Catching our breath

Ok, in the last 2 months we have finally moved in, I turned 40 just for the fun of it and we had two dozen relatives over for our child's birthday. Not much in home improvements beyond taking down some very lacy curtains and lusting over Arts & Crafts furniture we can't afford.

These are some of my favorite parts of the house:

OK, so it's fake and always was. Actually, it was gas originally, in that now non-OSHA-approved scary unvented way.


The walls have one of those embossed design kind of panels (I am thinking Lincrusta or Anaglypta; need to research more) and a plate rail.


All this has gotten me into reading up on the original Arts & Crafts
movement and how it was a reaction to industrially mass-produced shoddy merchandise
from the Victorian era. And how much that seems like the case today with China leading the world in such things and I spend half my time fixing the badly made toys people keep buying my child.

It all inspires me to create the art and furnishings and so on, if I can get caught up with fixing the kitchen sink drain, and everything else, before I die.