Monday, June 25, 2012

Welcome to Our Home

I was talking to someone the other day, can’t remember who it was now, and I mentioned the fact that my home is my “thing”.  You know how people, men and women alike, always have something that defines them; their trademark if you will?  Whether it’s great hair, the perfect purse with every single outfit, that 1/16 inch stubble that never seems to grow, it’s that person’s signature thing.  Now I’m not talking from an inner-person standpoint here.  What I mean is the thing you notice about them physically.

For me it is definitely my home.

Many, many years ago I gave up on the possibility of always having great hair, the perfect purse to go with every outfit.  Somehow though, and you can confirm this with Matt if you like, no matter how often I shave my legs there always seems to be that 1/16 inch of stubble.  Or more.  Perfection is not possible no matter how much I want to strive for it.

So I said screw it to aiming to be the perfect person. But it just hit me this past week that the thing for me is my home.  Boom, like I’d never realized I love to have my house set up in a comfy and pleasing way.  My house isn’t exactly like something that just fell out of a magazine or anything but, if you visit, the thing I’ll hope you take away is that you were relaxed and happy while you were here.

I’m a collector of various things – shot glasses, sports memorabilia, movie related memorabilia.  Not an overabundance or anything though like those people you see on Hoarders.  I don’t even own a live cat, let alone one that died too long ago to remember.  Yeah, I just threw up in my own mouth a little bit too.  You’re welcome.

But anyway, each of those small collections kind of end up defining the spaces in my home and I’m cool with that.  Every Interior Designer on the planet will cringe at theme rooms.  Well I love them to be honest.  So I guess ID’s are cringing at my house?  Oh well, probably why I had no desire to see ID school through to the end.

So because I promised multiple times that I’d post pictures (as I was reminded recently) I guess there’s no better time than now to invite you over.


This is the kitchen before, when we first moved in.  Before the painting madness ensued and I covered just about every square inch of this place in low VOC latex.


Kitchen now.  The cabinets are just painted but we’re playing around with the idea of darker cabinets so at least this was a cheaper solution to see if we like it and can live with it until we save up to renovate the space.


We’ve got an en suite master set up which is pretty cool.  We had this in our last apartment too but they put the teeny stand up shower in that bath and the tub in the other bath plus the guest bedroom was larger there so we ended up giving up the second bath to our guests and office.  No biggie though…


Because now we’ve got separate rooms for the guests and office (as you know from my last post) and our bedroom is just perfect.  The bath attached is a nice perk.  We tore out the glass doors (yuk!) and Matt put a refresher epoxy on the surround.  I’ve been wanting to paint our bathroom this color of blue since I installed blue in a client’s bathroom before we left Massachusetts last summer.  I think it works well with the brown and we already had the shower curtain & accessories.


This is my desk set up and some of the built-in shelving for the office.  A side note for all my EcoEtsy peeps – the green boxes you see on the shelves are repurposed.  My most recent order of Ripple the Twine came inside those two boxes & then inside a shipping box.  I cut off the side flaps, painted them using the paint color we have in our guest bath, attached some self-adhesive Velcro to the front flap and now I’m using them to store stuff as well as cleaning up the look of clutter on those shelves.  The flap-top box in between them houses all my small acrylic craft paints.  As you can also see a bit of sporty goodness has started to find a home too!


And this is my little sales corner.  I don’t know if anyone will ever be at my house to buy a single copy of any of my work but I like having it on display if for no other reason than to feed my own desire to keep doing it.  When I look up and see all of my projects in one display I am happy that this is what I do for a living now.  Okay, happy is probably an understatement; elated, ecstatic, “broke but I’m happy”.  Can’t argue with that! 

It has started climbing into the triple digits on a regular basis now.  So unlike the winters here where you can be outdoors pretty much every day and all day, and also unlike winter v. summer back on the northeast coast, I’m spending the summer inside.  I figure I owe at least that much to the house, to appreciate its awesomeness now, after all the hard work to get her here.

(Sorry for the blurriness of some of the pictures, I took them with my phone and didn't have time to edit the images)

14 comments:

Karen said...

The changes you've made all look great! I like the darker kitchen cabs, too. And I *love* your old typewriter! Enjoy!

