Won’t you come to dinner?

With much help and patience from The Man, I have done it. I have fully, perfectly and exactly realized my artistic vision and style, in the form of a place to dine.

We have transformed this in to this….

One small space contains everything I love in this silly hobby of mine…

• a very modern classic tulip table – bought from Rachel so she could get one she really wanted
• sleek and sexy black lacquer chairs - yard sale $50, former 80′s crap
• Regency-esque chair seats – fabric on super sale, my first adventure in upholstery
• they feel like they belong together – yet nothing comes close to matching

The Man may even let you sit in his chair. Its arms are sturdy and inviting of long after-dinner conversations.

And if we have too much fun and end up on the floor, there are plenty of beautifully curvy lines to surround us while we giggle.

Such busy little bees we were

Ok, all y’all know that decorating is just about my most favorite hobby in the world. Moving in to this house has been a very long process… more settling in than decorating. This weekend we finally got around to some PROJECTS – YAY!!

A big fat gigantic THANK YOU goes out to The Man for being a perfect project partner! He helped when I asked, did an amazing job, and steered clear when I was acting a total maniacal bitch not so pleasantly.

First up… The Man and his friend finally got rid of the God-awful, non-functioning light fixtures over the fireplace. They are much more appropriate to the house and cast a lovely light, if I do say so myself!

Submitting to retail therapy – against my will

Shopping, oh how I hate thee! Let me count the ways!

I am sitting here in a completely empty office in the dark save for the one light in my cube. The only sound is the soft whirrrrr of my computer fan and the HVAC. It is very calm and peaceful and I kind of wish it were like this all the time.

To add to my morning zen I actually put 2 minutes of thought in to my outfit. I am accessorized. I’m having a good hair day. I even managed to put on perfume! (Yes, Rae, the French whore perfume)

And, thanks to The Man who insisted, I have $300 cash waiting patiently in my wallet for a shopping trip this afternoon.

Cue anxiety attack!

Seriously. My stomach is in knots at just the thought of stepping foot in stores and – even worse – trying on clothes.

But as I admitted to The Man as he was delivering me to the front door of my office, I’ll never improve my self image if I’m always feeling like I am wearing sausage casings.

My wardrobe has become incredibly limited and I have stubbornly refused to buy fat clothes. I am cheap and I don’t want to admit I’m not a size 6… 8…. or 10 *ACK!!!* any more.  It’s hard to get out from under the wet blanket of self-loathing when there’s nothing you can put on to make you feel good about yourself.

So I am going to do that thing that I hate most in life… I am going to shop. My strategy is this:  a few multi-use pieces, mostly in black, with lots of colorful accessories. Hopefully I’ll soon be able to ditch the fat clothes and I’ll still have a lot of cute accessories. Then I will go home and purge my closet of all but a few things that don’t fit. No more reminders of what size I was.

Wish me luck.

Oh… on a happy note here is another smidgeon of  progress on the home front.

You may remember this picture from the first day we were in our house. We took a LOT of crap on Facebook for our sexy TV stand (and blow up mattress and cardboard dining table) even though our real furniture wouldn’t arrive for a few more days.

Confession:  that was still our TV stand until last weekend. Actually it was another tote higher! HAHA

That’s fixed now with a much more practical solution…

p.s. I got another 10 straws done last night! At this rate I may have a lamp shade before the world ends in December of 2012!

Holy Mary, Mother of Productivity!

I think I set some sort of record for weeknight productivity last night!

This, if you remember, is where I started in the dining room…

I started in the opposite corner and cleared one small space. We hadn’t seen this corner since the day we moved in.

But clearing one space means destroying another.

I was feeling rather down about that when my friend Patty pointed out ”It’s Newton’s 3rd law of house cleaning: “For every clean and organized anything, there is an equal and opposite mess to make it happen.”

So I pressed on…

I ended up with 5 bags of trash and a tower of recycling.

And a TON of donations.

The result?

