The Designery - LAUNCHED

I have a big life update for you all today – After 11 years working in the Kitchen & Bath Industry, I am starting my own company!

Wow – it’s a "pinch me" moment in and of itself that I just wrote those words and posted the logo. My logo! This whole thing has been in the works for a while and like all good things, it was definitely a labor of love, but today it becomes real and I'm so excited to jump in! OK, so let's get into the details...  The company is called The Designery and is a Kitchen & Bath Design House. I will continue to specialize in all things Kitchen & Bath and will be offering full design services to my clients. For most, the Kitchen & Bath are at the top of the remodeling list and I’ve always believed it was possible to conquer these spaces that can be technical and expensive in a fun and collaborative way.

For years I have been cabinetry focused, and I still will be designing cabinetry, but with this new endeavor I will have the opportunity to go beyond cabinets and bring whole projects together for my clients by leading them with the other selections that finish off a space – lighting, countertops, flooring, paint colors, appliances, hardware, etc.  

As for Bell, words can’t begin to do justice for how thankful I am for that company and all of the technical knowledge and experience I have gained over the past 8 years. I was always given the opportunity to be creative and I got to see so many of my dreams, visions and designs come to life before my eyes. I was lucky enough to work alongside so many great designers, CAD techs, engineers and craftsman that have truly shaped the designer I am today.  I poured so much of myself into Bell over the years and plan to continue to work alongside them going forward.

I’m very excited for this new endeavor and I hope you will follow along with me! I have a new website that you can check out:

www.the-designery.com

along with a new Instagram handle: 

@_thedesignery

And you can also follow me on Facebook here. I’m excited for what lies ahead and thankful for all of you that have been along for the ride over the years. So much more to come!

 Photo by The Designery Photo Lab & Logo by Treebird. 

Gift Wrap Closet

I feel like this next sentence is the most grown up thing I've written in awhile....

I, Courtney Shearer have a gift wrap closet. I mean, how luxurious does that sound? HA! I really do have a closet that is now dedicated to all things gifts - cards, paper, boxes, bags etc....and it was fairly easy to get. I simply cleaned out a closet in our guest bedroom and utilized the space for something specific instead of another place to just shove all the things. Earth shattering I know, but I'm pretty excited about the end results monetarily and organizationally speaking!

So, the closet is in the Guest Bedroom we have been making over. It was actually one of the first things we did in this space before we started selling furniture and trimming out walls. Here is a shot of the before:

As we have slowly fixed up various rooms in the house I feel like our junk piles just get moved from room to room and closet to closet. This particular closet was out of control. You see I had to pull out junk just to get one of the doors to completely open! From clothes to sell, to Lot's jump-a-roo and everything in between this closet was FULL and I prayed for any guest who needed to actually hang something in the closet. Good luck to them.

With the closet cleared out you can see what we were working with. A single wire shelf. 

The space is not deep front to back, but does have some length to it, so we wanted to add more function and actually utilize the space we did have. Now, we could of gone all out here, I mean I do work around some amazing closet designers and we all know Brent can hold his own when it comes to building out some cabinets, but for this space we decided to go the fast, in-expensive route and just stay with the wire shelving. The game plan was to keep the one shelf we had and add 3 more shelves underneath. To maintain some long hang we got the 3 additional shelves in a shorter length to leave 32" open for guests to use.

Brent spaced the shelves 12" apart and he got to work setting the new shelves in place.

It was a relatively quick process and that was with two little people "helping".

Next, I went to work selectively loading the shelves. One of the great things about a project like this is the opportunity to purge. When you have a new cabinet, a new shelf or a new room you don't want to fill it with junk, you find yourself more inclined to thoughtfully go through items and either donate, relocate or throw out. I knew I wanted this closet to house guest room essentials like extra pillows and blankets and beyond that it would house seasonal throw pillows, my giant dressing-making bowl that won't fit anywhere else, and our gift wrapping supplies. 

I have two large containers full of wrapping paper which I pushed all the way in the corner. I also stacked an assortment of boxes back there too.

For the front section I got little baskets to house ribbon, tags, tissue paper, etc...I even found a box to store all of our cards. I labeled each section per card type - birthday, get well, congrats and thank you.

And finally I used 3 hangers to hold all of our gift bags!! It's like organizational heaven. Extreme I know, but it feels so good and fresh and organized and honestly it couldn't come at a better time because with the holidays upon us and gift wrapping about to ensue, knowing where all of my supplies are is going to save me time and money! Hallelujah for that!


