A very good year--the house tour: living room

The cooling weather means that we've finally gotten up the energy to start working on the house again and have begun to clear ivy out the backyard. But I'll save those details for another post and instead look at all the things we've accomplished in the year that we've owned our house. For the next few posts in September, I'm going to give you a house tour of before and after pictures to show off how much we've done. It will also be a chance to talk about the things we still need to do (or buy), room by room, mostly for my own records. I might even remember to go back and cross out items on the list as I get to them this year. I don't think that will affect blog readers using an RSS feed, but holler if it does and I will stop revising posts.

And without further ado, let the tour begin:

One year ago (minus 10 days), when we invited you into our house, this would be the view that greeted you:

Here's what you would see today:

Pretty dramatic change! New color, a wall of books, and furniture. Now the other half of the living room. Then:

And now:

So what's left for the living room? Well, wall art, for sure. I have commitment issues every time we hang a nail, so I have to be really sure I like what I'm hanging. On the wall above the piano, we are going to install a photo ledge from Ikea.  That way we can easily change the pictures without changing the hardware. On the small wall to the right (between the doors to the dining room and hallway), I'd like to have an eclectic and crowded mix of frames. And the old wicker shelf thing from Target has to go. Hopefully to be replaced with something that matches better. D wants a small mid-century-modern-style chair, maybe in vinyl or steel to go right next to (or in place of) the standing lamp to the left of the piano, for putting shoes on and for more modular seating when we have parties. I'd like a new coffee table, too, since ours is too small for the seating area (and doesn't match, though theoretically I could try to refinish it). Finally, I need to finish up the curtains. The inner and outer curtains are still on one rod. We have to hang a second rod for the translucent white curtains and then I have to hem everything so they don't drag on the floor and block our heat.

Here's a recap in list form, so that I can strike through items as I make progress:

• Art over the piano (ledge is up and "placeholder" pictures are there until we frame something new)
• Art on the skinny wall
• Replace wicker shelves on the skinny wall
• Chair beside the piano
• New coffee table that matches the rest of the furniture
• Curtain hardware
• Hem curtains
• Oh, and buy a super absorbent door mat

This post is long enough, so I'll end the tour here for now. Stay tuned as we make our way through the house all month.