New Beginnings Part 1: Downstairs

Hi all. My little sister reminded me the other day that I had been decidedly quite on the blog for the past couple months. I'm not dead, I promise. We just moved, so I've had a lot going on.

That's right, we have left behind the lovely Lancaster for the much busier Sheffield. Tom has started his PhD in Volcanology at the University of Sheffield and I am once again playing the housewife while I wait for a visa application to (hopefully) turn into a visa so I can find a job. But in the meantime I'm keeping busy with our new house. Given the post move budget (which has been very tight) I have more ideas then actual projects, but I have been getting up to a couple things, so more posts in the near future. But today I thought I'd just reach out for some help and inspiration and share a bit of the new home with you. This will probably be a three part series, we have a lot more space inside and out. But the downstairs is the part we spend the most time in (at least in the coming winter months) and it's the first two rooms I want to tackle (as well as the ones that are giving me the most trouble).

I'll start with the lounge, and curtains. this is the bane of my current existence. I have searched high and low for some contemporary and stylish curtains to cover the three windows in our lounge (and replace those hideous blue ones), but to no avail. I have scoured several of the Sheffied fabric shops looking for fabric to make my own curtains or roman blinds and I've come up trumps every time. I'm still trying to decide what I really want I guess, I thought about doing some roman blinds with a fun print, but then I thought maybe I should do regular curtains because they're easier to make. I considered a combination of the two. I know I want to add some colour to our drab grey lounge, but I'm not looking for a boring solid, but a print might be too busy with an entire wall essentially windows. Really what I want is a nice think stripe. I've found some inspiration online recently for some DIY thick stripe curtains that I like, and I might actually be able to afford, now just to decide which colour I want and find some sheets to fit the bill.

I like these stripes.

Lounge colour scheme?

I really like the pattern on these and I found a great DIY tutorial online at Craft Interrupted. She outlines four ways she found to achieve this look, but I think I'd go with her choice and buy a couple sheets and piece it all together myself. Still a bit iffy about colour choice, I have some thoughts on using Scandinavian themed colours in the lounge, keeps it simple yet bright. I like the mix of lime, teal and blue (we have a bit of that going on already) and the dash of orange to brighten it all up a bit. We have shades of grey instead of brown in the lounge, but I think it might still work. I'm considering cream and orange stripes. Either way a trip to Wilkinson's for cheap sheets is in order. A lot of sewing ahead for me.

My other challenge in the lounge lies on the opposite wall, that big blank one on the left. I want to do a really great montage of photos and things on the wall, I have three collage style frames already, but I think they may look a bit sad all on their own. But I must get something up there, so it's that or nothing at the moment. I also have the mantle to do something with. I find this one a bit daunting because the mantelpiece is firstly so low, secondly so narrow, and thirdly I have that beast of a 1960's gas fire to contend with! As Christmas is coming I'm waiting to tackle this project for a couple more weeks, then I can do a Christmas display and hopefully inspiration for after the holidays will come to me. I think more to come on this in future Christmas related posts.

Something like this only hung horizontally.

Finally we have the kitchen, which is much bigger then our last house, we even have room for a table this time (which we don't use a great deal, but it's there). We have one big bare wall in the kitchen as well, which doesn't bother me as much as the lounge because there's a lot less empty space in there. In fact I'm almost worried about hanging anything on this wall because I'm afraid it might give the kitchen a cluttered feel. So i think whatever goes here will have to be very simple. I've thought about perhaps finding some printables or images of herbs or veggies from an old book and framing them simply. But I think by far my favourite idea is to find an old window frame and hang it. Now I don't think I would put photos behind, it would make the room too busy, but I like the idea of a mirror, or perhaps a subtly textured print of fabric or paper in a contrasting colour to the wall. But I don't have a friendly neighborhood salvage yard, so where I might find some of these gems is a question I have yet to answer.
That's it for part one I'm afraid. But there is much much more to come. I love crafting during the holidays, and I have several projects under way for Christmas as well as some fun stuff by way of baking to post about this week. So it's going to get busier around here!