Improvements, Swedish Style

So I finally got to IKEA the other day while Jake was on Lucy-duty, and I (surprise!) made a few purchases. We got a new dresser for Miss Lucy, but of course, we have to assemble it, so it will be a while until it appears in her room and/or on the blog. But in smaller, easier-to-install projects, I have two:
First, new curtains for the pink room.

Here is a close-up of the pattern:

I'm not sure about them yet -- whether to hem them long or short, or really, whether they're an improvement or not. The old sheers were OK, but they were too short, and on very sunny days, they offered little protection. I think these curtains are better on both counts, but I'll need some time to get used to them.
Small improvement Number Two: New recycling bins for the kitchen:

A huge improvement over the cardboard boxes we were using.

Home Sweet Home

We're back from our trips southward! July was crazy with the travels and visitors, but August promises to be much more of a homebody kinda month for the residents of 83 Durant.

The garden survived our time away, although it is in serious need of some weeding.
Check out this AMAZING weed that sprung up while we were away:


I did a little bit of weeding yesterday, and Carter even helped by eating some of the stuff. Good dog.

We haven't had a lot of luck with the veggies in the garden. The pepper plants are no bigger than they were when we first planted them, and the tomato plants seem oddly runty. But we did have a nice bunch of grape tomatoes on this one plant:

Perhaps some more aggressive weeding and some additional fertilizer is in order.
We were pleased that there was no water in the basement upon our return, which seems to tell us that our window well and gutter solution really was a solution! Hooray!

My mom was very busy after we visited -- she hemmed all of our curtains! Now they look so much better! Here's the front room with the new and improved curtains:


We also got a new tablecloth. This seems hardly worth documenting, but I do like our dining room an awful lot, so this is another chance to show it off:
That's all for now. I was already scolded tonight by a faithful reader who couldn't believe we hadn't posted yet since our return. Yikes!

Making things Pretty

Today we installed some new semi-sheer screen-type curtains on the french doors leading to the front room. We bought this fabric at Ikea. It's called Anno Inez. [In case you didn't know, that's Swedish for "In the year Inez." --jb]

Our supplies (for two doors) included:
*two panels (24 X 118 inch) Anno Inez (we had some left over on each roll....any ideas on what we should do with the leftovers?)
*Four dowel s cut to 26 inches
*four brass cup hooks
*needle and thread
*four elastic hair bands

Here's the before and after.














I rather like them! They will make the room a little more private, but still allow lots of light.

Shocking (pink) Discovery

Today I noticed something strange, a small hot pink patch hidden between the closet and the wooden moulding in the dining room. We all know that the pink room is, well, pink. And we know that our bedroom was once pink (because it is bleeding through the wallpaper). But today we made the shocking discovery that the DINING ROOM WAS ALSO PINK. All of it, walls and wainscotting. This is insane.

We are now wondering how many rooms in the house were hot pink, and whether someone who lived here was crazy or in a cult, or perhaps was blind. We're also wondering about the timeline for all of this. Could it be that the yellow paint and the upstairs wallpaper are actually recent updates, perhaps done at the prodding of a real estate agent, a real estate agent who is a "staging professional" and might have also added new furniture to the house? [We know that the agent for the sellers was a "staging professional," and it seemed pretty clear that the house was in fact "staged" with limited furniture, no personal stuff, and perhaps a lot of fake furniture.]

The blogging has slowed down, which I think represents both a return to the business of the semester, as well as a much-needed break in home repair emergencies. No critters (that we didn't invite) and no leaks (as far as we know) for a couple of weeks now, so we're hoping it stays that way.

In other news, we also got new curtains for the front room. They're from Ikea.




We will need to hem them, but for now we're letting them skim the floor. They let in a lot of light, but also give us some privacy, and I like that they're not just plain white. Check out the pattern, which fits nicely with the medallion and the wallpaper border at the top:

Another small step for beauty

The basement landing melee has been slightly improved today. As you may recall, there is no door at the top of the basement stairs. There is one at the bottom, but there's a pretty serious draft coming up into the already cold kitchen. So we had a temporary fix, in the form of a seriously ugly yello-orange blanket. The color itself wasn't exactly ugly, but it made an ugly curtain (safety pinned together) and just generally looked bad in the mostly green & blue hall/kitchen area.

But today, Target to the rescue (again). I got a longer version of the green velvet panels I used on the sliding glass doors off the kitchen. OK, so that new curtain really needs to be ironed. But I'm glad it fits here so well.

Non-Rodent-Related Updates

I promised pictures of the new dining room curtains, so here you go:

We get a nice sunset in the dining room. I ordered new sheers for the pink room, but they're not long enough (sigh). Those are some tall windows. We're also trying to figure out curtains for the front room (currently some hand-me-downs from one of my mom's neighbors) and for our bedroom (very old and faded lavender ones that don't really fit or look right). I hate shopping for curtains. They are never in the right size for our windows.

In lighting news, I recently discovered that the non-functioning light in the laundry room basement isn't a light at all: it's a heater. It is still inoperable (I can't figure out how the switch works) but we're one step closer, I suppose.

It's a "Fostoria" (that name is on it so I looked it up on the internet) and it's mounted on the ceiling, right beside a fluorescent lighbulb fixture. It seems to be some kind of infrared quartz heater. It looks like the one pictured here:
http://www.infraredheaters.com/och.htm
but I don't see anything that looks like the switch box, which looks like this:

It's not clear how this box could turn the thing on or off, so I don't know if works, or if it has a burnt-out heating element, or if it's a fire hazard waiting to happen. For now we just don't touch it. But I guess it's just another one of those WHHHHHHAAAT spots in the house.

It's curtains for 83 Durant!

Behold! Jake's fabulous Christmas Eve Dinner! We had a wonderful meal, and a wonderful Christmas, opening the many, many packages under the tree. Many of those packages will soon lead (and some have already led!) to projects here at 83 Durant.



Mom helped us choose, iron, and hang some nice new white curtains. They are now featured in the kitchen (picture on the left), in the office (picture on the right), and in the dining room. They are rather lovely, bright white with tiny pin tucks.

We'll put up the dining room ones tonight or tomorrow morning, with more pictures to follow, of course.

Jake continues to fight the good fight against the critters.

We also had a massive Home Despot trip this evening. It involved tying full sheets of plywood to the roof of the car. That was all very exciting. We have more shelving plans. So many projects....

Last minute preparations for Santa

We put up another wreath today on the front gate to welcome any gift-bearing visitors. Sadly, this picture highlights the fact that the fence is in serious need of a paint job. Perhaps Santa's elves will take care of that?



Mom is hemming the green velvet curtains on the sliding glass door in the kitchen (see previous post on those curtains). She also washed windows and sweeped the floors. We're pretty lucky to have her as a house guest!












All the presents are now wrapped and under the tree! Very exciting!!

Quickie Winterizing & Beautifying Solution

We have a big glass sliding door off the kitchen onto the "L" porch. It's lovely when the afternoon sun comes in and warms the place, but it's a bit chilly once the sun goes down. Solution: Target (R)! A cheap, long curtain rod, and two long, sage-green velvet panels later, and a little bit of handiwork with the drill (which I love), and we have a warmer, fuzzier kitchen!