In My New Home…Organized Chaos

I am in heaven!  I finally closed on my new home a couple weeks ago and am not in the throes of boxes and bags and a myriad of furniture and belongings.  My clothes are on a rack in the cellar…that is the ones that will fit.  The rest are on an extra bed in the second bedroom. Boxes of all shapes and sizes are all strewn around the cellar and also in the second bedroom.  And me…well, I sprained my ankle coming out of my old place on moving day so I have had my feet up, cold compresses numbing the pain, and unable to get around without either crawling on my hands and knees or using a walker. Yep, you guessed it..I am down with an injury and now must wait to get everything organized. 

But I do not want to focus on this..I want to sing the praises of myself for choosing and buying the best house built for me.  My little place is perfect for the style I love which is traditional and somewhat shabby chic, and has a big kitchen for entertaining and a huge bathroom with a lot of character and room for improvement but good enough til I get settled.  With the November Thanksgiving came some days of real cold but other days of 60+ degree days with sunshine.  I feel snug as a bug in a rug!

Moving in was a challenge because I have a couple pieces of furniture that are heavy.  First of all the box spring to my queen size bed would not fit up the stairs. I had to throw it out and buy a metal frame to take the place of it.  Not so bad, but now my bed is lower to the ground. I intend to fix that with a topper that I hope will raise me up a couple of inches.

My cherry bedroom  dresser is so heavy and the stairs in this place, again very steep, and the treads are shallow.  A very large china cabinet that does not detach from the base is also a piece that was clumsy and difficult to move. By the end of the move the top had come detached from the base.  Oh well…one of the casualties of moving and I should have expected it. So what though…I have it in my kitchen where I wanted it and painted its final coat of white it is perfect right where I set it.

Christmas is coming and so my small tree went up and the colors of the furniture, walls and the tree trimmings fit with the vision I had in mind.  The color palette is soft and soothing. The atmosphere is “small parlor” style.  The architectural elements already in place in the room lend nicely to the vintage appearance with my furniture. 

 

Now it is time for me to get everything in order for the holidays and my first Christmas Open House. I am beyond excited!  You are invited to read my next installment that will show you all the decorations and the buffet I will be sharing with my guests.  See you soon!

Patience in the Pursuit of my Happy Place & Fall Decorating Ideas

So I am moving closer to the closing date of closing on my mortgage. Seems like the more excited we are about seeing our vision through the longer it takes to happen.  Maybe I need to learn a little bit about patience.  I know that I have not been in the cheeriest of moods as the cloud of "additional documentation needed" looms overhead.  But here I am in the last week of October and I can actually see tomorrow...and it looks like I can yell hooray shortly.

In the last month I have driven to the new place about four times.  It looks more raggedy as the days go by because it is not being lived in right now..(the owner moved in with her fiancé, and the grass needs to be groomed.  But hey...some repainting was done on the trim and fence.  I am so grateful to call this place mine one day soon.  One of the things I look forward to is driving by just to drive in the driveway! 

When that happens I will have a paper trail of everything I had to do to make this purchase happen, and the experience to share with any future home buyers.  I could write a book by now.  The docs and records stack at least 9" high and fit nicely into a canvas shopping bag.  And I have saved the entire process in a file on a computer, copies of everything I submitted with dates and everything, duplicating my online mortgage lending file account that my lender maintains.  The knowledge I have now of this entire journey could be of use to someone else someday.

So moving on I just want to decorate my place for the upcoming holidays.  First, Thanksgiving.  I envision a bale of hay with some nice fat pumpkins on my porch. I see perhaps a cornucopia sitting atop one of bales..and perhaps a couple of planters of mums.  Or...better...here are a couple of pictures I found on the internet for beautiful outdoor decorations for Thanksgiving:

If you have bushel baskets left over from your cider mill visits they make great holiday
vessels for mums or gourds or pumpkins.  If you do not have any check out the
nearest thrift shop in the baskets aisle.

Those empty wire foliage containers that you get from all over the place
do have a special use for this time of year.  The floral can be purchased
at the dollar store but still have a million dollar impact.

Those galvanized containers are perfect for any time of year.  And finding a
few bare twigs and either some real autumn leaves or a package
of silk ones from the craft store makes a simple but lovely
arrangement.

