely. There are a ton of factors at play, so instead we’re focusing on the short term.

Over the weekend, we installed baseboards, which gives the room a much more polished feel than before. Cory decided that the basic door trim wasn’t hacking it and tore it out to make way for decorative trim that matched the other doorways in the house. He also filled in the holes for the hinges from when a door formerly hung in the doorway. We still have one more door to sort out, but that’s going on the back burner until the spring. Long story short, we have a sliding door that leads to our back deck that has a faulty seal. To keep the room warm over the winter, we’ve sealed the door with plastic, but have plans to replace the door with a French door once spring arrives. I personally am not a fan of sliding doors, so removing the door will make me very happy and should increase the likelihood of us using this deck (I know that sounds absurd, but we’re spoiled with having a huge stone patio on the other side of the house… don’t hate us. I can promise you there are other things this house doesn’t have, like a tub with enough depth for a bath, for one). Anyway, getting back to the matters at hand.

Cory and I have sat down a dozen times to sketch up the plans for the window seat (over dinner, at the bar, while on the train…), where I have a vision for the aesthetics of the seat and he’s also working out the most efficient way to funnel the heat from the radiator into the room from the interior of the window seat. He also figured out how we can install an outlet behind the seat to power two plug in library sconces, so I’m sourcing those this week.

We’re about halfway through painting the million windows in the room bright white, and already they’re looking much better. Apparently Anderson Windows’ version of white is called Alabaster, and it’s not white but a dirty looking cream colour, so paint is a must in here. I debated painting the mullions of the windows black, as I have planned in the rest of the house, but these double paned windows have inset millens that are white, so it wasn’t an option.

On the decor front, we sourced a rattan chair off Craigslist with a cushion in dire need of reupholstering, so I’m ordering a bunch of fabric samples for the chair, plus pillows and the window seat cushion. All in all, there’s a ton of sewing in our future.

On Sunday, we moved all the furniture that’s staying in the room back into the space and found new homes for all the stuff that formerly lived in the sunroom in its former state as a storage unit. I feel like we can finally relax again now that we’ve reclaimed our main floor.

Looking back on what’s still remaining on the to-do list:

• Finish installing the edge tiles (two of the boxes of black tiles that we received had bent corners, so they need to be exchanged)
• Install baseboards
• Paint the radiator covers
• Finish painting the windows
• Order and install new flushmount ceiling fixtures
• Swap out the outlet covers
• Build a radiator window seat and sew a matching cushion (more details forthcoming on this)
• And then it’s decor: source a rattan hanging chair, two rugs, hang some art
• Eventually we want to replace the sliding door, with a much more attractive French Door, but that won’t be until the spring