... means 'so, in this way, like this' in English and the Dutch often use this word to express their feelings after they've finished something. Thus zo, we have sold the house and have a moving date for Sweden. We still have to get some financing sorted out to buy the property we want (can't show it yet because it may bring bad luck) and than it's exit Dutch life .. enter Sweden life. It's all a bit of a mess right now because we didn't expect to sell the house in just one week. The day after tomorrow we're going to sign the provisional contract of sale and as from September the first The New Old House is no longer ours.

This is how I spent my weekend, trying to brighten up the landing and the study by painting some furniture and doing some oilcloth on table stabling.

It was just such a glorious autumn day. The sun was shining, clear blue skies and it was actually really hot so I could work with the windows open. What a little light can do to a picture.

I painted the armoire in glossy Nursery Pink by Cath Kidston and for the inside I used water based eggshell in All White by Farrow & Ball.

I painted the table, I use as a desk, in glossy Nursery Blue and I used Dotty oilcloth by CK for the top. Don't be fooled by the colors on her website because this oilcloth is really, really white and not off white as shown on her site. Most of the fabrics on her site show quite yellowy, I recommend to get a free swatch before you order fabric. The swatches are also a lot of fun because they are quite big and if you save up a bunch you can make a really pretty patchwork quilt - but don't tell her!

And as a final touch, I lined the shelves in the armoire with the leftovers of the oilcloth.

Boy I had some good old fashioned fun. I love projects like this but I'm getting through them. This house is almost completely done and it may sound weird, because they say you're never done, but it's really true. I can't add anything or I should drastically change everything but I'm really happy with the results so I think I need to move!

Red fling cabinet
Pink chair
Blue Tubtrug
Turquoise planner
Dress and Bags

When we bought this house in 2003 there was no kitchen, well there was a dodgy counter with a sink in it and some hot water tank hanging above it and some stoves were left and a very smelly fridge, but nothing quite Yvestown-esque (ha ha, I read this over here and I love it, thanks so much for turning me into something esque)

This is the sight of the kitchen when we took all the mess out and after the stucco people left - man alive do they make a mess!

With a very tight budget we found this kitchen on eBay for no money and remodeled it and painted it white to fit our kitchen.

Now a couple of years later we decided that we are grownup enough to spend grownup money on a ridiculously expensive fridge. You should know that I have different prices for everything when I tell my mother how much I spent on stuff. It's always 50% off and I always bought it on sale. But I really couldn't cheat with the baby blue Smeg we bought. You should've heard the howl she made after I told her the price when she asked me if it was ok to give a donation towards the fridge for the Bo's birthday.

Before the Smeg could enter our kitchen we had to make some changes.

I decided that we needed new counters, the old (build-in) fridge needed to go and I had to do some new shelving arrangements.

The bookshelves were a later addition so I wanted to level the work tops and replace them with oak.

Here's the result. New Ikea (abstrakt) counters, a leveled work top and less shelves.

Oh and of course room for the baby bleu Smeg!

***

As I get so many email asking me where I bought this and that, I've decided to include as much info on the bottom of each post as from today. I can't impossibly write down everything and link to everything so you'll have to email me only if you really, really must!!

I bought the Yummy letters over here, the wallpaper and red clock are by Cath Kidston, the sink, work top and counters by Ikea and the china is Greydawn by Johnson Brothers.

We finally found a replacement for the HORRIBLE IKEA LAMP. The Norm 03 by Normann Copenhagen won me over after the Bo convinced me he would put the lamp together (it's a bit of a job) I went for it and I love it. I do miss my HORRIBLE IKEA LAMP just because of the whole conversation it brought with it. The constant bickering in the house about a lamp is actually quite funny to me and all the hilarious comments left on that one post cracked me up. It's so interesting how we can look at one piece of furniture so differently.

As I never really showed all the corners of the bedroom before, it's always a little corner or the view from the bedroom door, I decided to make a little bedroom photo set over at Flickr for you to have a peek.

