New Friends, Interior Decor and Deceptacon Weeds

I love driving down dirt roads with tree canopies like this one. The area around the house is getting built up by the day and this is the last functional gravel road. A big development at the end of our street means the city will likely get around to paving this one too. I'll enjoy the bumpy ride while I can!

So, the house is looking pretty damn good. I realize I'm biased but still! The rest of the lighting fixtures arrived today and as of last night, there's power in the kitchen. I walked upstairs last night and flipped the kitchen switch...it was mesmerizing. After not having power on that floor for months to then have bright inset lights twinkling away. Amazing.

All the inset lights are dimmable which is exciting to me at this juncture in my life. The under cabinet lights are being installed tomorrow. Here's a daytime pic of the other side of the room/the dining area.

That table is really small for the space but it'll do for now. I'll take a better picture of the chandelier tomorrow.

The faucet arrived which is awesome because I was worried it would take the full 6 weeks to get here.

So pretty! I bought a bigger window ledge to go behind the faucet since the crappy ledge of yesteryear was only 2 inches wide which would never be able to support a little herb garden. So for $7 I bought a new ledge at Home Depot (again, much respect to the big HD), ripped out the old one and had Andre (in the blue shirt by the sink in the pic above and below) install the new ledge. Voila'! Herb garden ledge!  

You may notice the biggest event to happen to the house recently...the floors were stained over the weekend. It was the most stressed I've been since renovations started. I wasn't sure about that color I'd previously been so sure about when they started rubbing it in the wood. For about 20 minutes I was convinced I'd picked the wrong color and ruined the entire house.  I did what anyone would do. I took a break and ate an ice cream sandwich in silence. When I went back upstairs and saw the main area done I realized it was a great fit and everything was fine. Here's the before pic-

I actually really liked the unstained, IKEA-esque color but the darker stain blows that out of the water. The grain of the wood is gorgeous and you'd never see it with a lighter stain. All hail Minwax Provincial!

Countertops are getting installed on Monday or Tuesday which leaves only plumbing work to be done. That reminds me, I have a bedet in the back of my car. I gotta bring it in the house. I keep forgetting. I trekked over an hour away to pick it up because almost no one stocks bedets or the elusive hardware that goes with them, so I had to drive to an industrial park in Fredericksburg, VA to get it. Then I decided to take the more scenic route home and got lost for three hours. Turns out gps, maps AND a compass on my phone when service is sketchy is pretty much like not having anything at all. I had a full tank of gas and it was a pretty day so it could've been worse.

Let me introduce you to some new friends! See, we've been noticing that there are quite a few flies out in the country which made me think of one thing...one thing I always wanted as a kid and never bought.... A VENUS FLY TRAP!  

*WARNING: The picture below is graphic*

What can I say? That fly had it coming. I couldn't love this plant more. It's my Little Shop of Horrors. I also bought a tiny cousin to the venus flytrap-

This little plant doesn't have mouths that snap shut, instead its little leaves are covered in prongs of syrup that stick to gnats and then dissolve them. Nature is amazing. With these two plants and the dozens of frogs hopping around the house outside, I'm hoping the slow flying raisins dissipate.

With almost everything getting done next week, we have to paint as much as possible this weekend. What I'm realizing is that the hard work is just beginning. Louis looked at me today and said, "What colors are we painting the rooms?" Well, what a fine question Louis. Looks like I'll be staring at interior design websites all night!

I'm thinking of doing an old school finish on the walls of the main room/hallway so I need to brush up on that technique- pun intended.

As you can see, I need to finish the ceilings now that the floor is free of death trap objects to maneuver around. Taping drop cloths over the floor is easier than hurdling buckets, fans and table saws. 

Our contractors are so lovely, they decided to replace the screen on our porch as a gift to us. I won't say it didn't come without a price though...Rob had Rush Limbaugh blaring the whole time and this feminazi's head almost exploded. I had to sequester myself downstairs. 

The last drivel I heard was about Obama's dumb idea to pursue clean energy technology and how he's just like that idiot Carter- cut to my dilated pupils and clenched fists. Yeah and the oil spill is a part of nature and the ocean will heal itself and don't worry about there being more carbon in the atmosphere than EVER before because living in a man made science experiment is natural and who needs clean energy anyway my hefty pill popping ass will be dead soon so who cares?! SUCH a test of my patience- to the basement!

Lastly, I made a very, very, very cool discovery yesterday. When I got back from my three hour bedet tour I went to the garden where I planted more corn, soybeans and cow peas. I noticed that this one type of weed has practically taken over since Farmer John tilled the area for me yet it's nowhere else on the property. I've been pulling it like a weed but every time I do I say to myself, "Self, this weed is too pretty to be a weed and it looks kinda familiar". SO, I did some research and it turns out that this "weed" is actually something called Purslane. 

