Last week’s blog post was such a success that I wondered if I shouldn’t just write about Aiden in every blog update? Thank you to everyone who gave me such lovely feedback and I’ll be sure to provide updates on Aiden and the next baby in this blog.
Renovations are a tough and sometimes emotional experience, particularly if you are living in your home with the dust and dirt as it’s happening. For this reason during the Glebe St renos we often had a break between each room or area to:
a) enjoy the newly completed room and bask in how clever we were to achieve the beautiful and practical outcome,
b) have a much needed break from the dust, noise, unreliable trades people and general chaos, and
c) replenish the bank balance for the next project.
The room we tackled after the kitchen was the lounge/dining room. Here are some 'before' shots from pre-purchase inspections....
Having lived in our bedroom for the past 2 months meant this was the next practical step. Before we moved in we had some building work completed – squared up some arches, had a chemical damp course injected into all the downstairs walls and a solid hardwood floor laid. This left our lounge/dining area with 2-tone walls -the original dirty/creamy paint colour and raw cement rendering, all covered in hardwood floor dust. Noice.
Mum and Dad offered to come to Sydney from Brisbane and paint. Offer was accepted before they could change their mind and they ended up coming for a week. They arrived on Friday night and first thing on Saturday morning we were off to the hardware store for paint, ladder, brushes, drop sheets, sugar soap, wall filler….you name it! The first decision of the day was which undercoat to choose. The walls had many imperfections and the undercoat needed to cover the different wall colours as well as smooth out some of the ridges and bumps. Perfect walls would be unrealistic without replastering and not what we wanted anyway. In my mind the point of living in an old house is acknowledging that it holds the history of the families who have lived there over its life, and life is never perfect.
After caffeine and sugar to discuss the merits of various undercoats, we were able to complete our purchases and take the loot home. Dad started the prep work on Sunday but the majority of work got completed while Arran and I were at work each day. We would come home in the evening to two dishevelled, paint splatted and weary workers ready to be fed and watered. Most nights we took them up the road to sample the delights of the various Glebe Point Rd restaurants. We had to keep their energy and motivation up to finish the job!
In the end the job was a lot of work and took the majority of the week to complete. The result made a huge difference to the look and feel of the room. We chose Dulux Antique White USA, which is a bright ivory white colour. I really wanted to steer away from any creamy-yellow white undertones as I felt these would contribute to the light problem.
So here is the finished result.
In the foreground is a beautiful Dattner table and chairs we bought with Arran’s inheritance money from his maternal grandmother. We covert this table and it wasn't a hard decision to spend the money on such a beautiful piece of furniture. Nicholas Dattner used to take out full page ads in The Good Weekend magazine that comes with Saturday's Sydney Morning Herald. It used to tempt us each week but we were strong and didn't enter his shop on Pyrmont Bridge Rd in Glebe until we knew we could have one of his Australian hardwood tables. You can't buy these tables directly any more so we feel very lucky to have one.
The chandeliers were a wedding gift from Mum and Dad. It seemed fitting that they hang in the room they spent a week painting. We bought them with us to the Terrace house we currently live in.
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