How: Making it Our Own, Part I

Before we started working on the house this summer, I promised myself, “I am going to savor this. This is the only time I’m going to be doing this and I am going to savor it.” Which is to say, we’ll be tweaking our house for a long time, probably as long as we’re in it, because that’s how that goes. I love nesting. But we had a lot to do up front to get up to speed, make it comfortable and make it our own. And I’m happy to report, I did savor it, though there were a few cranky moments—ok maybe more than a few—when I got a little worn down from all the painting and cleaning. John was incredibly patient through those parts and he deserves some credit. We did everything as a team, as you can see here. (I thought I was buying a drop cloth but it turned out to be a painting suit, so we rolled with it.)

My first goal was just to get everything clean and bright and comfortable for our first guests, John’s sister Polly and her husband, Bruce. “I think you’re pinning a lot on this and stressing yourself out,” John said. “Everything doesn’t have to be perfect.”

I explained that it didn’t have to be perfect, I just wanted to be done with the first round by the time they arrived, so I could relax the rest of the time there without all these little reno jobs hanging over me.

I was reminded again that I’m the worlds okay-est painter when we had to re-paint the doors of several rooms downstairs, a cabinet, and the gate to the house, which had lost a couple slats to some high winds right before we arrived and which our amazing neighbor, Earl, actually replaced before we got there.

The house is trimmed inside and out in a color called bleu gris which is one of the reasons I fell in love with it, so I wanted to work with that. One of the first things I also wanted to re-do was a cabinet in the back of the house that I thought would make a perfect pantry.

The inspiration:

The before. John cleaned all the junk out of it, which was a lot, and I cleaned the dirt below the junk.:

The after:

Lots of imperfections if you look up close but as a dermatologist once told me long ago, no one should look too long at anything from a distance closer than 12 inches.

I’ve mentioned too, the bed in the living room. I didn’t want to get rid of it because we might need it for an additional visitor or if someone doesn’t want to sleep upstairs, so I turned it into a daybed. The before:

The after. It’s very cozy for reading and watching the Tour de France in the afternoons, and maybe also, napping a bit.

Finally, the guest room. The guest room was actually in pretty good shape but we fitted the bed with all new bedding, swapped out the fussy ancient shades on the brass bedside lamps** to something simpler, cleaned the brass, and added the two paintings, one from a vide grenier and the other from the local recyclerie (like a thrift store). I did a little research and found out that the one on the side wall, is of the Eglise St. Martin in nearby Hix. I love it.

And then, we enjoyed the rest of the summer!

Stephanie

**Tiny bedside lamps on the wall on either side of the bed are de rigueur in France and I am here for it.

***The paintings might be a little high right now but that’s because I think lowering them requires a new hook in the wall, a stone wall, which might require a drill. We have a lot to hang so I foresee a drill in our future next summer. For now we went with hooks that were already there.