Saturday, January 25, 2014

Changes ... They Are A Coming to Our Home

It's been a very long time since the place I live has actually felt like a home. Yes, I know home is where your loved ones are and I'm down with that. My family means more to me than I can ever express. However, the house we currently live in *feels* like home ... finally. Since moving in here the first of June last year, I, along with the help of Jimmy & Tanya have been able to make changes, add things to make this *house* into a home. One that is comfortable, cozy and warm. One that is welcoming to all who may enter.

Throughout my entire life I have lived in many different types of dwellings, from a two room efficiency apartment, to a 2,000 square foot condo, and each place was personalized with my artistic creations or personal taste design. However, until we moved into this double wide manufactured home, I have never felt the peace or serenity that I feel each time I walk through this door. There is just something different about here. As with each place we've lived, I made sure to thoroughly cleanse and then smudge the entire house before we put anything inside. And even though the first day of moving was a bit shaky with the furniture not fitting through the doors and then subsequently needing to make changes from the beautiful plum colored sofa and love seat it took me months to find, to the soft golden small sectional and chair & ottoman combination, those new pieces just *fit* in this place.

Unfortunately for me, our bedroom has been a bone of contention for me since we left our furniture in MI. We had a beautiful golden pine bedroom set that included a 4 poster bed with matching over sized 6 drawer dresser and mirror for me, a chest of drawers that was over 5 ft tall for Jimmy and two nightstands with matching lamps. Moving to NC changed many things in our lives, and the lack of comfortable furniture was one of them. Yes, before we go any father, I am a material girl when it comes to the comforts of my living space. I do not always want the latest and greatest styles or colors and sometimes I even dig deep into the past for inspiration for the color scheme of the living spaces. Our master bedroom is just blah. When we moved in I was *content* to accept and live with the vinyl wallpapered wall boards found in many manufactured homes. Truth be told I didn't want to wait for the maintenance team to paint one more thing, I told them to just leave the walls and I'd make changes later.

The vinyl wall coverings are floral with blue, rose, mauve and green colors and since I already had navy blue linens for the bed and drapes for the windows, I was able to move our things and give us a bedroom, a place to sleep and put our clothes. And I was satisfied with the space ... for a while. Then I began to get restless. The master bedroom is our sanctuary. This is where Jimmy comes to when he's home to relax at the end of a long day being the go to guy for the Witchling (and before anyone takes exception to what I just said, he LOVES the Witchling, LOVES being her everything when he's home and wouldn't change anything about that time spent with her), it's my place to do my college assignments, my blogging and where I spend the end of the day after the house has settled for the night just relaxing, meditating and recharging. It's also my cave when I don't feel well and need to just hibernate away from everyone.

Changes to the master bedroom and bathroom have begun ... this past Saturday while Jimmy was home and we went out doing some errands, we drove down to Lumberton to Badcock (yes, this is actually the name of the place) & More Furniture. I had gotten a sales flyer earlier in the week which listed your choice of 4 styles (any size from twin to king) of beds with financing for everyone regardless of credit. These types of ads usually find me in my skeptical mode, but this one just hit the right nerve or something. Anyway, we found a King size, Serta, memory foam pillow top, and lo and behold we are approved with $200.00 down. SOLD I tell the man behind the desk. Paperwork complete, down payment deducted from the debit card, delivery scheduled for Tuesday and off we go.

Tuesday the bed arrives, the delivery team bring it in and set it all up, even giving me a hand putting the bed skirt on before they settle the mattress on top of the box springs. I add the sheets, comforters, and pillows and I'm very pleased with the way it looks. Yes, it's kinda boring all in black, but I have a method to my madness. I'm gonna paint the walls of the bedroom and bathroom. There is a specific primer that is needed in order for the paint to adhere to the vinyl wallboard, one coat of that magic and I'm feeling artistic, LOL!

I've narrowed the paint color down to two choices. Everyone knows my favorite color is purple and while I prefer the deep dark Royal Purple, I didn't think that would work too well for a wall color. So, I've gone to Lowe's purchased 2 of the 8 oz. paint samples which I'm going to paint on the bathroom walls (cause they have already been painted once with that primer I mentioned earlier and a weird shade of peach), and leave it there for a few days to decide which one I like best. It's a toss-up between Lavender Fog, which was my first choice and Iced Violet.

 

 

It's been loads of fun living out of Rubbermaid totes (NOT!!!) since June but I just couldn't do it any longer. So right before we went to Maryland for our Yule celebration I took myself off to the local furniture store, purchased a tall 6 drawer chest of drawers, a 40" flat screen television and Viola!, the master bedroom is now *cough* mostly *cough*complete. I've also pretty much convinced myself we (I) need a headboard to act as a buffer between the cold (or hot) outside wall where the head of our bed is *OK, you got me. Yes, I *want* a headboard, but if I can find a reason to *need* one it's so much easier to convince myself*, LOL! Then I'm also replacing the bedside tables that no longer go with the color scheme I've chosen for the bedroom. Truth be told, those light colored tables are borrowed, do not match any of the other furniture in the house and are going just as soon as I can find what I want to replace them. BTW, if you haven't noticed already there is nothing in this bedroom that comes from the same furniture store or *collection*, it's all very eclectic, just like me. Once I get it all finished I'll post another blog with the *after* pictures and ya'll can compare the before and after pictures, LOL!!