It's 2011 already!

This blog is severely neglected. 'nuff said. Well, wait, I will say a little more. First, there there will be more to come since there will be some major changes happening in 2011 and thus, this lovely cottage will be seeing some changes too (no, I am not pregnant!). Stay tuned (to those of you who have stuck around this utterly boring blog!).

Also, happy new year!

A year later...

Wow, I can't believe it has almost been a year since my last post. Well, okay, I can. I have a few blogs floating around in this world and this one seems to get neglected. Not too much has changed with the house, mostly due to a lack of time and putting money towards other projects (like a trip to France!!). We have been enjoying summertime and all the great harvests our garden has been giving us. Some photos below...

We have a new screen door, finally! The old one was begging to be replaced. A lady in Seattle custom made it for us. Dave chose the dragonfly design:






I hope to be more active with this blog in the coming months!

The Garden

Well, as summer has flown by, our garden has been flourishing. Here are some photos.

The back patio and Otis:




More of the back patio:

Furniture

Our new settle arrived the other day. A local craftsman made it for us. We are waiting for the matching chair and foot rest to be completed. It looks really, really nice in our living room. Also, we painted the living room a while back. It's a color called "Mocha". Its a nice, warm, brown and it really makes the living room super cozy. I love how different it looks. Before the living room was a pinkish-mauve color. Yuck. That said, you can kinda see the new paint in these photos.

Photos





Beautiful cherry wood:

More painting

It's been a while since my last post. Life has been busy! I thought I'd post some photos of our recent paint job in the downstairs hallway, stairway, and upstairs library. The stairway opens into the library and is a room that is between the two upstairs bedrooms. It doesn't have a door-just a cool open room with some amazing windows. I will post again soon with some photos of the garden.

Our next big project is to refinish the wood floors. *gulp*

Before
Hallway before paint


Hallway before paint


Hallway/Stairway before paint


Hallway/Stairway before paint


Stairway before paint


Hallway before paint (Yeah, I know-there are a lot of color swatches! I'm indecisive!)


Library before paint


Library before paint


Library before paint


Library before paint


After
Hallway after paint






















New light:


The flickr photoset: http://www.flickr.com/photos/kaltech/sets/72157600546727650/

The garden

This year will be the year our garden really becomes what it should be. We have been slowly figuring out landscaping ideas, plant ideas, etc. For the past 3 years, we have successfully grown veggies in the summer time. Our three veggie beds and numerous pots give us a harvest of zucchini, lettuce, spinach, green onions, sugar snap peas, carrots, sweet peppers, cucumbers, tomatoes, garlic, strawberries, blueberries, basil, oregano, mint, and chamomile-some years we add in more herbs.

The sun has been teasing us lately. It's still quite cold in the Pacific Northwest, but many of my winter bulbs have bloomed. The crocus and daffodils are showing their colors. The bluebells are almost there. The winter heather is covered in pink flowers and I recently added some perennials. I also made up some hanging baskets with pansies. I love pansies. They are easy to care for and give you bloom after bloom for months! I can't have as many flowers out front as I did last year because a little deer found my yard and ate most of my flowers-so most of the color right now is in the backyard.

Here are some photos:

The backdoor and patio-the breakfast nook is in the window to the right of the door and the mudroom/laundry room is in the window to the left. (The door and screen door will be replaced this Spring with a bungalow-style wood door and screen):








Flower beds:




The flower bed on the north side of the house-it sees very little sunlight, so shade loving ground cover and bulbs are going to do excellent here (the daffodils are almost ready to bloom!):


One of the hanging baskets on the front porch:


Strawberry and Blueberry plants soaking up the sun in the backyard:


I am so ready for summertime!

Bungalow Photo Set

Photos of our Bungalow are posted on flickr. Check it out if you like.