Lived in and loved.

Once again I beg forgiveness.  It's been two months since I posted on this blog and I've had so many lovely comments from people all over the world.  It seems the Paw Paw post was very popular.

I have no excuse except the end of last year was a whirlwind.  We traveled to California for the Holidays to see Daniel's family.   It was perhaps the longest we'd gone without visiting DeJoux... We missed it.     Before we left we put up some Christmas decorations.   I hope the neighbors noticed.  I think this is the most lived in the house has looked for many years.   Driving down the road you really did see our illuminated wreath.

We put a wreath on the South side of the house

Quite a feat to get up there on the ladder

Daniel put some lights on the front porch too.

All lit up during the day

Daniel made a wreath for the old dutch door

Traditional...made with bits and pieces from the garden

We even put solar lights on one of the trees in the field

The inside of the house has also become much more usable.   The open loop geothermal heat pumps work excellently.  They keep the house warm and we never seem to run out of water.  The Nest thermostat tells us how often the heating comes on, even when we are away.   Even in this cold weather it does not come on too much..which suggests the insulation is working too!   The best part of the Nest thermostat is turning the heating on from the iPhone when we are in the car on the way here.   I just wish the Aga had the same functionality.

The big news of the month is the addition of soft furnishings.   Since we've been staying at the house we have only had our kitchen stools to sit on.  They are lovely but they get hard, you can't stretch out on them and the cats had taken to sleeping on the beds as these were the only soft surfaces in the house.    We had hoped to get a sofa before Christmas but it just didn't work out... 

While we were away we bought a sofa from Overstocked.com   We'd seen it in pictures but never sat on it.  I didn't care.  It wasn't too expensive and once we get Daniel's sofa re-upholstered this new sofa will end up in the master bedroom.   Then a couple of weeks later Daniel was looking on One Kings Lane and they have a great section of auction finds, one offs...We found two wing back chairs there...  They were interesting 70's style... a bit over the top but unusual.  We will get them recovered (at some point) but they were very good value.  Finally, as we were looking in Restoration Hardware (or RH as they now seem to prefer to be called) and we saw an unusual high backed, narrow sofa. We hadn't thought about getting a sofa for the center hall but this was narrow and we thought it just might work.  The seat was at dining height so we can use it with an extending dining table when we have big dinners. 

So, literally in a matter of weeks we went from no seats to an abundance of soft furnishings.   The cats, as you can see in the photos, have never been happier. The combination of log fires and sofas galore has made them very happy...Daniel too. 

The center hall with Cindy, fireplace and sofa (right)

High back -  keeps the drafts off!

The cats have hardly moved from that spot. 
...Cindy moves occasionally

Our interesting Wing-backs...I love them.
We're going to cover them but they go with the
walls of the library rather well

Daniel reading Susanna Applebaum's book on the sofa

So good to be able to spread out

Sofa, chairs and a working fire place. 
What more could you want?

We've decided that we also need a baby grand piano for the back of the living room.  It's a very big room and there is space behind this sitting area.   Daniel's friend Tabb is a concert pianist and has kindly offered to help us find the right one. (Did you know there is a place called adoptapiano.com?) When we were in California with the family Daniel played Christmas carols and we all sang.  It was amazing (for the participants, not the listeners!).  I forget that Daniel plays because we don't have one.  I'm sure if we did he'd practice a bit.   He would be the first to admit he needs a bit of practice...but it's like riding a bike, right?


POST-SCRIPT:
I forgot to mention that we also bought our Christmas present from the family (as part of our gift amnesty).  The gift amnesty works this way.  We don't buy each other gifts but before the holidays we agree a price to spend.  Then everyone goes out and buys something they want for that prices.  Everyone then shares with the rest of the family what they have been been bought "by the family"...honestly it saves a fortune in shipping costs, everyone gets something they want and everyone feels they've contributed to holiday gift giving spirit.  
Anyway, Daniel and I decided we would buy something to hang clothes in the bedroom  You know how you take of clothes that are not dirty enough to wash, but you don't want to put them back in the closet.  In our house these end up on the back of a chair.  

Add caption

We were in Highfalls Mercentile and we saw these metal antlers made by a local artist.  We immediately loved them and decided these would work well in our barn like master bedroom.   They are both slightly different and you can't see in this photo but the tips are painted with what look like "french tips".  They look great with or without clothes hanging.