Jennifer New Writes & Reads

We love to P A I N T- Picking out colors is so much fun! What a fun time as a couple, paint, paint brushes, seeing our little place transform before our eyes. This is our freshly painted room. 

Now, we need to say that some of these photos are from a poor quality cell phone and you will see what we are talking about.  

Sorry for these and this is the last article we will apologize.

If you have not read the previous Versions of the story of Hoshi Chao, click below:

Searching for the Right One? Hoshi Chao V1.0 – Purchasing

What Have We Bought? Hoshi Chao V2.0 Setup & Cleaning

Changing it All!! Hoshi Chao V3.0 – Making it OURS

Back to the story…

 We started adding my little frogs in to our Beachy Florida theme. One is a frog vase that my second daughter and her husband got me about 5 years ago for my birthday. We like to keep incense sticks in it.

See my little green frog on the right, my dad gave it to me as a gift, so sweet, memories.

Notice the two colors selected in the blue-green color hue?  

Remember all of those little wall mounted storage racks, and, of course picture frames?  They are all getting a makeover in our new colors! Everyone and everything needs a makeover once in a while. 

The kitchen theme became roosters and chickens, with the colors being white with red cabinets. Oh my, we kind of struggled with the red. Painting with no mistakes is very hard since red is unforgiving.

The little vintage refrigerator got a fresh color uplift as well. Sorry NASA, she is OURS!

Looking back from the kitchen you can see the Florida beach theme colors of aqua and green we used for the highlighting.

Being creative with the paint was a lot of fun. We did step in a drop of paint and walked it on the carpet, but quickly tried to clean it up! *Note, always keep rags, drop clothes and whatever cleaner nearby. The bathroom closet wall cleaned up great!

The wall mounted television worked out great and is at the just the right height. Notice how much brighter the overall space is with the ceilings painted a fresh white? 

We are still working on the shelves for the electronics and display area. Ultimately, this was our decision to hold all of our needed items for the TV, but to also give us some area to decorate. The difficulty was that we wanted open space, so we installed only what we needed!

The bedroom started to get new themed mirrors and reconditioned hooks for hats. We moved these curtains in from the other room. On the to-do list is to make new curtains that will make the room pop (wonder what Version will be included)!

More themed and decorations mounted on the walls.  In the bedroom we elected to paint the ceiling the dark aqua and it is so calming at nighttime.

The bathroom walls cleaned up wonderfully with a fresh coat of paint.  We wanted to change the beautiful yellow shower plastic (yuck) but ultimately realized that since  it was not broken , no need to fix it!  A new shower curtain will cover the entire front, so move on………

The iron hooks were found at our local community center and reconditioned to match our theme. Notice, how using the two colors of blue and green in the bathroom gave the room some dimension in a rather small space. 

This was just a little plain nightlight. We have a lot of shells from living in Florida. By gluing on a whole sand dollar it really blossomed!

We initially sanded and reconditioned the counter tops white.  Insider note, in an upcoming version this has since been changed. For the initial time though this provided a solid look and kept our budget in check.  Don’t you wish you did not have to have a budget!? I will say though, the two red sink covers did not last long.

The netting was from a large piece of decoration we took from our home. It once belonged to Moby Dick, but that is another story entirely…

The netting received hot glued shells on it and the reconditioned picture frames with ocean and beach designs really came together.

Our colors are slowly getting pulled in. We found a Welcome Mat that has the blues and greens to match our theme.

So beautiful when you step back.

Oh yes, we decided to keep the the couch. In the end it came close to our beach theme  colors, functioned well as a fold out bed, and it was not broken.  With the original finishes inside, we truly did not appreciate it at all, but funny how changing the other elements made it work out fine. Below is a photo of the couch folded out to make a bed with a red quilt.

I love my little pantry. Pulled out here and ready to fill. Then you slide it back in. DO NOT forget to latch it. Yes, we learned the hard way (lol). We traveled and got back in to find food all over the floor. Doesn’t our little old frig look amazing in red! Also notice how well the range hood cleaned up and painted in a gloss black.  It matches the new microwave.

Here is an inside photo of the refrigerator and freezer, just right for us now.

I found a Happy Camper! Still making a few repairs, but most of our decorations are being placed around. Notice how nicely the computer area and rolling office chair works.

Our mirrors arrived! They look so classy. We could not hang them right away. Our weather was too cold and they would fall, not holding to the adhesive. There was room left for both of them to allow for a little decorating and storage shelf.

We found a perfect pic for the bathroom. Thank you Herb Alpert! She is covered in bubbles! Tried the use of the white jewelry mobile rack. My advise is NO.  Most of her jewelery found its way out of the plastic through the traveling process and thus, we own it no more!

Love our bedroom! Total transformation from brown country to blue beach Florida. We have our quilts with Stars. They go with the title Hoshi Chao. Bet you hadn’t figured that one out did you?

Looking good! Still working with the sink and plumbing, one of life’s little joys. All i nall though it was starting to come together. Notice the completed shelving on the left below the television?

I take my own pics sometimes. Goof ball.

First time hanging baskets of flowers, wind chimes, and lights!!

We decided to try the zero gravity chairs and we love them.  Plus the color goes nicely with our outside colors. Our wind chimes were fun to pick out as we traveled to Florida. Have you ever noticed once you get close to Ocala all the places to get souvenirs? This one has a turtle on the top, hust right for the Turtle Man.

Getting the books onto the bookshelfs, and towels into the center cabinet on the lupper left. 

We tried to somewhat hide a Ron Jon sticker. We have so much fun in Cocoa Beach, shopping there, spending time in the surf. The desk chair has proven to be a plus for not only working at the counter, but rolling over is a comfy chair to relax next to the couch.

Do not dismay, this is only the beginning of the finshing touches.  The next couple of Versions will cover taking Hoshi Chao on her first trips and the minor changes onces we began to live in her while on the road.  Hope you are enjoying the ride!

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