Farmy Old World Parisian

When I have a new baby and am totally encompassed by this stranger in my life, everything else seems to be put on the back burner.  That's how I roll.  I don't do home improvement projects.  It's hard enough living day in and day out with a babe on my boob, sucking the liquid from my being.  I don't like to think about paint colors and bathroom lighting.  When toddler time hits, things are freed up a bit more.  While I still have to worry about the toddler eating the paint off of the roller and hoping she doesn't climb onto my lap while I'm trying to make an Internet purchase of new bathroom lighting, hitting random buttons with her lightening fast hands, thus deleting my entire transaction (because with Dial-up Internet it always takes longer to make purchases), I feel more empowered to do things in the house.


We have done some improvements since moving in during the early summer of 2007.
By "we" I usually mean Chad.  I have the ideas, he does the dirty work...


We have painted all of the walls in all of the rooms.  Most of our walls are old plaster walls.  Very textured and very cool.  Not the easiest to hang things onto, though.

We have a tan living room and halls.
A tan and white kitchen/dining room.
A blue bedroom.
A green bedroom.
A green bathroom...which used to be wallpapered, even the ceiling!
An orange laundry room.


New light fixtures have been put up in every room.  A chandelier in the dining room.  A ceiling fan in the kitchen.  A Tiffanyesque light fixture in the living room.  New lights in the bedrooms, bathroom, laundry room, hall (one hall still needs a new light fixture).  There are these four very cute sconces in the living room, two surround the fireplace.  They had these ugly glass globes on them, but I bought shades a while back and they are improved, but I'm still not entirely happy with them.


I have replaced all of the UGLY plain and boring switch plates and replaced them with various styles throughout the house.  My favorite ones are in the living room.  Thanks Hobby Lobby.


We were going to paint the existing kitchen cabinets, but upon sanding them down a bit, we liked the rustic look they had.  Keepers!


Our house was built in the early 1920's.  It has beautiful wooden doors and beautiful moldings around the pulley-style windows.  Gorgeous.  A beautiful brick fireplace sits in our living room.  When we moved in the carpets were all ripped up to unearth gorgeous hard wood floors.  The linoleum in the bathroom was removed to unveil this awesome geometric style tile that was original to the house.


But we still have some work to do.  While I'm not one who needs to "keep up with the Joneses", I have a definite style that I would like to see evolved in this house.  I call it "Farmy Old World Parisian Influenced."  For now this style will will be intermingled with the "Kids' Crap All Over The House" style.    


The major things we need to do are:


1. New windows in the "new" part of the house...the part that was torn down in the 1960's and rebuilt exactly as it was...huh?  Thanks grandma.  You tore down the second floor that I now need.
2. Redo the kitchen and tear down this useless half wall thing that is, like I just said, useless.
3. put up a cool backsplash in the kitchen
4. I would LOVE a butcher block counter top.  I am so over granite countertops.  Blah.
5. I would also LOVE an apron/farmhouse sink.

The little things we still need to do are:


1. Repaint the bathroom.  I no longer like the color we painted it last year.  We had to keep the door closed all of the time after showering because of Gigi who liked to stick her hand down the toilet when no one was looking.  The paint has since started to peel on the ceiling and the top of the walls because of humidity.  We can now keep the door open and I would like something different than the green it is now.

2. Install new sconces in the bathroom.  The sconces we have know are atrocious!  They are probably 50 years old and look it! 

The wiring is a bit tricky in the bathroom.  The current sconces have a switch to turn them off and on and unless we hire someone to rewire the bathroom, who would probably end up doing the entire house, we have been searching and searching and searching for cute bathroom sconces with a switch.  I have finally found such sconces and they are on the way.

3. I would like to paint the ceiling of our front porch sky blue.  I have heard that it keeps wasps away for some reason.  Fools them into thinking they are in an open area and it's not possible to make a nest.  We get lots of wasps on the front porch trying to make nests.  And it would look pretty.


So, the bathroom is the next project.  I need to find a different paint color and Chad will install the new sconces hopefully this weekend if they arrive by then. 

I had a shade made last year to fit the window.  Smith and Noble makes custom sized window treatments.  Love them! 

There's a small shelving unit in the bathroom that we use to hold extra tp, towels and magazines.  I need to spray paint it.  I heart spray paint.  I did a rocking chair that had belonged to my Aunt Jeanne that we keep on the porch and a wire basket just last week.

I should have been a tag artist...