If you have a porch with steps, what better way to spruce up each one
than with an array of pumpkins, mums and gourds? The colors
make it a spectacular fall show from mid October through to
Thanksgiving Day.

 

One of the things that anyone can do to decorate for the season whether you are an apartment dweller or have your own home is to decorate your door.  Nothing says welcome more than an attractive wreath or spray. I found these on the internet as well:

Each of these wreaths has its own personality.  I love how a couple of the wreaths have
incorporated pheasant feathers together with gourds.  Turkey feathers work
just as well if you cannot get your hands on pheasant feathers.
The colors in all of these wreaths sing out the season and yet are
tasteful...not gaudy or ostentatious.

My house is yellow so the colors I choose for my decorations will include that color in the scheme.  I have a lot of room to make a real statement.  A vine of fall leaves and twigs could make a great hanging trim for the front of the porch roofline and hanging on the two side pillars.  I could go nuts, actually.

Stand by.  I hope to share some of that kind of decorating as soon as I am moved in the place. I look so forward to showing all of you my new pride and joy.

Dream your dreams with open eyes and make them come true.......



You all will never believe what I have to share this time!  I am as mystified at the sudden events as any of you will be after you read this.  You all know how much I like to decorate and re-do and change my space, right?  Well here is a serious re-do endeavor....I am buying a house!

Many of my single girlfriends were either in a house or on the hunt.  One of them in particular felt it was time for me to become a homeowner too. I knew what I wanted.  I felt like being around a lake was my calling which also kept me near my work. But I felt inclined to look where they lived. Most of them had come back to the city where I grew up and the prospect of living there was pretty enticing. Believe me, when I decided to make this move I had every intention of giving the different cities equal consideration. However my hometown is in a hot market, overpriced and in a situation where I do not see the maintenance of the city being on the upside. And, too, the inspiration for my decision came from a chance call from a realtor that I had spoken to about a year ago who called me on a whim to tell me about a cute cottage size house that had just hit the market. That call was about all the things I wanted in my next house...near a body of water, small town but with the comforts of the big city nearby. And above all...it must be charming! 

So while I was perusing online ads for homes I really was just looking at the market to see what the possibilities were. This realtor had been contacted by me months ago when I took a chance to ask a couple questions about a home at that time that was on the market.  I told her I was only browsing but had to know the specifics on this one occasion. She remembered me and called me right around the month that my lease was about to expire.  She told me about a home that was a "cottage" type and she remembered that is exactly what I was interested in.  After we hung up the phone I decided to take the short drive to the house she was talking about and instantly...I fell!  I surveyed the neighborhood, drove around the block to the city park with the pond and walking trail, and took note that a lake was within a mile distance away with privileges.  I actually held my heart as I pulled into the parking lot of the park, exited my vehicle and took a comfortable seat on a bench within it.  I noticed the tennis court busy with youngsters taking lessons, the basketball court abuzz with two teams of men in their thirties, moms with strollers walking the paved trail around the perimeter and the sounds coming from the nearby pond..you know...frogs, crickets...and the like.  The sun was high and the sky was blue and the grass was green. This was a beautiful place and I felt connected to it.  Suddenly I decided I wanted this.

A few days before someone from FHA contacted me to remind me of a program that would assist me in being a homeowner.  I scoffed at the plan originally as the woman reiterated the ease of utilizing the program she described. But now as I sat in that park I was in a thought frenzy...how could I make this work?  Am I really a candidate to buy right now?  How much would a house payment on a home that costs X amount of dollars really be?

Next day I was doing some serious math. I calculated every home I found online that interested me using their mortgage calculator. I contacted the agent about the house I had seen that day I decided to pursue my dream. She informed me that the house was already sold ..in a record 4 hours!  This only excited me more and before I knew it I was out the next weekend looking at 5 homes all within my price range. If I wanted to make this a dream come true...I would have to act quickly on anything that came up that I was interested in and fit my price range.

Fast forward to today in September and I am in the middle of the mortgage process.  All the documents I needed to prove my worth were already accepted.  My realtor and I are waiting on a waiver to allow the lender to sign off on some things that required attention at the house I am buying.  The appraiser had pointed out some places where paint was peeling and a map had to be drawn pointing out the location of the well and septic on the property. Once that document is logged in we are good to go and within a few weeks I will be a proud new homeowner.

