In the two weeks since my last post a carload of stuff - clothing, dishes, books, household decor, paintings, has been either been placed on the freecycling table downstairs or carted off to the Sally Ann. The china hutch, dining room table and chairs, sofa and book table have gone to new homes, either to a friend or to a Syrian refugee family.
Ian came over on Friday and Saturday, despite not feeling very well, and gave us an enormous amount of help. We went sofa shopping on Friday. On Saturday we boxed up several large boxes of books and small paintings, everything off the kitchen counter, and cleared out the pantry so it could be moved. Ian finished a glass-fronted sideboard I’d bought months ago, installing the shelf and hanging the doors.
The sideboard is teal in colour, and I’m building my colour scheme on it because I already have most of the elements I need. The new sofa is light grey, the walls are white with a pinkish undertone to warm it up. One wall is painted pale aqua. I'm planning on buying red chairs. A pillow or two or a throw in the right colour(s) should pull it all together. Here’s a picture I pulled from Pinterest with my accent colours. Obviously I’m not going for this eye-popper, but I’ll use these saturated colours in small doses as accents against the greys and whites "bones". I'm not one of the "greige" school of decorators.
Our friend Mohammed recommended a painter, Kamir, and we hired him. Kamir and his helper Sayid finished painting the place a couple of hours ago. Painting took them two days, and the difference in the rooms between dark walls and light is astounding! It almost feels as if we’re floating!
The cats spent yesterday freaking out because of the noise and mess; clanking ladders, the snapping of plastic drop cloths, and a very nifty but noisy machine which simultaneous dispensed and taped a 25 cm (10”) wide strip of brown paper to the top of the baseboards. Smokey settled down after a couple of hours but Hobbes spent the entire day screaming murder and running from place to place to hide. Smokey tried to comfort him, and had some success, but we couldn’t get near him. It took a couple of hours after the painters left for the day yesterday for Hobbes to quit hyperventilating and slinking around like a furry snake. They were a little more laid back about the whole thing today. Hobbes took up a hermitage under my rocker, Smokey spent the day sleeping next to me on the floor.
Now we are left with stacks of boxes and undifferentiated piles of household rubble on the kitchen floor. It’s staying there for now. I am too tired to spit. I mean it, I just tried. It went nowhere.
I still have to buy shelving for the living room, new chairs, ottomans and a few odds and sods. The new beds and mattresses are bought and are to be delivered, hopefully they arrive before our guests or we bunk on the floor, which is not as much fun at 71 as it was when I was five!
Despite the very hard work it will be worth it when the place is finished. Or so I keep telling myself. Please someone tell me that your decorating re-dos turned out well and you didn't just want to commit arson afterwards.
Film at 11:00 (of July) or maybe a picture or two. We’ll see, the camera’s been acting up recently.
