Last spring we shared that my daughter Kylee moved into her first house (remember when she got married? AHH!! And now her first house, oh my heart).
After studio apartment living, she and her husband Lance bought a small townhouse in Seattle (if you missed that news, catch up here!).
My other daughter Courtney rents a room from them in the townhouse and has shared her design plans for the tiniest room you’ve ever seen. She will be back with an update soon, but today I invited Kylee back to update us on her progress in getting settled in their little townhouse!
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Hello! Kylee, here! It’s been awhile since you last heard from me so it’s about time I shared a few updates from our townhouse! Last time I showed you my simple powder bath. Since then I have been slowly making progress to other rooms in my house.
I recently had a day off from work (which means I was actually home before the sun went down) so I snapped a few peeks of how things are coming along. I’ll let this be just an overview of a few of our rooms and then I’ll be back to share more in detail some of the small space tips and tricks we are using to make this little house our home.
Our home is a three story townhouse (in Seattle every square foot of land counts!). As you enter the front door, you find yourself in a long hallway. We recently painted it white (Swan White by Glidden) for a cleaner and brighter backdrop for our accessories and rugs.
To make the most of this small area of our home, we utilized the entire hallway as functional space, adding some convenient pieces for storage and coat hanging. We don’t have a coat closet, so the more hooks the better, I say! The white storage unit above is from Ikea–it’s the perfect space-saving piece for a small hallway or entry. The cabinet doors tilt out and hold gloves and scarves, reusable grocery bags, shoes, and supplies for Bella, our puppy.
My favorite new addition in this hallway is our colorful Dash and Albert runner from Rug Studio. I just love the pop of color, pattern and warmth it adds right when you walk in the door!
Bella’s favorite room in the house is definitely the living room which is on the second level. After many months of basically nothing going on in this space due to a struggle trying to figure out how to get our ginormous leather couches up the narrow staircase (I will finally share that success story with you in my next post–it’s a good one!). Once we figured out a trick to get our couches in the house, the room started to come together.
For warmth, we added the great zig zag rug from Rug Studio to bring a lot of texture to the room. Since our kitchen and living area are all one room, I think the rug really helps define this as its own cozy little area. We haven’t decided exactly what we want above the couch, so for now we’ve settled on a temporary and inexpensive solution by using framed Rifle Paper Co wrapping paper as art.
Bella couldn’t be happier to finally have furniture. All she wanted was a comfy spot. And we couldn’t be happier to finally have a room where we can invite friends over to sit! We don’t have a dining area (this really is a SMALL place!) so our sofas and coffee table serve more than one purpose.
Getting our bedroom set up on the third floor was also a struggle. Going up one flight of narrow steps was bad enough, but imagine going up two with large furniture? We have lots of awesome hand me down furniture from parents and grandparents, but so many of the pieces are big, heavy and difficult to maneuver around the tight corners in our townhouse. This is where starting from scratch with new furniture would have definitely been easier!
But being a young couple on a budget and wanting to use what we have, we were determined to make as much of it work as possible. In some cases, we had to resort to drastic measures.
When we moved in, we quickly discovered that we could not get the queen-sized box spring up to the third level. We slept on the mattress on the floor for several months while weighing our options, until we decided to literally cut our box spring in half and then put it back together. Crazy, right? But it worked! I’ll share that tale soon too, it was intense and I have photos to prove it.
While our kitchen is probably double the size of our studio apartment’s kitchen, we don’t have a separate pantry or a lot of cupboard space. And I love to cook! We’ve created a makeshift pantry by putting most of our dried goods into cute jars on the counter and keeping our cooking utensils in a pitcher next to the stove.
And last, but definitely not least, I wouldn’t be my mother’s daughter if we didn’t have a coffee station. She taught me well. Our little coffee station is set up on a hand-me-down wine rack. True to our Portland and Seattle roots, we love our coffee, so it sure is handy to be able to grab a cup as we head out the door to work every morning!
That’s all for now, but I’ll definitely be back to catch you up on the projects I mentioned and to show you more of our home!
Beautiful! What a flare for style. I love the photo of you dog stretched out on that terrific couch. I had the same issue with my box spring when I move into my first house. Ended up getting a split-box queen mattress, and selling the old one.
^5’s on your entry — that IKEA cabinet rules, as does the rug from Dash + Albert (my favorite rug company!)
Absolutely love this!
I love the wine rack -turned- coffee station! And using the Ikea shoe storage consoles for dog supplies is a great idea too! I think I need one of those now!
I love it, everything looks beautiful! I’m curious to see the box spring cutting adventure and how you got the couches in!
Tania
What type of dog is Bella????? I’m in Love!!!! This could be the one!!!
