Miriam's Dining Room Continues!!!

I AM SOOOOO TIRED!!!!! Yesterday I slaved away and worked on my sweet niece Miriam's dining room. Remember the before?

The walls were brown, the chair rail was low and the window treatments covered part of the glass on the windows, making a dark room darker.

Soooooo.......I had them change EVERYTHING!!!

Miriam and I wanted a shabby cottage look and her hubby Ross knew to stay out of the way and just supply muscle when needed.

I told Miriam we (I) should fabric the walls, since I don't have the know how or tools to wallpaper. I will show how to do that in a post in the NEAR future. I know Amy of Maison Decor is impatient for me to show this, but I'm not ready to share yet. I want to show my pictures first.

So Miriam and I chose fabric at Calico Corners, which I blogged about in a previous post. We brought samples home and taped them to the walls because you always have to see the fabric in the space. What looks good in the store is not always what is going to look great in your house.

We chose the one in the middle. It was wonderful that Miriam and Ross liked the same one. No one cared what Aunt Betsy thought. (That's not true, actually, since they are both scared of me, as well they should be.)

The week earlier Miriam and I had found this sideboard.

We sanded it and painted it to look old and dirty!!!! Yum, just what you want around food.

We had found this brass chandelier that I repainted. Boy is that hard. I didn't want to take the crystal chains down, so I had to work around all the glass, and I got paint everywhere and on everything.

I suggested (strongly) that they rework the chair rail detail to be similar to mine.

So my carpenter buddy Nigel popped off the old rail...............

This is a picture of Nigel. I call him Nigey. He doesn't complain 'cuz I get him lots of work.

Here he is putting up the new wainscoting detail. I love him. He always does what I tell him to do and I'm SURE it has nothing to do with any money changing hands.

Miriam and I found a wonderful table in Gloucester Massachusetts!

This table can expand to accommodate the whole family, so we may have Thanksgiving at her house next year. When I come back in the spring, I will clean up the finish and give this baby a good coating of wax.

Then we found 8 armchairs at a local auction. As I mentioned in an earlier post, they are the most uncomfortable chairs in the WORLD.

But don't worry, Aunt Betsy will fix them when she comes back in the spring. Oh, God, I'm referring to myself in the third person!

Here they are!!!! They need so much work that I'm afeared.

They will be totally reinvented by MEEEEE!

O.K., now I'm reviewed with you guys the scope of the project. In my next post I will show the transformation!!!!! Have I mentioned how tired I am????   'cuz I'm REALLY, REALLY tired. I'm going to go lie down now.
P.S. I just spell checked this post, and I'm soooo tired, that I spelled my name wrong.

My new china cabinet

When I redesigned the china cabinets in my dining room, for some reason I can't remember, (I'm serious, I can't remember what the @#$% I was thinking) I changed them from corner cabinets to straight on cabinets. I also decided to leave the top open for a more casual look.
This is the way it looked when I bought my condo....

I really don't like a low chair rail. They are set that height to keep the backs of chairs from bumping the walls, but since I don't have any chairs placed against the wall, I moved it up for a better visual proportion in the room. I had wood installed to make a fake paneled look, just like I did in Miriam's dining room and my renovation project in West Palm
Beach. If I ever do another dining room, I promise to come up with a new idea.
Here's the after shot.....

I had the cabinets built to look like the wall was deeper, and that they were recessed. To make the entry from the living room look nicer, I added some simple wood strips to the doorway side and doorway ceiling to create a paneled effect. This looks much nicer than just a flat side.

I added touches of blue glass on the shelves to repeat the feeling of the chandelier.

This is the left
side!!!!

And this is the right side!!!!!!!!

The blue glasses are called hobnail glasses. They were produced by the Fenton Glass Co. I collected this stuff from EBay. I love these glasses and never use them. The reason I bought them, is 'cuz I just wanted them to look pretty on my self.

This is more hobnail glass that I love. I don't use these either. I am not exactly the most practical decorator.

MORE STUFF I DON'T USE, JUST LOOK AT.
Aren't they pretty?

This is a pretty vase I DON'T USE.

These two shelves hold all the glasses and dishes I use from the whole two sides of my china cabinet. I use the plates and glasses to set my table when my family comes for one of my "HOME COOKED" meals. The plates are my "special" majolica from that exclusive boutique, Home Goods.
I have to leave now to go pick up dinner from Bertucci's. I'm taking it to my brother's because my sister and her family are in town. I'm the youngest of 5 siblings, and there always seems to be one or another wandering in to visit.  Mod Vintage life has added this post to her party, you can see it at http://modvintagelife.blogspot.com/

My dining room continued

Today we are back in my dining room, as my brother has left town, and I am taking a break from my niece Miriam's dining room (which I plan on finishing this weekend, if I can recover from my exhaustion. Boy, this manual labor is hard. My shoulders hurt, my hands hurt, my hips hurt, my knees hurt. The good thing is, I like to complain!!, and since I am doing this as a favor for Miriam, she has to listen. The problem is: She hasn't read the memo, and she doesn't want to hear about my delicate state.) (Which is why I'm telling you guys.) (Actually, no one in my family wants to hear about it.) (I do all this work, and the least they can do is listen to me go on and on about my aches and pains.) (I am a wonderful Aunt, I want some #$%^ coddling!!!!!)
Sooooo.....
Oh Boy!! here's another shot of my dining room!!!