I am over the moon for my little piece of heaven.  Its a 990 square foot 2 story bungalow/cape cod style.  It has two bedrooms and a large bathroom, extra large kitchen and a mudroom.  The living room is wide and short, kind of interesting floor plan and features vintage touches that show it's history.  There is a basement which suits me great because there is no garage and I need a place to store the things I love that in the past I have been forced to get rid of. 

This is one of two house on the blocks..that's the way this neighborhood rolls.
The neighbor keeps their yard beautiful and since I have only one neighbor I do not
feel crowded.  I think the porch could use a swing and the windows some colorful
planter boxes.  Don't you?

I love the layout.  Some may see the dining room being an obvious place for eating but

I would like to put my contemporary sitting area on one end and my vintage sofa and

other furniture pieces on the other end.  One day I will enlarge the window on the right to a picture

size.  for now..I am happy with the vintage flair of the crown molding and the wainscoting.

And some day...I will look into getting real wood floors back in here.



The bathroom is a bit too contemporary for my taste but it is sound in
its electrical and plumbing for now.  Someday a claw foot tub, vintage floor
tiles, a dresser re-purposed as a vanity and perhaps a nice window over the space
there would be something to look into.  The big closet across from the tub provides
lots of storage space....more than at my townhouse.  This room has great bones!

This kitchen was updated by painting the cabinets this warm cherry color and granite
counter tops were added.  A great start. I intend to change the color of the cabinets to a warm
cream color and build a fancy island/storage out of an old dresser. A nice chandelier over it and
add some pretty pendant lights over the peninsula/snack bar would do wonders for this room.

Notice all the wonderful light steaming in from outside?  This attracted me immediately
to the kitchen/mudroom area.  I think I would like to place my china cabinet, as seen in previous
installments of my blog, on that right wall. If I could change one thing..it would be to add a door
perhaps a dutch door, to the opening between kitchen and mudroom to sort of seal off the
basement entrance that is right there by the window in the mudroom. It may be needed to retain warmth
in the winter, even with the upgraded vinyl windows throughout the house.

I did not know how much I wanted a mudroom until I saw the one at this house. Someone
was smart about the floor treatment choice and installing the organizer!  Finally I will be able to
empty out my car trunk of all the picnic items and beach equipment!  Fate read my mind!  And, yes
that is granite on the sill there.    Notice how clean and fresh the entire first floor looks and it
is so bright with all the windows!


When I decided to make an offer I was concerned that the seller would only consider the kind of financing that the buyer would be using which would totally discount anyone else including mostly those low-balling.  So to make my offer stronger I wrote a letter to the seller letting her know my emotional response to visiting her place and how much it would mean to me and to my little dog Kozmo to be living here. I also inserted pictures of both me and my dog into the text of the letter.  My realtor tells me it made the difference.  Just goes to show you how creative you have to be in this fast moving market.  I am not to proud to beg which also helps!

I had been visualizing this event for the past two years.  I had even shared with my best friend that I had made up a visual board with pictures and writings glued to it that encompassed what I wanted, what I wanted it to look like and what my plan was to make it happen.  I heard brides did this prior to getting engaged and then in wedding planning.  I knew it felt right for me to do because I had also read the Book of Secrets that says that if you want something badly enough you have to visualize it to make it come true.  I guess that book was right.

So now as I prepare for the day I will actually close on my mortgage and take possession of the keys to my kingdom I am beaming with joy!  I felt an emotional attachment to this place as soon as I entered the front door.  From the big comfy porch to the cute and quaint living room, to the extra large kitchen which will allow me, for the first time in 5 years to keep and store all the things a good cook really needs, to the back yard with its cute tool shed...and all for the same price
per month I am paying to rent! 

I am not saying home ownership is for everyone but it will certainly agree with me.  And even though the house is just fine the way it is I can see the potential to put my mark on every room in this place and not have to give it up as I would with an apartment or other lease agreement. Being able to put to use all the years of planning and dreaming and doing will now make a difference in my surroundings and in my life.  I cannot express the depth of my contentment with the future I am beginning to build and will continue to build over the rest of my lifetime. 

Every decorating decision I make will be worthy of this blog and I look forward to sharing with you the little changes I will be making to each room. 

Stand by...this dream is about to be mine.  I am so glad you are here to witness it and I hope you will share your comments. 

