My doctor told me to take it easy and not do anything to strenuous...with two boys, it's impossible...I try to rest, but then someone needs help with the Wii and the other screams, "Mom!! I pooped on the poooooottttyyyy!" Both mean I have to pause Sherlock and get out of my bed.
Also, I tend to get bored just sitting, with the same view that happens to have a terrible paint job. Today I painted a wall in my bedroom to both assuage my boredom and cover up the awful red that was glaring at me for the last year. Why did I paint it red, why?
I've also been searching for the perfect color for my living room. Seven years ago it was painted a light gray olive color. Great for the time, but with the new bright, happy kitchen, I need something fresher. I tried yellow, or "Custard," to be more precise, no good. At noon it turned positively florescent.
Next, I tried a vintage green color. The darker green is "Everglades" and the lighter is "Key Largo" by Benjamin Moore. When you put any color on that particular wall in my living room, it darkens a bit. As if a few drops of gray were suddenly added. It's very strange. I have a darkening wall.
I adored the darker green. It was perfect for the yellow and red cabinets I have in the room, and looked delicious with my crazy fireplace. John thought it was "crazy." This from a man who cooks in my kitchen. He wanted something "grayer." So, I went exploring on the Benjamin Moore website and found "Wyeth Blue" the color of the year! Well, one can't go wrong with that...
It's okay. A little too plain for me, but John likes it so it's what I'm gonna paint. Unless he makes me mad on the day I decide to buy the paint...Then Everglades forever!
I included the photo below because the paint in the paint tray looked green and on my darkening wall, it turned blue. The difference is subtle and hard to capture with a camera, but crazy, right?!
Also, right before my surgery I tore out the carpet in my bedroom. We had previously torn out all the other carpet in the house and left our room alone. There was a leak somewhere in our roof and the path of least resistance was the corner of our bedroom. So we were NOT looking forward to seeing what was under carpet number 3.
It always seemed insanely dusty in the room, though, so I had some tea and moved everything out, by myself, then ripped away. Trying to be dust free!
This is shot from my bedroom out to the hallway. It used to have sliced bit of the cheapest Home Depot berber carpet that I had cut with a knife and left for 5 years. Now you can see the continuous wood and my Flor carpet squares. (Those things have lasted forever!)
Here's the condition of the floor. It needs to be sanded and stuff. But that corner was exactly what we thought. A few years ago we went out of town during a rain storm. There was no one to put the pot under the leak and we came home to an obscenely wet floor that had buckled. When you stepped on it it was wavy, so we knew it was gonna be scary. When we bought the house, from our landlords, they bought us a new roof. No more leak! But sad floors.
I think we want to eventually put a new floor in the bedroom, hardwood because it's so tiny. But until then, I cut out the bad wood in corner and put a carpet over the exposed subfloor. Classy.
Even though the floor reveal was anti-climactic, it is still a 150% improvement from what was there. Bad, smelly berber carpet. The kind that's on a roll at Home Depot.
It's no fun to start a project only to have to wait for a while to finish it. It took two years to finish my kitchen. Waiting for money and for the perfect time to do that part that requires and absence of kids and dogs. And also finding the perfect chair or lamp.
In design school we were asked which room in our client's house we think should be redone first. Most of us said the kitchen, because it where we spend most of our time. The correct answer? The bedroom. Because if you have a gorgeous bedroom, you'll be less stressed about any other construction. You'll have a lovely space at the end of the day to relax in. (And also it will be easier for the client to write those checks if they are standing in a beautiful, calming bedroom). And yet, I still haven't done anything to my own bedroom.
I'm gonna try not to think about that though. I have too many projects. I'm just gonna stare at my peonies and think of England.