It turns out that Purslane is not only edible and revered in Europe, Mexico and Asia but it's also AMAZINGLY good for you. Here's an excerpt of the description:

Purslane contains more Omega-3 fatty acids than any other leafy vegetable plant. Purslane has .01 mg/g of Eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA). This is an extraordinary amount of EPA for land based vegetable sources. EPA is an Omega-3 fatty acid normally found mostly in fish, some algae and flax seeds. ^[5] It also contains vitamins (mainly vitamin A, vitamin C, and somevitamin B and carotenoids), as well as dietary minerals, such as magnesium, calcium, potassium and iron. Also present are two types of betalain alkaloid pigments, the reddish betacyanins (visible in the coloration of the stems) and the yellow betaxanthins (noticeable in the flowers and in the slight yellowish cast of the leaves). Both of these pigment types are potent antioxidants and have been found to have antimutagenic properties in laboratory studies.^[6]

100 grams of fresh purslane leaves (about 1 cup) contain 300 to 400 mg of alpha-linolenic acid.^[7] One cup of cooked leaves contains 90 mg of calcium, 561 mg of potassium, and more than 2,000 IUs of vitamin A. 

WOWZA! I've been pulling it like a weed for weeks! I'm going to try making it for dinner tomorrow. It can be eaten raw or cooked like spinach and it has a salty taste. 

Then I'm at HD tonight and I was drawn to a brilliant red/pink flower and wouldn't you know it...

The tags may be hard to read but they say, "Rio Purslane"! There are a ton of varieties. Mine have yellow flowers. I've been paying for omega-3 oil for years so the idea that I magically have a field of it is pretty exciting! 

Blood, Sweat and Chandeliers

Hello and sorry for the silence! We moved into the house the day we got back from our untimely but pre-paid vacation. It was chaotic but still the most organized and calm move we've ever had. Now we're living in the lower floor of the house while construction continues above us. We just got internet and tv hooked up which was a momentous occasion. It's nice to be on site vs. driving an hour each way to meet with the contractor or water seedlings. The downside is the fact that hammering and music starts at 6:30am each morning. Still- the house is really close to being done and should be ready in 2-3 weeks. We're enjoying the evening cookouts and the quiet!

All of our appliances are downstairs so we're cooking out for dinner every night off the back patio. Having a refrigerator hooked up is awesome no matter where it's located! BTW, that fridge was a floor model we got from Sears as was the cooktop. Gotta love floor models!

A lot has happened since we got back and moved in. I finally settled on fixtures, new windows were installed, Louis broke the tractor flying too close to the sun/driving too close to the fence, the kitchen is being installed, Louis fixed the tractor, I planted some things in the garden, the bathroom tile and showers have been finished and I painted the ceilings and bathrooms.

Some people say spending endless hours online price hunting is a waste of time, clearly I disagree. Everything in this house has been price checked and checked again. My satin nickel cabinet pulls and matching cabinet knobs were about $2 each from Overstock.com - most places want $14-19 each AND through Overstock they arrived in 24 hours. The internet is amazing.

Here are the interior doorknobs I picked, satin nickel Baldwin crystal handled knobs that I got for 60% off retail from an online Baldwin dealer- booyah!

Here's the faucet I decided on. Another internet deal where I got %15 off and a matching soap dispenser thrown in for free. Mine will also have a matching sidespray.

Kitchen before:

Kitchen now, mid-cabinet install: 

Here's a closeup of the cabinets, they're Thomasville and thank goodness for HomeDepot and their amazing deals and payment plans because without them this would have been an Ikea kitchen. 

I'm really excited to see it all put together. I went to a granite warehouse this week and have no idea what color to choose. Here are a few options- 

Option #1 -  granite

Option #2 - marble

Option #3 - granite

Option #4 - marble 

So- two marble choices vs. two granite choices...no idea. Leaning towards #1 now that I've slept on it.  I was originally going to go with a dark granite but all they had was black and that might make the kitchen look like an Oreo since I'm doing Walnut stained floors. 

My problem is I can sometimes be too matchy-matchy for my own good. The kitchens I like the best aren't afraid to mix white and off white shades. I really love marble countertops but need to find the right colors- time for some kitchen porn! 

I love whoever did this. That faucet is very similar to the one I ordered and those cabinets look to be off white like mine YET they went with marble countertops and it looks great to me.

Double sinks aside, I love this kitchen too. Again, similar faucets and cabinet colors. I chose almost exactly the same satin nickel cup pulls for the cabinetry- loving the mix of off white and marble...

People say marble isn't smart for a kitchen because it can lose its shine if acids like lemons or tomatoes are left on the counter but that doesn't scare me- I did some research and it'd have to sit there for a long time to eat away at the marble. 