Over the weekend Holly from the lovely Decor8 blog wrote a little post about me. I'm super flattered to be mentioned on such an inspiring blog like Decor8. Thanks Holly and thanks to all the people who left sweet comments on my Flickr pages and who sent me email. I can't believe how friendly people are. Thank you!!

One of the comments left on Decor 8 about my HORRIBLE IKEA LAMP cracked me up. I can assure, and maybe comfort you Melyna, my husbands finds it a HORRIBLE lamp too. Each time he walks in he's moaning about it. The other day a fly got caught in it and it made a terrible noise and he lost it. "That lamp is so ugly Yvonne, why on earth do we need to have this lamp? Oh God that fly is pooping all over it".

Well, I like the lamp. I like to throw some new stuff in the mix and this lamp so clashes with the rest of the room that in a sort of way it makes it a bit humorous.

My dream lamp for the bedroom is this one by Habitat. But since we don't have Habitats in The Netherlands anymore and because they're sold out in Belgium and because I keep forgetting to pick one up when I'm in the UK, I'll do with the HORRIBLE IKEA LAMP!!

The rose prints are Redouté replicas and the cat is mine!!

a little magazine sneak peak photo

Today Roselle from Ariadne at Home magazine came over to my house to interview me for the photo shoot they're going to publish.

My mother used to buy the Ariadne when I was a little girl. Back then it was a creative do it yourself magazine with lots of patterns in it and not so much about interiors. I remember fantasizing of having my own home and decorating it and to be in a magazine one day .... eeeeeee I'm going to be in the Ariadne. It's still very surreal.

I've been talking about myself, my house, my Bo and my Boo for 3 hours in which I almost chocked because I apparently can't talk, drink tea and have a cream cake at the same time. It's weird to be talking about myself for such a long time without being cocky. I think there's no one interested in me talking about myself for so long. If someone would do that to me I'd ask them to shut up. So I've decided that I like interviews.

Roselle asked about the reason I blog, she asked if it's a sort of exhibitionism. It's not in my case. To me it's sharing and trying to inspire other people to decorate their homes and make everything pretty. I also like blogging because I can't bottle all these creative things up inside me so in another way this blog is my creative depot.

I'm super excited about this and I'm probably going to cry when I hold a copy in my hand because, well I cry at Flintstone episodes. For those who can get a copy of Ariadne at Home, it's going to be published in August and for those who can't get a copy, I'll make sure to add some scans to my site.

Ooooooh and look out for the Ariadne at Home Kids Special. It's coming out in just two days!! Meeting Pippi Longstockings in Sweden? That would be a dream come true.

One resolution I made for 2007 is not to be so easy anymore. Since I married Bo almost eight years ago I've become too easy. In easy I mean "oh sod it, Bo will do it when he gets home".

I've always been a hands on girl. My father passed away when I was only thirteen years old leaving three women behind and a boy with two left hands, we were forced to do everything ourselves. So by the age of nineteen I was quite the handy woman. Fixing VCR's, painting houses, trimming trees, driving tractors, sewing cushions, studying, working in a shop, cleaning two homes, participating in an amateur drama group and cleaning a whole Hall single handedly wasn't strange to me. I can't sit still very long and I'm really quickly bored. It's not that I'm not interested it's just that I want to get on with things but I've lost that a bit since I got married.

To get my old groove back I decided to start the year fresh with a new D.I.Y. project known as The Cupboard Under The Stairs a.k.a. my pantry. It needed a fresh coat of paint, some un cluttering and organizing.

This is what it looked like on Monday.

And this is what it looked like two days and a lot of pink paint in my hair later.

I did everything myself, even the drilling and the lightning fixture. I was pooped by Tuesday night but extremely satisfied.

Thanks for your sweet birthday wishes, I had a really good one.

The day before my birthday (Sinterklaas evening) the Bo and I went out for Sushi in our favorite city and afterwards to see The Queen. I can highly recommend this movie - but that's a whole different story. On my birthday the people that are building a whole new neighborhood around us decided to cut of our water. It's one of the privileges of being born and living in a country with tapped water, it's horrible to go a whole morning without it. The rest of the day we spent food and cake shopping and in the afternoon we had a soes (Dutch cream cake) feast with my neighbor Amanda and her son Jesse. At dinnertime my friend Mandy, Rob and my brother with his new girlfriend came over for food and drinks and more soesen! It was a good birthday :)

So on to another festive part of this season, decorating the house.

