Goal 9 - check!

We're having weekend guests next weekend, and late last week I was starting to get anxious about getting ready for them. They're hubs' dad and step-mom, and they haven't seen the house yet although they've been super excited about it since we told them we purchased it. So, I want them to like it and I want them to feel very comfortable and enjoy their stay.

Heck, we've lived here now for over 5 months, so we may as well put some stuff in the main bath and master bath!

So I made a to do list, and on it for Friday night was to hang a few things (party on).

I went ahead and did a bit more than that, and here are the (crap pics thanks to crap-tastic camera again) results:

Main Bathroom:

Hung some nice modern sconces. I've had them a while and really like the, but they're kind of too modern for a lot of the main floor, but I thinkthey're perfect in here.

Master Bathroom:


Hung another sconce as well as pic by the same artist as our family room "eye" pics. I acknowledge that the red candles do nothing for it, but it was a last minute decision and just need to swap 'em for a more neutral colour.

But I also wanted to make the spare bedroom a little more home-y:



So we hung a mirror and some framed Thai batik. I was going to put some scrapbook paper in the frames originally, but when I was looking at our excessive collection of frames and stuff, I noticed them sitting there waiting to be framed and enjoyed. And up they went.

And after way too much Tyra-esque deliberation and a lot of holding and viewing, we decided to put the St Maarten art in the family room, but decided it needed a bit of height to ground it, so moved the vase o' sticks over there as well until we get lamps or some other stuff:


You'll note a couple things.
1-Yes, there are still eyes on the main wall. The plan to add a third pic didn't work out because there were minimal pieces the same size and when I did find one, learned photoshop and went to frame the doctored image, I realized that the new mat was ivory and the ones we had were white. It just didn't work.
2-My walls are not pink. I have to keep my camera on the colour swap setting for it to work and it makes all the colours wonky. They're a beige-y taupe. Trust.

With the St Maarten picture in place, my other 2 important pieces needed a good place, and the original plan for the SXM piece was a perfect fit. So I hung this piece

(my fave of the foursome) at the top of the stairs:

Where you can see it from the entrance, stairs and hallway.

And I hung this piece:
On the wall heading back down the staircase:

And the 2 smaller prints in the upstairs hallway like this:

They're all Aboriginal Australian dot (re)prints that I bought when I lived in Sydney for 6 months. I wish I had many more and I wish I had some that coordinated a bit better (gave all the neutral ones to mom).

Overall, hubs and I are both happy with the way things are starting to look and I seriously wonder why we didn't do this 5 months ago? Lazy arses.

I'd still like to hang the art in the dining room and some in our bedroom too. And...in the long wall in the entry way, but I need to first decide what I'm putting there in way of storage, seating, etc etc. Indecision and setting up a home are not a good combination.

You likey? Please tell me we're not the only ones who wait so long to put stuff up...

Salle de Bain

Let me introduce you to our rarely seen (rarely used) main bathroom.

I was cleaning it yesterday and realized that other than the attempt and eventual success in hanging some art in there, I've never posted this room. And now that my camera works and doesn't make my walls look pink, I figured I'd snap a few contortionist while trying to remain out of mirror reflection pics. (Although admittedly, they're still not the greatest)

Enter at your own risk...it's hubs' 'private' bathroom when there aren't guests ;)


Same cabinets as the rest of the house, just a more grey-toned countertop:

The beauty (and problem) with fake flowers; my sister commented during the house tour we gave my parents friends that the towels and flowers were all the same ones as when she stayed with us. Of course the towels had been cleaned more than once, but the flowers...maybe I need to think about changing up the scenery every now and again:
Our beautiful window coverings put up at the last minute so my sister would be able to use it in peace when she was staying. We really need to do something about that:

And the throne with plenty of designy and gossipy mags to read:

Now get outta here:

Plain and simple, but that's all it needs to be.

I like this lesson

So we finally solved the main bathroom crashing picture debacle.

I reframed the 2 broken frames and they've now all been hung using both a nail AND double-sided tape to maintain level-ness.

Here they are:

I actually really like them. They were intended to be a cheap, easy project to decorate a fairly unused space, but I really like them.

Yay! More walls filled!

Live and Learn

Remember last week I was considering art options for our main bathroom? Well, I finally decided on a few prints and when hubs and I went to Dollarama Friday night, we picked up a few frames:

We picked up 5 of these ones (hubs' choice) and 5 of a white frame (my choice). For the bargain basement price of $1.25 each, we could afford to be a little impulsive with our decision.

These ones were planned for the powder room, and once we narrowed down the images, and managed to finagle them into the frames, they looked fantastic. A few problems though:

1-there was nothing to hang the pictures from

2-the finagling of glass results in several cuts on your fingers if you're clumsy like me

3-centering the images on 2 glass panels that then need to be teeter-tottered into a frame is incredibly difficult.

I guess you get what you pay for.

Regardless, we decided that some heavy duty double-sided tape should do the trick. We tried one and couldn't pull it off with a moderate amount of force, so went ahead and hung them all in the same way. We both loved the way they looked.

So I went back to another (more high-profile) framing project. Not 15 minutes later...CRASH.

Damnit!

So we went and picked up the pieces while trying to keep away curious felines. We tested the others and they still seemed very secure, so we went back to what we were doing.

5 minutes later...CRASH.

Double damnit!

At this point, we took a hint and took the remaining 3 down and they pulled up a bit of paint, but we were left with this:

So last night I coughed up another $2.50 for 2 new frames and this weekend we'll have to MacGyver some kind of way to hang them a little bit more firmly.

There's been too much broken glass in our house this week.

Take note: Heavy duty double-sided tape...not as heavy duty as you'd think.

Flower Art

It's been a fairly slow "home" week this week. More important things have come up and it's just basically been busy.

Fortunately, I've usually got some free time each day at work to do some reconnaissance.

While cleaning the main (spare) bathroom last week, hubs and I were discussing how to decorate it. There's already some lavender hand towels and bath mat in there, and the shower curtain is beige with some grey and white stripes at the bottom. He pretty much agrees with whatever I like for rooms like this one (not main rooms) so it makes it pretty easy. Here's the floorplan:

He did have some opinions though and our thoughts for this room include:

On the top wall pictured, some sort of wall decal. I know I seem to have a weird fascination with these, but it just makes sense in some places. Here, it would allow the wall to have some interest without putting anything away from the wall where the door could hit or knock it. Something like this:
Where some branches could extend to the door wall and the mirror wall just a little bit. I originally wanted something a bit more swirly, and hubd wanted a bare tree, so this is the compromise. Of course, pay no attention to the wall and decal colour in the picture though.

Along the right wall pictured (wall with door), there's also a towel rack across from the shower. On this wall, we both agree that we'd like photographs framed in black frames and probably white mats, depending on what images we decide on. I said that I'd look up some nice flower pictures and have found the following ones that I really like

We could either do some white orchids on a white background:



Some coloured flowers on a white background:

We could also do plain white orchids on a black background:

Or coloured white orchids on a black background:

Or different kinds of white flowers on a black background:

While I think all the white & black simplicity is gorgeous, it might be a little boring. The beauty of printing out pictures at home, of course, is that we can print new ones whenever we want if we get tired of something.

Anyways, other ideas include:

A couple floating shelves on the wall to the left of the vanity (between sink & tub) where we can display some things and keep practical things for guests to use.

And finally, in the corner around the toilet, more of the series of framed photographs over the back, and possibly some sort of small, simple storage shelf/cabinet across from it for guests to keep anything they might need to keep there.

It's a start.

What do you think? Too boring? Too busy? Too anything?