Feb. Monthly Decluttering

February is supposed to be the month for de-cluttering the Living/Dining Rooms.  I lumped them in together because they are rather attached and go together.  And it has been suggested that I do a bunch of Before Photos and then After the Decluttering Photos.  So here goes the Before shots:

This is from the foyer looking at the doors that lead to the living/dining rooms.  When we moved into this house there were no doors here, just a big framed-out doorway.  After you got into the living room there were doors to the dining room.  These two rooms are similar in size and it just never made sense to me why there were doors closing off the dining room.  And get this?  Those were the ugliest flipping doors you ever saw!  Uggggg- lllllly is what they were.  My friend Norma took them and her husband put at least one of them in her laundry room.  That's how ugly they were.  One night I woke up in the middle of the night dreaming that I had put gorgeous stained glass doors in the entryway to the living dining room area and made it more of a combo room set.  So then I set about learning about stained glass, patterns and textures as well as colors.  It took me well over a year to design a pattern and then work with the glass guy on colors and textures.  It is a fascinating process and would really be a great hobby.  The tree trunk thing on the right of the doors is a great art piece I picked up in an antique shop in Puebla, Mexico.  It really is a tree trunk and has carvings all around it representing Adam, Eve, the apple, the snake, the tree and the angel who is telling them to get the hell out of Dodge.  I love it!  I turn it all the time so that each part of it gets equal representation.

On the left of the doors is my Greenling delivery tub.  They come and deliver fresh, local, organic goodies each Wednesday and pick up the empty tubs from the previous week's delivery.  Love Greenling!!

Here are a couple shots of the inside of the living room.  Notice the bookshelves?  I go through these all the time trying to organize them by subject matter.  In front of that is one of a set of three antique chairs that belonged to my Great-Aunt Bea.  This one still has the old original upholstery.  This will be changed  soon.  Next to that is my antique sofa and our prize possession.  The painting by Loretto Sanhueso.  We have 2 of her paintings and I wish a photo would do it justice.  It is exquisite.

These are some shots of different sides of the dining room.  The first one is straight on coming in from the living room. Then the lovely look at my block captain map for the neighborhood HOA.  I should really find another place to keep that, instead of next to the little wine cooler thing.  Then there is a pic of the buffet all cluttered up with San Pellegrino water and glasses.  What is hiding behind all that Italian water is my antique Desert Rose stuff that my Grandma gave me.  I think it looks exceptionally good against my beautiful green tea ice cream colored walls, don't you?

Ok, I tried and tried to move these last ones around so that they make sense.  But nope, not happening for me today.  These are the coordinating rugs we have in the living and dining rooms.  The top photo shows you the distance between said rugs. The middle one is the living room and then finally the dining room rug.  We love these rugs because they are not traditional oriental rug colors, they work so well with each other and are each beautiful in their own right.

What my goals are for these rooms is to:

1. Reupholster the 3 little chairs from my Aunt Bea

2. Reupholster the dining room chairs

3. Drapes or window treatments of some kind and get rid of the shitty 1970's mini blinds that I hate.

4. Touch up paint where necessary

5. Keep looking for just the perfect coffee/cocktail table for the living room.

6. Continue to fine-tune the bookshelves

I have just taken my breakfast room chairs into the antique refinisher guy and then they will go to the unholstery guy.  As soon as I get done paying for those he finishes with those I hope to have some fabric selected and take the living/dining room chairs in to the upholstery dude.

If you think of something I can do with the windows in those rooms, please let me know.  I am open to all suggestions.  Other than shitty 1970's mini blinds!