The tree is up. It's my first ever fake tree and I'm still working on liking it. I don't know yet if I can go without the scent of a real tree, without the wonky branches and the picking out ritual we have each year. Maybe I can go without that last one because it's terrible how we both fuss over a tree. There's still more to decorate - oh joy!!

That little aqua colored thing on the floor is the Boo's fish. She always puts it somewhere she likes. I often find it next to her food bowls, it's so cute!

I come from a family of large age differences. My father was 45 when I was born and my brother 13. We all grew up quite individually in a large home with each a private spacious room in where we would hermit and horde things to do. I never played downstairs in the living areas because to my mother these areas were for adults, I now agree with her. We shared lovely family dinners, outings and parties - my folks were really party people, I love viewing slides of my father and mother dancing in the dining room - but we never were really on track of each others social lives because by the time my sister had her first snog I was playing happily with Barbie or My Little Pony. It was fascinating though as a child to have older siblings and mixing up with an adult crowd.

I've kept living in large spacious houses in deserted places all over the world for the rest of my life and I've been living quite happily in the middle of nowhere. I am a social person but I love to walk away from it whenever I want to. I've never been a group girl either and I don't really work well in a team. I do like to joke around and have fun outside work hours but when I'm working I'm doing my job and I don't want to be bothered with social ramblings. I've also never been a part of a group of friends. I rather have few friends I can individually do things with, like when I was a child. I'm a loner and proud of it!!

So when the Bo and I decided to leave our country home three years ago to set house in the middle of a town because the Bo was getting a bit panicked to leave me alone when he went on business trips (there were no neighbors left, right, back and front just 270 pigs and a whole bunch of piglets) friends and family were quite concerned.

This is our house. We're in the middle with the green door and the geraniums. It's a barn conversion form 1890-someting and divided in three homes in 1924. I left out the house of my right neighbors because they're remodeling the outside and it looks like terror. We work well with the neighbors according the outside of the building. It was my idea to get matching awnings and to paint the whole lot in the same color. I only couldn't get my head round on the dark navy doors. It looks like a black hole in middle of all the whites. So our door is light green just as it is in the back.

The first two and a half years were great because I was busy renovating, decorating, shopping, painting, planning, cooking, cleaning and running after everyone telling them what to do. I didn't have time to actually observe my new surroundings and to adjust to town life.

I really dislike the word "Do" in a sentence like "Let's do lunch" or "I don't do kids". But I just couldn't find a better title to start this post as "I don't do neighbors", I really, really don't. I thought I could but I'm really crap at it.

The house is old so I hear everything and I hate it. I dislike the sound of crying babies, people hammering (god forbid we did a lot of hammering in our days of hammering) and I hate tap noises. Running tap noises are the most horrible noises on this planet. I don't want to know when my neighbors are doing the washing up or when they shower. It annoys me that whenever I don't hear taps for a while I get concerned that they don't shower enough and that I have smelly, stinking neighbors. I also get annoyed by cars. Our little stoop makes a great parking place, the stoops left and right apparently don't work. Isn't a rule that whenever you visit someone you park on their stoops not on their neighbor's stoop?

Although we have baby and tap noises and a parking lot (I should charge for) we have friendly neighbors and it's not their fault that they are our neighbors.

I'm really happy in this cute little house but I wish I could pick my middle up and place it somewhere remote - like Alaska for example.

There are tons of reasons why I love the Bo but one of them is the insanity we share for things we love we want no matter the consequences. After a speedy shop round through Amsterdam yesterday we stumbled upon this fridge. We're now going to redesign our whole kitchen to make that fridge fit. Don't tell my mum because she'll start picking her hair. She really dislikes our ever changing moods and she gets worried when we bring home yet another chair, that's not going to fit. It's the thing we do. Some people without kids have a lot of pets, we have a lot of furniture. When I'm old kids will probably call me "the crazy chair lady".