All photo are my own. 

Guest Room Progress + A Light Paint Matched to a Skirt

We are rolling right along over in our Guest Bedroom Makeover. This past weekend we finished up the trim + paint, installed the bed AND switched out the ceiling fan for a chandelier. 

I found the chandelier on Facebook Market Place for $40. I drove to get it last week and was excited about the elegant factor it was sure to add to the space. We got it hung Saturday morning and the room instantly felt elevated.

Next, Brent put together the bed we purchased from Wayfair and guys - this bed was $146.75. Such a good price for a king bed and we were really pleased with the look and quality once it was set up. The only negative....the bronze color of the bed was fighting with the brassy/bronze color of the light. While we liked the color of the light we knew from the beginning we may end of painting it so we started tossing around paint color options - white, gray....plum? HA - one of these is not like the other but believe it or not Brent and I almost instantly agreed that a dramatic deep purple/plum color in a semi-gloss sheen could look really great in the space. The inspiration - a faux leather skirt of mine. Brent took the skirt to Home Depot and color matched it. Pretty spot on, right?

Next, Brent set up a make-shift paint booth out by the shed so he could spray the light. 

I have to admit it was a little scary watching the light turn from a pretty brassy color to plum, but we kept reminding ourselves it was just paint and if it was hideous we would just re-paint it. 

It took a few coats and we let it dry for several hours before bringing her back inside to install. 

Photographing this light was a beast. Daylight savings has not been my friend when it comes to capturing the true colors of the space, but the shot above is the best I got to really show off the color. Overall, we think we like it. I especially love how the glossy deep purple hue accentuates the details of the chandelier. We purchased these candelabra sleeves also from Amazon for each light so the electrical wires would be concealed. The color definitely feels good in the space, but I knew I needed to see the whole space come together with bedding, etc...to know for sure. I found these sheets on Amazon, another great deal - $29.70  for a King Sheet Set. There are 62 THOUSAND reviews raving about these sheets so I gave them a whirl. I got the white, and so far, they are super soft and nice. We got the bed all made up last night and things are feeling really good. Next up - nightstands, lamps, art....you know, more pretty. Excited to get this space wrapped up soon, just in time for the holidays! 

All photos are my own. 

Guest Room Makeover - The Before

Wanna hear an embarrassing story about our guest bedroom? Shortly after we moved into this house (4 years ago - crazy!!) we had a house guest. In my mind it was a last minute thing, but honestly, it may of been a planned thing, I can't remember. Regardless he ended up having to go to the store to buy his own soap!! T H E  H O R R OR! I mean honestly, could I be a worst hostess? After that I made an oath to be better. The first step was obviously to stock up on the essentials and the second step was to make a cautious effort to make our guest room has comfortable as possible. Since then we have done our best with what we had to work with, but anyone at the beginning, middle or end of making your house a home knows it is a process and certain rooms/projects just tend to take priority over others for one reason or another, but it is finally time for our Guest Bedroom to get some attention.

The first step in making over this space was to remove some of the furniture. Like a lot of guest rooms this space was outfitted in furniture from times past. From my past specifically, it was from my childhood bedroom. I loved it, but the truth is guest rooms just don't need SO much furniture. We had a dresser, a chest and a nightstand in addition to the obvious bed. Guests just don't need all of that stuff. Regardless of how long a guest stays they never move stuff into the drawers, so most were completely empty or worse stuffed full of stuff we didn't even know we had. Anyone else? What is it with our human need to fill any and all spaces we have!? So, I sold most of the items in a weekend and suddenly the room was feeling a lot more open and inviting.

In a perfect world we really wanted to incorporate a king bed into this space. I know this statement is full on diva, but once you sleep in a king bed, it's so hard to go back to a queen, but sadly a king just wouldn't fit on the wall.  Then, last Friday something amazing happened -  Brent said what if we moved the bed to the window wall, so we flipped it around and....BOOM:

Not only does this orientation just feel better, but now there is plenty of room for a king bed! So I listed the bed on Facebook Marketplace it was gone by the afternoon. Now, with an empty room we were ready to add some details and get the space prepped for new finishes.

The goal was to try to elevate this space to match the adjacent guest bath that we did last year, remember that space? While I know I haven't shared the full reveal of that space yet (coming soon - promise!) it's on the fancy-ish side and I wanted the room to have the same vibe. The game plan was to add trim to each wall. We tossed around adding a chair-rail and wainscoting but ultimately decided to do a fairly simple series of rectangles on each wall using a dainty trim piece.

