Living Room Built-In Cabinets

The unthinkable has happened.  We finally finished our living room built-ins.  We didn't think the day would ever arrive.  But it did.  Turn outs it was totally work all of the work.  Okay fine, let's be real.  It was totally worth all of Nate's work.

Ike agrees.  He's pumped that his people might finally be able to sit down on the weekends again.

We've been working on this room since June so it's nice to see the end.  We hosted a party this weekend which was a great extra push to add the finishing touches.  Like doors.  And books.

Nate built the entire thing from scratch.  I'm not usually the braggy wife but I can't get over how talented he is.  I still can't believe he was able to do all of this himself.  The cabinets, doors, molding.  All of it from scratch.

Between the built-ins, new wood flooring (which is darkening nicely) and molding wall, this space doesn't even look like the same room.

We decided to decorate the shelves with old books and few other vintage finds.  I'm still acquiring books.  I'd love to completely fill the shelves.  Our local library is having a book sale soon so I'm hoping to bring home a bunch then.

The scrolly thing was finally removed from the fireplace.  You don't know how happy this makes me.  Nate keeps telling me there is room to add it back.  I take back all of that previous braggy talk.  He's a jerk.  A talented jerk but a jerk none the less.

I actually like how the tv looks above the fireplace now. I never thought those words would come out of my mouth.  The molding frames it nicely. It's like a beautiful piece of art that allows me to watch New Girl and Fixer Upper.

The hearth penny tile turned out to be an excellent choice.  Easy to install. (Minus slicing my finger open cleaning the grout off.  It's hard being so talented.  Imagine if I was allowed to touch power tools.)  Most importantly, it looks fancy.  Post to come on this process.

Our mantel is an old barn beam. It's dreamy.  We'll have a tutorial soon on how we installed it beings multiple people asked us this past weekend.  Can you tell I'm behind on blogging? So many good posts to come!

Installing the left cabinet was an interesting adventure.  Nate built these built-ins in two pieces, a lower cabinet and then the top shelving unit.  Turns out our walls aren't straight (thanks loser foundation people).  He had to chisel out some dry wall to fit in the base unit.  We were able to shove the upper unit in because Nate calculated for a little wiggle room.  Good thing because at one point I thought I might die being smushed by a cabinet.  What a lame way to go.

Just for fun, let's head back to October of 2013.  There wasn't anything wrong with our circa 2013 living room.  It was just never our true style.

It totally feels like home now.  Actually, it felt too fancy for us for the first week.  We kept thinking we were in the wrong house.  We have now fully adjusted to life as fancy adults.  Fancy adults that won't be getting out of their pajamas for the next three weekends.