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Cheval Mirror

Dear Perfect Cheval Mirror-

I dreamed of you, but did not think I would ever find one exactly like you, at least not in my price range! But mark my words: on payday, you shall be mine!

And finally I will be able to see my whole outfit in the morning, right down to the shoes!

I found my perfect mirror for the new bedroom at Lowes!

p.s. Prepare yourself for golden retriever nose prints.

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It Only Took Two Years…

The back bedroom has finally had it’s makeover. Ta-da! I can’t believe I started clearing out this room back in November 2009. Then we dropped the ball. Then the room accumulated more junk. And we were pretty much back at square one.

Well, all that changed this summer. Sadly, our favourite mattress store has closed it’s doors for ever. But we did get a terrific bargain on a king size foam mattress. That was motivation enough for me to get moving again.


I cleared the room out in a matter of days, and my lovely friends Marc, Josh and Kolby spent an entire Saturday helping me paint.

I didn’t have the heart to tell them that I hated the first color I picked out- too little boy’s room blue. Sunday morning found me at Sherwin-Williams, picking out another color. I settled on Drizzle, in case anyone is interested. It was my first instinct, but I chickened out and went lighter. Lesson learned.

So, Lewis and I spent the next two weeks repainting and trying to make all the edges nice and crisp. No small job, as anyone who has ever applied the zillionth coat of paint to plaster in an old house knows. Oliver kept us company. And his bone kept him out of the blue paint.
Finally, we were done. We were able to set up the frame and the mattress, move the dressers back in and then I got down to the fun stuff. Decorating.

Here is my continually evolving design board. As you know if you’ve been following along, I have the dressers. I also have lamps very much like these two. I purchased the cotton coverlet from WalMart and ordered the ceiling fan through amazon.

I’ve been trolling etsy to find a seashell wreath like the one above. So far they’ve been too expensive. I may end up crafting my own. The two doggie prints are from etsy as well.

I’ll probably have to wait until next summer to order the sheet sets from L.L. Bean, since they’ve sold out for the season.

Obviously we need a headboard and we have not yet installed the new fan. That will probably change the lighting in the room. Curtains have yet to be finalized. Lots of little items yet to be settled.

Whew. Well, that’s all for today. Maybe some more details in the future.

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Just Because We’ve Been Quiet Doesn’t Mean We Haven’t Been Busy!

Can anyone guess what is happening here? This is just a sneak peak. More to follow soon!

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Change Of Course

Okay. So, remember all that lovely progress we were making in the back bedroom? Yeah. Well. We’ve kind of stalled. There are a couple of factors:

1. I am lazy.

2. We couldn’t buy the mattress because we are very broke and recognised that we shouldn’t go further into debt at this time.

3. Kelly wasn’t going to stay with me over the holiday (but in the end she did stay a few days).

4. I’ve been having misgivings about the color of the bedding I ordered from JCPenney since it arrived. I like it, but I don’t love it. The color just isn’t right. So I’m going to send back the bedding.

5. I still really like the curtains, and they are really cool, but the colors are also lighter, a perfect match to the too-light bedding. They do come in other colors, so there is hope yet.

6. And then the latest L.L.Bean Home catalog arrived in yesterday’s mail…

These are the beautiful sand dollar sheets they’ve had for years, but weren’t available just two months ago when I was online shopping. Maybe they only have them for the spring and summer months?

Then I saw these starfish sheets, and I think I like them even better!
The downside is that they are very blue-blue. Like cobalt glass. And I’ve really had my heart set on more of a teal blue or a sea-glass blue. Speaking of sea glass…

What’s the matter with me? I’ve never had so much trouble decorating before. Bedrooms are possibly the easiest rooms to decorate, too. Why am I being so wishy-washy?

Maybe I can use the sea glass wreath as color inspiration, using all those hues of blues and greens. Hmm… I know that I can build a whole room around one object. I really love the sheets. Maybe, when I’m truly ready, I’ll order them and go from there. Pick the paint next and actually paint the room. Spray the handles on both dressers to match each other. Then buy the mattress. Then pick out a solid comforter and blankets. Gee, it sounds like we won’t be revisiting this for a while, but that really sounds like the best course of action.

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Great Progress

Jessica came over on Sunday and we spend a solid 4 hours clearing out the clutter. I know, there is still a lot left there, but we are nearing the end. I could have worked longer, but we stirred up so much dust that both of us had headaches, so we called it quits. I took a nice benadryll at bedtime. That did the trick. Too bad it leaves me so groggy. I could have taken one and kept working after Jess left. Since then I have somewhat lost momentum. Actually, I haven’t done anything at all in there.

Can you see any improvement at all? I know there is still a lot there, but check out that carpet. So much more visible than when I began this decluttering a few weeks ago.So, there is a bin on top of the tall dresser that has all my favourite stuffed animals from childhood. I want to find a better storage solution for them, but I’m not sure what would be best.

I have an old set of rabbit ears tv antennae there. I guess there is no need for them any longer, so I should just throw them out. The box it the corner is the new bedding. The rack in front of the window is clothes I’m wearing again. The green laundry basket next to that is more old clothes I need to go through.

The rest of that pile along the back wall is office supplies and other things that have homes. I just need put that stuff where it belongs. There is a big stack of empty bins, an old metal doll’s high chair I need to find a box for, then stow it in the cubby. The pile of boxes in the middle are things I want to keep, but don’t really have homes for yet. The bath chair needs a new home, maybe in the basement? I still have one box of papers to go through, then there are several shoe boxes that are sorted by year. Not the best filing system, I know, but better than the stacks Jessica and I went through on Sunday. There are two boxes of lotions and potions that I either found in the linen closet or cleared off the dresser of doom, which still doesn’t look any better: I have two boxes of stuff to give away to specific people, and two boxes for donation. There were three until Jessica went through them. She found more stuff she could use, or knew someone who could. Fantastic!

Hopefully I’ll have more progress to report really soon. I’m getting really close to my self-imposed deadline of the 18th. I know there is no way we will get the room painted, and we have decided to wait on the mattress because I just can’t spend that kind of money right now. But at least we would have a clean, empty room for Kelly and James to stay in. As long as Lewis can find the air mattress, that is…