Like all DIY projects these days it's a family affair, so Brent and Croix got to measuring :)

All of the trim cost a little over $100 and Brent got the pieces cut and installed in a matter of hours. 

We are painting the walls white - White Dove OC-17 (same color as most walls in our house) because A. it's a good color and B. I have a ton of the paint on hand so it just made sense. I got started on painting all of the trim on Sunday but Brent ran out of trim for the last little sliver of wall and of course every Home Depot in the area was out as well, so we are hoping to get our hands on another stick or two today and finish up the painting tonight, but look how pretty it's looking so far....

If you follow me on Instagram stay tuned this weekend because we ordered a bed and I found a light on FB Marketplace all ready to be installed as soon as we can finish up this paint + trim I will be taking you through the whole process on stories!

All photos are my own. 

A Birthday + 2 Goals

Yesterday was my birthday! 

I don't care how old I get a birthday never ceases to thrill. I've always had a false sense of reality and or confidence in regards to my birthday. For years I honestly thought people were so jealous of my birthday because it was only 2 days after Halloween and in the same month as Thanksgiving. I mean, what a gift right? Haha.....I was a weird kid and I have to say some things never change.

We  kicked off my 34th with a fun weekend in Highlands with family. We had a fire, we saw beautiful fall colors and we got to watch the Georgia Bulldogs WIN! A Great day!

Anyways, I thought my birthday week was a good time to let you all in on a few goals Brent and I set for ourselves this summer... Goal #1 - 40 Countries by 40. We both love to travel and we're always up for a good adventure. I went on my first, big across the ocean trip in 2010 and have been hooked ever since. So far, I have been to 16 countries and Brent has been to 24. We definitely have a lot of work to do, but we are excited for the challenge. Brent turns 34 in January so we both have about 6 years to reach our goal.

We have a few trips on the docket for 2020, one of which is Tanzania where we are going to climb Mount Kilimanjaro, otherwise known as goal #2! Well, that's the plan anyways. We are currently in training mode for that big adventure, but we're not getting any younger over here so we felt like 34 was as good a year as any to try our hands at conquering that 19,341 ft beast.

Have any of you been to 40 countries?  Climbed Kilimanjaro? Would love any advice or country suggestions you have!


All photos are my own. 

Boo

I don't know about you guys but our front porch has been decked out for Halloween since late September. I think our over eagerness was equal parts an uber excited 3 year old and a mom so desperate for the temperatures to get out of the 90's I thought a pumpkin or 10 could give me good ju ju.

The strategy this year....take every spooky decoration I typically set out around my house and put it all, every last bat, rat and bone on the front porch together.

It's a lot, but it makes me smile every time I see it. And see it I do, just about every night as Croix and I go outside to "look at the stars" with the skeleton. He has been excited about Halloween for months. Literally watching Halloween cartoons on YouTube since Easter. Every other day a new super hero costume arrives at our house. Brent + Croix = T R O U B L E, So at this point I'm honestly not sure if we will see Spider Man, Black Panther, Captain America or Hulk Round 2 this year.

One thing we know for sure.....

The skeleton on the front porch is definitely going as BATMAN!

Over the weekend I added the purple mum and Brent and Croix carved our Jack-O-lantern, so I would say we are all ready for the big night next week. Stay tuned to see which super hero graces us with his presence.

All photos are my own. 

Chair Sale

You guys...I'm a chair-aholic. Wait, maybe I should say....I like chairs with good bones and potential that are relatively in expensive so I can customize them to make them awesome. Yeah, that sounds better. 

Regardless, I have a making-chairs-cool obsession. It all started a few years ago with these chairs - my twin girls, adopted in 2015....

                                                                            

They underwent a BIG makeover (read all about it in this blog post), ahem...check out their BEFORE

                                                                          

Yikes, right? But the bones were good and with a little love they quickly became the pride and joy of our office in our first home.

These chairs were perfect for this space and I wasn't about to leave them behind when we moved, so I took them to my office over at Bell Cabinetry & Design where they have hung out with me day in and day out for over 2 years. Honestly, I would sleep in them each night if it meant I could keep them forever, but they deserve better, they deserve to shine. So I have decided to sell them. Over the years these chairs have gotten a lot of love on social media and I've received numerous inquiries about purchasing, so now is the time. I wanted to write about them here to give you guys first dibs, but they will be going live on Facebook Marketplace & Craigslist later this week.