Look at the bench, don't look out the sliding doors 'cuz I don't clean up my plants outside until the spring. I found this bench on EBay, and liked the needlepoint covering. It didn't have the little skirt, I added it, and the trim.

 

I found the pleated muslin trim in a local craft store, and dyed it off white by dipping it in tea. Sooo it is actually tea stained.

I have lots of left over trims, so I played around with some, and decided to layer the rose trim over the blue. Some of this I hand sewed onto the bench, and some of it I hot glued on. The reason I didn't hot glue all of it, is it didn't occur to me until I was half done. To freshen the old needlepoint, I steam cleaned it with my handy little steamer.

Here's a picture of my chandelier!!!

AREN'T YOU JEALOUS???!!! It was the first thing I bought for my new home, and it set the color scheme for the living room and dining room. I got it from a store in North Cambridge, MA called City Lights, it's on Massachusetts Avenue, if you want to go check it out. (The store, not the chandelier. It's an antique, so I got it, and you can't have it.)

I LOVE THIS SUCKER!!!!!!

Check out the close up. Check out the tear drop blue crystals. Check out how coooollll this is.

The little blue beads are called barrel beads. CHECK THEM OUT!!!

I love it! I love it! I love it! I love it! I love it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The reason they are called barrel beads is because.....(wait for it) They are shaped like a BARREL!!!

My brother has started reading my blog, and commented on the excessive use of exclamation points. I feel that exclamation points are sort of like accessories, why have a little if you can have a lot?

I had the lamp shades custom made. Sometimes, being a designer; it's just necessary to be extravagant. I used trim from Brunschwig & Fils, cut it in half for the edging.

O.K. campers, I am going to stop here. I went to the eye doctor today, and they dilated my eyes and everything is blurry. Great! Something more to complain about! Next post will be about more details on my dining room. Try to contain yourselves.

This is just a test

Hiya, I'm trying out something new with my feed, you know, what is emailed to my subscribers when I add a new post. So this is just a test to see if my whole blog is sent via email, or just a teaser. This is to get all you lazy readers out there to actually go to my blog, rather than just read it in your email. I'm at my niece Miriam's, working on her dining room. And...since she is a computer whiz kid, she is helping me with figuring out this Internet stuff. To soften the blow, of having a post that really isn't going to entertain you in any way shape or form, I will post a picture of the walls I'm covering with fabric, so you can have a little joy in your day. I am so tired after doing three walls, that I can barely type. The pictures are really blurry, 'cuz we had to use Miriam's phone because I don't have any way to load my pictures onto her laptop.

The reason I want you to read my post on blogspot, rather than in email, is because I'm trying to make some money, and you have to go to where the ads are. I have made $8.50 so far this month!!!!! If this keeps up, the ads will cover the cost of my website. I AM AM INTERNET ENTREPRENEUR

Thank you for the comments

I just want to leave a quick post to all the guys who leave me comments. I LOVE THEM. I know I don't respond too often to them, but I'm not good at thank you notes either. So, this is to let you know that I read each one with great enjoyment, and wonder that someone has been kind enough to take the time to write something to me.
In honor of you, I will now take the time to share with you some of my REALLY stupid actions and thoughts.

1. Cigarette smoke gives me migraines. I've started watching a new show on BBC America called The Hour that's mesmerizing. I was deep into the show when one of the main actors lit up a cigarette and blew the smoke out towards me. I held my breath so I wouldn't get a headache, and then realized he was on the TV.
2. I love honeydew melons. They taste like candy. I cut them up and eat them while I’m reading. The other day I started one that wasn’t as good as they normally are, but I didn’t give it much thought. It wasn’t until the next day while I was eating the 2^nd half that I noticed it was orange. Kind of embarrassing, since I’m a designer, not to realize what I’m eating is not green but orange! It was a cantaloupe. (I don’t like them.)
3. Have you ever tried to make a phone call with your remote control? They both have number pads, and sometimes I pick up the remote, wanting to make a call, only to be confused about what I just did.
4. I was in the library last week looking for a book by one of my favorite authors; M.C. Beaton. I couldn’t find one. Now, I know that my library has a LOT of them and I couldn’t believe they were all checked out. That night as I was lying all snug in my bed, I realized I had been looking in the M section of the stacks.

