Personal note. Times Three.

Three quick shout outs I'd like to make-- I know it's not as much fun for the rest of you when I make this blog uber-personal, but it's more important to give these people what they're due, so tough tit. It's happening.

Shout Out #1: Goes to my lovely mudder, who flew into New York (at our pleading) to help oversee our noodle of a baby while we did all this crazy moving and shaking. Little did she know that after she booked her flight I'd find out about this LA trip, and would end up out of town for a good chunk of her visit. She's been a good sport and she's pretty much making everything possible, so John and I would would both like to send her a major shout out of thanks.

Shout Out #2: Goes to John, for devoting a substantial amount of his weekend to packing and moving my office. It isn't the nicest way to spend your recreational time after you've worked an 80-hour work week, and that fact wasn't lost on me. That guy is such a mensch. I am truly the luckiest gal in the world.

Shout Out #3: Goes to John's cousin-in-law-once-removed (I think that's the legal connection), who is recovering from some pretty major medical stuff this week. We're thinking of you, thinking of your family, and sending all of you all of our love from here. Rest well and get well. We love you.

Okay guys, that's it. No more mushy-gushy stuff until I start deluging you with baby pictures when I'm in withdrawal tomorrow night.

Dude. Busy.

This week has been a hairy one. Things started out normally enough. with the typical amount of crazy-person-juggling-too-many-projects-too-many-social-activities-and-too-much-baby-simultaneously, until I found out on Wednesday, very unexpectedly, that I was going to be flown out to Los Angeles to "take a meeting". I'm not going to delve into the "what that is" yet, since I don't know if it's "going to be anything" yet, but let me tell you, considering "it might be nothing" it has totally thrown my schedule for a loop!!

Yes. This is what LA looks like in my mind. Yes. I am a dork.

This past weekend, we were meant to be doing the final move out of the barn up at Fox Ridge (Yes. We're not done up there. Let's not talk about it too much. It's giving me anxiety. The gist: they gave us an additional month to move out of the barn after our closing-- I think because they could see it would be futile to insist we were out of there sooner.) BUT I was also slated to move the rest of my stuff out of my old office on Wednesday (NO. I also wasn't done in there. I DON'T WANT TO TALK ABOUT IT. IT'S GIVING ME ANXIETY!!!) so when I found out that I was spending most of my week in Los Angeles, I decided to shelve the barn move and tackle the office move this past weekend, since the people who bought our little house are far more flexible/merciful/generally pleasant than the unabashed crook who used to rent us our office. (No. That has not been a New York love story.)

Yes. That's a bike on the right side. 

So, I spent the majority of the weekend boxing everything up in my office and making a major push to get everything out of there and into the new office space. Right now things are extremely disorganized in the new space (I think I just heard super-sonic-assistant Emily grimace from miles away...) but I have high hopes that I'm going to get things squared away next week when I get back. (Was that the sounds of Emily's middle finger I just heard?!?!)

In the meantime, I'm going to take the big plunge, fly out to LA, put my best foot forward (not in my mouth, fingers crossed), and enjoy my free flight out to visit my brother and our West Coast friends, even if I don't become the next Martha Stewart.

As Mummy always says, "It's better than a poke in the eye with a sharp stick!" 

Completely insane person announces birth of royal baby...

I know this isn't my typical posting subject, but this photo, taken from the NY Times article about the birth of the son of Prince William and the Duchess of Cambridge, actually made me LAUGH OUT LOUD. Like spit-laugh-coffee-into-my-computer-amounts-of-laugh-out-loud.

Look at the face on that mad-man. And he's officially in charge of announcements over at Buckingham Palace. It's not like he's some kooky fan-boy who just shows up and pretends he works there. They pay him to stand outside screaming. I wouldn't let him within 5-miles of a royal baby if I was in charge! 

Regardless of their less than prudent hiring policies, I want to wish the royal family a big congratulations on the birth of their son. 

They don't know what they're in for... : ) 

Baby-Chews-On-Shoe-Photo-Shoot...

Sadly, this went from a "can-you-believe-how-cute-I-am" photo shoot to a "can-you-believe-you're-letting-me-chew-on-your-shoe-because-I'm-so-cute" photo shoot in about 2.5 seconds. But seriously, could you take that sandle away from that baby??? Look at that face!!!

It's like he's daring me--- "Go on, take it from me. I double-dog-dare-you." 

This kid has clearly got my number. 

A little light at the end of the tunnel...

