Entertaining Little People While We Work

A rainy day and no big sister to watch that Sprout doesn't wander off down the road meant entertaining the boys inside a near empty house.

We brought lots of drawing stuff and a basket of blocks.

They helped Papa Pan pull staples out of the floors we'd pulled up carpet frpm and helped pound nails down in the sunporch.

They spent most of their time playing Tag and Hide and Seek. Any bets on how long it'll be til someone hides in the flour bin?

Day One of the Clean-up...

My favorite room in the house is the butler's pantry. Really, I'm in love with the hardworking farm history and the potential it has. There's the coolest flour bin in a barrel that pivots out on an iron thingamajig with a vented tin lid in one ccupboard. The room is pretty grimy right now and it's looking pretty ugly right now too. Its was wallpapered 15 years ago with mac tac. On removal I found that on the shelves the mac tac was papered over fresh latex paint over old oil paint! The ceiling is pressed board paper tiles. Icky...

Honey? I think we need a bigger cat!

The house was built when indoor plumbing was an after market consideration.

After discovering the latex sludge mess under the Mac Tac I decided new shelves might be a good investment.

Tomorrow I CLEAN, Today I got down all the Mac Tac.

Upstairs and outside...

Our bedroom...

The scary orange room (you had to see what a shrine this was to 80's hair bands before) will be a studio after the kid's attic is done.

Sunporch...

Wild Culture kids racing to the graveyard

Inside our new house!

Main Floor Foyer...

Upper Foyer...

Diningroom...

Livingroom...

Lots more to come. The best surprise was when we pulled out all the sheet flooring and carpets upstairs we found bare pristine wide plank pine floors. Those that are painted look pretty easy to strip. Downstairs, we're not quite sure because the flooring choices are strange - painted tentest in the livingroom, vinyl sticky squares over chipboard in the diningroom. But, we have high hopes!

So Close, Yet So Far!

I was looking forward to showing you round our new house as today was closing day, but our mortgage company is in Toronto and our banks close an hour before theirss do...so the final stuff on the sellers end will not happen til tomorrow morning. BOOOO!!!!


Instead, here are the doors into our new house!

The side door into the mudroom/kitchen...

The front door that's inside the sunporch...

The side door into the sunporch....

Tomorrow I'll welcome you INSIDE!

Nature Girl's 10th birthday!

We'd planned on a picnic but the weather did not cooperate so we moved inside and had a tea party instead

No one minded - see that window behind Nature Girl - that's 3 hours BEFORE sunset, inside was most definitely nicer!

We didn't need to hire a clown, we have Darkmirror instead.

Nature Girl asked for an old fashioned dollhouse that she could paint and renovate just like our new house. The funny thing was I found this at an antique shop a week before she asked, and on the way home from Red Barn Antiques we realized with all the crazy packing going on there was nowhere to hide it at home, so it's been in a friend's basement for a month.

Mudmama knows all.

HAPPY 10th BIRTHDAY my beautiful spirited wild Nature Girl! I am so blessed to be your mommy.

Have I ever mentioned how much I love Kijiji?

It's where I go for appliances furniture what have you.

I have been watching daily for CSA approved wood cook-stoves and classic BROWN leather sofas and club chairs (those new squishy ones with big folded over arms look like a pile of intestines to me).

Every once in awhile I search for vintage stuff too.

For Mother's Day Papa Pan got me EXACTLY THE SAME victorian men's dresser with tall mirror that my dad had when I was little. It has a small cupboard on the right hand side and my imaginary friend lived in there. I'll post pictures of it once we move (we haven't reassembled it since bringing it home)

For years I've been looking for a green velvet sofa. A settee. One with pretty legs and curved arms - something Duncan Phyfe like.

Look what we found!

75.00