Adventures in Decorating: The great refresh of 2013

Posted: 2013/05/14 | Author: Lola | Filed under: Decorating | Tags: chalk paint, cork, decor refresh, Furniture, Home and Garden, moss, Redecorating, topiary |Leave a comment

It all started out innocently enough, we needed a new bed because our mattress was older than my daughter ish and I decided we would keep waiting until other things were taken care of before dropping 2000+ on a new one. But then, a friend had one for sale, a great one, cheap and very gently used. So I bought it. I knew it was going to kick off an entire domino effect, I just had no idea how far reaching that one little purchase would become. So one day during Thanksgiving Break while my BIL was here, I had him and Babu

Take my son’s old nasty bought used for MiniMe mattress to the basement
Move MiniMe’s newer twin mattress to his Race car bed
Move MiniMe’s twin bed to the basement
Move the queen frame from the basement, set it up and move our mattress and box springs to her room
Move the new mattress into our bed

Voila!

No wait, this meant her room had to be redone into a bigger girl room, between Thanksgiving and Christmas, on top of the Holiday Decorating, shopping entertaining etc…

A newly acquired on the FB Marketplace french desk, chalk painted, distressed
A new set of memo boards made big enough to go on her walls, thanks Pinterest
A semi custom set of shelves and bench for her wall
Moving her dresser into her closet

Voila!

No wait, after I took down the Christmas Decor I wanted to move the couch to the other side of the room, which caused the black buffet to get moved to beside the fireplace.

Which looked AMAZING.

But…totally screwed up my accessories, because now the couch was sitting on a big, blank, wall and the metal piece was all off placed.

Then came Valentines Day.. I made roughly 1000 home made valentines and approximately 47 gajillion batches of fudge, some heart shaped.

Then came Easter and the invasion of the Bunnies…..

I was clearly trying to occupy my mind, myself, and my time during the fighting for my marriage by keeping my mouth shut, going into super internal processing/change mode, and not throwing my husband out like I wanted to roughly every 1-7 days when I reached the, OMG this is hopeless or OMG I’m going to have to call Momma M and have her dig me a hole on the compound for his beaten to death body. I couldn’t run because I had plantar fasciitis. Strength training and sending my friends out of nowhere really long cussing tirades so I wouldn’t SAY them to Babu became my only outlets. The weeks wore on, and on, and on. I read books, I journaled, couples therapy began to actually work inside my marriage, the man began to actually baby step toward something I considered, considerable… as in I’ll consider letting you stay here. Things became less painful, I became stronger, more educated, more understanding, more patient, more capable of managing myself, him and what we were going through. Right before Easter I read an article talking about surrounding yourself with things you loved in your home. Every room should feel right, not just look right. I’m pretty sure it showed up in my Taptu or FB news feed. I read it, thought yeah that makes sense I already have lots of things I love in my home, and went on with my day. Later I read another article talking about photo walls, putting large groupings together vs. more groupings that are smaller. A few days/weeks who knows later I started pulling Easter down and it hit me…

Everywhere I looked things were the same as they were 3+ years ago when we had round 1 of almost divorce. He moved out and took some things with him, he moved back in and I put them all right back where they were before he left. At the time it made perfect sense, restoring everything to its pre-PJ days, making it whole again, all nice and tidy just like it was before. Three years and 1.5 crisis later as I looked around amidst gathering bunnies, it all just felt stagnant. Everywhere I turned and looked felt like bad JuJu.

It was time for a full on refresh. When I was younger and I’d break up with a guy, or get dumped by one, I’d spend the Saturday after I picked myself up from the trauma completely cleaning my apartment from head to toe and completely re-arranging as much as I could. Back then it took all of 4-8 hours. Apartments are small, furniture was not that movable and accessories while plentiful were easy to “redo”. This time, I also had the excuse of the blank wall behind the couch. It was making me anxious, an empty space needing to be filled. I don’t like undone projects, in spite of having more than my share of them. I don’t like unfinished business, in spite of learning to live with so many instances of exactly that. So I kept taking things down from walls, from table tops, moving tables and other small furniture into big piles. I needed as much of a clean slate as possible. Then I proceeded to spend the next 6+ weeks living life, working and pulling off a refresh. There is no way the pictures could convey the true nature of the work involved in making a few simple changes. Ha! When have I ever done anything simply, it just doesn’t seem to be my style, but I’m learning to embrace it more. I wanted to add more black and white. I wanted more natural elements. I had to play and tweak and replay and re-tweak until everything felt just right. I had to not only redo the pictures but wash and clean every piece of glass in the frames. I had to have the staircase, The Destroyer and the guest bath painted. Here are the pictures of the journey and the fruits of my, and the painters, labor. The trim guy comes in the next 10 days to finish the downstairs with chair rail and dado squares. The pergola is getting built over the back patio before mid- June, weather permitting. I think I’ll try to tackle things in smaller chunks from now on. Lord am I tired.

Before-