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.
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
You thought your time of trial was over, didn’t you, Gentle Reader? Well, you were wrong! Steel yourself for a revival my of amateurish vision, insufficient preparation and failed execution!
Tonight’s unimpressive endeavor is a door mat! This beaut was cobbled together from fraudulently ordered FLOR “samples”! Did you know they will send you 6 tiles for free? (Yes, the checker-ish looking ones are actually 4 smaller pieces that count as one large one.)
I know you’re thinking “DAYUM that looks sweeet!” But trust me, that thought is misguided. Remember how I said you get six tiles for free? Guess who only ordered five!?!
HALEY!!!
Ok, fine, it was me. I only ordered 5 tiles and while it may look kinda totally impressive up there, in actuality it is tragically wee. Should you feel wacky and attempt to use it for its intended purpose, be prepared to work some serious Geisha-style tippy toe steps.
Oy.
Oh good jeebus… how did I miss the symbolism of this project? A door mat? Really? A door mat?? I keep begging for someone to shoot me now – and hopefully some Brave Little Toaster will come forward and spare us all the terror and agony we all know is ahead.
I just made a BIG step in crossing off the very first thing I put on that damn list: the leaking shower! (It’s actually item number 3, but that’s because I was trying to hide it behind other things everyone has to do.) It has been leaking since June 2007.
Wait wait wait… before you lose your chops about how much water I have wasted with a leaking faucet over the course of 2.5 years (oh my… I just got queasy for a second) I have been turning the water off behind the faucet with a screwdriver this whole time! Let’s say it – all together now… GHETTO! Yes, I know… it’s only the best of the best in the Girly Fabu-palace. D’oh! Any way… that little bastard’s number is UP!
It’s really the little joys in life, isn’t it? Like being able to step in to the shower, turn a handle, and have water come flowing forth… clean, clear, cleansing water…. *drool*
Since my back yard doesn’t get much sunlight I try to keep my eyes out for things that may actually survive back there. Here are a couple things I saw when I just took an anger walk a few minutes ago…
I am in the dark as to “lighting design” – quite literally!
Now that my house is really coming together – and more importantly, staying together – the fine tuning of it all is staring me in the face. The biggest deficiency by far is lighting.
It has been my long-standing belief that overhead lighting is the work of the devil, and I do prefer my rooms to be more cave-like than bright and clinical.
BUT…
Even I must admit that there are times when sufficient illumination is a good thing: homework, sewing, and generally any time you want to be *gasp* productive. My lack of floorspace, total absence of room symmetry, wee square footage, labyrinthine walls, oddly placed outlets, and the general ill will I feel about lighting my space in retaliation to the very existence of fluorescent lighting in the livingroom and kitchen all conspire in my head. So I pretty much just sit in my dark bat cave and tell myself it’s “mood lighting”.
Damn it. I need help. Serious help. Perhaps it’s time for another trip to Ikea.
Amongst my errands this weekend was a QUITE entertaining trip to JoAnn Fabrics. Rachel’s appreciation for white knows no bounds! HAHA
Any way… After much dain bramage I managed to find turquoise and coral versions of the same fabric. My plan is to make a two sided throw to add some color to my bed, and encourage the fat furry beast to NOT sleep next to my head.
I am such “Remedial Sewing 101″ that I’m not sure how to put two pieces of fabric together: back-to-back, and then add an edge of the black velvet ribbon I have from my livingroom lampshade project. Do I sew the pieces together first, then the edge? Or do i put the edge on each side first, then sew the edges together??
ACK!!!
Oh, and did I mention the fabric is knit? Knit is easy, right?
This is what a typical Ace Hardware looks like in my neighborhood. Can’t you see why they are like DIY vortexes, sucking me in for hours much to the chagrin of my child?
Home Depot: spray paint (for dresser, door hardware), stool for vanity?, side table?, stain for cabinets
Fabric store: fabric for vanity stool and a “throw” for my bed (a place for Kenai to sleep instead of in the middle, near my pillows – brat cat), vinyl to recover my table
Paint duties: finish vanity, dresser, picture frame and baseboards
Rearrange room (finish??)
Rachel’s Birthday Bonanza! Woo hoo – party down!
Sunday
sleep in
WAK Shack party with Suzanne
Now… That will be one satisfying weekend if I can get all that done! Hold me accountable!
Someone may be doing a progress inspection next week! Yay for me!
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
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!
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…
The last week has been B-A-N-A-N-A-S. Work has required that I work and it’s been fun. I am angling myself to be quite the graphic designer That, coupled with a drive to get stuff done at home, has resulted in little time or energy for much else.
