House pictures and so much more!

Normally I would wait a few days 'til I took the time to add another post. For one I'll get more comments that way (I recently figured out that my best chance of getting into double digits is to blog every other day and then take a few weeks off!). But tomorrow we'll be gone all day, I'm anxious to show some house pictures and I figured instead of waiting 2 more days I'll just nonchalantly hint that those who do leave comments could be so kind as to go back and read yesterday's post (or a small portion) and leave a comment.

Now I may post.

I have so many new pictures that have been accumulating I'm not sure where to start!

The room I have both before and after (painting) pictures is the dining room, one of my favorite rooms in this house! The kitchen and dining room (which are connected) are so open to the outside. With the sliding doors to the kitchen open, the dining room door open and the windows open it almost feels like you are outside (I'm a very outdoorsy kind of a person and since the weather here is WONDERFUL I'm feeling totally and completely spoiled!).

And you know how the before and after pictures you see on tv when somebody is advertising a diet pill or an acne treatment? Have you noticed how the before pictures are always of a lady without makeup? (perhaps she has makeup on to make her look as makeup-less as possible.) I'm sure this is one of the oldest tricks in the book to make their product look way better than it really is. If they did nothing but show a picture before makeup and then one with makeup (without the weight loss or cleared up acne) they'd probably already have half of us convinced it's a product worthy of our money.

I am telling you this and making this post much longer than it needs to be so that I can confess that I know the clutter in the before pictures makes the after pictures look even better. If you don't care for my choice of color I would still bet that you like the after pictures better if for no other reason than the clutter-free atmosphere (that's how I am, anyway).

So here are two pictures of my before-painted-and-full-of-clutter dining room.




Did you notice the stencil paintings above the windows and around the top of the wall? Now if you're the type who appreciates and enjoys stencil art in your home then please don't take this personally but I am the epitome of a non-stencily-type-person...the stencils just had to go (the walls hadn't been painted in years either so I did have a justifiable reason as well). If I walk into a home that has stencil art I can appreciate how homey stencils make it...but it's just not my kind of homey. You know?

Before I show you the after pictures I want to take a bit of a rabbit trail and it has to do with lizards. I had to laugh reading the Princesses blog this morning as I discovered how unwanted lizards are as house-guests to some (probably most) in the U.S. when they are more than welcomed into my home here! Not only are lizards not a bother (except for an occasional dropping that needs to be cleaned up) but they take care of so many of the bugs that are a bother. Besides that I think it's cool watching them crawl across the ceiling. And because we're in the bug season right now (beginning of rainy season) I'm debating on starting a "Let's help our household lizards reproduce quickly" campaign, or something of that sort.

How does this have anything to do with painting my dining room? Well, as common as it is to find lizard eggs in baskets or in the back corners of our cupboards I'm always interested when we find them and this time it was behind the outlet cover in the wall!


Aren't they cuuuuuuuuuuuuute? These must be old judging by the amount of dust on top of them (2 out of the 4 had hatched...guess 2 of them were duds).

I do wonder how long this can't-make-a-normal-face-for-the-camera-stage is going to last.

Enough about lizards? Actually, I do have just one more picture that recently made it's way from the camera to our computer. It was taken at our rental house just a few days before our most recent move...

This is the not-as-welcomed type of lizard that made it's way into my sink one day! It's not that I was really bothered by it but it was pretty big (bigger than the picture makes it look) and if I came anywhere near it it would freak out and run around the sink like a spaz-lizard. The smaller kind we have in our home are much cuter:-)

I was going to take this opportunity to expound a bit more on the other reptiles that live in our homes here in Brazil (frogs) but this post is getting really long so I'll save frogs for another post.

Onto pictures of the dining room. These next two are really dark (probably from the sun shining through the windows) but I'd probably have to wait 'til tonight when it's dark to get better pictures so I'll just post these. The green color doesn't show up so well in these next two but you can see the color better in the picture of the vase.

Because of the darker color green I chose I left one wall for a lighter color just to make sure it didn't make the room feel too small, etc. And actually it isn't near as dark as it appears in these pictures! I'm really happy with my paint choice:-)

This next picture of one of my most prized possession shows the two colors better...

This vase has a story with it that could become very wordy but I'll try to keep it short and sweet while the last two pictures are uploading to blogger. I saw some of these handmade vases in a few stores but the price was way out of my range (R$150 which at the time was equivalent to 70 U.S. dollars). I know in the States a handmade vase this size would cost way more than 70 bucks but down here you can do a lot more with that amount of money and I couldn't justify spending it on one decorative piece for our home. Then when Karis was a baby we made a trip to the U.S. embassy in Brasilia to work on getting her American passport (she has dual citizenship). On the outskirts of Brasilia we saw a lot of these vases lined up on the side of the road! We weren't able to stop right then but I did mention I'd like to check on the prices whenever we left town. So that's what we did and although I figured these would be cheaper I had no idea how much cheaper! This one was my favorite and cost a whoppin R$45 (20 bucks!). Needless to say I was soooooo excited and talked my husband into letting me buy a smaller vase, a fruit bowl and a planter as well. I really like my vase!

This next picture shows the two colors in the dining room better than the first two...

Onto the last picture and my 2nd most-prized possession. I hesitate to describe it as a prized possession since it is something I made but if I explain how I made it then it will not come accross as boastful at all. You see, I've always wanted to be gifted in art. I can't draw, I can't paint and I am jealous of those who can (like my SIL). But when it comes to decopauge...well, I can glue napkins onto a canvas like nobody else! It's a craft I'm addicted to since it takes zero talent, is cheap and gives you quick and good results.

I have many more decopauge ideas for other rooms of the house that I will begin working on once the prior art-studio is turned into part craft-room (still working on convincing Jonathan with this idea!).

Finally, end of post.