Casa Del Grace, For Your Enjoyment

Alright, so true to my usual form of making a promise and then beating around the bush fulfilling it for longer than it takes a first-grader to sound out "antidisestablishmentarianism," I am here two weeks after I originally promised pictures of my refinished bedroom furniture, to provide pictures of my refinished bedroom furniure. And to rant, natch. What, you were here for sunshine and kittens?

Okay, fine. Kittens!

Well, singular kitten. Singular kitten totally digging his Santa outfit, whereby "totally digging his Santa outfit," I mean, "shit dude, I'm stoked he didn't kill me!"

Lawyer Boy and I discovered recently that our upstairs bathroom is an unholy disaster of Biblical proportions, and that renovating a bathroom is, coincidentally, a financial disaster of Biblical proportions. We have spent the last year of our lives slaving away on this house that we bought for approximately four dollars and a salami sandwich, which was formerly a disgusting mildew-ridden cricket cave, and which now is...not. I recognize that I've set the bar fairly low here: All I've said is that our house is no longer disgusting, mildew-ridden, or infested with cave crickets, who look to the uninitiated like craggy prostitutes with their ankles behind their heads. * It has been more work than herding a litter of kittens to get this house into shape, but finally, it's really coming together, and our house is no longer a big bucket of suck. We think the progress on the house is moving along well enough, in fact, that in order to get the bathroom done, we applied for a refinance. Yesterday.

This morning, like before-most-college-students-had-gotten-to-bed early this morning, the bank called LB (apparently they know who speaks their language around here). In order to figure out how generously they would like to reward our blood, sweat, and unspeakable profanity of the last year, they want to do a walk-through appraisal of our house on Wednesday morning. Tomorrow. TO-EFFING-MORROW, AMIGOS!!!

Commence extreme panic, frenzied cleaning, and fervent lighting of prayers candles in the Thoreau household. We had been hoping to avoid a walk-through appraisal, the real-life version of "My House Is Worth What?" with less of the profoundly obnoxious Kendra Todd, and more of the tangible real-life consequences. A walk-through appraisal with less than twenty-four hours' notice was, to say the least, as unwelcome as a Jehovah's Witness knocking on the door of a Sig Ep Kamoniwannaleia** tropical mixer. In preparation for the real estate apocalypse that is upon us, one of us finally had to wrangle our wardrobe back into the closet, dresser, nightstand, bookshelf, and everywhere else we use to contain the fabric of our lives when it's not smeared across our entire second floor.

So, my panic-stricken cleaning fest is your gain, and thus I finally bring you, at long last and with much fanfare***, photos of our freshly refinished bedroom furniture. In case you had forgotten, which is possible since I began this topic when Tara Reid had never enjoyed surgical enhancement, LB and I had some truly hideous oak bedroom furniture that I decided we should sand, repaint, and refinish to look "weathered," to fit in with our bedroom theme of "French country romantic."

Now, bear in mind that we're not there yet. The furniture is done but we haven't hung pictures or accessorized or figured out the most flattering pose for the cat to strike while lying on the bed. But, in its infant stages, here is our bedroom:

The view from the doorway. Yes, my bedtime reading is "Mastering the Art of French Cooking." Some of us just think about food all the time. Some of us are going to be a threat to the world food supply when we're pregnant.

From the same end of the room, but really just to emphasize the fact that I have two chandeliers in my bedroom. This room used to be two bedrooms, one of which was roughly the size of a Lean Cuisine, so we have two light fixtures. They are both chandeliers because my husband is awesomesticks.****

In case you're wondering which fabric we picked out at Fondiqua's, this is it. We had to cover the cardboard back of the no-longer-oak bookshelf. Stage left showcases a picture that I haven't found a home for yet. Don't worry, we tuck it in each night and assure it of its personal worth.

Girlfriend just likes to be in her own pictures. Also, Grace-Based Trivia: I'm wearing the same shirt in this picture, that I'm wearing in the picture on the dresser. Play within a play, what what!

The aforementioned dresser, without the aforementioned assbaggery, tomfoolery, and cockamamery. Still with pictures of me, though, so my ego is assuaged. And thank God!

For those of you who are unnecessarily interested in the artistic aspects of this project, this is what the crackle finish looks like up close. It's a chocolate brown base coat with cream crackled over top. Chocolate plus cream. Mmmmmmm. Mmmmmmm....

Speaking of chocolate, I will leave you tonight with a shot of my favorite chunk of chocolate love, Breeze, our 100-lb Labradozer who has recently taken to sleeping on the sofa:

Can you imagine trying to move that so you can sit down?
No, I just can't imagine trying to make that face move. Who is a muffin? Who is a sweet, sweet chocolate muffin?

*A worthy skill, of course.
**Wherever you are, and I include in that an open cubicle or church, please say that out loud.
***Cue the fanfare! I said cue the trumpet fanfare NOW!!
****Thanks to Mr. Apron, who called my sense of humor "awesomesticks," which I can only assume is a compliment.