Stair project

Okay, okay I have been really remiss in not posting any house updates since the kid was born but I am determined to get into it again. Especially as we are about to start on a new phase of works and I need to catch up on what's changed since last July!!

Okay between May and November 2010 there was the small matter of a small person that landed in our lives and dropped the bomb of never sleeping for more than two hours at a time. Which sounds a dream during the day and prior to having a baby I thought that wee ones sleep muchly so I would be able to, blissfully, get on with the numerous house projects while my little ray of sunshine slumbered away. Well it didn't exactly pan out like that...although she slept a fair bit in the day her snoozes were filled with me trying to retain some semblance of order and housewifery between THE CONSTANT FEEDING and THE WASHING MOUNTAIN....man they can eat and poo those newborns.

Anyhoo, after 6 months of shattered sleep, we eventually started to come out the other side and as an early Christmas present, in a wave of "wow our baby can sleep, let's make sure we put measures in place to never disturb her again" fervour (which included nailing down floorboards, installing black out blinds and oiling doors) t'husband arranged for our stair carpet to be fitted.

Looking at this picture, the non-carpeted stairs look quite nice....they weren't! If they had looked anything like this I would have kept them as they were.

And below is the new carpet....

Seems like a small project but seeing as we had to decorate the stairs and entire landing before it was fitted, this was the pay off.

Isn't it funny how some twinkly, sparkly lights make everything not only brighter but better!

An extremely belated Happy Christmas...

It's curtains....

This blog seems to be becoming a list of excuses rather than developments on the house. We had lovely guests to stay this weekend so we were playing host rather than interior designer / builder.

Our lovely guests (hi Aly and Jol) also brought us a fantastic house-warming gift - a vintage typewriter! I love it and it goes beautifully with the awesome phone t'husband bought for my birthday (photos to follow). When we eventually get round to sorting the office they will look lovely together on my desk and I am also envisaging a shelf of other vintage stuffs such as a camera, lots of books and perhaps a globe or two...

Image from Oh Happy Day

Anyway, although we were having too much fun drinking wine, walking, talking and eating curry to get much house stuff done. I did get round to replacing the temporary curtains with the longer term temporary curtains. Eventually I want something really thick and warm with a strong graphic pattern. Was thinking about these....

I really like the material, the background colour (I have a thing about grey at the moment) and the pattern but the pink is just that bit too pink. Wanted something more raspberry and something that won't cost me an entire months wages for one window! So it was a trip to Ikea to see what they had. The bedroom ones we were using were too neutral to really work in the room. The good thing about having a light house where everything is painted white is that I am being a bit braver with the colour choices. But I think I may have been a bit too brave....

Although I love the contrast between the white walls and the shock of raspberry, I sometimes think my living room now looks as though it could double as a bordello! Think I will leave them for the time being (especially after the time it took to hem and hang them - I am not gifted at such things) and because they look much more cheery than these....

Other projects included a cloakroom area.....

And some 'investigative' sanding on the stairs.....

So we now have a random semi-sanded panel that will probably remain this way until we can pay to get someone to decorate the stairs. T'husband has said he thinks it looks like a little bit of art. I keep thinking I may attempt to strip and decorate the stairs myself and then I remember I HATE sanding and I am not brilliant at glossing. No patience = lots of drips....so I am going to also keep thinking of this as a little bit of art too and reminding myself it's not about the finished thing but the process you go through to get there! But when we do get there I want stairs that look like this....
Or like this....

Stair images from Living etc