Our table is ready! I couldn’t wait to share it with you.
It’s even better in person than it was in either the rendering or the art show picture. It has perfect proportions and it feels so smooth and comfortable. I could sit here for hours. Continue reading
Ryan and the boys have finished the built-in shelving in the living room. It is beautiful yet functional. It’s not exactly what I first wanted but I’m glad West Elm wouldn’t deliver the storage cabinets that I had picked out (only available in the states and backordered). These built-ins are very functional but still give lots of room for art and tall flowers and pottery. I am very excited to start shopping with Amber.
The only thing that still needs to happen in this room is to paint the slats between the finished wood and add ambient lighting. I’m hoping to get a behind-the-sofa table to put one lamp on and then likely we will need wall lamps in each corner over the shelving.
Little things that will make a huge difference to the warmth and coziness of the room.
Does a reno every really finish?
One of the little luxuries in a cook’s life is space. My old kitchen had a severe lack of space. My new kitchen….a little more 🙂 One of the best spaces for storage in this house is this little pantry under the stairs. It’s close enough to use on a daily basis for the things that don’t fit in the kitchen and big enough to keep all the extras I couldn’t buy previously (i.e. Costco runs for paper towels).
Here is a picture of the pantry as a blank slate.
We took some time to think about how to use the pantry to it’s maximum capacity. We thought about pull-out shelves but with a sloping ceiling this really limited the storage. Continue reading
The kids love their room and I can honestly say I’m jealous. Who wouldn’t love to sleep in a “bunk-bed-sunken-ship” (as per my 7-year-old) with shark sheets and fish swimming around the walls to boot? They also love the bubble light which casts fun shadows and light rays in the night-time as well as the octopus rug.
Amber did an amazing job with decorating this room. I was very worried that it would be 20 shades of pink but I was pleasantly surprised by my girls picking a palette of blues (with help from Amber). The sharks really sold it for them. Not that there is anything wrong with pink but we just have so much pink in the toys and dolls and dresses…it’s nice to have a few different colours around 🙂
We got all of the bedding from Pottery Barn Kids except the name quilts which were specially made when they were born. 
The decals are from Etsy and the rug was from Wayfair. The light is from Robinson Lighting and is worth the crazy dusting it needs. The reading nook/book cabinet is from Ikea and works so well to contain the hundreds of books the girls read constantly.
I’m so happy with the way our master bedroom is turning out. The grey we picked for our accent wall is very pretty. It’s warm and inviting and not too overwhelming. Our furniture is very big and can overtake a room but I love it. We needed the rest of the room to be light and airy to balance it out. Our furniture is from Crate and Barrel and worked really well in our first bigger apartment that had a massive master bedroom but not so well in our last bedroom. Continue reading
It’s all tying together. This week Billy finished the wood slats measurements, drilled holes to dowel in the slats and cut angled rectangles into the staircase to safely house the slats. It took two days to organzie, but it looks amazing and is super safe. It ties in the midcentury modern feel but is also fresh and modern. Have I mentioned Amber can design like a genius and Billy can do anything? I’m glad glad they are on our team.
The stairwell slats are below and are looking mighty fine. They mirror the slats in the living room and complement the floor. They also form a little boundary between the stairs and the dining room but are open enough that the eye can travel trough and flow from room to room. I quite like it. Now to pick a paint colour for the walls… 
One of the features in our condo re-design that I have been most wanting to see is the wooden art around the fireplace and ceiling.
The warm wood that matches our floors will come up the fireplace wall and across the ceiling. The hope is to make this room very warm and cozy while still retaining the height and openness. We also wanted a way to link the two foci of the room (the fireplace and the TV/credenza).
I think these long wooden slats really meet all of my requirements and exceeds my expectations. I can’t even tell you how tedious they were to install Continue reading
One of the reasons we really liked the layout of this house is that there is a space on the second floor for the girls to play. This lets us put together a playroom that they can keep all their crafts and toys in. They can play with their toys whenever they want and I don’t need to worry about stepping on Legos or cleaning it up if a guest pops over unexpectedly. That being said, I didn’t want it to be a free-for-all explosion of toys.
Stuva storage from Ikea
Right now we decided to keep the wooden futon we own. We have a lot of visitors that come by and we like to have a bit of extra room for extra guests. But it does take up a lot of room and it might be better used for lower seating for the kids.
We still need to get a rug and a low circular table for the kids to do their crafts and play games on. For now the floor will do 🙂
Ryan is working hard on getting us the perfect wine bar and liquor cabinet. Amber has designed a great setup and Ryan is upping the ante with custom features. I’m excited to see if ties in with the kitchen but still matches the decor planned for the living room.
I still need to find the perfect dual zone white and red 48 bottle wine fridge. I have a few leads but they won’t be ready until mid June. I guess I’ll have to use the old standard fridge for a little while yet 🙂
One of the things our family loves to do is to entertain. This is especially important for big holiday dinners but for us happens all year around. Armed with the knowledge that our new dining room just needs to be a dining room, I was left with the want for a big solid wood dining room table to fill it up. However, I looked everywhere. Cheap stores, expensive stores. Local stores. Shipping from Italy. I couldn’t find the mix of mid-century modern and big, bold solid wood that I had envisioned. I talked to my designer about this. She wasn’t able to source anything that worked either. So, she contacted this amazing local furniture designer and artist Kate Duncan and asked her for guidance. Could she marry the two things I want and still make it work in our home? Continue reading
A home worth waiting for 