Soooo, this is just a small selection of my brilliant actions and thinking, to give you a lift at the start of your week. Tonight my family descends on my house for a home cooked meal. I'm buying take out.

Cows everywhere

I have a collection of 21 oil paintings of cows. I originally collected them for my den in my Watertown house. When I moved into my current home, I had to find a place to hang them, so they are spread between my living room and my dining room.

This is a shot of my old den in Watertown. It was photographed by Eric Roth, a wonderful photographer that I have been working with since the beginning of time. We started our careers around the same time, and the stories I could tell!! I'll save that for another post. A behind the scenes look at what a real magazine photo shoot is like.

I bought this picture at an auction in a town in Massachusetts whose name now evades me. This was years ago before the advent of the Internet. It had been described to me over the phone, and I was driving a long way to bid on it. The directions I was given, sent me way  out of my way, and being new to MA, I didn't have a clue as to where I was going. It was dark....It was cold....It was snowing....I started to REALLY need to pee....AND THEN I GOT A FLAT TIRE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I had to pee so bad, I couldn't figure out how to change the tire. OY OY OY. A really nice man stopped and helped me. I couldn't decide what was more scary, the possibility that he was a mass murderer, preying on young girls in the dark, or that I would pee my pants. Well, I'm still alive, and dry, so it had a happy ending. I got to the auction house just before they put this picture up for bid, and I got it. At this point, I probably would have paid anything for the damn painting, just to make my ordeal worthwhile.

I was going to write more today, but my brother is visiting from Van Couvre, and he wants me to go for a walk with him. Since he is my OLDER brother, I must do what he says. So I'll finish this later. Have a nice Sunday.

OMG! A new space!

I'm finally finished writing about my family room/kitchen. You guys probably were thinking that I lived in a house with only one space. But today we move on to the dining room.
Here are  the before shots....

This is looking into the dining room from the living room. The window looked out on a crab grass barren area, which of course I had to redo, and while I was at it, I changed the window to a door.

And this is looking into the living room from the dining room.
The corner cabinets look OK in this picture, but in real life the detailing wasn't up to my exacting, fabulous, demanding, (possibly unrealistic) expectations. So I redid the whole wall. Why spend a little bit of money, when you can spend a lot? I wanted the look of a paneled wainscoting, so I did what I have since done two more times, I faked the panels with srips of wood. My niece Miriam has done the same thing in her dining room, which we will be talking about in the near future, as it's almost time to finish that room!!!!! I also did this treatment in my little Florida bungalow, which you can go to see on my website, by clicking on the cottage picture to the right. I try to think of new ideas, but my brain is old and not working so good no more.
Here are the after shots.......

Unfortunaltely the picture is a little light, since I took it at the wrong time of the day, and I had to over correct in Picasa. I added a terrace outside the doors, I will show it to you in the spring, when the weather becomes reasonable again. I have a grill out there and a table and chairs. I also have a lot of plant material that needs pruning. I have learned, just because something needs pruning, isn't always enough to make me pick up a pair of shears.



I reworked the wall with the corner cabinets by making a deeper doorway and recessing cabinets on either side with open shelves. I reused the bottom doors in my new design. Yes I actually reused something in this condo. OY, am I frugal or what? I had reclaimed old pine put down for the flooring, and then covered up this expensive wood with a sea grass rug from Restoration Hardware. The draperies are from Restoration Hardware also, but have been redone. I used three panels for the door, cutting one in half and sewing it onto the other two, to make fuller side panels. Rather than hang the rod just above the door molding, I hung it as high as possible to make the ceiling seem taller.

When I do dining room lighting, I like to add recessed lighting to supplement the chandelier light. It can add a nice glow. If you can't do that, it's always nice to have one or two table lamps on  a piece of furniture in the room. Very often, just the light from a chandelier can be glaring, or not bright enough.
I like to mix chair styles around the table, I find it more visually interesting than if they all are the same. Arm chairs make for a more comfortable and relaxed meal. When my family comes for dinner, I have to chase them out of my house, because they all stay seated around the table way after when dinner is over. I am ever the gracious hostess.

I find mixing in a little scorched bamboo adds a touch of casual elegance. If you ask me to analyze why, I DON'T KNOW.
I use this piece to store my bar supplies. Alcohol doesn't agree with me anymore, so I don't remember what's in this cabinet. The flowers are fake. I LIKE FAKE!!!
They don't shed, and the water doesn't get slimy and stinky. And they don't attract bugs. Being a whack-a-doodle, I don't kill bugs, but catch them in my bug catcher cup and put them outside. So, think of all the time I've saved by having fake flowers.
O.K. that's enough for today. There's still lots to share about this room, so come on back soon.

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