thoughts

this time of year is beautiful, no question. but i have to say, i get a little nervous when the leaves start to fall. i have to keep reminding myself that they will come back again. i love the green living things and i love to be outside, and i get so lonesome for the green things when they hibernate. stella made this flower decoration - she poked the stems of the flowers through the wide leaf, to keep them all together.

i took this picture at the beginning of summer. tiny plastic streamers can be incredibly beautiful in the sunshine.

random bedroom picture which i may have even posted before! i love the colors, the striped paper, and of course, the lamps.

another random picture i have saved. i think so much of a beautiful room comes from the architectural details. imagine this room without the wall panelling and i think you will see what i mean. i don't think anything that i've put inside this my house would look very good if it weren't for the fact that we replaced things like the old flooring. unfortunately, it's those structural things that are most expensive to change! unless you're terribly handy, which i am not. if i were, i'd be tearing the old chair rail down from the hallway, putting up crown moulding, and installing bypass closet doors right this moment!

i so very much want to go to sleep, and i know i will get woken up before too long. sleep deprivation is a cruel thing. rafe is lucky he is so very darling that i can't help but worship him, even though he steals my sleep every night.

exteriors

we need to reside the house, but can't afford that this year. still, i am in my idea-collecting mode and have a few pictures saved. here they are!

wouldn't do this, really, but thought it was neat the way they made it look old in a pretty convincing, non-cheesey way!

Painted brick? love the gray of the shutters, and the shutter locks.

heh heh

more my style...isin't this a sweet house? we won't tell them it's bad feng shui to have a tree blocking your entrance, huh? ha ha! very cute house.

kitchen - lauren

I have a feeling you might hate this, Lauren, but....here is a photo of the type of light I'm talking about. It's not exactly what I was picturing, but the same idea. I believe it's a paper shade. The one I was picturing is more of a "mum" shape. Now that I look at it, I think it would be too out of place. I still think you could do a contemporary light, but maybe something with metal, instead.

Arts n Crafts door with Fancy Glass.

This would be a typical arts and crafts door....

Ah! if only i could figure out how to rotate a picture...but that would take too long! (i DID try, and sadly enough, couldn't figure it out!) note the blue/gray and red cabinets - i think it's very cute. maybe too "country" for you?

this is the ottoman i mentioned. see how there is a tray in the middle? how awesome is that!?

found the old pictures!!!

here is the old fireplace, obviously! and the very very dark beams with ultra-white paint between.... sh iver ! actually, i really do understand what they were going for in this house originally....an english tudor type of thing, with the dark beams and rails and stucco walls...the only problem was, they did it in an ultra ugly way! ha! seriously, the finish on the wood was dreadful, shiney, dark and splintery wood, too. the masonry of the brick is, i think, pretty yucky, too. they made super deep grooves between all the bricks which is weird. same as on the exterior.

the original kitchen! well, after a little tearing out. originally we were going to just paint what was there. oh man, am i ever glad we changed it around beyond just painting cabinets.

front hall light fixture - quite hideous, you've gotta admit. the front door was wood but had bad hardware and a million coats of paint, as well as a little window at just the perfect height for people to stare in at you before you even know they are there.

wish i had more pictures of the original master bathroom. i have already posted the "after" shots. it's SO MUCH BETTER NOW!!!! before, closet on the outside wall, no window. weird angled vanity. weird, weird, and more weird.

this is the room where we now have the piano. there was much questioning of my desire to replace this light fixture. can you believe it? sigh! the front of the house used to be all these double-hung inefficient windows. it was pricey to replace them, but it made a HUGE difference in the appearance of the house from the front. now it is 3 casement, two sides operational, middle one not. love em. much better looking.



this last photo so you can see the window difference. so much better. yes, we still need paint and repair to the wood stuff on the exterior, etc etc.... but ah, i have to say the i think windows are so important!

hope you enjoyed the trip down memory lane!

random things

Stella's room, which I haven't posted before. Here it is.

I did this painting yesterday while Rafe took a nap. I wish I had more time to work on it. The sky is dorky, but I like the foreground. This heart painting I did for Stella, as she was in a phase of giving hearts to show love. Funny, the colors are exactly the same as the painting I did yesterday.

This one in the white frame is a painting of a pool that Stella did a while back. I like it. The white frame used to house a baby room print - I popped that out and inserted her painting in it's place.