Speaking of my obsession with marble, here's the shared full bath, I put a traditional marble floor in. Sorry the picture is blurry but it was overcast.  

Here's the simple subway tiled shower in that bathroom- this picture was taken before I primed and painted and before I added a decorative trim to the top. 

Here's the trim. 

The master has a marble shower and a decorative marble floor. Both these bathrooms have radiant heated floors powered by the boiler so it doesn't cost us anything extra to run them!

Here's the freshly tiled master shower and floor before I primed/painted.

Here's a pic of the other side of the room during the painting process-

I swear I'll take better pictures some day. 

I created a pretty cool little design for the half bath off the hallway if i do say so myself! It's a high shine beige marble lined by high shine beige marble mosaic tiles. Once again, thanks to HomeDepot for making a deal with the devil to carry great materials like marble cheaper than anyone else in town. Sure, I had to go through each box of tile piece by piece in the middle of the aisle because their cuts vary SO much by color. I cut up my fingers, made a big mess and looked crazy but I brought home similar shades of tile at a great price and that's all that matters! 

I'm going to beadboard/wainscott the walls in that half bath this weekend to achieve this kind of look-

I love a project and this house has a ton. I'm seriously lacking in the garden department because I'm waiting for our elusive plumber to hookup a hose connection to the well on our property. I don't want to use good city water we have to pay for to water the garden. So for right now I have just watermelon, cantaloupe, squash, corn, brussel sprouts and peas. That seems like a good little list but in a 10,000square foot garden it looks like a pebble in a bathtub. I'm probably going to bend and plant my tomato seedlings this weekend because they can't wait any longer. 

Here's a pic of the brussel sprouts and peas at the base of their little trellises-

Last week:

This week: 

Before you ask, no I have no idea what's up with that little one in the back row. Who knows. I'm definitely late on planting but it took a long time to get the garden fence up and it was pretty impossible to keep everything going not living here. I planted corn as soon as we moved in and four days later it's already sprouted. It may not be knee high by the 4th of July but we'll have corn this year dammit! 

We're letting our neighbor friend who put up the garden fence, "Farmer John" as he's known, put a few horses on the back acres of our property for the summer. That way we won't have to mow and we'll get to see horses. I'm pretty excited to feed them apples and give them names.

Overall, things are going well. My white whale of the moment is picking a chandelier for the dining room. So much choice. So much. It puts me into a trance. I'll post a few pictures of those choices when I have it narrowed down. The electricians are waiting to come back in until I pick one so it's fair to say I'm under pressure. 

My projects are calling me- more later.

Laptop in Paradise

Last summer Louis booked us a vacation in St. John. At the time we had NO idea we'd be extremely busy home owners by May 2010 so we paid for it in full and laughed at the idea of trip insurance.  Not smart. Fastforward to April 2010 and we were desperately trying to reschedule or resell it- no dice. SO, here we are, vacationing in St. John while construction continues and I have YET to find tile, faucets, blah. Hence the laptop. I'm sitting here drinking a Pina Colada and surfing faucet websites. Honestly I'm thrilled to be doing this here instead of in our tiny apartment "office" that's the size of a cocoon and gets hot enough to bake cookies.

Faucets. You'd think it'd be easy to order faucets but alas, the prices and styles vary greatly. I've probably spent over 100 hours looking at faucet porn online. Between faucet and tile research I probably could have been trained to fly a plane or at least have gotten a motorcycle license. Oh well. My Modern-French-Country theme makes it easier to know what I'm looking for. The problem is whether to go with a brand name and hopefully have some piece of mind or to scrimp and buy the cheap knock off that may or may not spring a leak. I lean towards spending more because if my sink breaks, it affects the countertop which would be unebelieveably expensive to redo for a different sink.

Perrin & Rowe $300-500+ 

Here it is in a farm style kitchen very similar to what I'm doing-

I love the cross bar and the swan neck but I'm torn between that look or this one-

Hmm, yeah I like this one. It's more classic victorian country. BUT the swan neck option offers more space for moving big pans around. I really want as much space as possible between the bottom of the sink and the spout in order to wash our large pots and pans with abandon. Right now I struggle with a teenie sink and a faucet that juts out horizontally with NO arch at ALL to the neck. I loathe it. There's no way to get water to the top of the pots and pans since I have to swing the faucet out of the way to even fit them in the sink. Life is so hard, right Haiti?

The more victorian country looking faucet is also WAY cheaper....I think I just sold myself. I'm good. Now the question is 2 or 3 leg? The faucet above is a 2 "legger". This one is a 3 legger-

I think I like the 2 legger better. "2 legger better" sounds like the name of a band.

If only I could decide on tile. The search continues!