With kind regards,

Kimber

With the passing of 2015 I have been reminded daily of all of the changes I have wanted to make to my townhouse.  While I am pretty restricted, obviously, by the regs that that my lease stipulates I have many options for making my place more my own.  I can paint a wall here and there, I can move my furnishings around and change the locations of the artwork on my walls.  More than that I can change the entire feel of my place by changing out the furniture pieces.  In that vein I have been seriously considering changing from the earth tone semi-contemporary feel that is has now over to shabby chic with a much lighter and more soothing color palette. So I am beginning to get some photos saved and looking at colors such as white, robin's egg blue, blush and the like, and in doing so I will be changing out my hardwood tables or painting them.
I began this process last weekend by looking at the china cabinet I purchased a few years ago. It is a dark mahogany or cherrywood, I do not know which, but it needs to be color-changed.  I have been interested in trying out the new chalk painting that seems to be all the rage and did some research to learn what I need to do to get a good result.  It is not supposed to be difficult.  I hear it is pretty easy to use chalkpaint, that it is very forgiving but it the paint is expensive.  I headed over to the nearerst home store to buy the paint, brushes and other supplies and began my project.
Choosing a color was a bit of a challenge.  Should I go robin's egg blue or stark white?  I liked both but thought I would do this project in white since I liked the look of a similar cabinet that I found on the internet that was painted that way.

This cabinet looks so much like mine, with the exception that mine has two doors separated by a a divider in the middle.  I love the look of the bright white inside and outside.  The china that is inside is exactly what I want to display.  The french cabriole legs and inset panels mirror my own.  This is where I began to plan my project.

So as you saw in my last post I began the project and then it didn't work out the way I intended so I ended up painting it plain white latex which by the way, looks just as nice.  I have thought of painting the inside but cannot decide whether to wallpaper it in some cool cabbage rose pattern or just paint it robins egg blue.  Either would be nice.  And since I changed the material covering the seats of my vintage DR chairs, either would coordinate nicely and give me that shabby chic look that I wanted, at lest in the DR.

I have a chandelier I can hang in there too.  The ceiling is a bit lower, I think seven feet or so, so I cannot hang something too big or too long.  but I do have my old light piece from my house from which I downsized.  Thing is..it is in a strange
goldish color.  Should I paint that white or blue?  Should I leave it alone?  And if I do paint it it would be better to do it before I hang it right?  So, here I am, stalled, because I need to decide on the whether or not to paint it before I hang it. So, I will move on to something else.

I should change my furniture.  I found this lovely shabby chic style of sofa at the right price but its gonna cost almost more to move than its worth.  Its perfect.  The photo shows its the right color and style. Maybe I should just suck it up and buy it before someone else gets it.  I want to treat the wood  frame with the chalk paint and maybe change the color of the upholstery into a robins egg blue. 

Isn't it a charmer?  I want it but I still have my old sofa and even though I have room for this in my living room now I feel like I am only interested because it is available for a limited time, not because I am ready to full force start changing up my décor.  And, I will have to find a way to move it.  Anyway, I am still trying to nail down this item through the seller and hopefully I will have it pretty soon.  I just do not see a better deal coming along. This seller is asking $185, but I am
hoping she will sell it for less since I have to come from so far away from her to get it.

Once I have the couch in place I am thinking of having one wall painted as an accent wall in that pretty blue I was talking about earlier, with some glaze striping on the same wall.  I recently hung new curtains that look like linen with silver threads running through, nothing gaudy, just a little speck of silver to pick up on the sterling silver ice bucket I have in which I will be creating a hydrangea flower bouquet.  Other colors in the room will be a white desk with a black chair and sort of farmhouse style shabby chic. Some pretty home made throw pillows and perhaps, just perhaps, a jute rug with some blue specks in it to make the beige carpet a little more interesting. And that is my start. 

Ill let you know when I get finished and come back.  With my life changing all the time who knows what my next post will say.  Let's just wait and see!

Wish me luck.

Trying the Chalk Painting Thing.....

Since I moved into my place a couple of years ago and brought with me the earth toned contemporary style furniture I already had, things have gotten quite boring to me.  Yes, I know that even if I do not have small children or pets and my color choice is practical for hiding a good amount of wear and tear it concerns me to be so milk toast. You may remember my post from some months ago highlighting the re-do of my galley kitchen. There is not a lot a person can do to improve thier digs when they are owned by someone else, i.e., a property management company. However there are small details that can be enhanced, colors introduced and non permanent things that can be brought in to make your place your own.

