Eileen Josephine

A Little Painting

We did some painting in our downstairs hallway yesterday:

We repainted all the white trim and ceilings to match the white we used in the rest of the house, and used Behr "Nature Retreat" as an accent on that little wall below the steps and on the opposite wall (the space behind the entryway table and piano which you can't see in this photo.) We were going for a blue-ish grey, and this color ended up being a little more blue than I had expected, but I still think it works. I love how a little paint can bring a whole new life to a space! 

Check out what it looked like the first day we moved into our house! Don't mind Adam (our Hungarian exchange student.) Also, I'm not sure why the mattress is in there... I think we were scrubbing the filth from everything upstairs. Anyway, yeah, look:

MAN our house was disgusting. It makes me feel good to look at all of our before pictures! We looked at a lot of houses when we were shopping around, and this one just really grabbed me. Even with its disgusting black bathtubs and carpet that looked like someone had vomited all over it... I could just see past all of that. I knew we could make it pretty again!

Our neighborhood is old (our house was built in 1925) and a lot of the houses haven't been given the best treatment over time. Most of the really big beautiful ones have been split up into apartments and just not given the love and attention they deserve. I like to imagine what it must have been like back in the 30's when everything was new and beautiful and the people were all so proud to live in their big, new, fancy homes and everything... Letting pies cool in the windowsill while their clothes dry out on the line. Stuff like that. 

I hope the first owners of our house would be proud of what we've done to the place so far. I am! We've come a long way.

Oh yeah, and we are never. ever. buying a super-fixer-upper ever again! Haha :)

<3 Lindsay

Energized

A mere change in schedule is all it took for my life to take a turn toward awesome... Greg and his brother decided to start working out in the evenings instead of the mornings, and this new schedule works out so much better!

• I don't have to (not) get up at 5am to work out (it's just too hard)
• I don't have to work out in the evenings, which keeps me up all night
• Since the timing is so much more convenient, I will actually work out
• Greg gets to spend more time with Vada in the morning
• Greg actually gets to work earlier in the morning so he can prepare himself for the day
• I get to quietly and leisurely cook dinner after putting Vada to sleep
• Greg and I get to enjoy a later-than-usual, but quiet and relaxing dinner together as husband and wife

I'm giving my 5k training another go since my knees are better. This time, I'm not going to try running outside until I've finished the 9 week training course on the treadmill. Hopefully that will strengthen me up enough to prevent another bout of patellar tendonitis. 

So, as expected, I've had a ton of energy all day after getting up at 6 and doing my cardio. I had to do a bunch of stuff for the salon this morning, and then Vada and I went to the park before nap time. We spent the afternoon organizing some things in the sewing/craft/play room, which I'm feeling really good about. I got rid of a lot of crap I don't need, and prettied up my desk and bookshelf. 

I got a new green lamp for my desk... I had my eye on it for weeks. It was on display in the front window of a boutique next to the salon, so I finally just went in there and got it today. But the thing won't turn on! So it's back to the white one, which is technically supposed to go in the living room once we acquire a second end table.

Now I've got one wall of that room almost completely finished! Yay :) Finally. It felt so good to feel inspired and motivated today instead of like a slothy slug.

Since it seems that Greg is back on a normal schedule, I can't WAIT to go to some yoga classes again! Hooray for exercise and energy :)

<3 Lindsay

My Piano

Since Greg surprised me with this piano a few weeks ago, our house has really felt like a home. I play it every single day. I forgot how relaxing it is to play! 

I emailed Greg a Craigslist listing for this piano (I had been doing that for a few months, haha) and later on that afternoon it was delivered! I couldn't believe it :) He definitely surprised me. This piano plays a little differently than the one I grew up playing. The action is a little harder, and it seems a lot louder. It sounds really nice, though. I love it, and I can't wait to teach Vada some songs when she's older.

That's two items officially marked off my list!

<3 Lindsay

A N.E.E.T Feature!

I was featured on N.E.E.T. Magazine's Blog today! Check it out :)

<3 Lindsay

Daily Photo 72/365 - The Never-Ending Dum Dums

When we first moved into our house, about 4 years ago, I got super excited about having trick-or-treaters come to the door on Halloween. I got a ton of candy, including a huuuuge bag of Dum Dums. Sadly, we only got one doorbell ring the entire night! And it was just a bunch of kids who were barely dressed up and definitely too old to be trick-or-treating. (Damn kids these days...) So, we've had these lollipops for about four years now. I keep them in this pretty glass candy jar on a shelf between the dining room and front room when you first walk in the house. Luckily, my niece eats a few whenever she's over. And it's our friend Josh's mission to finish them off, so he eats them too. Lollipops don't really go bad, right? Haha :) If they're not gone by this Halloween, I'm giving the entire jar of them to the first kids who ring our bell!