I picked up this plate rack at the Kitsch Kitchen flag store and while at it I took some pictures of the store for those few fans I know who can't go there.

I didn't dare taking pictures downstairs because of my weird picture taking phobia.

This is the new rack in my kitchen.

Just to let you know. We're not going to change this side of the kitchen. We are only going to put new doors up to match the new doors on the other side but that's it.

ps.: isn't it really cool how that fridge is the same color as my china?

There are a bunch of reasons I've been so quiet. One is the weather ... it's stinking hot over here (I so get this phrase now because everything really does stink, including some people today in the supermarket). The other reason is that I've been working on my boot room.

The main plan was to move all my gear to the attic and turn it in to a sewing room. But after some Bo inspections and dodgy floor constructions and the chance that the perfectly plastered ceilings could come down, we reconsidered and moved my gear to the boot room instead. It's a great little room we only used for laundry and some of the tools we both use. It now is a utility room and not so much a boot room anymore.

This is what the room looked like when we bought the house, actually this is what all the rooms looked like when we bought the house.

We than decided to renovate and paint everything white so we could decided later what to do with the rooms. Honestly I'm one of those people who needs to sit in a room, for as long it takes, to know what to do with it. Boy I love that stable window! It was actually so tatty that we spent a month recovering it.

This is what it looks like now. And there's that plastic rug I've been talking about (still need to find an online retailer for that one K). And look at those fantastic Chinese gauze lanterns I bought via Kathleen at Anahata.

This is from the other side. I couldn't get a good shot of the washing area and the stable window because there's too much light coming through the window because it's so stinking hot!!

I still need to do some finishing touches but I'm really pleased with my little utility room. Of course the attic is still going to get it's make-over, we're going to make it a guestroom. We never really have that much guests but having the spare bed in the studio isn't so much fun either. So the studio is going to get a nice lounging corner too. Oh my .... all the possibilities. It's going to be a winter of many home improvements. Ah ... the thought of winter!!!

***

And some other stuff I'd like to write about. Leslie started a fun new Flickr Group: in my life. Please go over there and join if you like. And oh .. uhm, I've changed the layout AGAIN!! I can't stop myself.

After a very long and fun conversation with Kathleen last night we came to talk about my garden and the boot room and how the boot room is joined to the house. It's a bit complicated because pre WWII houses here in The Netherlands are always a bit of a mystery. For example we didn't have a full working bathroom when we moved in because the house wasn't designed for it. Apparently the previous previous previous previous owners used to bathe in the little house (we call boot room now) in a bucket. The previous previous owners made that little extension that joins the main house with the little house. That little house is a true gem because it's multifunctional. Behind that cute door, with the heart cut out, is a little attic where we store "things we do not want to look at and be seen with" aka Bo's stuff. Behind the large window is the laundry and behind the small window is a WC. The little annex is for washing hands and for being pretty.

The patio is still really boring but everything needs to grow and I still need to paint. But we've come a long way as this is what it looked like when we bought it two years ago.



It's home and it's different to most houses here and that's why we like.

See the whole set here

Last week I bought these Lack shelves at Ikea because I find them fantastic. You can't see the hanging construction and we almost have the same color walls as the shelf so you don't really see them hanging much at all. But, with having yet more shelving, the same problem returns ... what to put on them?????? I'm not really one for ornaments because I really dislike the dusting and because I can't find nice ornaments. But I do love vintage tin toys and I adore vintage Tonka trucks because they're so cool and come in really cool colors. So I started to gather bits and pieces I have tucked away around the house and was actually surprised with how much fun I think it is.



The vintage radio is a gift form my mother in law. She used to use it when she was my age. The little Adam Frank's Lumen cedar tree I found via Kathleen. I spelled out Boo Lief (means Boo Lovely) with some vintage alphabet blocks and found the old world bank in the attic. I bought the green Tonka truck on eBay and gave it a good wash (but it's still dirty) and I'm going to try to find another one for next to the radio on the top shelf. I'd love a red one!!

