27 October 2009

Dream Big

One of our favorite pastimes is to pick a city we fantasize about living in, and browse local online real estate directories. You know, for when Hubby has a job that doesn't require us to move 4x in 5 years, and I just have a job that doesn't pay in hugs and a sense of fulfillment and peace that will stay with me until our children are grown and have turned my hair gray.

Call us gluttons for punishment (or bargain lovers) but we'd love to someday purchase a house that needed a little TLC. Just a smidge. We're thinking tacky wallpaper, bad carpet, and ugly 'gold' brass fixtures that need a touch of refined taste. Good taste. Which I think we have. You may disagree.

My favorite room to focus on during our online browsing/drooling sessions is the kitchen. The phrase of choice: Wow, it has such potential.

Maybe one day we could make it mostly and remotely inexpensively resemble this....


Subway tile black splash... glass front cabinets... the drawer pulls... Swooon...
'Vintage' schoolhouse pendants...
I've got three more words for you: White. Farmhouse. Sink. Hello, lover....

Chalkboard vinyl/paint on the pantry door... Do you notice the door knob? And did you see the spices in the glass jars? Y'all already know what I can do with my laundry detergents.
Hello! I already have the vintage children's desk!
And that is seriously my dream dining set right there... except maybe the chairs should be painted in different colors, like two blue and two sage...
But the dark wood flooring... the pale, sea blue walls... um, and can you say, "Gorgeous milky-white wood window trim and shutters?"
Simply dreamy, I tell you.

Every home we've lived in had those basic, middle 'natural' stained cabinets with no hardware. How I feel about 'natural' stained cabinets is this: pick a side, any side! Be it ash blonde or cherry wood or espresso! Just have some guts and make a move. Don't be bland. Don't be boring. Don't be 'natural.'

When we finally get the chance to own our own kitchen, I will paint every single one of those cabinets a distressed white. Or black. And if there's an island, and I hope there's an island, it will be pale, smoky farmhouse blue. Anything but 'natural.' *

Big dreamers we are.

*P.S. I'm incredibly grateful to have had 4 roofs over our family's head the last 5 years. I strive to be content with what we have, I do. Despite my enjoyment of browsing, dreaming, and thinking about future possibilities. Let's refer to it as my 'creative spirit' seeking gratification, rather than materialism, m'kay?
**All photos courtesy of Country Living Magazine, style gurus extraordinaire.

4 comments:

Auntie Val said...

My dream house is the 12'X 21' Victorian Farmhouse...at my age it's all about downsizing.*smile*

http://www.tinytexashouses.com/TTH%20Gallery.html

luke and pamela said...

our house has tacky wallpaper, old green carpet in the sponged-green stairway, and soooo much more, wish you lived closer. :)

ps, photos are so dreamy. do people actually live like that?

Anonymous said...

Hey, that's MY dream sink too!!!

Our Family said...

Well, what self-respecting woman of the 90's didn't enjoy a good sponge paint! An entire stairway, though? Hmm...
I don't personally know anyone who lives like that. Most people I know, us included, still use a plastic crate as a "temporary" substitute for at least one piece of 'real' furniture. :-) I'd be willing to keep the plastic crate if I got that sink, though!