May 27, 2008

Clean Slate

Empty. That’s the feeling you get when you walk into our house. The mold hard truth forced us to toss our den’s fabric furniture.

Truth be known, this room has always been a decorating challenge. It’s long and narrow, with windows on one end and a fireplace with odd bricks on the other. We’ve regretted our cherry cobbler paint choice because the room seems to dark. We’re still undecided if the fireplace’s odd brick and mortar gives it character or makes just makes it…well…odd.

Eventually we’re going to have get new furniture to sit on. Seriously, now all we have is a desk chair, dining chairs, our beds, and the floor. We’re seeing this moldy misfortune as an opportunity to call a mulligan. Thus, we are selling our big bulky desk, cabinet, and entertainment center and will gradually get new stuff as we can.

But before we just go out and buy something willy nilly, we need a plan for how the finished room will look. Ultimately we want to go with something more modern and sleeker instead of the oversize, bulky, stuffy furniture we had. But we don’t want to trade comfort and homey-ness. Kayla and Wes have agreed to help us come up with the plan. They’re both creative. He’s an architect, she’s a graphic artist, and they write for Apartment Therapy on the side.

The truth is, you don’t have to have furniture in a room to live in it. We’ve found the two empty rooms to be magnificent play rooms. Caleb and I spent hours over the weekend throwing balls at each other and wrestling in the den. In the living room, we have the giant cardboard box that our HVAC unit came in. We cut windows in it and made an airplane cockpit out of it. Then we took markers and drew buttons, gears, guages, and radar displays inside of it.

It’s so nice to have fresh clean air to breathe. We’re trying not to take that for granted. After a while of playing in the yard, we say, “OK, time to go inside and get some fresh air.”