All the Trimmings

The end is in sight! The majority of the trim work is complete and the painters start spraying tomorrow! I'm holding the baby as I type one handed, so I'm short on words. The pictures pretty much speak for themselves.

I do want to note the newel post at the staircase. The original stair parts were in the attic and the "stair guys" were able to salvage two posts and turn them into one. It's beautiful! The stairs themselves, not so much. They still need to be stripped of the yucky carpet glue.

Thanks for stopping by! And thanks to Susan for hosting Met Monday!

You Can't Always Get What You Want

I had originally planned to do a post about our master bathroom, but I decided to wait for the tub to be installed before posting. So this week you'll see where we're headed in the kitchen.


When designing the kitchen for our house, we wanted to go with a look that would be appropriate for an early 1900's Victorian. The kitchen that came with the house was circa 1940's so we didn't know what the original looked like.

This is the vintage/classic look we had in mind for our house:

Image via Southern Accents, photography by Tria Giovan.

I'm sure almost all of you who frequent the home blogosphere have seen this kitchen by Frank Babb Randolf. I love everything about it. So naturally I had my heart set on recreating this kitchen, including the marble counters. Everyone and their brother tried to talk me out of marble. It stains. Yes, I know. I'll seal it and wipe up spills right away. It etches. Yes, I know. It will be honed to help hide etching. It's not kid-friendly. We're putting walnut on the island, where the monkeys eat. But, alas, my honed Carrara marble tops weren't meant to be. It's not available at any stone yard in our immediate area. I almost cried when I heard this news. Too bad statuary is out of our price range! We just weren't sold on quartz look-a-likes. We wanted light, uniform counters, so we just weren't sure about granite, as it's mostly dark and speckled. 

During my visit to the stone yard I became increasingly worried. Nothing much light or uniform...except for the gorgeous statuary we can't afford. But then I spotted something beautiful and...green? We never planned to have green counters, but a slab of Coast Green granite was calling my name. Dear Hubs liked it, too, (he really wanted granite to begin with) so Coast Green it is! Although I really wanted marble, I probably will be happier with granite in the long run. Especially after one of the monkeys spills juice and doesn't clean it up (which is a daily occurrence). Soon the Coast Green granite (on the perimeter) and walnut (on the island) will be installed on these:

Getting closer! Thanks for stopping by and thanks to Susan at Between Naps on the Porch for hosting Met Monday!