Click here for more pictures

I finally found the perfect fabric for the shower curtain I wanted to make for the bathroom*. I've made it from voile, it's the same print as is on the cushion but you can't hardly spot the difference between the voile and the cotton duck. It's great! I've stitched curtain tape on top of the voile and made buttonholes in it and hung a regular white shower curtain behind it. I'm really in love with it.

Do you see that little tail of the rubber duck in the picture? Well here they are, my new priced possession!!



I found them the other week and they crack me up. I don't dare to remove the plastic because I'm scared they go all funny and soggy.



I also love my fake geranium. I've tried to keep plants in here but the bathroom is just too dark so I gave up and bought this fake plant. I don't have to water it, don't have to speak to it, I only need to dust it so now and then.

* interesting fact, Dutch houses only have one bathroom and one downstairs toilet.

One of the reasons why I love to be married to my Bo is that he can make all things I have in my mind. For example this cabinet. A quick napkin drawing was just enough - I Love it!!

After a couple coats of paint (I hate painting MDF) and all the dramatic shelving problems involved, it turned out super cute.



This cabinet was actually easier to decorate as the open shelving I did on the other side of the kitchen. We use this cabinet for tea and coffee and because tea and coffee products always come in nice boxes (if you don't mind to spend a bit) it's easier to make everything look good. For example the Celestial Seasonings teas come in lovely, artsy boxes. I also bought some Chinese tea tins when I was last in New York to add some color. I'm absolutely in love with the cabbage bowls I found on eBay and that tea cozy. I also still love my pink Bodum jelly kettle, unfortunately they don't sell them anymore.



A bowl of lemons and limes are a cheap way to add some color and something living to a room. They are also really good for your health and tasty in teas. I found the book steps in the garbage and took it home and now is functional for picking stuff from the top shelf.



***

Something completely different. I have such bad hey fevers this year that I can't go outside at all. I've tried everything but nothing works. I went to the doctor and he put me on Zyrtec but that doesn't work either. My mother read somewhere that you should drink the juice of an union and mix it with sugar and put half a union next to year bed ... didn't work either ... made a hell of a smell in my bedroom though. Any tips, any tips at all to help me out of this misery would be fantastic!!

Just want to share the origin of the famous "Fresh Eggs sign". I received some emails asking me about it after I published it on Flickr. I bought it on eBay a little while ago. I just went there again and I'm all over in love with all the signs this seller is making. I think I want something with cupcakes next.

Visit the shop: Wiscombeart

I love open shelving but it's hard to create a display of items that don't look yet too organized. When I made my kitchen design, before the renovations, I was determined to have open shelving everywhere. I now have but I've been struggling with it for the past year. I didn't have the right china, I needed pots to store things in, I needed ... just things to make it right.



So I started my hunt on eBay for pastel blue china and I found Greydawn by Johnson Brothers. I mixed it with some old and new Laura Ashley stuff, some Cath Kidston stuff (OF COURSE it's getting pathetic) and the odd Ikea items.



I'm pretty pleased with the result and I promised myself not to change it. The best thing is that we use all this stuff daily so it's not just a display of pretty things it's actually useful too!

After all the shelving in the kitchen is done I'm going to start on the pantry. I want to make it pink or green, I don't know!!

Thanks to the lovely Jane from Posy for sending me a Cath Kidston spring/summer 2006 catalog. I love everything in this catalog and I love the new layout. I hope one day Ms. Kidston is going to reward me for all the free advertisement I'm giving her.

***

Oh and Reese ... she did it!! I'm in love with that movie. I went to see it with the Bo and I even, one day, hopped on a bus and went to see it myself again in the middle of everything I was doing. I had to drop it and go see it!! Beautiful performances by both Reese and Joaquin - what a shame he didn't get one.

Recently I made these top pillow shams for our bedroom. It started with an old white sheet I wanted to throw out but then I found that lace frilly hemming material while cleaning out some sewing drawers and made the shams. But white shams are just so boring. So I picked up my iron and the stitch-it kit by Jenny Heart, placed an extra heart and a flower in the center. And ta da ... brand new shams!!



