Never Stop Improving

The marketing team behind Lowe's stores recent tagline "Never Stop Improving" deserve a bonus...and extra vacation time...in a pristine high-end resort...with umbrella laden drinks and fanning assistants.  It's just plain brilliant.  The tagline itself is actually rather generic and applicable to a myriad of situations (recall Nike's longtime "Just Do It" campaign?), but it tugs so strongly at the heart of every true do-it-yourselfer that you want to march yourself straight into a Lowe's and fill a cart with material courage to transform your spaces into the stuff of dreams.  It's like telling a shoe addict to "Never Stop Accessorizing"...it only fuels the fire.

While I have often categorized myself as a shoe addict, I never thought of myself as a do-it-yourselfer until a twist of fate (or act of God, as we see it) plucked me and my young family from our urban existence and plopped us into the rural countryside of Southern Oregon.  At the time, my husband and I had been married for a little over two years and carried a three month old bouncing baby boy in our arms.  When we married in June 2003, I understood full well that we would most likely move at least two or three times throughout the duration of my husband's career as a military Fighter Pilot.  And our first move was ironically from my hometown to his, as we were transferred to the military base he grew up at with his family when his father served in the Air National Guard.  Thankfully, my husband knew the area, but to me everything was as unfamiliar as stepping through the looking glass.  Yes, the landscape was extraordinarily beautiful, but I didn't know a soul and was navigating through the newborn phase, all while living among boxes and searching for a new home in a rural community.

We happened upon a diamond-in-the-rough in a tiny outlying town of 700 residents: a farmhouse on 5 acres built in 1936, unoccupied for the past six months.  The little community was first settled in September 1909 by Czech immigrants who named the town after their former home.  (Descendants of original settlers still maintain many farms and continue to build up the community.  A rich heritage indeed!)  We were intrigued and infatuated with the house.  But we didn't have a clue what we were diving into.  Over the past 6 plus years, we've had a front row seat to the renovation of our beloved farmhouse...and a restoration of our faith in the power of community, self-reliance, patience, penny-pinching, farm fresh eggs and the love of family.

{Photo by Kelly Armijo of Armijo Designs, featured in House of Fifty Winter/Spring 2012 Issue}

Last year, I received an invitation from Janell Beals, author of the wonderful blog Isabella and Max Rooms and also editor of new online design magazine House of Fifty, to write an article for the magazine about the changes I saw in ourselves and our house throughout the renovation (which is far from over, by the way).  I was tickled pink to receive such an honor, but daunted nonetheless by the task of summing up just how this experience has and continues to impact our lives.  While gathering my thoughts, I knew I wanted to convey to the reader the importance of being content with your life and all it's subtle and not-so-subtle nuances...to "Love the Life you Have" and appreciate your unique blessings.

{Find the article and the current issue here!}

{The House of Fifty app for iPad can also be purchased through iTunes!}

After the article and it's accompanying photos had wrapped and were being prepared for placement in the Winter/Spring 2012 issue, I spied a commercial for Lowe's introducing their "Never Stop Improving" campaign...and everything seemed to come full circle.  What continues to drive me to appreciate my home and unique life is the desire to make situations better for my family...to never stop improving.  This is at the core of every project created by any man, woman and child around the globe.  I'll say it again...that Lowe's team is brilliant, and our family may be inadvertently responsible for financing their campaign through the past six years of improving.

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A little retrospective of a few of our changes throughout the years...

Breakfast Nook

{Before}

{After}

{Before}

{After}

Guest Bathroom

{Handsome Hubby hard at work...demolishing!}

{Before}

{After}

{Before}

{After}

Living Room

{Before}

{After - Now to hide those unsightly electronics cords!! Cue next project.}

{Before - Popcorn ceiling that had to be hand-scraped off...eek!}

{After - No more popcorn ceiling and new life to an old door.}

Daughter's Nursery

(Once a tiny strangely shaped room across from the Master Bedroom)

{Before - The only surviving picture of an entire room of wood paneling...scary.}

{After - Chandelier from Lowe's!}

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And something to sum it all up from the very beginning...

One month after purchasing our house in 2005.

{Ah, it says so much without saying a word! }