Our new outdoor light just arrived last weekend, and I recruited John to install it pronto-tonto. That poor guy-- he gets like 10 seconds to sit down on the weekend before I'm clapping my hands together, trying to rally some enthusiasm for our next home improvement project. (Sorry dude!)

The outdoor light was installed above the new exterior french doors we installed leading outside from the kitchen. I knew I wanted somethin' country, so I tracked down a gooseneck sconce from this cool company called Barnlight Electric. The website is pretty rad-- you can custom design your light fixture to suit your needs-- pick the finish, the size of the shade, the amount of goosey-ness for your gooseneck fixture... You know. The works.

Yes, goosey-ness. 

So, the fixture I "designed" looked like this, only ours is in the rust finish:

It only took about a week to receive, which is pretty terrific considering they're made to order and ship from Florida. Once installed, it looked like this:

I guess a day-time photo is probably in order, but this image just seemed so much more romantic. 

We also purchased a pair of rust finished flood-lights, so John can flip them on and scare the ba-jesus out of everybody in case of a zombie-apocalypse. However, since most days aren't a zombie-apocalypse, we also installed a dimmer switch so that we can have the flood lights cast a slightly more-enchanted-less-interrogation-room light for everyday use. 

All in all, the outside lighting is shaping up nicely. Swish! 

The other side of the pantry, before-and-after...

The pantry started out as a particularly gross part of our house. It was dark, not just a little smelly, and appeared to be a strong-hold for the mouse population of our house (which was thriving). Julia and I did the uniquely miserable job of pulling up the old linoleum floor, and things improved almost instantly.

eww.

totally gross.

A big step forward was having the newly revealed floors sanded and sealed, and installing a new light fixture obviously brightened things up too. But the paint job is really what turned things around...

After the light fixture went in, I started getting my plates and bowls squared away, which definitely brought out the obsessive-compulsive in me. Again... my priorities were questionable. Pretty sure I could have spent that time doing something a little more constructive, but there is something so satisfying about organizing shelves.

And now it looks like this...

And for the sake of continuity (and because I had two...) I installed the same light fixture in the hallway outside of the pantry. 

Looking pretty sharp these days...

Onwards! 

Plugging right along in the dining room...

What with our never-ending to-do list, it is often hard to decide what to tackle first, and in what order. But there are somethings that are just too tempting to ignore, even if they're actually very low priority. 

One such example (I have a long list if you're interested...) is painting the inside of the dining room built-ins. I decided, pretty much on a whim, to paint the cabinets Benjamin Moore's "Euro Blue". I confess, this was some seriously whim decision making-- basically it was on sale-- and I was like, "Yeah. That seems good." And voila-- the interior of my cabinets went from icky-creamy-old-sticky-dirty to "Euro Blue!"

Bang! 

At left, you can see the cabinet, post-painting the exterior (Benjamin Moore's "Beach Glass" on the walls, Benjamin Moore's "Decorator's White" on the wood work and trim); and then below, you can see the interior of the cabinet, post-painting. Considering it was a bit of a gamble, I'm pretty darn pleased with the results.

Imagine my pleasant surprise when I discovered that the folks at Elle Decor are also excited about "Euro Blue". Albeit, they're calling it "Indigo" and it primarily manifests in crazy-frigging-prints, but that's because they're fancier than me, and apparently more adventurous too. That said,

I'm totally cutting edge! 

You're never going to believe it...

But everything actually went exactly according to plan with the refrigerator delivery yesterday. The guy showed up (exactly when he said he would!), he brought us the correct fridge (exactly the one we were expecting!), and he took away our old fridge (exactly the way we'd hoped!) He was wonderfully pleasant, totally professional, and I'm planning on buying all of my future discount appliances from him. What a completely enjoyable Craig's List experience. (Okay... thus far. Ask me again in 31 days when my warranty has expired.)

So far, so good! 

We spent the entire weekend admiring our fridge, and even John said on multiple occasions, "This is actually a really nice refrigerator." When it comes to John, that qualifies as a glowing review, so I'm thrilled!

Now we just have to convince one of John's family members (she knows who she is!) to bring down the standing freezer she has in her basement, which we're plotting to install in our basement, and we'll be able to store that 1/4 of a whole freaking cow that a neighbor has promised us.

So far the country is pretty awesome. Once that cow gets here, it's gonna be off the hook. 

If all goes well...

Okay, that's never a good way to start a blog post. It's just tempting fate, let's be honest. Especially if you're the proud owner of a money pit. You'd think I'd know better by now.

But what's done is done. I've said it, so let's just keep on rolling here.

