Our “Circus Room” Reno Plans, A Must-Have Addition to Your Chairs & Stools, & Best Weekend Sales!

Hi all! I’m at our house in NC after driving down with my sister last week to visit my parents (including an early celebration of my dad’s birthday) and to work on a few house projects. Several of my projects are still in the planning phase but I hear more and more from you guys that you’d like to see the whole renovation process rather than just the “afters” so I’m sharing some progress details with you today in the format of a “View It, Do It, You It” post!

If you’re new here, for these posts I share something I think you’d love seeing (“View It”), a quick & easy decorating or DIY tip that you can knock out in 20 minutes or less (“Do It”), and some favorite finds for you and your home (“You It”). Let’s get to it…  (affiliate links included in post – full disclosure statement available {here})

One of my plans for our NC home is to get our hardwood floors refinished before we move all of our furniture in (I learned from the mistake of not doing that in our current home!). Of course that brings a domino effect in play – we have a room off of our kitchen we call the “circus room” that’s currently carpeted and we want to add hardwoods to instead. But before we do that I’d like to get any construction on that space done rather than risking new hardwoods getting damaged. Part of the plan is to remove this half wall and columns between the kitchen and “circus room” to open it all up:

I think it will make a huge difference don’t you?! While those columns do offer structural support, I had a structural engineer out who said we could add a beam in the attic to replace the columns as the support and then tear that whole partition down – yesss!!! Which brings me to another plan for this space – it relates to why we call this room the “circus room”… 

We have an octagonal vaulted ceiling that’s a cool feature but also kinda looks like it should have a trapeze attached to it :). I don’t think it would take a whole lot to tone done the circus tent feel and add a little more style. My plans include flattening out the peak, replacing the dated ceiling fan, and adding wood paneling – I think it would turn this ceiling into a stunner!

Want to see some of my inspiration for it? While not exactly the same shape, the ceiling in Finding Lovely’s master bedroom (which you can see more of {here} – so, so pretty!) cemented my idea that flatting out the peak of the ceiling is the way to go:

You can see more of Jackie’s beautiful home on Instagram {here}.

I also came across this gorgeous in-progress image from the home of Jordyn of Our PNW Home – her ceiling has the exact same octagonal shape as mine and with the planked wood look that I had envisioned for our space:

Here’s a pic of her space once completed – it’s so beautiful isn’t it?!

You can see more of Jordyn’s stylish home on Instagram {here}. 

So the next step for me is to find a contractor to get the job done because doing work involving high scaffoldings is outside of my DIY wheelhouse! My structural engineer had some contractor recommendations so now it’s on to vetting those contractors and getting bids. I’ll keep you in the loop…

I knocked out a super quick & simple project yesterday to solve this small but annoying problem that I’m guessing many of you have too:

Yep, the felt pads that you put on the bottom of chairs and stools constantly end up stuck to the sides of chair legs instead of underneath them. I decided to try out {these felt pads} that nail on to the chair legs that a friend of mine swears by:

They come in white, brown, & black in various sizes – you want to order ones that are slightly smaller than the size of the chair legs (mine are the 24mm white). It took me only about 10 minutes to add them to my kitchen counter stools. You simply pull of the plastic caps that are already on the chair legs with some pliers (do it carefully because you don’t want the nail breaking off in the wood!):

and then gently nail the new felt pads onto the bottom:

It’s so easy and those felt pads aren’t going anywhere! I’m totally adding these to my other chairs that are on hardwoods too! Just be sure that if you don’t already have nailed-on plastic caps on your chairs like I did, that you pre-drill holes for these new ones before adding them. If you try to hammer them in without any pre-existing holes, you risk splitting the legs of your chairs. 

I was surprised to find LOTS of great sales for the holiday weekend! After scouring all of them, these are my favorite buys:

1. {This pretty bench seat} that we have at the end of my daughter’s bed is at the lowest price I’ve ever seen it! (FYI the measurements on their website aren’t correct – it is 47″ long.)

2. {These luxury towels} that have been my tried & true favorites for over ten years are on sale plus an extra 25% off once added to your cart as part of their Friends & Family sale. This is the lowest the price on these towels gets! 

3. {This rattan bar cart} is over 60% off, giving you a Serena & Lily look for less!  

4. Amazon Prime Day is this Tuesday and Wednesday (stay tuned because I’ll be sharing deals from this huge annual sale once it starts!) – they’ve released a few early deals including $40 off Apple AirPods {here}. Jeff bought me AirPods recently and now I’m wondering how I managed without them, especially with our whole family working from home.

5. There’s a great deal on the latest model of Dyson’s cordless vacuums if you’ve been thinking about getting one – you can find it for $200 off {HERE}. It’s an awesome vacuum – I promise that once you go cordless you’ll never go back! If that’s still above your price range, I also have a Shark cordless that’s a great vacuum (I haven’t seen a deal on it as low as the one I shared a few weeks back but I’ll let you know when I do!)

6. {This cute puff sleeve top} that comes in lots of pretty colors is on sale plus an extra 30% off with code NICEONE. There are several other cute tops and accessories as part of the sale too that you can see {here}. 

Also check out J.Crew’s sale {here} – they have 40% off full priced items with code SALETIME. My favorite is this darling plaid top I found {here}:

7. Afloral has their whole site at 20% off with code STORE20. {These faux leaf branches} are so pretty for fall! Also, the faux florals I used in the fall flower arrangements in our home are part of the sale – you can find links for exactly which ones I used in {this post}. 

8. My favorite glass vase is on rare sale {HERE} with free shipping just in time for the holidays! I have two of them in the medium size and use them constantly. They can also be used as glass hurricanes with candles:

9. I bought a faux magnolia wreath last year and it was such a great purchase because I was able to use it from fall all of the way through the winter months. The exact one I have is no longer available but {this magnolia wreath} that’s similar is $45 off today and ships free with code COZY. 

10. I bought {this small white chest} on sale for in between my girls’ twin beds – it arrived just a few days after I ordered it and I’m so happy with how it looks! The design of the feet is so up my alley:

And with that… I hope you all enjoy the rest of your weekend (and day off tomorrow if you’re off for the holiday)! Thanks for stopping by!

XO,