Thank God for clogged vacuums

After doing exactly nothing to the house for the entire months of September and October, suddenly progress!! Moving from such a small apartment to such a medium-sized house left us with lots of missing things. As much as I would rather be skinned alive, dipped in honey and thrown in a bear cage hate shopping, filling those holes and finishing unpacking seemed like an insurmountable task.

After rat bedding clogged the vacuum for the umpteenth time we went to Target on Saturday night to see if we could get a new filter or maybe buy a new vacuum. All I can say is thank God for clogged vacuums!  Funny how once you get IN the store, shopping is easy

We got it home and immediately assembled 1 cart, 2 shelves and an étagère – impressive!

Lucas doesn’t like it when we’re productive… he be sad doggie.

Well, you can understand why… now that there are homes for our unpacked stuff, we proceeded to upend our entire house, creating absolute chaos!

It’s ok, because we actually made some serious progress and the things we did, I LOOOOOOOVE. Seriously – I look at the little corners of progress and I am absolutely freaking ELATED.

The sun room is an awkward spot in our house. Junk tends to gather there:  it is a convenient staging area for things coming and going.  It doesn’t lend itself well to regular use, even though it’s the first thing you see when you walk in the front door. Its giant windows make for a sunny room with a nice view, but it also shares an awkward window with the living room. Target provided a storage shelf for Lucas’ stuff and a shoe rack to rein in the massive pile that comes from 3 shoe whores living in one house.

I think it’s now a nice place to sit for a spell… and Lucas has his own orderly bed room (since that is where he chooses to sleep any way!) The sheers let it all the light without having a clear view straight out to the street.

This kitchen has a super awkward gap between the counter and the stove. Paper bags and unused shelf organizers (and often the mop bucket) landed there. Lame. Between cooking and the dog eating the kitchen it’s a corner of EWWWW that is no fun to clean.

Now it’s splendid! We couldn’t have hoped for a better fit! The added super bonus is that we’ve reclaimed massive counter space from underneath the Kitchenaid and the spice rack! Our massive expanse of counter space is returning!

Since we’re having seven people over for Thanksgiving I know the dining room will return to a new and fabulous normal soon – like maybe tonight because I am SO SUPER FREAKING HAPPY!

thank you, Honey, for putting up with me! xoxo

How Emily got her sparklies back

A little at a time, bit by bit, shiny things are making their way back in to my life.

Getting all my worldly possessions back under one roof again sure helped.  Unpacking has been slow but steady and little corners of the house are getting “settled”.

I am happy to report that one of my most prized possessions has taken a prominent place in our home again – my UmberDove triptychs. And, fittingly, they are flanked with shiny things!

Yes, I do kind of like the sconces, but hate the gold tone and they seem to take a non-standard chandelier bulb (I’ve tried 2 sizes so far and no dice.)  I don’t think they are long for this world…

Last night The Man, The Child and I ate dinner at a reception venue that we thought could be a strong contender. We definitely want a real Chicago Italian-style affair and their food was fantastic! With much anticipation we were led up to the largest banquet room and when they hit the lights… well… The Child and I kind of lost our shit minds!

SPARKLY!!! And do you see it?… A DISCO BALL!

*swoon*

This is the view we’ll see when we look down on our guests before the big entrance…

Could it be any more perfect? No, I think not!

The room that this blog “forgot”

You may have noticed the conspicuous omission of The Child’s room here.  I guess there may have been (not so) veiled references to the Bermuda Triangle that was my daughter’s domicile, but I’m pretty sure I never horrified you with a visual of the carnage.

There was very good reason for the omission…  you will thank me later.

Her room in San Francisco started off with two major strikes against it:  it was impossibly small; and the only window did not look outside, but upon the kitchen (yeah, don’t ask – I have no idea why either).  I tried to be very creative in my space planning.  I got her a loft bed and put a desk underneath.  Her dresser was tucked in an awkward nook.  I made every possible attempt to preserve as much floor space as possible.

My efforts were in vain.

The third, and quite possibly largest, strike against her room in SF was that I really tried to let it be “her space”.  I didn’t want to nag about keeping it clean – hoping that she would also want to have as much space as possible by making efforts at tidiness.  No dice.  On at least 4 different occasions I took everything out of her room (overfilling the livingroom), and put it all back neat and orderly-like with “fool proof” organization systems. 

