Day 14

Out of the bedroom, back to the kitchen....

the animals wait patiently while I snap snap snap - Caleb to go out, and Madison for breakfast

the pantry. i love having a pantry.

Day 13

I had an unusual night...woke around 4 so hot and sweaty that I couldn't sleep. I came downstairs for a cool shower, then went back to bed, but still couldn't sleep...so lay in my bed and took pictures in the very earliest morning light....it was rainy and grey (my favorite weather!)...

still awake...

what's on your bedside table??

I did eventually fall asleep and slept til 9:30, so now my day is all off!

Day 12

Some of you know that in addition to my day job at a school for children and adults with autism, I also sell vintage clothing. I turn my living room into a studio for photo shoots....so, this is my living room "before" ...

I push all the furniture into the dining room, pull down the paper background, add lights, and voila! A photo studio!

And here's the result. This was the model who was out yesterday, in The Pretty Woman dress.

Day 11

Here's a little corner of my dining room, going from the living room to the kitchen. I think The Dining Room is my favorite room - and I think it's a shame that "open living" and "eat-in kitchens" sort of did-away with them. I love all the accoutrements of The Dining Room - dishes, and serving pieces, and china cabinets.

The Little White Table (yes, that is it's name - "Katie, where did you put the mail?" "On The Little White Table" "Do we have any batteries?" "Yes, look in The Little White Table") is inherited from my mother and her garage sale days. I never thought it was anything significant, besides a cute little simple table, but everytime I have an indoor tag sale, the furniture people all ask me what I want for it. I say it's not for sale, but their interest leads me to believe there must be something worthwhile about it, beyond its being Little and White.

That top picture, of the fruit, is needlepoint.

Another non-functioning lamp. I love the orange luster of this one, and the butterfly finial with dangly the blue-cabachon thing

I don't know what that item actually is, but it's been a great key and leash holder

I stick cards and interesting things that come in the mail, in that white planter - part of my matte-white pottery collection. I do have a nice collection of brown transferware - this is just part of it. I love transferware and collect brown, red, and black - though lost most of my black collection in The Great Black Transferware Crash of 200mumblemumblesomething. It's a sad sad story. I'm sure I have pictures somewhere. That's for another day.

I got this little bee skep charm/pendant in a box lot of jewelry at an auction. I set it on the picture just so it wouldn't get mixed in with stuff to sell, never dreaming it would stay there for like the next five years. Now the picture looks naked without it.

Day 10

Here's more of the (unpainted, Lauren!) kitchen - the window wall, with some close-up details. Seriously, it needs major work. And it's the one place I would *really* put some money if I had it, cuz I know an outdated (read: gross) kitchen can really cost me final value dollars. That's the corner of the fridge, photo left...like the oven on the opposite wall, it blocks the base cabinet, and there's a big empty space photo left of the cabinets/counter (where u see the mop).

Those things hanging on the wall, are my color inspirations - they've been hanging there for at least ten years, ha, they don't call me Swifty for nothing!

Apple green walls, black and white toile window valances, white base cabinets with open shelving on the wall, black soapstone countertops and some red accessories. That was the vision. Ain't happening now.

This is my whopping huge straight-sided ironstone pitcher collection. I used to have more, but some were curvy pitchers and I decided to narrow the theme. Of course, these are harder to find.

My favorite kitchen accessory is my bunny butter dish. I got the original almost 20 years ago...about 10 years ago the bunny part fell on the floor and broke...I went through three other butter dishes over the next few years, never really happy with any of them, while I searched for my same bunny one - finally found one on ebay (yay), and have been butter-dish-happy ever since.

Day 9

I guess I've been chicken - I've been showing you very selective areas of the house...the "good." I guess we need to get to the bad and the ugly.

Here's the kitchen wall that's on the back of the house. That's not op-art on the walls. Those are 12-year-old unpainted sheetrock walls...a project started with my husband, and never finished when we split. We moved a doorway, moved around the appliances, replaced a window. It's a very awkward arrangement. The base cabinets to the left (photo left) of the stove are barely usable as the doors won't open all the way, and you're like behind them as you open them. I do love my big glass door so I can see out. And the half door on the right is to the pantry.

I found that big orange painting in someone's trash. It has a little water damage on the bottom, but I love it!

The kitchen definitely needs some TLC before I list this house next year!

Day 8

There are birds' nests at both ends of my front porch...and even one under some loose ceiling boards...I'm glad they're there, and the cats (indoor) like to watch them come and go from the window...

Day 7

My sister gave me and my ex-husband this darling copper mailbox for our first wedding anniversary, back in 1990. I've moved it from house to house, and think it will probably be my only mailbox ever. The door fell off long ago. The post finial is off something in my last house, I just screwed it - well, my NEIGHBOR screwed it - into the top of the post, when he saw me struggling with the power screwdriver. The hedges could use some serious trimming.

