Making It Too Perfect: 2011 in Review

2011 was a busy year around these parts, so today we're going to take a little trip back in time reviewing all that we've accomplished in the past 12 months. It is usually encouraging to look back and count ones accomplishments. :)

The first few months of the year revolved around many late night and weekend projects in the kitchen at our old house - the most massive home improvement project we've done to date -  there were just so many steps! In fact, I spent the entire month of August blogging about that kitchen and all the work that went into it. Here are a couple after photos - we DIY-ed the cabinets, countertops, backsplash, flooring, etc.

But, you know, it's even more impressive when you see the before photos...

In April, we hired a contractor to finish the drywall in the laundry room and great room (because we were just so tired of patching and repairing drywall!!!), then it was time to paint and decorate those rooms (the fun part!).

In May I worked on condensing our home office down to a small computer armoire and shared about it here.

This project was also featured over on Jen's blog, IHeart Organizing, in August. Woohoo!

Then, June and July were filled with outdoor projects, trying to up the curb appeal for putting our house on the market. It is amazing how much better a home can look with a little TLC.

Then it was time to list it and WAIT. . .so I filled my time up with fun blogging and design service projects. In fact, this blog was launched in July!

In September and October, I participated in the Roomspiration Blog Hop and Link Up Party inspired by Ange from The Blooming Hydrangea, linking up rooms from our old house as often as possible. I had an absolute blast sharing our home with other bloggers and checking out all of their inspiring rooms as well!

The best part of the experience was having our Indiana kitchen highlighted by Roeshel on The DIY Showoff at the end of October when she wrapped up the Roomspiration Kitchen Edition. What an honor!

Then, I joined in with over 700 other bloggers on The Nester's 31 Days of Change link up party and wrote 31 entire posts on creating and maintaining a Clutter Free Home, including many fun posts such as this full kitchen cabinet reveal. Participating in the 31 Days of Change was a great way to meet new bloggers and gather so many wonderful ideas.

This fall, I also started offering free design services, in person and online, in an attempt to gain experience in a field that I am absolutely OBSESSED with.

Using Olioboard, I enjoyed creating a mood board for an office/ homeschool room for an online friend, Rebekah.

and I also brainstormed craft storage ideas for my friend, Bethany's versatile china cabinet.

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Also in October, I spent an evening with my friend, Karla, re-organizing her kitchen cabinets.

In early November, I shared some fun ideas I came up with for making over our cousin's entry way.

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With the recent move and the holidays, design services have definitely been put on the back burner around here, but I just can't wait to get going again!

Mid-November we moved out of our little ranch home in Indiana into the farmhouse in Ohio where my husband grew up. Several weeks later, we FINALLY shared a quick tour of our new home.

Then we shared about our built-ins in the family room and a couple minor modifications we made so we could set up our home office there.

Then we did a little tweaking of the mudroom, and we left  you hanging, here:

So I promise, there will be more to come in that space!

In the time being, we're making over the living room here at our new house. I recently shared a living room inspiration post.  And while I'm at it, here's a before photo of that actual room, which you haven't seen before. . .

I'm sure we'll have lots more to share about that space soon!

And of course, sometime this year, don't remember when. . . I found out about the miracle that is Pinterest and enjoyed setting up my page over there.

I hope to be back sometime in the next few days with a fun-filled, optimistic Goals for the Year 2012 post :) In the meantime, stop on over to The Blooming Hydrangea 2011 Year in Review Link Party where I just linked this up with a ton of other fun bloggers' posts reviewing what they did this year. Have a great day, folks!

Also, be sure to stop over at Rhoda's blog, Southern Hospitality for the 2011 Top Projects link up, I'm linking up there too.