Hi Suzanne! Bella is a mini Australian Labradoodle :)
I grew up in California and Texas and since have live in the southwest again. I love much of southwest and want to incorporate more of that into our design. I love your overall design but the southwest rug in your entryway really caught my eye and I was wondering if it is one of a kind or if you purchased it somewhere as I have been looking for one like it.
Thank you.
Hi Kraig, I got the Rug from Rug Studio. It’s really great! There should be a link to the exact one under the photo of it in the post!
Thank you Kylee…totally missed the link. Thank you for sharing this beautiful room!
You have done a great job- congrats!! I had to laugh when reading about cutting your box spring in half. When my husband & I were first married, we too lived in a tiny place- a row house in Annapolis, MD with a tiny curved staircase to get to the upper floor. The only way to fit our bed upstairs was by literally sawing our box spring in half-by hand! A few years later, we moved into our first house & replaced our queen bed with a king- I was sort of sad to put our old box spring out to the curb- It is a funny story to tell to this day & still makes me smile! May you continue to make special memories together as a newly married couple!
What an adorable townhouse in Seattle! Can I come visit?! My favorite item is the coffee station. Thanks for sharing your creative decorating ideas. I’ll be using a few of these for my home, too!
I can hardly wait to read the post about how you cut your box spring in half. We have recently moved into an old house and planned to renovate and put the master bedroom in the basement. But….we also discovered the queen box spring won’t go down the narrow staircase. (Neither did our huge couch. Unfortunately we ended up having to sell it and buy another one.) We really don’t want to have to do that with the bed too.
We’ve had people suggest to us that we cut it in half and put it back together, but I just could not see my way clear to doing that. So I’m anxious to see how you did it and maybe I won’t feel so leary about doing it.
Your place is beautiful. I’m looking forward to getting started on decorating mine. Hope you don’t mind if I steal some of your ideas
Love what you’ve done and eager to see more. You’ve definitely inherited your mom’s gift of inspiration. How in the world did you get Bella to close her eyes and smile in that second photo? Priceless!!!
What a beautiful home! We have a 3 story townhome also and it’s been somewhat of a struggle to make it work for us. Our living/dining/kitchen is on the 2nd floor with a long narrow hallow and extra living room on the 1st floor. All bedrooms on the 3rd.
I painted our hallway with the same color your mom’s hallway in her home :) Love the colors she picked. But I’m starting to feel like it’s too dark and I need to make it WHITE! Problem is, our ceilings are not a pure white so I would need to pain those too AND the recessed lights also came in that color so not sure what to do :/ Maybe a white board and batten?
Can’t wait to see more of your home! Don’t know anyone else who shares their 3 story townhome :)
The place looks adorable. Love the headboard! But the real question is where did you get Bella!? A breeder you could recommend? I have been showing my mil pictures of her every time she is on the blog and she we need to find us a Bella of our own!!
Hi Kim! We got Bella from a breeder in Oregon called Mt. Park Labradoodles. I would highly recommend them! You definitely need a Bella of your own ;)
You have a lovely home and should be very proud of what you have achieved!
Congratulations! …. I too am in love with Bella!
Lovely! I’m heading over to Rug Studio now…I’m in need of a rug (love yours so much!)
It’s all wonderful. Seriously, is there anything more fun than setting up your first real home?
I love what you’ve done with your new home so far! I especially like what you’ve done with the bedroom. Where did you get the headboard and pillows?
Hi Laura, the headboard was from Walmart of all places! My shams are Threshold from Target and the throw pillows from HomeGoods. :)
I am looking for a narrow bench like the one you have in your entry – where did you find it???
Hi Teddi, we found the bench at HomeGoods! It’s just perfect for the narrow hallway!
Had to laugh when I read about trying to figure out a way to get the box spring upstairs! Our daughter & son-in-law removed their banister in order to do the same, and lived without one until their first son was born – methinks your solution was a better one :)
Bella is smiling! We had to cut our bed apart for our first home too! It makes a memorable part of your history together.
Such a fun read! Reminds me of taking a window out of the frame to get furniture upstairs in one of our houses. Please keep us up to date!
Love the bedroom – where did you find the headboard??
Where did you get the coffee table? I love it!
Hi Monica! The coffee table is from World Market. It’s actually on sale right now: http://www.worldmarket.com/product/cameron+coffee+table.do?&from=fn
is that a real dog????if so it is the cutest dog on the face of the planet..bar none!
I love what you’ve done and can’t wait to see how you got the couches and boxspring up!!
What type of coffee maker is that? It is adorable!
Hi Dominique! It’s a Nespresso Citiz machine :) Here’s a link to the same one! >> http://bit.ly/1Rzszhh
Love this look! <3 Nice job!I'm moving into a new space and am so excited to create a home like atmosphere! Do you, by chance, know what your living room paint color is??? Its gorgeous. My couch is a brighter red suede than yours but I'm liking greige and taupe shades with mine as well.
Would like to know paint color too! (For living room with doggie)