I decided to do my version of a Real-Life Homes post and took a few snaps of what my real life home looked like yesterday morning (Monday, January 23rd). It was a rare morning where I was up earlyish and the girls were still sleeping, so you only have shots of the downstairs of our home. If you click on the pictures you can see larger versions of them.
Our tour begins in our living room. It's the first room you step into when you enter our home via the front door. This first picture shows the right side of the living room (your right as you're standing inside our doorway). I'm not sure what the strange orbs are in this shot - maybe reflections or maybe I need to clean the lens of the camera.
And this shot shows you the left side of the room. The day before I took these pictures was the Sabbath and I'm trying really really hard to actually observe the Sabbath. That means more picking up and cleaning to do on Mondays, but having a day of true rest might well be worth it! In our real home we have a lot of clutter on top of the computer armoire as well as a bit inside it. We nearly always have toys on that rug near the computer armoire because it's a great sunny spot for the girls to play. The stained glass window is one reason we bought this house ten years ago. I fell in love with the old windows, amount of light in the rooms, and in particular this stained glass window. In the morning it throws squares of colored light across the floor of the room and is magical.
Then we move toward the dining room. Our living room and our dining room are adjacent to each other. Your eye is immediately drawn toward the fingerprints on the glass doors of the china hutch. Honestly I'm not sure what to call that piece of furniture. It was a gift to me from my father years ago. He purchased it at a farm auction for a ridiculously low price because it had been built inside the home and was too large to be removed. He opted to use a saws-all to cut it into two pieces - a top and a bottom - and then had a friend help him carry the two pieces out of the house. It's made four moves with me now and we love having that storage space! Unfortunately the top of the bottom piece is also a convenient catch-all for clutter. Speaking of clutter you probably also notice the crayons, paper, and toys on the dining room table. Again, left-overs from Sabbath play that didn't get picked up.
This next picture is a bad one because the camera didn't appreciate being asked to look into the windows. We're still in the dining room here, but looking to the south at my sewing nook. It's really the dining room window alcove that I've claimed as my sewing nook since I gave my office to the girls years ago to use as a playroom. We used to have a loveseat in this nook and it was a lovely place to lounge and read books.
From the dining room we walk through a small hallway and into the kitchen. Our kitchen is probably one of the most cluttered rooms in the house. The stuff sitting on the kitchen table is stuff that usually lives on top of our portable dishwasher. We remove it every morning when we run the dishwasher. Then, after we empty the clean dishes out of the dishwasher we roll the dishwasher back into the pantry and re-stack the stuff on it. I have a serious lack of cabinetry and countertops in this 1920's era kitchen and we haven't the means to remodel it so we make do.
This view takes your eye toward the north side of the kitchen. You can see the portable dishwasher in front of the stove since I haven't yet emptied the clean dishes and rolled it back into the pantry. You can also see just a bit into the two pantries. And, of course, you see the stack of dirty dishes on top of the stove from dinner the night before. Remember, I'm trying to have a true Sabbath, so dinner dishes were not washed on Sunday.
The other room that we have on the first floor of our real life home is the playroom. This is a small room that used to actually be the original kitchen in this 1880s home. I think former owners might have used it as a bedroom, but we first used it as an office and then it became the playroom for the girls. It's realistically more like a play closet, because they store their toys there but more typically play in the dining room, living room, or kitchen. They really prefer to stay with me while they play. I don't have a modern open floor plan, but the rooms flow nicely and because it's such a small house (about 1200 square feet split between two floors) we're never very far from each other.
And that, my blog friends, is a glimpse into a fairly typical morning in our real life home.
LOVE the stained glass window! It was the first thing that caught my eye in that photo! I would love to have them one day. I completely understand not having enough kitchen space, too. It goes fast, especially when you actually do things in it like cook and can. :0) Thanks for the neat glimpse into your home. :0)
ReplyDeleteLove the floors as well as the stained glass window!! Your home is wonderful and full of character!!
ReplyDeleteJennifer