The day The Child started packing to move, THIS is what her hovel room looked like.  Yeah, I warned you…  Honestly, it’s so dark in there because the drifts of detritus eclipsed all light sources.  Honest.

So once all of our stuff landed in Sebastopol, one of my first priorities was to create a new and beautiful room that was exceedingly realistic for a 10 year old to keep clean.  I wanted lots of open space, a lot less crap, and the threat of great bodily harm whatever is out of place going in the garbage can if she goes to bed even once with a messy room.

This is the result…

She LOVES it.  It needs curtains and an area rug, but it’s darn close.  In fact, she’s been living in it for 2 weeks straight and I didn’t move a thing to take these pictures.  This is exactly how she left it.

Welcome to the jungle*

* formerly known as our garden…

My poor garden is long-suffering.  It goes through periods of total neglect, being used as a paint/workshop, or is the victim of my less than expert attention.  Last week when attempting to dig up a science project I realized the dire situation that had bloomed back there.

Weeds!  Giant killer weeds!!  And they were taking no prisoners!  It’s shocking how they can grow on top of  brick!

There were at least a thousand chores I didn’t want to do so I decided to head outside and slay some weeds.  A little bit of effort yielded a BIG sense of accomplishment – and a big sense of dread at the enormity of the task at hand.

It ultimately took 3 hours to weed my tiny little garden - and I filled the curbside composting bin TWICE.  As you can see, there’s not actually a lot of dirt back there… it’s mostly brick.

Oh… and while I was pulling weeds like a mad woman, what was The Child doing?  Uh, she “helped”.  Who doesn’t need a gigantic hole in the garden?  I really can’t tell you just how helpful it is to hear “LOOK NOW!” with every shovelful extracted!  The annoyance pride shone across my face as I reminded myself that there were many other ways she could have “helped” that would have been far less helpful

 So today – in honor of the first day of spring – we prettied up the clean, weed-free dirt with some actual pretty and EDIBLE things! 

Red-leaf and Meyers lettuce, two kinds of tomatoes (at least one is fog-tolerant – we’ve had them 3 other summers), sugar snap peas, and catnip for the Hairy Beast.  The tall, green-thumbed super salesman at Sloat Garden Center assured us that all of these things would survive the total lack of unclouded sun, cool weather and questionable soil that graces our neighborhood.  Riiiiiiight.  We’ll see about that.

We put some major COLOR!!! along the far wall to brighten up the view from the livingroom.  I’ll be happy if the Forsythia survives… because it’s so bright and grows quite large, and also because it’s my namesake

 

So freaking awesome, even The Child had to admit she was wrong!

Haley has moved from scoffing me to trying to plan my untimely demise so that it can be hers NOW…

THANK YOU AGAIN MOM!!!!  I loooove it!

Watch out turquoise – you’ve got competition!

Ok, I am officially obsessed with coral!  Thankfully, I think they go together smashingly!

I’ve been hating this color I put up in my bedroom but I think painting this frame will help me live with it – at least for a little while.  I fully expect to get a wild hair and paint it the same blue as my hallway.  I ran out of gloss black paint, but the dresser will soon be bathed in it.  Then it will look truly kick ass!

Thanks, Christine, for talking me in to keeping this photo.  I am LOVING the blues in the photo with the orangey-red of the frame.

Paint is my friend

More vesitages of the past have been re-coated in a new color – and received a stay of execution new lease on life.

Tell me that the blue/coral isn’t bad-ass!

The formerly way too islandish end table is now glossy black and will happily do until I get a mirrored one.

The shelf?  I’m not sure yet what its purpose will be, but it makes me happy to look at it.

My sofa, she is supersexyfabulous

Now my sofa beckons.  “Come hither,” it says.  “Come rest your arms or your weary head on magnificent works of beauty.”

Yes, my newest UmberDove pillows have arrived and they are perfect.

