Grant-Fangs!

He looks sweet & innocent.....

and then...Baby Dracula!

Royce & Lynn call them his fangs and I got a great picture of them.

Finally-new pictures!

The living room (fireplace room) is almost finished. You can see the olive green paint I just finished this afternoon. After this, I painted more blue in the laundry room. The laundry room might just end up being my favorite room in the house. And how could I forget-our laminate floors in Brazilian Cherry. I think they look pretty real and seem fairly easy to maintain so far. These floors go all the way down to the TV room and we decided to put it in the closet area off the laundry and bathroom too. Less carpeting for the cats to puke on.
This room makes Dan feel very happy. He has a big screen TV and finally after waiting 22 years, leather furniture. We need a rug here and to the right I plan to hang a collage of vintage frames and photo's. Is there such a thing as modern Italian? I think this is the look we are after.
Here's the shower. Yes, I know I wasn't going to show you until it was done. We went with subway white as the glass blue was $20 per square foot! Yikes!! We're keeping it clean and simple in the shower.
This picture shows you what our paneled walls will look like in the dining room and fireplace room. They look a little rough as they are just primed once. I'm thinking about keeping the yellow in this area as it flows nicely into the green in the FP room.
Here's the floor we selected for the bathroom. It will go on the shower floor too. It should work well with the black vanity. We bought a light blue paint for the walls in the bathroom. I'm hoping it will come out a grey blue but you never know until you get it up. I think that will be a Sunday afternoon painting project.

Remodel Checklist

Laminate floors in Living room +

Laminate floors in TV room +

Tile ordered for bathroom +

Master bedroom carpet installed +

Guest bedroom upstairs carpeted +

All interior window trim +

Interior door trim +

Paneled walls primed +

Laundry room vinyl installed +

Wainscot in laundry room +

Wainscot in new bathroom +

Plugged drain unplugged +

New leather furniture delivered to TV room +

Most of this happened in the last 7 days. Again, I apologize for the lack of pictures but I've been so busy helping Dan move things all over the place while they carpet one room or the other, that by the time I finish, it's too dark for a decent picture. It also happened to be mid-terms this week and for the first time in my career I had to send them home. We just didn't do that in 1st or even 4th grade. It wasn't that big of a deal but I had to make sure my online grade book was up-to-date and all missing assignments were accounted for.

Tonight, when I got home, the carpeting in our bedroom was finished. It's a very dark brown and I really like it. We had to put the floral loveseat in the bedroom for now but hope to find a better place for that. On Monday, after school, I picked out the new tile. Dan also had a good hand in picking this out. We went with something totally different and I think I will just wait for a picture to show you. It will be installed next Monday. Then we can put the new sink in. Can't wait!

MEA this week! We'll be in Cyrus for a few days with the rest of my family. Fish fry on Friday(Paul) and Alaskan salmon on Saturday courtesy of Royce. Yum! Cyrus Bazaar is on Saturday morning as usual. Hope warmer temperatures are on the way.

I plan to take some remodel pictures tomorrow and take advantage of the natural light.

Mom & Rosemary

It's Mom's birthday today! She and Rosemary, along with her new Westie pups, came up for the afternoon. We did a little shopping excursion to Fergus and had lunch at the new cafe next to the Union Square Market-I recommend it highly! We all loved our lunches and they were very reasonably priced. The bread is from Falls Bakery and all the tables were laminate from the 50s and 60s. They serve wine too but we stuck to the coffee.

Rosemary is Mom's first cousin, who resides in New Jersey but recently bought a 2nd home in town in Madison where her parents still live. I met her for the first time a few years ago when we she met, Mom, Nancy and I in NYC for the day. She's a neat lady and aren't those little dogs cute? Lewis and Clark...Lewis is the girl. I meowed to get their ears to perk up for this picture-Rosemary suggested it and it worked like a charm.

Remodel Update

Sorry no pictures, my rechargeable batteries on my camera lost their last ounce of strength.

Last week was such a slow week, but this week, we are in high gear again. We have 9 new white craftsman style doors looking very at home in their new spots. The door trim is mostly finished and the windows get theirs tomorrow. We had to make a small change with the door trim after school but it's looking just right now. These little tweaks and decisions drive me crazy because they can make a big difference.

On Thursday & Friday, the laminate floors go in the TV and living room. Those rooms will be pretty much complete at that point after they put the baseboards in. I am VERY excited to see those floors go in. The crown molding is already in both of those rooms. I can't wait to come home on Friday after school.

We have our EA Fall Drive on Wed so it will be a late night for me. Dan will actually be home from the cities before I will. There will be a lot for him to look at around here.

The Twins are making me nervous. 4-4, I should be painting but really want to sit and watch the game. I have soup going on the stove-a nice cold wet night for that, plus I'll have leftovers for lunch for a couple of days. Beef-veggie, in case you were wondering. :)

October!