In a world full of ho hum options in the category of office chairs, this is my gift to the world. Too dramatic....oh well, sorry not sorry! :)

Here are the details:

Office Chairs on casters. 

26 1/2 " high x 25" wide x 24 1/2" deep
Seat height off the floor is 17 3/4" and seat depth of 17"

Floral Fabric + White Vinyl for easy clean-up 

Qty: 2 

Email me @ hicourtneyshearer@gmail.com with serious inquiries about purchasing.  

All photos are my own. 

Chicken Drama

I have to tell ya, I never thought I would have a blog post titled - "Chicken Drama" but here we are....no really, here I am holding a chicken and a baby. Ha - what a sight :)

OK, on to the drama....

In mid July around 6:40am each morning we started hearing a loud crow coming from our backyard. Not an ideal sound to hear when you live in a neighborhood in the city, not a farm and you are under the impression that you had 3 female chickens.

Now let me tell you, figuring out whether you have a male or female chick is kind of a crap shoot to begin with. There are no obvious, um... "parts"... if you will, to confirm the sex of the baby chicken. What there is, is a lot of voo-doo-like tricks that are done to guess. In our case the guy held each chick in his hand and dangled a piece of copper wire on a string over the chick to determine the sex. Umm...yeah....maybe we should be thankful we don't have a backyard full of roosters.

The crowing culprit - Lou our Barred Rock chicken. In this post I described Lou as the undeniable leader of the group. When the crowing first started we dug deep into Google to find out if it was possible to have a crowing hen. Turns out, it is. From what we read, in small back yard flocks with only hens, it is not uncommon for one of the hens to take on the role of alpha and crow. We hoped this was the case, but even if it was we couldn't have a crowing hen, alpha or not. So, we decided to do what any sane-minded person with 3 chickens, one of which crowed and two children would do - we got another chicken. Actually we got 2 more.

Meet Dolly

& Pearl

Our thought - if we brought in a new chicken that was a bit older then it would be the alpha and Lou would stop crowing. So, we got Dolly - a Lavender Americana. Dolly is a year old and was already producing eggs when we got her. Because Lou, Dot and Pip had been together since day one we didn't want to introduce Dolly to the group alone so we got Pearl at the same time. She is a Silkie and a few weeks younger than the original 3. 

We quickly learned that a pecking order is real. The new chickens did not receive a warm welcome from the group. Maybe I'm naive, but in my mind, the girls would invite them in, show them the nesting boxes, Lou would stop crowing and the 5 of them would live happily ever after, producing an array of colored eggs for us. WRONG. The OG chickens were not happy to meet the new chickens and were down right mean to them. Especially Lou. Dolly, our hopeful alpha was clearly intimidated by Lou and quickly owned her lowly position on the pecking order.  So now we had chicken fights AND a crowing chicken. Sadly, we were forced to make the hard decision to send Lou to live on a farm in Tifton, GA. It was a bummer to lose her, but the flock as a whole as been better since. Now, a few months later all 4 chickens are friends, no one crows AND Dolly started laying eggs!

It took her some time to get acclimated, but once she did we started getting these pretty blue eggs just about every other day.

Once we started getting eggs we took right to Amazon/Etsy and got ourselves all set up with half dozen boxes. Once the other girls start laying too, we may go with the full dozen size containers, but for now, how legit do we look?

Life with our backyard flock is pretty sweet right now. It's fun to check the nesting boxes each day for an egg and the excitement in finding one never gets old! We look forward to the multi-colored eggs in our future, but for now,  we are just happy everyone is getting along and no one is crowing.

All photos are my own. 

Console Table Makeover

Well, I'd say the first week of October is a good time to come back from summer vacation :) We had a great summer and really did try to lay off home projects and enjoy all the work we had done, namely our pool + backyard (hello...chickens!!). It was nice to relax, well as much as one can relax with a 3 year old and a now crawling baby roaming around. But now that it is officially fall we are ready to dip our toes back into some home improvements.

The first project kind of fell into my lap by way of my friend - Facebook Marketplace. Every time I'm in a new town I like to peruse the site to see if there are any treasures waiting to be snatched up. Last Saturday I found this gem in Tifton, GA for $65.

Yes, her coloring is, well hideous, but look at the bones. I love the fluted details, the curves of the top, the leg positioning, etc. Plus, I've been in the market for a console table for awhile now for the stair wall off the mudroom.