Well, changing out the furniture in my place will certainly make my townhouse feel like a real home.  And I am excited about that.

 

In the past year I have really bought into the shabby chic look.  On Facebook I joined a county shabby chic page and seen all the beautiful furniture pieces that people sell there and share with their members.  Since I am a big fan of a softer palate of colors for my surroundings this style works well for me.  Chalk painted tables and hardwood accessories, the soft pastel/white/linen colors of upholstered pieces and various decorative pieces in soft turquoise, sage green and pink go no only with my personality but also brighton my demeanor.  So that's the way I choose to go and decided to embark on

chalk painting a piece of furniture that screams "I want to be painted". 

 

It is a country french china cabinet done in dark cherry or mahogany.  Some people warned me not to paint such a beautiful piece..leave it as I found it.  I used to agree with that piece of advice. I thought it, at one time, that it was a crime to paint over natural wood.  But as the decades have proven, dark pieces make for a dark room.  And seeing the success that others have had with chalk painting intrigued and excited the heck out of me!  I can see the possibilities of having a pretty dining room with my pink Homer Laughlin "Marilyn" pattern china displayed so proudly. I can see pretty floral pieces and dazzling crystal set up in this  cabinet providing the perfect starting point for setting up a chalk painted country french dining table with chairs upholstered in a lovely cabbage rose pattern to match the skirt that hides the cabinets under my kitchen sink directly adjacent to the dining room.  My mind cannot stop now.  I am so ready for this.

Here is the before of my cabinet:

 

The beautiful lines and curves of this cabinet work perfectly
for a chalk painting project.  I cannot wait to get started!

So I picked the color I wanted, which was a linen white, and did some research to learn that the paint type I wanted is available at Home Depot.  It was just a quart and cost $15.98.  I bought some new brushes and a drop cloth too.  Everything I had been reading up to now about this kind of project kept telling me how esy it was to use chalk paint, how forgiving it is..what a nice smooth finish it provides with no sanding or surface prep required other than a light wipe down with a mild detergent to get rid of dust or other particles. 

I ran home, paint in the bag with all of my tools. I couldn't wait to get the paint opened.  I knew I had thoroughly dusted the piece the day previous and did not observe any new dust accumulating since.  I taped off the glass doors, but I left the hardware which i wanted to be painted anyway, and if need be I would change out the knobs later. 

I laid on the first coat with a brush about 3 inches wide.  The paint was smooth and thick.  I tried to be as even handed as I possibly could as I stroked on each line of paint and moved from the side of the cabinet to the front aruond the glass doors and up around the molding. 

 

It was about this time that I noticed the paint had taken on a crackle effect.  Oh no.  This is not the smooth linen finish I expected or wanted.  I had to stop.

This is what I expected the piece to look like:

The fnish on here is not streaky or crackled. It is a smooth
white finish with a wax sealant on it.  I think the
finish makes the china more attractive. Just my opinion though.

When I posted this on FB I got kudos from many who said they thought this was
a very attractive outcome and said they would not change it.

While my FB friends thought this was a beautiful finish I could not disagree more.  I envisioned a different smooth white shiney finish. I felt that it highlighted the china more and provided a sort of fancy with a plain backdrop for everything inside the cabinet.  I believe that the crackle finish makes everything look more folk art primitive...not the look I wanted.
So today I will be going home and working on correcting this and my next blog update will follow letting you know what happens.  Thanks for following.  I will return in a few days! 

So it has been a few weeks and I have not even gone back to my chalkpainting project.  I am so afraid of being found out by a professional grade chalk painter that my efforts were less than stellar and that I may have ruined my piece. You see, I am not ready to sand down the finish on the portion of the cabinet that crackled.  So I tried painting it with shellac and repainting in an inconspicuous place and I am not sure it looks good painted matte white.  I will never be able to get that chalk paint finish that I was seeking.  Oh well!

So, onward and upward to just painting the whole thing with plain white latex, replacing the knobs and calling it a day. I find that I just do not have the energy to re-do this whole project right now.  Here I was thinking this endeavor would be fast and easy, but it is not, especially when I figure in all the things I would rather do on the weekend or at the end of a long day.

I will try this paint method on another piece that is smaller on another day in the future.  Take care and see you back here next time.