House Guest

Who knew that painting and adding picture rail to the dining room would take this long?! *raises hand*  yeah.... I figured it wouldn't go as quick as I wanted, but a girl can dream. Walls are painted, trim is up, painted, caulked, holes are filled... all I have left is some paint touch-ups on the trim.  I can't wait to REALLY pull the room together, but what pleases me most is that the trim looks like belongs.  like it's always been there.  yay!

My self-imposed hard deadline to get this all touched up and done is this weekend.  Why this weekend?  We have friends coming over on Saturday, but more importantly, Sunday marks the beginning of having a house guest.  Remember how I mentioned that my parents are moving?  As I mentioned, Mom has a job in Boston metro-west area starting next week.  They sold their house in less than 2 weeks, but something's still missing.  A house to move into!  So until they find the right house, Handy Dad'll be staying with his sister in CT and Mom'll be staying with us during the week.  This will be the first time anyone will actually be staying in our 'guestroom' which until now has just been the cats room with the extra tv.  Hope they like they're new roommate!

Since hopefully (for all of our sake's) this living arrangement will only be for a month or so, I'm trying not to worry too much about design.  Trying.  Not fully succeeding, though.  Mom's bringing her own twin bed and dresser (just about all the room can fit), but that still won't stop me from drooling over some spectacular small guest rooms on Pinterest.

So, which room do you want, Mom?

sources: 1/2/3/4

Art Musical Chairs

There is finally one room in my house that has all the desired art on the walls and has NO empty frames.  Huzzah!! After getting the new living room rug, I started rearranging the art a bit, leaving it rather unbalanced.

For the past year, this print and it's brother have been flanking the tv waiting to be a completed composition.

Flashback to a year ago:

With the new rug, the "brother" print ended up at the end of the couch.

I've been drawn to images on pinterest that draw attention away from a tv with a gallery wall.  Since we have our enormous gallery wall in the office, I decided a mini one was in order here.  There was a bit of trial and error.  My initial plan for the wall looked kind of awesome as composition itself, but when I looked at it with the whole room it got a little nutso busy.  I don't want the tv wall competing with my plate wall, afterall!

I was planning to paint all the frames white or silver to unify them, but after living with it this way for 2 days, it just didn't feel right in the room.  That actually makes me sad, because looking back at these pictures, the wall itself is really successful.  I really like it, a lot, but I wasn't willing to sacrifice my other design elements to make this the feature.  The whole room was starting to look crazy overdesigned.  Not good.

Luckily I used 3M picture hangers instead of nailing everything into the wall, so I was able to very very carefully pull off the adhesive and move all the art.  (I'm currently having a love affair with the 3M picture hanging strips.  That's what we used in the cutest nephew ever's nursery, and they're awesome and easy and they should totally sponsor my blog.  hint hint.)

So I simplified.

It's not as dynamic on its own, but it makes so much more sense with the rest of the room.

Did you also notice the other art switcheroo?

The repro map of our town from the 1800s (that I got at a tag sale for $2) earned a place of honor after a spray paint make-over.

I am also pleased to report that the dining room is painted and I've started cutting the picture rail pieces.  I can't wait to see this room come together like the living room has!!

Modern Quilting

When I was in middle school, my mom made me a quilt.  Nice and sophisticated twin size with pink and purple hearts.  (I picked out the pattern when I was little in case you were questioning)  When she got around to making my sisters quilt, a few years later (when my sister was in college), she got a queen size quilt with a more grown up blue and gold starbursts.  Since then, Mom's been promising me a 'grown up' quilt if I can just pick a pattern that I like.  Since I'm not drawn to traditional quilts (shocker) it's easier said than done. Now, I'm not saying this is the one, but Holy Chic Quilt, Batman!  Those aren't words I usually associate together- chic and quilt, but this little lady earns it.

Stay tuned tomorrow for updates on my living room TV wall, and hopefully some progress on the dining room!

Random side note:  I'm learning how to type pretty well with one hand, since a certain kitten had decided that blogging time is also cuddle time.