We've had this hutch that belonged to Brent's Great-Grandmother on this wall since we moved in and while I like the piece it just wasn't working for two reasons. Number one, several rooms in our home open to one another in the center of the house. An open floor plan is great, but the issue I was having was too many wood furniture pieces with different tones in one line of sight. We have our breakfast room table, a china cabinet, the antique laundry room door AND this hutch, all wood and all in different tones. It was just too much and this hutch sat in the center of it all, so it only made sense for this to be the piece to go. And number two, I don't have very many surfaces to house picture frames and I felt like this hutch was taking up prime real estate for a nice family photo right when you walk in from the garage.

As soon as we got the table home I started testing out possible paint color contenders.

We settled on Elephant Ear a pretty, true gray by Sherwin Williams. The next step was to sand the beast down and get the shine off.

Next up we got to painting. We bought the Behr Ultra paint + primer in one from Home Depot (did a color match for the Sherwin William's hue) which worked out really well, because it only took one coat. There were a few areas we touched up after it was all dry but the paint went on nice and smooth and the piece became prettier with each stroke of the brush.

Things got fun when Croix decided he wanted to help, so I talked him in to letting me paint the body of the piece and he could finish it up by painting the top. He was SO excited and only asked me 100 times if I was done yet and ready for him. Finally, it was his turn, and while wet paint (inside) + his 3 year old bouncy self could of been a disaster he did a pretty good job.

As soon as the paint was dry I was maneuvering this piece into it's new home and wow - love, love, love the way it turned out.

I had plans to replace the hardware but the distressed, brass knobs that came with the piece looked great with the new color. This side of the house feels so much more airy now and I love having a place to check my teeth before I walk out the door :)

For now I put a family photo from a few year's ago on the shelf, but I'm excited to get an updated version with Lot in there soon!

All photos are my own. 

Meet Our Chickens

OK, OK for anyone tired of chicken talk, today will be my last blog on all things chicken, but now that you've seen their house (coop) we figured you'd like to get to know the girls a little better, specifically what breed of chicken they each are and what color eggs they will produce. When we started researching chickens we had no idea there were so many different kinds. Their look, temperament, egg production and egg color were some of the main characteristics we honed in on.

Obviously a pretty chicken with pretty eggs was high up on the wish list, but the highest priority to us was the chicken's temperament. Because these animals would be in our back-yard and around us all the time as we grilled, played in the pool, worked on projects outside the shed and just hung out, it was important that our chickens be nice and friendly. There were some that had really pretty hair/fur (ha) but were known to be skittish and broody, so we marked those off the list quickly. Each of our chickens are a different breed and each will produce a different color egg, but the one thing they have in common is their easy going personalities. Oh, and they are all female....we think/pray ;). With that being said, let's get to the introductions...

Up first, meet Lou, she is our Easter Egger. 

Lou has always been the biggest of the 3, as she is older than the others by about 10 days. She is also undoubtedly the leader. We aren't sure if that's because she has always been bigger or if it's just her natural personality, but the other 2 follow her around wherever she goes. We figured out quickly, the fastest way to get the chickens to like us was to suck up to Lou, because if the other girls saw Lou sitting in our lap, then they would follow suit. 

Lou is prettier than most Easter Egger Chickens because she was crossed with a Barred Rock, so her coloring is striking -  black with white stripes. 

Easter Egger chickens typically produce about 200 eggs a year and the eggs can range in color from light blue to green to brown. Though the eggs can be a lot of different colors, whatever color she lays first will be the color we always get. 

Next, meet Dot, she is our Light Brahma. 

Dot was a tiny little yellow chick with fuzzy feet when we got her, but those yellow chick feathers have now been replaced by white feathers with black specs. Her fuzzy feet have remained though. This is a signature characteristic of a Light Brahma and gives them a fancy-schmancy look. She is already really pretty and regal looking. 

Her eggs will be light brown and she should lay 3-4 eggs a week, even in the winter when a lot of chickens don't lay as many. 

And finally, little Pip - Our Olive Egger.

Pip has always been the smallest of the 3. As a tiny chick she had dark black feathers and still has the same look today. She will likely be the most boring to look at of the 3 (sorry Pip) but her eggs should be really pretty. Olive Eggers lay olive green eggs.  Pip should lay 150 - 160 eggs a year. 

We got the chicks from the same farm so they have been together (at least with us) from the beginning. They are very close and travel in a little pack around the yard. They have eaten all of my mint and marigolds and like to peck around at the grass. We try to hold them a good amount to keep them used to human interaction which is working pretty well so far. Of course we have to remind Croix, pretty much every 2 minutes, NOT to chase the chickens and NOT to shoot the chickens with water guns, but all in all, they have adjusted really well.

