Finally, Some Finishing Touches

We finally finished the guest room, and the girls' room. I made the
curtains myself!

Lotsa landscaping

The yard is still huge, and hopefully now it'll drain properly.


Pavers 'round back with a new bike stand by the AC condensors.


Walk from the driveway to the deck steps.


Started paining the posts and planting the pots.

The Wish Fulfillers

On the right are Dan and Lou, our builders. On the left is their
right-hand man electrician, Bobby. These three have been together for
I think they said more than 25 years. They were an amazing team. We
miss having them around. They made wishes come true!

Deck is Done!

I think the deck and back door area are the best example of the fusion
of Seth's beautiful design and Dan and Lou's excellent carpentry.

Living Room is now The Dining Room

This is our old living room, remade as our dining room. I got some
new dining room chairs with cane backs. These seashell balls I got
two seasons ago on sale at Pottery Barn. I love them.

Master Bath is Done

The master bath is now finished. The tile is a muted blue--bluer than
this photo shows. And the wall color is a muted, pale eggplant.
Sharon said the wall color is "sophisticated." Yay! That's what I
was going for. The vanity was Paul's pick. A Restoration Hardware
find during their annual bath sale. It's happy in its new spot, after
living unassembled in our living room for months this winter.

Backsplash Concept

So, I'm going to do a backsplash just behind the range, between the
two brackets underneath the cupboards here. My idea is to do a
pattern that suggests a Pennsylvania Amish quilt, a connection to my
home state. There's a tile maker that will make "quilt squares" in
any combination of about 500 colors and textures. I xeroxed the tile
pattern and have been playing with it a bit, with the help of some of
my more artistic friends (both of whom are big quilters). I'm
discovering the whole idea is not going to be easy, but by
simplifying, I think it might work. I have a couple of samples coming
this week, so I'll color copy them and tape them up behind the range
and see how it looks!

More Master Suite Pics

It's a bit spare, but it's a great blank slate to work on for the rest
of my life. At the moment, my business-case-funded swedish antique
cupboards look pretty nice here on either side of the bed.

Firstfruits of the Heavenly suite

Pietra Cardosa and Vermont Danby

Hearth and Surround

Hearth surround tile in place. The cabinet in corner is temporary.


The mantle is poplar so it will be painted; the tile surround was selected to match
the pietra cardosa countertops (sample shown) which are being cut presently.

The kitchen island will have a white marble top with faint peanut buttery veining.

You can see the visual connection to the office nook just beyond the ovens. The
Carliles are really starting to occupy the new spaces, moving furniture back into
some of the front rooms and even using the ovens.


One day there won't be a dumpster in this composition.

Mud Room

Dan built the mudroom bench by cutting a piece of oak into strips,
then routing the edges of each strip. The effect is not unlike a park
bench. I saw the idea of "double decker" shoe storage in a magazine,
where you leave one section double-height to allow for boots. As you
can see the kids are already embracing having a place to put their
stuff. The powder room, like so much of the rest of the house, awaits
paint. Thankfully, Dad's visit last week to paint shoved us closer to
someday being done. He worked all day long for nearly a week. We're
almost done trimming in the master, Dad!

Bathroom Education

Target has the BEST stuff. Here is the shower curtain I got for the
kids' bath. When they complained about how see-through it was, I told
them to strategically place themselves behind Africa. They can bone
up on their geography while on the commode, though as Sharon
immediately recognized, it's already a bit out of date: no Croatia.

Also, look at these great shampoo/conditioner dispensers made by Aviva
Better Living. I love the little basket in between. No more gunky
shampoo bottles around the perimeter of the tub, encouraging mold in
the caulk. The kids think they're fun, and I like how they dispense
things in controlled amounts.

Bedside Reading

This is where Seth sheds a little tear. I'm sorry, Seth!!

These lights have been a controversy. I've wanted pendant reading
lights hanging over my bed for reading for years--ever since I saw
Candance Olsen do this on her show "Divine Design." How great would
it be to have your reading light in bed suspended over your shoulder,
with its own switch on the wall? It would be GREAT. But who knew
that pendant lights are largely the domain of kitchen lighting, made
almost exclusively of glass and metal. Finding a soft shade pendant
light is next to impossible. Like Seth said, "where do they hide
those on the internet?" The answer is that they are not to be found,
so we should open a company.

Until then, however, Pottery Barn had them this season. I ordered one
and fell in love, but they were not perfect. First, they're a bit
large. Second, that largeness interferes somewhat with the stunning
gang of windows Seth designed over our bed. Third, they're a bit
contemporary (and the ceiling fan in the same room is old-world).
Still, after hours of looking on websites late into many evenings,
replacements that were smaller and more "period" could not be found.
What's more, they went on a GREAT sale on the Pottery Barn
website--basically a third off. For those who don't know it, Pottery
Barn has one of the most generous "price adjustment" policies in the
industry. They'll give you the sale price on anything you've
purchased within 60 days. Unbelievable. The most you get anywhere
else is 14 days. It goes without saying, then, that my committment to
these lights ratcheted up somewhat. I had the electrician put them
in.

And here's the thing. I think they totally WORK. I think the windows
are enhanced by them, and they are enhanced by the windows. The fact
that they are an "eclectic" mix with the old world fan is sorta' cool,
in my opinion. But here's what I love most. In the night, when these
lights are on, the intersection of the two beams of light they emit
occurs DEAD in the middle of that gang of windows in this beautiful,
graphically exact light pattern. It's brilliant.

Mission Control

Lou built me a desk in the butler's pantry yesterday. Per Seth's
suggestion, he built it out of paint-grade plywood. We were getting
ready to head to the lumber yard for yet more moulding to trim it out
with when Lou found a piece of leftover window skirting. I think it
looks great. And I have just LOVED the way Dan and Lou have taken
every opportunity to make do with what we already have in the house.
It soothes my "footprint" guilt.

Great Room Gets Some Bling

Bobby the electrician installed the rest of the lights from
Schoolhouse Electric. The ones over the island are like the Dolly
Parton of the light fixture world--big and curvy and unapologetic. I
love them.

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