Renovate Fox Ridge: Moving Right Along!

As promised, we are aggressively tackling an epic (though somewhat scattered) to-do list up at Fox Ridge this week. Sadly, this morning started out rainy-- I mean TORRENTIAL RAINY- so (after a minor discouraged snit-fit on my part) we began by focusing on the indoor portion of our list. Well, okay. Let's be honest here. First we started by focusing on a delicious steak-and-eggs breakfast. For quite a while. But eventually, we got around to the to-do list and decided to startin on the ugly-awesome sconces.

I was pretty certain that wiring these sconces for electricity was going to be a grand plan that ended up hard and horrible, but remarkably, the whole thing went fairly smoothly with a little ingenuity and a substantial amount of assistance from my dad. (Just for the record, I call my dad Papa and my mom Mummy. They're both English and that's what they told me to call them, so that's how I'll be referring to them going forward. Except when I call Mummy The Mother Figure, because sometimes she demands a little more formality/awe/fear than just "Mummy".) About 30 minutes after Papa and I started in on the lights, we were finished with the electricity aspect of this project, but the kinda-ugly-aspect of it had yet to be addressed. I wasn't ready to go for a full-fledged monochromatic spray-painting, so Mummy and I sat down with a little tester pot of latex paint from the hardware store and touched up the oh-so-luminous (unsightly) kelly green paint of the toile leaves with a more muted olive green color. Transformative. Revolutionary. Rad.

Check out some before and after shots: 

 Sconces, before, sans electricity.                     Same sconce, with electricity. Still ugly.

    Sconces now with electricity, and the new paint job! 

Did someone just say "Awesome"? 

That's right. A pair of awesome. Look at those pears shine!

Not to brag, but we actually did a bunch of other little jobs today too- rearranged the front porch furniture, spray-painted the dining table that sits on the porch to match the rest of the outdoor furniture, set up the platform to build the greenhouse on, spray-painted a new mirror for the city bathroom, did a little antiquing, and ordered the wood for the greenhouse... but the sconces were definitely my favorite (and most completed) accomplishment for the day. Tomorrow I'll fill everyone in on more of The Greenhouse Project details, as that project unfolds. Or collapses, as the case may be. 

One Last Thing: A reminder to go and check out Brooklyn Limestone to see our terrific feature there. I am completely thrilled to have been included, and it would mean the world to me if you would let Mrs. Limestone know that you're swinging by from After-Dinner Design.