JudisJems said...

Looks like you are truly putting your stamp on your place. Can't wait to see it in person, one of these fine days.

Keep cool!

Love, Mum

Launna said...

I love the dark cabinets... I might do those with mine, even though I am just renting. I find the white looks so grungy. I am going to ask the owner if he'd mine, it looks so much more classy.

I love your office... I want one..hahaha

Everything looks wonderful :)

Maine-y-ac said...

Looks fantastic! Love the little sports corner in the office.

and dark cabinet, brown & blue in the bath. Love it all.

draagonfly said...

Looks like it's really coming along! TOTALLY impressed that you took on those cabinets! OMG. That's a lot of work! Good job!

Alice said...

The dark cabinets are a go! Congratulations on the new house. Have fun turning it into your dream home.

Jenn Flynn-Shon said...

Thanks Karen, that typewriter doesn't work currently (ribbon is dried out) but I hope to get it back up and running someday. I'd love to go all old school & write a book on it or something :-)

Jenn Flynn-Shon said...

Its tough to keep cool when you live on the surface of the sun. The pool helps (a little lol). Anyway, thanks & looking forward to your next visit so you can see it all in person. Plus there will be a surprise on the guest room door just for you when you arrive :-) Love you!

Jenn Flynn-Shon said...

The last time I painted cabinets was also when we were renting. Funny thing though I did the exact opposite & painted them off white. They were that fake wood grain melamine sticker type of cabinet and the kitchen was tiny & the dark color made it look extra small. Painted them a creamy white and it really opened up the space. It is a LOT of work to paint cabinets and I highly recommend spraying (esp the doors but faces too if you can)instead of brushing or rolling. But you don't have to use spray paint, there's a sprayer available that uses latex paint) Let me know if you're going to do it, I'll give you some tips.

Thanks Launna!

Jenn Flynn-Shon said...

Thanks so much Sue! That's just the beginning of the sports stuff. And as I know, you can totally relate lol. Of course for me its not just B's but Sox, Pats, Packers & all kinds of other random stuff like tix from the Nascar race or DBacks/Yotes bits. Once I can I'll be picking up my Donald Driver & Brad Marchand jerseys (and I better hurry up because who knows who might get traded or retire!) then I'll retire Favre & Recchi jerseys to the wall. I want to frame them but I know that's pricey (plus it limits wearing them on those special occasions when I want to share the old school love!). For now they're probably going on some kind of homemade hanging device. Well, for now they're still hanging in my closet for lack of fundage on even coming up with hanging things but you know what I mean lol

Jenn Flynn-Shon said...

Cabinets are indeed a LOT of work. Much cursing ensues when I paint cabinets. Every time! But the payoff is always why I enjoy doing it, its a transformation that makes a big overall impact and distracts you from the fact that the appliances don't match, floor tile is wonky, and countertop is laminate heehee Thanks so much!

Jenn Flynn-Shon said...

Thanks a bunch Alice! It is coming together and I'm really enjoying making that happen. A little bit more everyday gets hung, painted, organized, washed, etc. and I start feeling more like its really ours :-)

Almost Precious said...

OMG - Jenn, the transformation of your kitchen is amazing. The before photo shows a very generic, white on white, bland as unsalted, unsweetened oatmeal, kitchen.
But the after photo shows one that is rich, warm and inviting. Incredible what a bit of color can do. Also love the colors in your en suite master bath. Lucky you to have already had the lovely shower curtain and accessories . . . they compliment that wonderful shade of pale turquoise/teal blue beautifully.

Hee, hee - yeah I love that wonderful old typewriter also. :) Can see you whipping out a great Mickey Spillane type crime novel on it. "She breezed into his office on long legs that wouldn't quit. With a toss of her lovely head she flung her golden hair away from a killer face. Her eyes glistened with tears, her mouth, a slash of blood red trembled ..." :D

As to your inquiry re: my book -- it is still on the back burner -- simmering. It lacks something and unlike a pot of stew I can't correct it by sprinkling it with a bit of pepper and a dash of Worcestershire sauce. If only I could. LOL

Anonymous said...

I can feel the joy and contentment coming from your words.
What great light coming in from the kitchen. Nice!