Day 6

The one wall in the living room has become my "gallery wall." I bought the old mantel shelf from an antique store before the days of ebay. The rose painting I was so excited to get at a live auction, I was expecting it to go high, as it was in the hey-day of shabby chic madness on ebay...the auctioneers went through everything in the house and finally said, 'well, that's all, folks," and I said, what about that painting?? A lot of people had left, or were already standing in line to cash out...so a painting I'd expected to pay $50 for, I got for $7! I was so excited! I bought the framed watercolor of Paris and the Eiffel Tower on ebay - I'm addicted to all things Eifell Tower! I bought the cute kitten-and-ball-of-yarn needlepoint (could it BE any cuter??) in the ornate gilt frame at an estate sale. The needlework cat has green sequin eyes and is signed by the artist, Mildred. The cat's name is Mildred. And the forest acrylic painting was done by my daughter, and is set inside a chippy frame that used to hold a mirror that broke.

Day 5

This is the view of the back door from a little way out into the yard. Wow, the back has gotten really overgrown! The door needs repainting, and the volunteer maples need thinning, and the stair railings need tightening. The deck should probably be demolished altogether, quite honestly. I used to shoot up there against the back of the house, but models kept getting their heels stuck in rotted boards!

You're seeing part of my vintage watering can collection. I'm thinking I might part with that when I move...maybe keep the best 3-5, and let the rest of them go. Sigh.

Day 4

I have a crushing weakness for built-ins. It's part of what keeps ending me up (grammar, much??) in old decrepit houses "with potential." I see a built-in, and I must live with it. This, obviously, is the kitchen. Sadly, my plates are just a skoonch too large, and the door won't actually close.

I got the...whateveryoucallthatpieceoffurniture (for some reason, I want to call it a "commode," just not like a toilet) underneath out of someone's trash many years ago. I've never had the heart to paint it, it's so nicely chippy, though it is starting to look a little beyond "shabby chic," and onto just "shabby." It doesn't hold much.

The walls are awful laminate sheeting - came with the house. That's the pantry to the right of the cabinet (photo left). You'll see more of that another day.

Day 3

I figured you should get to see the big picture. This is the living room, what you see when you walk in the front door. I just pulled a chair back to sit in for the shot.

It's not a bad sized room, it's just difficult because there are so many doors and windows (behind me now, on either side of the front door) and no good walls. I sort of created a wall with the tv cabinet and bookcases - otherwise, that "wall" is the stairway railings going up to the second floor.

To the left is the dining room and through to the kitchen. To the immediate right is the "ebay room," and the two doors you see in the upper right corner are to my daughter's room and the bathroom...then the stairs go up.

The cabinet/bookcase things does take up a lot of visual space, but without it, there's nowhere to put STUFF. And while I'm planning on getting rid of most of my furniture before I move, I have mixed feelings about that very useful piece. My daughter says "let it go, it's out-dated." And true, I want my next space to be a little more modern and clean, but still...I've had that longer than I've had HER (and she's 17).

Anyway, that's the center of the house. The first time I walked in, with the realtor, the owners had already moved out, and had left just a few pieces of furniture. The only thing in the room was a round table centered under the ceiling fixture (it's...for another post). I said, "oh! what a nice large foyer!" The realtor looked at me like I had two heads, and was like, "uh, this is the living room." Didn't matter, I was already sold by the front porch and the diamond-paned windows.

Day 2

This little vignette on top of a bookcase right inside the front door. I collect vintage aqua american pottery, so this lamp was a real find for me! I especially love the molded roses and leaves spilling down the front. Doesn't matter that I've never replaced the wiring, nor that I can't find a shade to suit the old harp. I don't need it to work. I just need it to look nice.

The painting of the woman in the grey dress, walking along some coastal hills...ahh, from the 1930s (so I'm told), and I think she just looks like she has so much joy. I want to be her some day. She reminds of a character from "Enchanted April" - a delightful, must-see movie.

The picture of the two sweet little bridesmaids in the gilt frame - my daughter and cousin (my cousin's grand-daughter, I never remember how cousins are "removed"). Baseball player Orel Hershiser took the picture at a family wedding (he's not family, but friends of).

The large floral - now that's a historic piece! I was newly separated in 1997, had never heard of ebay (sigh, can you imagine??), but a girlfriend was buying a lot of jewelry there, and it got me hooked. I started buying little things - a $2 vintage red glass heart brooch for my daughter for Valentine's Day...a brown transferware plate for my collection...small things. But I started spending a little more and a little more...on a meager salary, a now-single parent. The day that painting arrived in the mail - I'd paid $75 for it, and it's...average-ness...brought me back to reality, and I was like, whoa, what am I DOING?? I couldn't afford luxuries like that! But I realized I had stuff in my OWN basement that I could probably sell on ebay. My mother had been a real garage sale hound/hoarder, and I had saved so many of her things after she died in 1990. Anyway, I decided if I wanted to continue BUYING on ebay, that I'd need to SELL on ebay to subsidize the habit. And so I did. I became an ebay seller, and 10 years later, I'm still an ebay seller! All thanks to that painting!

Day 1

So, the child is grown, and almost ready to leave the nest. August 2009 she's off to college in parts as-yet unknown. And *I* will be moving on, as well, to something more manageable for one person. I love my house - it's charming. Well...it has the POTENTIAL to be charming! What it really is, is messy and overgrown. It's gotten away from me the past few years.

So, I need to start getting things in order...and this photo blog will journal the transition from messy and overgrown to...well, hopefully, less messy and overgrown! First I'll introduce you to the house, but by bit, and eventually you'll start seeing some changes.....

And here, on Day 1, is My House...