Erin's Madeover(ish) Dining Room

I can't believe that two months have passed since I enlisted the  help of you savvy readers in rearranging my dining room... It seems like I should have completed a lot more projects than just redoing one measly room, but my days are usually filled with picking up toys, cleaning rice cereal out of Ike's ears, and changing some increasingly odd diapers. (In case you should ever come to my house for dinner, rest assured that last thing never takes place in the dining room.) At any rate, it's done(ish). I say "ish" because you know me... nothing is ever really done. In other words, this place will probably look totally different next month. Let's take a trip down memory lane and check out its previous iterations: Super old:

Kinda old:

And right now -- today -- this is what I've got going on:

I took the suggestion a lot of you bandied about and bought some Ikea Aina curtains for my puny window. See? I listen(ish). HB hung them high and wide, and voila! Bigger window. The sexy 70s lucite chandelier came from Ebay.

I tried to reuse most of my old goodies, like this Curtis Jere(ish) brass tree, but the table and chairs had to take a hike. The old Danish table went to our office, and the Burke chairs went to Karly's dining room. Because, sharing means caring, right?

Our new (to us) 90" long reclaimed wood and stainless steel dining table came from craigslist, and the sellers even delivered it for no additional charge. Super score! The Marcel Breuer(ish) chairs came with Karly's glass table and I wasn't totally sure about them at first, but for $150, I've decided they're awesome. And comfy.

The brass sconces came from Ebay. I almost photoshopped out the fugly cords, but I decided to keep it real, yo. Ok, and I'm lazy. And busy. And I'd also like to know what to do about them. I think I should nail them to the wall and paint them black. Thoughts?

I already had the Karly Springer(ish) console table, but I added a few nick knacks, trying to keep the neutral vibe going. The Head came from Room Service, the mask and bronze hand were both made by art school buddies, and the faux bois tray is vintage. The cord is pissing me off.

Here's a view of the left side of the dining room/entry way. I didn't want the dining room pieces to compete with the ceiling, so I kept everything on the down low. Except for Doris.

Doris is my new David Hockney(ish) million color screenprint that I picked up for $4.99 while thrifting with the ladies. She's 100% hand pulled awesomeness.

Yet another view of the right side of the room... I may have gotten a bit carried away with the photos, but at least you can see that the vintage Drexel benches reverted to their original linen upholstery.

Beethoven is holding down the back corner. My friend Peter did the naughty etching above his head. It's a special surprise that you can only see up close and personal... real personal.

That's it for my home tour! Hope you dudes aren't disappointed that there aren't any trees growing out of the floor or poltergeists in the corners. I'll get to work on that, pronto.

Ish.

Opart Giveaway!!

Good morning everyone!  Glad to see you all survived a night undoubtedly filled with panic and nightmares after Erin's haunted house tour yesterday.  You guys are some tough kittens and for that we would like to reward you!  How about an, um, I don't know, maybe a GIVE AWAY???!!! Hooray!  Everyone loves a give away.  Especially me because it makes me feel like Oprah.  We're very similar if you divide all of her accomplishments, bank accounts and loyal followers by approximately one hundred gazillion.  Enough about me, the real Oprah in this story is a lovely gentleman called Tim who sells his affordable photography prints under the name Opart on Etsy.  He's a rockin photographer who wants nothing more than to bring warmth and joy to your little hearts this holiday season.

Here's how this shit's going down:  I'll be posting several of Opart's pieces (I just couldn't narrow it down) you dudes pick your favorite one and leave a shout out in the comments section.  Next Tuesday, I will pick THREE WINNERS via the magic number generator et voila each of THREE WINNERS gets their favorite piece.  Don't worry if another winner also loves your fave, Tim is happy to print duplicates.

Here are your choices:

Carousel 1970, 8"x8"

Street Party, 8"x8"

Happy Holidays, 8"x8"

Zebra Number 3, 8"x8"

Almost a Unicorn, 10"x8"

Road King, 8"x8"

Gina, Venice Beach 1996, 8"x8"

Four Bee Eaters, 10"x8"

Five Humming Birds, 10"x8"

And just incase you can't wait until the big reveal next Tuesday, you can buy most of these prints for $25, which includes free shipping around the world through January 2010, here.

Happy commenting!