 

*photos courtesy of UmberDove

Wall of Haley, updated

Thanks, Rae for suggesting the addition.  The frame turned out great!  (Spray paint rules )

100% pure, unadulterated “Emily”

The infamous vanity is done and I could NOT be happier with it.  In fact, when I look at it I *SQUEEEEEL*

And to hold my jewelry I HAVE A STAG HEAD!!!  I know you wish you had one, too!  I know you also covet by beautiful UmberDove tray, so go get one of your own!

Let’s play Spin the Color Wheel!

My bedroom is this close to being done.  I just need some finishing touches.  I’ll give you a hint as to the Very Brave for Emily direction I’m going with this….

Disregard the black and white and chrome, then think contrasting color to the other color known to exist in my room

Umber - are you sooo proud or what??

 

p.s.  Look at what a tool I am!  I made a keychain!  And YES I am that lame and only have 2 keys (and that is the grand total of all keys I own and/or am in possession of).  Hell, one of them I never even use! HA!

Who says City Life is complicated??  hahaha

My new (favorite) child

Honest to God – this is the best $65 (thanks Craigs List!) I have EVER spent.  My livingroom rug looks amazing.  To think, I almost spent $99 on Saturday on a lowly upright…

My new little pretties

My lovely UmberDove has created 2 more custom masterpieces for my humble little home.  

Behold, nap-tacular “armrests” for my sofa!  Because while it’s armless elegance is a thing of beauty, the lack thereof makes it a little formal feeling when what you really want is to be a sack of lazy.

 

Dear Neighbors… The show is OVER

For four nights now you have had an unobstructed view in to my bedroom.  Yeah, not much interesting going on.  I’m sure you were hoping for some Must See activity being that my bed is right under my window, but you got none you cheeky monkeys.  I’m sure it has been about as interesting as watching paint dry.  Wait!  Paint DID dry!

Anyway, you may have noticed that the curtains came down on your little voyeur show.  That is because curtains finally went up! 

Once I could again operate under cover without my cursing, frustrations and missteps being viewed by you sneaky little peepers I undertook the Herculean project of building a headboard.  In typical Emily fashion I looked around to see what I had on-hand.  Lo and behold I had turquoise fabric!  And I had enough!  What I didn’t have was the proper workspace or tools for the job.  So, unsurprisingly, I invoked my powers of ghetto fabrication and got to work.

Ok – FYI – Elmer’s spray adhesive doesn’t do jack to hold foam to wood.  Neither does wood glue.  Nails pretty much pull right through the foam, too. 

I recommend enlisting an octopus as an assistant should you try this yourself

 

 

The piece of MDF that Eamon brought by was PERFECT.  The width fits like a glove inside my bedframe.  My extremely accurate measurement guesstimation skills apparently only work on the horizontal.  I was feeling sooo smug when it nestled in and I L-bracketed it to the bedframe.  Patting myself on the back, I was.  Singing my own praises, I was.

I figured that I’d borrow a staple gun and smooth out the edges.  My patience only lasted so long hammering finish nails to secure everything at 11p.  Yes I was feeling pretty damn full of myself.  With joyous glee I enthusiastically began putting the rest of my bed together.  It wasn’t long before remembered my “Princess and the Pea” mattress situation (standard mattress + 4″ of memory foam = zzzzz).  Uh oh.

Uh.  Crap.

The turquoise fabulousness that is my new headboard is hardy to be seen.

Yes – this is a headboard FAIL.  Not an epic fail, but…

Add longer L-brackets to my hardware store shopping list.

Happy Birthday/Merry Christmas to Me!

Yeah, yeah, I know… neither occasion happens until Q4’08 (d’oh! too much time working in tall, shiny buildings!)…

But, my mommy loves me soooooo much that she bought me this pretty-pretty early

(You shut up, Haley!  I know you will be trying to pry this out of my cold, dead fingers when I’m gone!  Don’t EVEN try to deny it!  Cheesy??  Hmph!)

Yay for another homage to the fabulousness that was my Nana & Papa (my mom’s parents!)

Mom…. YOU RULE (reason #657,150)

Have I sinned?

Curbly posted the 25 Biggest Decorating Mistakes.  Let’s see if I’ve committed any mortal sins…