Keeping Busy on Rainy Days...

When it's raining cats and dogs, I feel like there's not as much to update on. Bike rides become a little less frequent and a lot less scenic. Travel slows down and my bank account breathes a deep sigh of relief. And yet... life still ends up feeling busy sometimes. I suppose it's just because I like it that way. I schedule as much as I can, even if it's just errands, into a day so that I don't feel like I did nothing. In fact last week I over scheduled and effectively overflowed the washing machine and ruined my spatula (and my lunch) just while trying to get ready for work.

R.I.P. Little Blue

Lovely weather this weekend... I know all of you in California feel really bad for us right now.

I've had a stretch of 4 days off though, and the rain really settled in. Actually a cloud settled in, on our house, erasing our view of much of anything. It felt like a good time to relax, read a little bit, and recoup.... so I did 4 loads of laundry, deep cleaned the house, and painted an old dresser we've been hanging on to.

Then today I finally re-arranged the living room. I say "finally", because a) we've had a guest sleeping out here, so for awhile I couldn't... and b) it's needed to happen for a long time because the heater is on the back wall. If you aren't sitting within about 5 feet of the heater, you aren't getting warm. And with our new residence inside the storm cloud, heat is necessary.

So I'm pretty sure that about 4 months ago I promised some photos of the inside of our house once we were "settled in". I'm actually, finally, beginning to feel a bit settled in (which is about to all be un-done in 2 months, but more on that later). So some pictures of my projects and our settled-ness...

I'm really wishing I took a "before" photo of how truly ugly this dresser was. It wasn't really that different. It was just dark brown wood, with lots of chips and stains. But it was seriously dumpster worthy.

I also wish I'd taken more of a "before" photo than the one above. This is more like mid-re-arrangement. Anyways...

After:

Man, everything just feels better with a clean house...

I'm actually pretty happy with how the dresser turned out. Sure, white is a ridiculously boring color. Actually, it's the same color as the walls and the ceiling. The exact same color. Because the paint came from a bucket in our garage. So the color I painted the dresser is actually called "free". Free is my favorite color.

Kinda cozy, no? We inherited this unique coffee table thing from a friend. It could use refurnishing, but I really like it. It's the perfect height to go with our couch, and it has storage drawers. Pretty sweet.

Isn't that a cool piece of furniture?

My seasonally confused indoor tomato crop

Scott gathered a batch of local succulents together for me. He "planted" them in the kitchen window (and in my favorite tea cups... ha!) to bring a little cheer indoors whilst Mother Nature wreaks havoc outside.

Well, there you have it. A little tour of the part of my house that is clean... Now I'm going outside to enjoy the sun, cuz it's back and gorgeous outside today! Take that California!