About three weeks ago, I found a like-new fridge on Craig's List, and I've been emailing with the seller ever since. The fridge is like-new because it's a showroom model from an appliance store in the Bronx. According to rumor (and the salesman selling me the fridge) the fridge, a Summit FFBF280W, is fresh-out-of-the-box, in pristine condition, and even comes with a warranty (granted-- it's brief. It's only a 30-day warranty.) I did a good amount of research and the fridge comes with rave reviews, so fingers-crossed, this baby is gonna be a gem, not a dud.

Here's the online image:

So... The good news is that my fridge is only $400.00 because it was already removed from its box. The normal price is $1,239.00, so that's pretty darn good news, right off the bat.  The very good news is that my Bronx-based salesman has agreed to deliver my Summit FFBF280W to our house in Callicoon for an additional $150.00. Considering refrigerators are heavy and we've got our hands full at the farm, $150.00 seemed like a good price to have a fridge miraculously appear in our kitchen. Also, NOT picking up a refrigerator in the Bronx on a Friday afternoon is worth far more than $150.00. The really good news is that he's going to deliver it TOMORROW MORNING!

Hooray!

I'm so excited to switch over to this fancy-pants fridge. The one that came with the farmhouse had a fierce inch of mold in the freezer, and even though I've scrubbed it clean (numerous times), my memory of the mold is vivid and unwavering. Not only that, but it's a monster of a thing-- a true suburban fridge-- so we're thinking we'll move it into the basement as a back up for holidays and social events, and use this svelte new one upstairs!  

Hopefully, if all goes well, I'll be able to blog a photo of my actual refrigerator tomorrow!

Onto the living room now...!

So, eventually this living room will just be a living room, but in the meantime, it's functioning as both living room and dining room. This room took a good amount of priming and prep too, and let me tell you, there's a LOT of trim in that room. Blimey-- wainscotting-a-go-go! 

Before...

More before...

In the midst...

After! 

In the middle of priming...

More after! 

We've still got a long way to go before these rooms are finished, but they're considerably closer than they were 7 weeks ago when we signed the papers on the farmhouse purchase. Imagine what we can accomplish in another 7 weeks!?!?

(Assuming we don't die from exhaustion first...)

He thinks things are looking pretty good too...

I told you he was a good sport! What a guy!!! 

Next up-- our temporary bedroom...

This room is eventually going to serve as our dining room, but for now, circa "Phase One", it's acting as our bedroom. In here, we just had to pull up the linoleum floor and paint the walls like 9-times. And voila-- transformed! I don't know if you remember, but we had to prime this room THREE TIMES (major boo for both time and $$$) before we could paint it. 

In the midst of round two of the priming process...

And now-- the room we call home!

Oh jeez! It's been a while...

I know I owe you a million photos and I'm about a week behind schedule, but I'm wicked tired and don't really have the steam to narrate too dynamically. Forgive me if I'm inarticulate, generally dull, or laden with typos. This has been a busy, crazy week and we still have the weekend to prevail over. So-- I'm going to opt for the "quitter" approach, and just load up a bunch of before-and-after photos and you can come to your own conclusions. : )

Below is Julian's room when we first arrived. Note the lovely office-style drop ceiling, lifeless linoleum flooring, and the wavy-warped faux-wood panelling. Très chic!

Initially, we thought we'd just paint the panelling, ignore the ceiling, and pull up the linoleum for "Phase One", but it turned out that a lot of the electrical work for the second floor had to be run through the walls of this room, so we decided, what the hay, and just pulled down the ceiling and panelling too-- and jumped right in! Geronimo!

This was John's first round of drywalling and spackling in the new farm house. One-two-three, up it went. Hanging the dropped wainscotting ceiling was a little trickier.

Keep in mind-- this room isn't totally finished. We still have to put up the ceiling molding and roll on another coat of paint, but it's a pretty big improvement to the warpy walls we started with. In case you're interested, ceiling and trim will be Benjamin Moore's "Decorator's White" and the walls are a custom color that is one shade deeper than Benjamin Moore's "Old Prairie". It still needs a little tweaking, but Jules seems pretty content so far. He's a good sport. : ) 

Happy 4th of July!!

I promise a photo-loaded post will be up tomorrow, but in the interim, 

Happy 4th of July!

Here's a little home renovation "amuse-bouche" to tide you over...

Yes! This is our new pantry-- once the happy home of many a mouse,
now the residence of my extensive bowl collection.
As John's mom says, surprisingly frequently,
"You can never have too many bowls."

Can't wait to show you everything else we've completed on the farm so far... We've been BUSY! 

And I mean, BUSY.