Our home is by no means perfect.  It’s not our “dream home” and it certainly was purchased based on the price rather than its aesthetics.  But I must say, it has charm.   There are things about it that I love—the hardwood floors, the huge yard, and the way the sunlight comes through the big front window.  I also love that we’ve made it ours.  We’ve put a lot of work in to make it livable/enjoyable for us (when we moved in, the bathroom sink was just a sink inset propped up on two shower curtain rods….yeah, I wish I had a “before” picture to show you just how truly strange it looked).  I’m constantly tweaking things it seems.  Moving furniture, switching the wall hangings, looking for the perfect area rug.  I’ve grown to love the challenge of having a “fixer upper” home and fixing it up in creative ways that cost little to no cash.   Here’s our bedroom.  I’ll be sharing my other favorite parts of our little home in the days to come.   What we did: 1.  Painted the walls (the color is quite bold, yes). 2.  Both dressers were mine and Andrew’s from our childhood bedrooms.  The styles are similar so I just painted the handles on both black to spruce them up/modernize them a bit. 3.  I made the tissue pom poms in the corner above the bed and the gothic-ish candle sconces were thrifted. 4.  The large paintings (in the photo of Lyla) are by moi. : )  When we first moved in, our bed was on that wall and they were in place of a headboard.   5.  We installed the blinds on our own.  (Okay, Andrew did it.  I watched.) 6.  The framed photos above the dresser are all from our honeymoon in Boston, prints from the Museum of Fine Arts. 7.  The lamps and cedar chest belonged to Andrew’s grandma. 8.  The dresser sashes are actually window valances we used in our first home.
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wall

dresser

Our home is by no means perfect.  It’s not our “dream home” and it certainly was purchased based on the price rather than its aesthetics.  But I must say, it has charm.  

There are things about it that I love—the hardwood floors, the huge yard, and the way the sunlight comes through the big front window.  I also love that we’ve made it ours.  We’ve put a lot of work in to make it livable/enjoyable for us (when we moved in, the bathroom sink was just a sink inset propped up on two shower curtain rods….yeah, I wish I had a “before” picture to show you just how truly strange it looked).  I’m constantly tweaking things it seems.  Moving furniture, switching the wall hangings, looking for the perfect area rug.  I’ve grown to love the challenge of having a “fixer upper” home and fixing it up in creative ways that cost little to no cash.  

Here’s our bedroom.  I’ll be sharing my other favorite parts of our little home in the days to come.  

What we did:

1.  Painted the walls (the color is quite bold, yes).

2.  Both dressers were mine and Andrew’s from our childhood bedrooms.  The styles are similar so I just painted the handles on both black to spruce them up/modernize them a bit.

3.  I made the tissue pom poms in the corner above the bed and the gothic-ish candle sconces were thrifted.

4.  The large paintings (in the photo of Lyla) are by moi. : )  When we first moved in, our bed was on that wall and they were in place of a headboard.  

5.  We installed the blinds on our own.  (Okay, Andrew did it.  I watched.)

6.  The framed photos above the dresser are all from our honeymoon in Boston, prints from the Museum of Fine Arts.

7.  The lamps and cedar chest belonged to Andrew’s grandma.

8.  The dresser sashes are actually window valances we used in our first home.

Cute/silly things Lyla has done recently: 1.  Today she almost emptied out an entire container of baby wipes (NOT funny) and when I caught her in the act I said “Lyla…that was not very nice.” in a stern voice, and for once I didn’t waver or crack a grin.  She walked right over to me and gingerly put her arms around my neck for hug.  SO sweet.   2.  She was recently given a pair of Crocs in a bag of hand-me-downs.  She pulled them right out of the bag and [even though they are way too big for her right now] has hardly taken them off since.  They have Dora on the back strap—who she LOVES.  Not the TV show, just the character.  I’ll turn on the show and she is not interested at all.  But if she sees Dora’s face on anything she gets super excited and shouts “Doda! Doda!”  Yesterday morning she grabbed the shoes as soon as she got out of bed and brought them to me and asked “put on?”   She spent the morning clomping around in just the shoes and her diaper, watching her feet as she walked. 3.  Leave it to daddy to teach the inappropriate words.  She’s been saying “bum” for quite a while—she pronounces it “bon” and usually says the word while patting her own bum or mine.  Now she’s also saying “boobs” —also accompanied by poking at hers or mine….or dada’s….or grammy’s….
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Cute/silly things Lyla has done recently:

1.  Today she almost emptied out an entire container of baby wipes (NOT funny) and when I caught her in the act I said “Lyla…that was not very nice.” in a stern voice, and for once I didn’t waver or crack a grin.  She walked right over to me and gingerly put her arms around my neck for hug.  SO sweet.  

2.  She was recently given a pair of Crocs in a bag of hand-me-downs.  She pulled them right out of the bag and [even though they are way too big for her right now] has hardly taken them off since.  They have Dora on the back strap—who she LOVES.  Not the TV show, just the character.  I’ll turn on the show and she is not interested at all.  But if she sees Dora’s face on anything she gets super excited and shouts “Doda! Doda!”  Yesterday morning she grabbed the shoes as soon as she got out of bed and brought them to me and asked “put on?”   She spent the morning clomping around in just the shoes and her diaper, watching her feet as she walked.

3.  Leave it to daddy to teach the inappropriate words.  She’s been saying “bum” for quite a while—she pronounces it “bon” and usually says the word while patting her own bum or mine.  Now she’s also saying “boobs” —also accompanied by poking at hers or mine….or dada’s….or grammy’s….

I love the pursed-lips look on her face when she’s concentrating on something really hard.
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I love the pursed-lips look on her face when she’s concentrating on something really hard.

A couple shots of my “studio” (a.k.a. the spare bedroom in our house).  Vintage pretties.  The necklaces are coming soon to our etsy shop.

“eh-pane, eh-pane, eh-pane!”  

…and you best believe that she won’t stop saying it until you acknowledge that, yes, there is in fact an AIRPLANE up in the sky.