I picked the same color of green in the CK shams for my bedroom closet, painted the French chairs pink, upholstered them with the same CK fabric and ta da... everything is matching!!

I love things matching. This bedroom matches beautifully with the green guestroom. I painted the walls the same color as the closet.

***

These are two interior blogs I found recently:

• Posy
• Posidriv

The natural light here is terrible. It's dark and gloomy and it feels more like autumn instead of winter. I need some snow and sun!!!

Thus my attempt of taking a whimsical photo of my new green guestroom/study failed miserably. With some Photoshop tweaking it turned out ok-ish but you can't really see how the green becomes delicious when the sun shimmers in this room - oh I love this room!!

I found the French bed on a Dutch auction/car boot sale site and picked it up last Sunday. My neighbor, who caught us caring the bed inside, insured us that it could do with a new coat of paint - arrrrgh!!!

Neighbor: *puts on a broad Amsterdam accent*
"doesn't it need a new coat of paint?"

Me: *puts on a Southern Dutch accent*
"don't you need to shut your mouth?"

I would have love to say that!!!

I indulged a little while ago in the Cath Kidston eiderdown. I was looking for a real vintage one but they are always so tatty and I prefer my bedding to be clean and fresh. Speaking of Cath, don't you think her sale goes on a bit too long? I'm waiting in anticipation for her new spring line. I've been keeping my wallet shut just in case. I've made the hot water bottle cozy myself some time ago, from a Gap sweater.

Bo thinks the room looks like a child's bedroom - well it does a bit but so does our whole house. For Pete's sake we have sailboats wallpaper in our loo!!

***

Oh and Dooce is in The Netherlands and this post cracked me up. The weather IS crazy here!!!

Marné and I had a late Christmas swap because we were both so busy last month. I always LOVE swapping with Marné because she always knows exactly what I want without knowing it. I was having the Lightning Bugs fabric and the carving blocks on my wish list - do you spot the letter Y? And look at that mini knitted jumper :o)

Last October in New York I bought a big fabric pink letter B at Anthropologie for the Bo. The girls made fun of me because I bought my husband a big fabric pink letter B. one doesn't always have to buy something ugly looking just because it's for a man. Some men do like big fabric pink letters B or T or S. Ha ha - it's on his nightstand now and it looks really sweet.



The cool thing about the metal letter Y Marné sent me is that I now have my own "masculine" letter on my nightstand. Yay!!



Thank you Marné it was a fun swap!!

***

I'm also really excited about Leslie's Gifty. It's been such a long time and I always really enjoyed it. I hope I'm on the list!! And Whip up, I can't wait to see that site in action.

For a long time now I've been in love with Lucinda Chambers Jubilee wall hanging, I'd actually love to own it but the Bo finds it appalling. Recently, browsing a back issue of Homes & Gardens, I saw the wall hanging in cushion size and immediately thought of a fair solution ... not a big, enormous, appalling wall hanging but a nice small cushion for on the living room sofa instead. So when we were in London last December we went out to The Rug Company on Holland Park Avenue to score me a Jubilee cushion. But ... it was closed!! So I went browsing the internet. I didn't find a shop where I actually could buy the cushion but I found a lot of other good stuff.

First I found the website The Brocante Home and I love it!! Look at this entry - seems I'm not the only one with the Jubilee obsession ;o) Earlier I came across this cushion over at Laura Ashley and it made me think just to create my own. And, while browsing The Brocante Home again, I came across this entry and it reminded me of New York, last October, when we were in The Cath Kidston shop ... that same flag hangs in the shop!!



So yesterday I started to make my own Union Jack cushion, but along the way I realized that I didn't like it. "It's too loud!! Maybe I should just make a cross instead". To cut a long story short, I've made a Welsh flag instead LOL! And I really dislike it. So today I made something a little less bold and I like it.

In spite of all this, I now want that wall hanging and the cushion to match!!