<3 Lindsay

Daily Photo 71/365 - The Breakables

My dining room is one of the only rooms in my house that I consider "finished." I am really particular about decorating, and always end up liking pricier things, so I just wait and save until I can get what I want rather than settle on something I think is just ok. That leaves us with a lot of unfinished rooms. It annoys me, but it's less annoying than having to look at stuff that I don't like very much all the time. 

The china cabinet is a Billy bookcase from Ikea with glass doors and I replaced the knobs with ones from Anthro. Our "china" is Crate and Barrel's Classic Century Dinnerware. We got all of the serving pieces and 4 place settings as wedding gifts. Then, when we "finished" remodeling our kitchen (it's still not 100% finished) a few months ago, I begged Greg to let us get another four place settings (it was on sale!) and now we use it as our everyday dinnerware. I love it! I think it makes food taste better ;)

The walls are painted "Marina Isle" by Behr, which is my favorite color ever! I used it on our front door, too. And I made the curtains with some Amy Butler decor weight fabric that I can't seem to find the name of right now.  

I have one other picture of the dining room as it is now on Flickr, although it's from Vada's birthday party so there are extra chairs and balloons and food everywhere. 

I really only need a few pieces to have the other two rooms finished downstairs. The front room needs a piano and a rug and preferably a new coffee table. The piano's the hard (expensive) part because it actually has to sound good. I play the piano, and Vada will too when she's older :) The living room is the worst though. There's just something about that room, I have this mental block when it comes to decorating it. I just need to find the perfect piece that I can build off of, but it's hiding from me. Oh well, slowly but surely!

<3 Lindsay

Daily Photo 65/365 - Always A Mess

If Vada is awake, her books are guaranteed to be scattered all over the entire house. 

<3 Lindsay

Daily Photo 63/365 - Vada's Loveseat

I'm going to have to play a little catch up (I almost just spelled that "ketchup"...) editing and posting my daily photos. I was so super busy this weekend! The fun type of busy though. I've been working on a huge project that I will hopefully be able to announce in a few weeks if I'm really really lucky.

Here's my photo from Friday, Vada's loveseat. It's changed some from when she was first born. We read books here before bedtime.

<3 Lindsay

Daily Photo 53/365 - Cozy Corner

Today was busy and I forgot to take a picture, so I took this last minute - just a corner of the living room. I feel like I've been nonstop cleaning all week but you can't even tell. (I guess it is only Tuesday...) I have to make sure to get this place spotless tomorrow, because we are leaving on Thursday morning to visit my family and I like to come home to a tidy house. 

I am le tired!

<3 Lindsay

Daily Photo 51/365 - Fabric Stash

There's my stash. All folded up nicely and in color order. That's all I've got! Apparently I love pink haha :) (It's true, I do.) Besides getting me super inspired, all that folding and reorganizing really has me liking some fabrics that I really didn't care about before. It's funny how a little rearranging can do that. Fabric feng shui.

This morning, we took a nice Sunday drive through the rich neighborhoods to admire all of the big houses. We passed this one for sale that looked like a big turtle shell coming out of the ground. It had a flyer, so I took one and started reading: over 6,000 square feet, 5 bedrooms, 4 full baths, 2 half baths, a "children's wing", sewing room, library, indoor garden, 3 fireplaces... Um, woah. I was intrigued, so I emailed the realtor to find out the asking price: originally $1,360,000 but now down to $950k. Chump change! ;)

Sometimes I like to go to open houses around the neighborhood to see what we're up against in the market, and I thought it would be really fun to schedule a tour with the realtor, but I didn't want to waste her time. Plus it would be a little embarrassing, since she would most likely be able to tell within one second of looking at me that I don't have a million dollars to spend on a house. So I did some lurking tonight and found a photo home tour of the house online. It is... HIDEOUSLY decorated. Like so bad I can't even see past the ugliness to the "bones" of the place. Somehow they made a 6,000 square foot home look cramped. Go look! 

The realtor says the owners have moved into their new home and that "The Halfshell" (I named it) is now vacant, so maybe it would feel different actually being inside without all of their stuff in there, but I don't know. This experience has made me feel super proud and happy to live in my way, way less expensive, 2200 square foot, 86 year old house :) 

<3 Lindsay