Our New Living Room

Before: During

They had so many holes in the wall.

After:

One of my favorite details in this room is my cedar chest. This was my grandmother's and I love that it's so central in the living room.

Another room, done. Except for some art above the tv, which now looks like a big, empty, yellow wall. Things will come together slowly like most things in the house are.

The room is so much brighter, even in the morning when the sun is on the opposite side of the house.

Tomatoes

Andrew and I eat a lot of tomatoes. Our bi-weekly grocery bill consists of about $10 of tomatoes, as long as they look good. Due to our tomato consumption I knew I wanted to plant tomatoes, and lots of them. I picked a spot by our side gate, it's full sun until late afternoon which is great for tomatoes.

But first, I had to get the spot plantable. The previous owners like everything else they did and everything else they planted were misled(or purposely lazy) enough to think that low-maintence means no-maintence.

Here's the difference: violets, hosta, whatever other scrub brush they had=low-maintence.

Gravel=no-maintence.

About two hours of pulling, digging, and raking this very compacted clay-ey soil, I had something I could work with. I dug some holes, filled it with lovely, vitamin-rich soil and smushed my baby tomato plants in.

I planted, Roma, Cherry and Big Beef tomatoes. Roma for tacos, salsa, pico de gallo. Cherry for salad and snacks. Big Beef for BLTs, tomato sandwiches and fried green tomatoes.

I also got this pretty bird bath at the store the other day, which is just off to the side of the garage door. It brings a nice splash of color.

Finally, Living Room Paint

After almost four straight weekends of painting, we called it quits. We were done painting for a long time. After all, the ugly rooms had been taken care of. The bright lavender in the quest bedroom: check. The Buckeye red and grey in the office and guest bath: check. Ugly golden yellow/brown in the upstairs bathroom: check.

Everything else was looking ok. The living room was a little dark for my tastes. A dark brown with darker avocado-y green. The sun doesn't hit the living room until late afternoon and it stays rather gloomy in this room all day. Andplusalso, the ceilings are like twelve feet high, ugh.

We finally decided to do something about it and picked out some paint chips at Lowe's. At first I only grabbed a grey and new, lighter green. As I was waiting for samples I decided to grab a yellow, too.

And... I love it.

This is the yellow next to the grey.


This is the lighter green next to the yellow.

I'm in love with the yellow. So this weekend is another long one of painting.