Most chickens don't start laying eggs until they are 5-6 months old so we probably have a good while before we get our first bounty, but in the meantime we really enjoy just hanging out in our backyard, swimming, grilling and chicken watching. 

All photos are my own. 

6 Months of Lot

Today my Lot Thomas is 6 months old. 

This kid, ya'll....he's just so good. Like honest to God the best baby. He is so laid back and go with the flow. Wakes up happy, only really fusses if he's hungry or gets overtired (he likes a schedule!) and is so patient with the sometimes overwhelming "love" from his big brother. Speaking of big bro Croix....

 He has loved Lot every minute since he met him and can make him laugh like no one else.

People warned us that going from 1 to 2 kids would be such an adjustment and a lot more work, but honestly life as a family of 4 has been awesome. Lot fit right into our life and now at only 6 months in we can't imagine life without him. He's the kind of baby that could make you want 10 more. Just saying.....:)

All photos are my own. 

We Have Chickens + DIY Chicken Coop

As we approached the finish line for the shed we took a little detour down the road of, "hey, lets get chickens!" It's really all my sister's fault. We were at a family reunion back in April and she showed us this instagram account of this girl who lives in Greenville, SC that had the prettiest chickens. Who even knew chickens could be pretty?! Honestly, not me, but even better - these pretty chickens produced pretty eggs and lived in the most charming coop. She could tell we were intrigued so she pushed further and said, "y'all should build a coop and get chickens too!" We laughed it off, but the seed was planted and the next thing I knew we were laying in bed perusing chicken breeds and fantasizing about our kids growing up in the middle of Atlanta with a piece of the farm life right in the backyard.

Lucky us, there was enough space on the right side of the shed to add a little coop, plenty big enough for 3 chickens.

Just like the shed, we started with 4 posts in the ground to set the perimeter of the structure.

The plan was to create a chicken run, 5 feet x 5 feet. The run would have 4 walls covered in chicken wire with a door on the front that locks to let the chickens out or keep them safe inside.

Once the chicken run was complete Brent built the coop. The coop sits on top of the run and this is where the chickens sleep at night and lay their eggs.

In the photo above, do you see the 3 little compartments on the front of the coop? Those are the nesting boxes where the chickens will leave the eggs. Brent put a flip down door to cover this portion for easy access to the eggs.

Both the coop and the nesting boxes got the same roof detail as the shed and as you can see from the photo above the roof line of the coop matches that of the shed as well. The chicken wire was installed next. The specific chicken wire was a point of discussion because I thought it might be cool to do something different here. Maybe a black chicken wire in an unusual shape? I was initially opposed to the"standard silver chicken wire" because I didn't think it would go with the vibe of the space aesthetically, but upon more research Brent found that the standard silver chicken wire was really the best because the weave was tighter which kept varmints out. According to a lot of research and feedback from fellow chicken owners, weasels, rats and snakes were the main cause of death for chickens. So, we went with the standard stuff and I'm so happy we did. Not only does it give us peace of mind that the chickens are safer this way,  but aesthetically it just blends in, and I realized after the fact, the lack of  statement it offers was exactly what was needed.

The open counter space you see in the photo above is my planting bench!  We just used 2 x 8 boards and sat them atop the chicken run to create the table. This is definitely one of my favorite details of this addition and one that I have already utilized many times! Brent added 3 holes to the back side of the coop for breathe-ability and I love the charm the little holes with chicken wire bring to this side of the coop. 

Back inside the coop Brent cut a hole in the floor for the trap door. We purchased this door that you can set on a timer to open and close at certain times of the day. The door closes at 9:30pm when it gets dark and opens again at 7:00am. 

Brent built a ladder that connects the chicken run to the chicken coop so the chickens can easily scurry up or down. 

Brent also built a series of perches inside the coop for the chickens to sit on. They like to be up high, so he gave the several options to choose from. 

While Brent constructed the coop, I worked on painting both the coop and the shed. We painted everything the color Kendall Charcoal by Benjamin Moore. I love the color. I'm not sure if it's appropriate to say a shed is chic, but........

She is pretty sharp, eh?

We got the majority of the coop built before we brought the chickens home, but it was a few weeks before we could let them live outside full time. A few weeks ago we showed the girls their new home and we feel like they were pretty impressed with their digs. More on the chickens soon, but for now, here's a shot of the girls headed home. 

All photos are my own.