I did it!!

I worked my nerve up and painted the door black. I really like it and didn't tell Dan just to see if he'd notice. It only took him a few hours to notice and he loved it. I was going to paint our address numbers under the window section but I think I will look for some cool metal ones instead. This entry will be surrounded with paneling 5 feet high and I haven't decided if I will paint or wallpaper the wall above. I plan to have some hooks running along the paneling for bags and coats-maybe a little bench underneath. You can see they repaired all the cracks in the ceiling and we will have a new light too.
This is the bathroom. The sink will go on the left. We STILL need to order the tile and had better soon or it will stall the progress in the bathroom. This decision is stressing me out.

This is the laundry room. Isn't it charming?!

I took a picture of my new birdfeeder. Remember this Kris? I bought two of them this summer and added hooks so I could hang them. They're so rustic and durable-the birds love them. Can you see the nuthatch inside? Speaking of nuthatches, I saw a little rust breasted nuthatch last weekend! I only see them once every year or two and they are SOOO cute!

Sunday Ramblings

Another pretty laundry room. I have decided to use beadboard walls up to 4 feet and on the ceiling. Not sure about the walls above that yet. The floors will be vinyl with a tile look.

I like the white number on this black door. I'm torn between painting the formal door in the entry we never use white or black. I heard on a decorating show that you should go with what you are most afraid and that would be black for me. We were going to replace the door but when we discovered how expensive entry doors are, we decided to have our contractor fix up the one we already have.

I use these metal vintage trays all the time. I happen to have this particular one in red as shown and in green. They do make fun magnet boards.

I am through with my trailer infatuation for now but had to show you this one. I think it's pretty terrible!

Awwwwww....

Autumn!

As sad as it is to say good bye to summer, I absolutely love fall. So far this fall has been quite summer-like and that's my favorite kind of fall of all. Decorating with natural items in fall is one of my favorite things to do and it doesn't look like I will be able to do any of that for a while, maybe late October if things continue to go well. Here are some other gorgeous fall images found elsewhere on the web. Enjoy, and Happy Fall!

I have a red chair similar to this. I may have to set it outside too.

It actually works!

We've had this light fixture up for about 5 years. When we replaced the old we assumed it would work with the light switch but surprise-it only worked with a pull chain switch. So, we just left it up and never used it. I had the electrician look at it and he thought he could drill into the base and put a chain on it so we could actually use it. Well, he did it and now it actually provides light! I bought bulbs for the other sockets too. :) I don't like those shades anymore-too big and beady. Should be easy to find different ones.

A Room with a View

Here's an inside look at the upstairs bedrooms which now have a brand new window each. They are slider windows with a screen. Once, the window trim is on, this room is finished and then I can have fun decorating it. I really hope I have some green paint left in this color so that I can paint the damaged areas without having to repaint the entire room.

I think I'm going to like this corner.

Inspiring Photo's

Besides those fuzzy rabbits, this picture has all the elements I love, old books, a cloche with a nest, white pottery and peonies.
I am thinking about storage in the laundry room and I like the simple shelves along the wall, probably no cubbies though. Wish I had those fancy appliances too!
The dark floors, white wainscoat and fun wallpaper in this picture is just the look I'm after. Can you believe this is just a laundry room area? I probably won't use a lot of wallpaper, the entry for sure, maybe the bath. The green Jacquard print paper in our living room will not make it through the remodel. It has been damaged pretty badly and I don't have enough extra to make the repairs. Oh well.

My poor hostas

Look at the flower bed in front of the windows below. My poor hostas, sedum, hydrangeas, peonies and more have been trampled down to nothing. I hope they will come back next spring. That stupid arborvitae or whatever it's called survived though. Nothing can kill that thing.

Exterior shot

These windows are called "modified cottage colonials." In a couple of months I will probably not have that kind of information stored in my brain anymore. In fact, I think I have lost some of my window terminology already. I love the prairie style windows too but they just didn't seem right for the style or lack of style of our exterior. Notice the brown shingles? Dan picked them out and is quite proud of them. I like them too. The siding will go back up soon and on Friday the last two windows go up above the pergola. The weather has been perfect this week for all this work.

Today was the best day of school so far. I think the routine is finally starting to kick in even though we are busy testing this week. The days go by so fast. Gotta go watch Mad Men!

Vanity Arrived!

The bathroom vanity arrived today. It's in a huge crate in our garage. When I got home, I opened up the top so I could get a close look at the granite and the bowl. I couldn't tell from this photo if the bowls were round or oval and guess what...they are rectangular and I love them. What a nice surprise. The knobs are oval and are brushed nickel so that's what we'll do with the faucets. It's packed up so tight, that's about all I could see and that it is in fact black. It came 4 weeks early too!