My DISH went out last week and the repair dude was scheduled to be there between 8a and noon. My house was in such a state that I couldn’t risk anyone (not even Dish Dude) seeing it, so I worked on it some Friday night – ignoring texts from the infamous Steve B. to come out and play – then was back up at *gulp* 5am to do some more. Lo and behold I get a call at 7a from DISH saying I’m the first appointment of the day so be ready at 8a. ACK!! I think I became some kind of cleaning and organizing Super Hero because except for the huge pile of cat hair, food, little and other detritus needing to be vacuumed my house was DONE.
Of course he couldn’t fix my DISH (can you say DVR withdrawals???) so he made arrangements for another tech to come on Sunday with another receiver (whaaaa! all my movies and recordings – GONE!). I sat for a spell, took a little nap, then went to pick up a Zipcar.
And where did I go?? You know where… THE DUMP!
Those bags represent the last of the last of the bad juju I have exorcised from my home. As I was filling them I was growing drunk with power I think I stripped the duvet off my bed (the one I have been sleeping under for fifteen years – no history there, huh?) and stuffed it in a bag. Same with about 100 other things that were useful to me but to no one else – but also carried with it some history.
I have come to view my excursions to the landfill to be baptisms of sorts. With each load I feel cleansed: my hope and faith restored.
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.
As much as I am going kookoonuts getting rid of stuff to achieve a very clean aesthetic, there are just some things that I can’t hide pretty and I am not about to part with them. My suitcase: I love it, it’s actually small, and it is the embodiment of one of the best things in life (going bye bye!). My sleeping bag: I am lucky enough to have a real bag and I’m not about to invest in something decidedly less technical that is twice its size. My shoes. My closet is such anal-retentive perfection that I am not about to sully it by throwing my shoes on the floor, but I really don’t have the room for plastic shoe boxes.
What I do also have is a tall bookcase that previously held clothes but didn’t go home with someone else from the yard sale. I may move it because I don’t feel like I’ll be happy with the way my bedroom is laying out. I see some tweaking in my future.
I think this is not a bad compromise. My goal is over the top girliness and what better gesture than displaying my shoes, rather than just storing them away? Mornings will be a lot less digging and a lot more enjoying!
The curtain closes over it and the suitcase/sleeping bag problem is solved! Now I have two shelves whose purpose will be determined after careful consideration.
Deep down, in the back of my mind, I must have known… I must have known that this room was going to be the most jacked-up, time consuming, frustrating and all around loathesome project.
I knew the walls were in bad shape, but that is truly an understatement. Not only are they devoid of paint, they have huge dings, none of the edges are straight and all the trim seems to be about half the size it should be with the other half filled in with lumpy, chunky, chalky spackle. Oh, and the window is all mildewy. And if I had a nickle for every spider that I’ve run across I’d call someone who gave a damn.
So, almost 24 hours in this is what my room looks like. And I’m stuck until the primer dries so that I can paint the other side of the room. At least I rebuilt all the drawers in my platform bed. (woo stinking hoo)
I cleared a path in my room last night and was reminded that my room doesn’t have to be the soulless dumping grounds for all my cast-off possessions. Being able to see the floor and the gray patch of paint on the wall got me excited.
Well, and another thing, too – one of the reasons I want to have a fabulous room – but that’s for me to know and you to not find out
I have a Zipcar truck reserved for a Saturday morning dump run. Then I am going to clear the whole room out. My livingroom will hate me, but it should go a lot faster and inspire me to get it done in one shot.
So here are the official “Before” shots: pics taken in a semi-clean but drearily and thoughtlessly not decorated. I think it would qualify as assembling things that kind of match (in the way ALL earthones match) as opposed to being decorated.
What an ungodly, ugly mess. *Blech*
Don’t you just love the shameless nature of the cat?
I’ve been thinking that the satin version of my bathroom paint color might be too dark in my bedroom. This weekend I was watching HGTV (shocking, yes, I know) and I saw someone custom mixing paint. I was relieved to think that the gallon I bought for my bedroom might not be a total loss: mix in some white and lighten it up.
So I just pulled out the can to make a test spot on the wall and I noticed that the little color smear on the top of the can looked awfully light. I didn’t think I pulled the right can from the pile. Then I pulled out the bathroom paint color and saw that it was much darker. Hmmm… what’s going on here?
When I got the bedroom color I just told them “Gentle Rain” and when wet it looked right. Well, funny enough the bathroom is actually ”Downpour”. Ummm, close but not the same My mistake in the name turned out to be EXACTLY what I was wishing I had! HAHAHA
Now that I see a patch of it on a swath of wide open wall I am getting motivated!
