Broken Foot - Or How I'm Getting out of Doing the Laundry

As you know our house has been on the market for about a week and a half.  We've had showings but no offers yet.  

Since this is a three dog, two cat family, there is a whole routine we have to go through prior to a showing:  We take off the covers on the furniture in the family room (we have slip covers but they're white and get dog hair and foot prints on them, so I throw a drop cloth over them when we don't have company or showings.  It helps limit the times I have to wash the slip covers.). We stash the dog beds and cat beds, put their bowls in the dishwasher, make sure the kitty boxes are clean, etc.  

This is also a house with two men who, although they are trying, just don't have the same definition of a clean house as I do.  To them, a rinsed bowl in the sink is fine ("Well I rinsed it!).  That means I've been spending my days making sure the counters are always clean, the bathrooms sparkling, and the floors are vacuumed, so we'll be ready at a moment's notice if someone wants to see the house.  In between all this I've been hoping to find time to paint some furniture.  Mr. P's Emporium needs some new merchandise.

The whole process is proving to be quite stressful.  So what do I do?

I break my foot.

Yep.  I stepped on a stone the wrong way, twisted my foot and fell.  I walked around on it for a week hoping it was just a bad sprain, but the pain finally sent me to a doctor.  Now I'm in a boot, on crutches, and am supposed to stay off of it for at least two weeks.

I haven't quite figured out how I'm going to keep the routine going, but it is kind of nice to have my husband wait on me a bit!  Hopefully the right person will come to see the house soon and fall in love with it.

Please hang in there with me as I know I haven't shown you any projects for awhile!  As soon as our lives get back to some sense of normal I'll get back to DIYing.

 

House Tour

Well, as of last week, our house is officially on the market.  We're hoping it sells fairly quickly, so please keep your fingers crossed for us!  And if you know of anyone looking to move to Fairfax Station, VA, send them my way!

The MRIS photos came out pretty good, so I thought I'd share some and give you a tour. I've never shown you the full house.  Hopefully soon we'll be settled in a new place and I'll be able to show you befores and afters of it!

Here's the entry looking into the dining room to the right:

 

 

And here it is looking into the living room on the left.

 

 

 

 

The living room ...

 

 

 

 

The dining room ...  Everything in this room was found on Craigslist and painted, except for the "famous butt chairs." I didn't paint them, but they're from Craigslist.

 

 

 

Here's the family room, with the fireplace I painted.

 

 

 

And the kitchen. (I had to take all my doo dads off of the counter to "declutter.")

 

 

I've never shown the bedrooms before because there was always more I wanted to do to them, and I never felt like they were particularly anything special to look at.  But here they are. The master bedroom and my office right off of it:

 

 

 

 

One of the guest rooms (my favorite):

 

 

 

Another guest room/den:

 

 

 

 

The last bedroom is my son's room, who is now out of the Marines and living back at home. It looks cluttered, so I won't show that. We tried, but he has a lot of stuff! :-)

 

And here's the basement.  Now it may not look like much, but picture it filled with furniture in the midst of being painted, and unpainted furniture stacked around it.  This room took the most work, so even though it isn't especially beautifully decorated, I'm just proud of myself for getting it cleared out!

 

 

 

So that's it.  We're located on a 1.5 acre wooded lot with lots of birds, squirrels, deer and foxes running around.  I'll really miss this place, but I keep telling myself that change is good!

My Hoarding Confession

When my friend used to call me a hoarder because of my stash of furniture, I'd just laugh.  I knew I wasn't a hoarder because I bought that furniture to paint and sell ... I had no problem letting go of it.

 

And while getting ready to put the house on the market I've made about a gazillion trips to Goodwill with clothes, household items, basically a ton of things that we don't use and don't need.  What kind of hoarder does that?

 

But then came the time to go through my shoes ...

 

 

 

 

I have shoes in two closets, plus in bins in the basement.  Winter shoes and spring/summer shoes.  I switch them out seasonally.

 

Now the reality is at this stage in my life, because I don't really work much outside of the house anymore other than occasionally having to go to a meeting and working at the vendor mall where I have Mr. P's, I only wear about a handful of my shoes regularly.

 

But when I started sorting through the shoes to give them to Goodwill, something snapped.

 

 

 

 

I just might need those 15 pairs of high heel pumps in a variety of colors in case I ever go back to work full time.  And those 12 pairs of dressy shoes?  Who knows when I'll be going to a black tie event?

 

Those silver flats are actually quite versatile.  And you never know when a pair of turquoise wedges are going to come in handy!

 

 

 

Then I started finding doubles of things.  Like two pairs of new knee high black boots because I forgot I bought the first pair.  Which I didn't actually need because I already had a pair of knee high black boots.  Actually a few pairs. Flat ones and ones with heels. I just really like boots.

 

So I mustered up my strength and gave a couple pairs of the boots to Goodwill.  It wasn't easy, but I did it. 

 

Whew!

 

But that leaves a lot of shoes I still need to go through and weed out.  I'm actually afraid to count them!

 

 

 

 

And it's really hard for me.

 

So I admit it.  I'm Deborah and I'm a shoe hoarder.  There, I said it! 

 

Now I just have to force myself to go through them and give a bunch to Goodwill. 

 

I'll do it.

 

(But you never know when you might need a pair of sequined black sandals ...)

 

 

 

 

Decorating for Spring

Technically it's spring, but the weather around here isn't cooperating.  Yoo hoo, Mother Nature -- have you looked at the calendar lately?

 

Anyway, weather aside, usually around this time of year I'd be having fun decorating my mantel for spring and Easter. I'd have a little vignette in the foyer to greet you when you came in the door.  And I may even have an Easter egg tree somewhere in the house.

 

So what do I have this year?

 

Nuttin. 

 

The real estate agent says no "clutter." I can have some flowers, but not too many.  Now personally if I was looking at houses, (hey wait a minute -- I am!) I wouldn't mind seeing a cheerful spring display when I walked in the front door. But I want to get this baby sold, so I'm listening to the agent.  If the weather cooperates so we can get some outdoor projects done, we'll be going on the market around mid April.

 

Last week was filled with clearing counters, meeting the carpet estimator, getting garage doors fixed, and having to reschedule the window washer for the second time because of the cold. Nothing fun like decorating.

 

So I've had to get my spring decorating fix by perusing Pinterest.  For now I'll just have to look at pretty pictures.  Sigh.  Here are some that caught my eye. Hope you enjoy them! 

 

 

 

 

Dear Lillie The Blog

 

 

 It all started with paint






Shelterness







Shelterness






Adventures in Decorating





My Style Décor

 

 

How about you? Have you done any spring decorating?



All photos from Pinterest and sourced where available.