Christmas at 220 Cochrane

Christmas truly is my favourite time of the year!  I love the music, the smells of cinnamon and gingerbread, and the decorations.  We go pretty crazy around here with the decorations, and we've been hard at work getting it all done.  We put the finishing touches on both the indoor and outdoor decorations this past weekend, so here's a few shots of how things are looking these days.

 

Now that our decorating is done, I guess it's time to start baking and shopping and wrapping...

Living Room Transformation

It's hard to believe that Christmas and New Years have come and gone, and tomorrow we will be back to work.  Having the past two weeks off has been great, but not restful!  We started our holidays with a few small jobs before Christmas, like painting some doors, changing out light fixtures and hanging drapes in the dining room.

Then the real work began on Boxing Day.  Our plan was to paint the living room and finally get rid of the tulip wallpaper.  Here's a reminder of the space we started with. 

Our 1st visit

Tiny doors in a giant room

The day after we moved in

 We had been considering removing the doors between the living and dining rooms.  The shelves were a bit odd and the doors seemed too small for the space.  It just didn't feel right.  So we took a giant leap of faith and started tearing down the wall.

The room feels so much more open, and the dining room is so much brighter now.  It was definitely a good decision.  The hardwood flooring went right underneath the wall and there are spaces where large pocket doors would have been originally.  We're hoping to find a pair and re-install them someday soon.

Since we would be making a trip to the dump, it only seemed right to also rip up the carpet in the dining room at the same time!  

Shiny hardwood under the carpet!

  

And then the priming and painting began. This is a big room, with lots of trim to paint so we recruited some help.  We seriously could not have done it without our friends Amy and Janice and my brother Ryan and sister-in-law Tami.  They're painting machines!

We spent a lot of time thinking about how we could mount our television over the fireplace and not see the cords and cables.  My brother even cut some holes, only to discover solid brick behind the plaster.  But when we accidentally removed the top of the mantle we discovered a piece of wood that we were able to drill a hole through to feed some electrical and cable.  

We then installed some panel molding above the fireplace, with a removable piece that hides all of the wires going up to the television.

We still have small touches to finish like adding mesh covers to hide the dvd player and cable box in the mantle and painting the tile around the fireplace, but the room is mostly done now.  I'm sure the tulips were a big hit back in 1985, but they won't be missed today!

A Long Overdue Post

It's been a while.  Sorry 'bout that!  Things got busy and before we knew it, Christmas had snuck up on us.
A lot has happened since our last post.  We dealt with our squirrel problem, had some windows removed, had some others replaced and our stone wall is finally done.  Our grand piano was delivered and the house has now been decorated for Christmas.

We both love Christmas and were eager to get this place all jazzed up for the holidays.  Because one tree is never enough, we ended up with four.  One in each window!

 

In our last house we used a lot of silver and white in our Christmas decorating, but this year we went with a more traditional colour scheme.  We like to change it up!

Outside is all done up as well, and we've had lots of comments on our train which we purchased just before we moved into this house.  

Our hope is to use our time off over the holidays to finally get rid of the tulip wallpaper in the living room. We've been picking out paint colours and it's sure to be a big transformation.  I can't wait! 

  

Baby (Grand) Got Back

We did it!  I can't believe it! We actually bought a grand piano!

When we came to look at this house before purchasing it, there wasn't much furniture left.  But there was a beautiful baby grand piano in the living room.  We tried to write it into our offer, but the sellers wouldn't go for it.  And now, 6 months later, we have our own baby grand being delivered.

I've had my eye on Kijiji since we moved in, watching for an inexpensive baby grand.  We've seen some that are affordable, and some that were way out of our reach.  I'm no concert pianist so I don't need a $20,000 piano.  We actually taped out a spot for one in the living room, just to see if it would fit.

On Sunday one popped up that caught my eye.  It was located about 20 minutes from us, and was listed as "make an offer".  Now I'm not one to email with a low ball.  When I post items on Kijiji, I hate it when people email asking if I'll take 25% of my asking price. So I didn't really know what to do.  I knew a piano wasn't really in the budget, but at the same time it could be a good opportunity to get one cheap.  On Monday I finally gave in and emailed with what I figured would be a very insulting offer.  To my surprise, I received an email back that I was the only offer, and we were heading down to see it within an hour.

It's not in perfect condition, but it's now ours.  It's being delivered on Saturday and I can't wait to get out some of my old lesson books and start playing again.  Made in 1919, it's a FAHR baby grand, finished in mahogany with the original ivory keys. Unfortunately two of the keys are chipped and some of the veneer has chipped off, but it's still a beautiful piece and it sounds amazing.  I'll post some more pictures this weekend, once we have it in it's new home.