+++++++UPDATE: AS OF 6:30pm CENTRAL TIME, ENTRIES TO THE CONTEST ARE CLOSED.  Sorry loves, come back tomorrow to find out who one and next week for a BRAND NEW CONTEST++++++++

House Hunting In Hell

Now that we've invested huge amounts of time and money into renovating our kitchen, landscaping the yard, and decorating the house, I've decided it may be time to move, which makes total sense to all you design junkies, right? So this weekend, Hunny Bunny, the baby, Karly and I, solicited the help of our realtor friend Kurt to look at a house in one of the most amazing neighborhoods in Austin -- Travis Heights. Oh, Travis Heights, how I love thee! When we drove into the hood, I thought about living within walking distance of the shops at South Congress, and I looked at families pushing strollers down tree lined streets with a misty sense that this could be our new life.

And how cute is this 1930s house? With a little paint and some new plants, it could be killer. Plus, did I mention that the neighborhood rocks, and the lot is STUNNING.

Yep, that's your own personal creek running through a little patch of wilderness, 5 minutes from downtown, 5 seconds from South Congress. Insane, is what that is. And astonishingly, it's (barely) within our budget. Hmmm.

As we pulled into the carport, Karly started her "Unh, uh" routine. Ok, so the backside of the house was a little ramshackle... The picture above captures about 1/3 of the length of the house. The carport was caving in, there appeared to be a strange 1980s addition tacked onto the back, there were about 500 doors opening to various outdoor areas, and the landscaping was a bit odd, but still workable. What can you expect at such a bargain basement price? And then we walked inside.

Is this part of an old garage? What's up with the "stairs" to nowhere? How come that doorway appears to be mounted upside down on the wall??? Why oh why does it smell like death in here...?

Ben held the baby into the mystery opening to get a closer look, and Ike -- who heretofore was perfectly placid -- started screaming BLOODY MURDER, which is obviously what took place in this room vampire cave. Now, normally I'd go spelunking to check out the "vintage" furniture in there, but I figured Ike knew something I didn't. Obviously, he sees dead people. After that, things got hazy. Karly declared the house was "haunted as shit," and decided to take Ike outside to calm him down, but I was not to be deterred from a bargain by a few measly poltergeists.

We pressed on to the 80s wing, which featured lovely wall to wall carpet in red -- to hide the bloodstains, naturally. Sadly, I didn't get a picture of the leg breaking spiral staircase straight out of Vertical Limit, or the disgusting bathrooms, but truly, these things were only pedestrian gross. You've seen them before. But I bet you've never seen this:

I'm just going to give you a second to reflect on the situation.

There is a TREE in the middle of the house -- in the kitchen, for goodness sake, which is somehow even more offensive. And lest a tiny part of you think that it might be cool to have a tree in your kitchen, remember the other rooms. Whoever built this patchwork piece of shit house built it out of plywood, cardboard and duct tape. The roof leaked all around the hole where the tree is, and a foundation was laid over the tree roots. Not good planning.

Plus it looks like sandworms from Beetlejuice are attacking the exterior of the home, and nobody wants that.

Here's another shot from the other side. DO NOT be fooled by my pretty picture. Imagine filth, crappy construction, and cheap materials everywhere. It is completely uninhabitable, and I have a VERY high tolerance for fixer uppers. Somehow I neglected to get pictures of the random door that opens onto an unstable, unfenced roof (dangerous, much?), or the creepy door to yet another pit of hell under the house that looks to be the spot where Buffalo Bill held his victims in Silence of the Lambs. The only thing that will save this house is a bulldozer.

And it's sad, you know? The original house was probably 1000 square feet, with period hardwoods and built ins, and it was tiny and cute. Then some morons decided they should add on 2000 square feet of crappy disconnected boxes, with absolutely no floorplan in mind, and they ruined it. Plus there are the dead bodies. I know they're in there somewhere -- Ike saw them.

Oh, and when we left, Ben backed into a stupid, random brick mailbox that had fallen and was laying in the driveway. Our bumper is totally dented in, and now we have to hire a man that actually goes by the name of "Crackhead" to pull the dent out.

But, guess what? I was never so happy to pull into our driveway and walk into our own nice, remodeled house. So, stay tuned for my dining room makeover on Wednesday. I figure that -- relative to this gem -- it's gotta look amazing.

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UPDATE!

Kurt sent me the pictures he took that day:

Just a lil group shot. You can totally tell Ike is screaming his head off. Also, Karly is too tall to live in this hobbit house.

I have also been informed that "Kentucky" will be fixing our bumper instead of "Crackhead." Good to know.