Ellie & Elizabeth

Hey guys, here is Part Two of the three part series, 'Ways to turn your house into a Vintage Home'. If you missed Part One, find it here.

WINDOWS AND MOLDINGS

Love deep window sills! They are a great option if you are building a home and you want to add a vintage feel. Hubby and I didn't even think of this until the last minute and didn't make ours extremely deep, but they are deeper than what we had before and I'm really happy with them.

Nothing says I'm over the hill like 'I'm excited about window sills.'

I love to see windows that have a sill over a foot or more deep. It's so cozy looking, I can just imagine throwing a cushion in there and making it a window seat. Here's one I found online that is a great depth and they actually added a hidden drawer in it! Ingenious! How much stuff could I hide from the Bear in there?? Every time he's grounded from his iPod, (every week) bam!, instant hiding place.

Picture courtesy of GL Callow Building and Remodeling (www.glcallow.com)

Something else I've seen done in houses to add vintage character after they are already built is making the molding above the window substantial. Nowadays the trend is to hang curtains as close to the ceiling as possible. It gives the illusion of a taller ceiling and I love the look, but it does sometimes leave an awkward space between the window molding and the ceiling. KariAnne at www.thistlewoodfarms.com (another Kentucky girl and one of my favorite bloggers!) added pieces of wood and trim at the top of her farmhouse windows and it really changed the whole look. It was only in the $22 range per window and it solved that awkward blank space! See below the after picture and those smocked curtains, LOVE! Click either picture to see a full tutorial on how she applied the trim and wood pieces.

Picture courtesy of www.thistlewoodfarms.com

The same goes for baseboards. That was another thing we didn't think about until last minute, but I'm so glad that we put tall baseboards in this house, They are about 10". I read there are no true 'rules' but a guide I found suggested that you base the height of your baseboards on the height of your ceiling:

8 foot tall ceilings: no larger than 5-6" baseboards

8.5 to 9 foot ceilings: 7" baseboards

10- 12 foot ceilings: 8 – 12″ baseboards

Our ceiling here in the master bedroom is ten feet, so the 10" baseboard works well here and in the other parts of the house that have 12 feet ceilings. If I hadn't built and wanted to inexpensively beef up my baseboards in my previous house, I would have left the original baseboard there (it was maybe 4 inches tall), put a thin piece of molding at the height I wanted the new baseboard to be. Then paint the new trim piece, the wall in between the trim and the original baseboard all the same color, so it looks like one big piece of molding. I've seen it done with crown molding too. The eye is really fooled into thinking the painted wall in between is part of the molding. I hope this makes sense. Here is an example I found at www.thehouseofsmiths.com. They used a board to guide where they put the top piece of molding...

Picture courtesy of www.houseofsmiths.com

Pic courtesy of www.houseofsmiths.com. Click photo and scroll down to mid-post for full tutorial.

and then painted the new molding and wall in between. Such a neat trick to creating a chunky baseboard!

Hope you've found some ideas to play around with...the last of the series is coming up and it's my favorite! See you Sunday!

Hugs,

Elizabeth

We all know if we had a hidden secret drawer, Bear would not only know about it, he'd be the one who designed and installed it. There are no secrets from the Bear. He probably already has these in his room, we just don't know about it.