where have i been???

Well, I have certainly have taken a hiatus from this blog, and I apologize to those of you who have checked-up on me in the past couple months with nothing reported. And to those who have forgotten, I hope you'll somehow discover that I am back.

My time away has been well spent on a few house projects, a bit of nesting, some gardening, mothering my almost 5-year old who will start school this fall ... and with a whole bunch of napping. My body has needed extra sleep the last 3months to make energy for the new little one that is growing inside my belly. Yes! - I am pregnant and we are expecting a new baby around the 4th of January. We are all so excited. Luckily my Spring schedule was light enough to accommodate the sleep! But, I have entered my second trimester and the energy and motivation is all coming back to me and I have quite a few new things to share with you in the coming weeks. But, I thought I would take this first post to share some pics of the mini house-projects I've completed.
First project that I tackled back in April was to paint the "walls"of our exterior "dining room" (patio) a dark-dark almost-black grey. I painted far wall as well as the large window to the left -- they're somewhat hard to see because they recede back given that they are so dark. I love how it responds to the almost black bricks of the sunken dining area - pulling the defining lines up from the ground onto the walls of the house. >> My husband then continued upgrading our outdoor space by creating this awesome pea-gravel sitting area ... as well as a gravel-pit play area for our son back by the garden.

The next project was a one-day face-lift of our entry way. I completed all the work myself in about 6 hours (actually brought me back to my IKEA days!) -- I started by pulling some carpet tiles from the basement laundry room and then laid & cut them to fit wall to wall in the entry. I then covered the carpet with plastic, while I (removed the TRONES bins from the wall and) painted the walls. This color is the same color as the exterior walls and our front door, so there is a visual consistency that I've started to carry throughout our house.

And most recently........ we've swapped my son's room and the guest room, to allow for the kiddos to share a room come the new year. Major nesting tendencies caused me to take the project on now, and with the help of my mother, we painted both rooms and switched all the furniture around in 2 days! I again carried the same color from the entry, patio area and all exterior doors into the kids' room by painting the wall behind the awesome built-in that came with the house. I actually tried the golden yellow that had been in my son's old room, as well as a royal blue color before settling on the dark "Night fall" by Benjamin Moore. It grounds the room. I'll be sure to post updates in a few months when I set-up the crib - so you can see how the room will adapt.

So....there it is. And here it is - my blog renewed. Thanks for reading!