Wednesday, August 7, 2013

Oh The Pressure!


MOTH reckons old age & a nagging wife have slowed down the completion of the upstairs home office to an elderly crawl. That combined with the fact that I ripped down the rubbish window coverings & tore up the carpet last year & binned them, has left the ambient temperature in the room during a bitterly cold Hills winter at about -5C. And with no heating whatsoever, we could have stored a dozen bodies in there in tip top condition for days!

However after a 'pleasant' domestic discussion recently, he's back up there trying to make some progress. It's a strange room & we've spent many an hour pondering over it's provenance. With a big separate side entrance leading outside & a sturdy lock on the outside of the door into the upstairs corridor of bedrooms, like a lot of other odd things here, it's had us scratching our heads. All we can conclude is that the original owner/builder back in 1972 was one of Stirling's GP's & due to the large size of the room, we think he may have used it to consult from.

The large bank of original bookshelves span an entire wall & that's where the present trouble is centred. Prior to the reno, all our files & work stuff were shoved willy-nilly into it. A disaster of odd 3 ring binders, old manilla folders, boxes of discarded computer cables etc - it was a real mess. All our books were in a big old bookcase on the opposite wall.
 
In a fit of pique I had a melt-down & decided massive rationalization was needed. 7 boxes of books went down to the Stirling Charity Book Hut & the bookcase has gone on Gumtree. I took the pic above as I was about to start sanding the wood back after MOTH had painted the back walls the standard Solver Parchment. I can't show images of the rest of the room 'cos it's a mess of ladders, paint cans, discarded power tools & general reno junk.

They've had a million coats of Zinsser to stop the old stain bleeding through, MOTH's over it. Zinsser's Sales Manager must be busting to put up his Power Point presentation at their next Sales Meeting showing 609% growth for Q2!
 

A before shot looking towards the big window at the other end of the room.
 
Staring at them, with just some touching up to be done on the wall, I had a horrible thought. As this is supposed to be a blog about our reno & may be viewed by at least 3 people & their dogs, I'd better lift my game. So I turned to that fountain of all things 'housie' Pinterest & did a search for 'Bookcase Styling'. I got the shock of my life - 56,791 pins loaded!  
 
It appears I will need to colour code everything, pull in unique pieces of objet d'art, channel Nate, Bunny, Suzanne et al & then arrange everything just so. All indication of our current Tax receipts, Super & Insurance stuff & general detritus of everyday business life must be hidden in something called a Kikki-K box. Above all it must look like I just casually tossed it all together in about 30 minutes. Oh, & then when that's all done, I need to upload it to my Pinterest boards & wait anxiously to see how many repins it gets. Geez life in 2013 is complicated!! 
 
Photobucket
 

11 comments:

  1. It's looking good. A label maker is a good tool to have for this job, but you probably have beautiful handwriting and don't have to use a decoder ring to read what you wrote, like myself. Good luck with that. Love, Heidi

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  3. I almost never comment on blogs, but today I must. I love your sense of humor! You make me smile and sometimes you make me laugh - you make me laugh very hard, and that's not always a good thing for a 50 yr. old woman who has had 4 children and now has bladder issues! I look forward to all your posts :)
    Sincerely,
    Gwendolyn

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  4. Gwendolyn, thanks for coming out from behind the veil & commenting - I really appreciate it! You reminded me to get cracking with those 'exercises' I should be doing in the car when stopped at traffic lights.
    M xx

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  5. Looking good Millie. Put a rocket under MOTH and tell him Neale Whittaker is coming to take photos in three weeks. We can't wait to see the Millie and Moth way of styling. It will probably start a new trend or else bring every normal person out of the closet as that's how they style!

    Jennifer xx

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  6. Ah, now the pinning begins to make sense! Which is not to imply that there are times when you don't make sense, because you really, really do Millie. Really. I colour coded my books once but a friend used to come around and move books around while I wasn't looking. It amused him no end. Me too really, but I wasn't going to fess up to that. And I reckon your bookcases look great.

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  7. So funny Millie! I think we buoyed the Zinzer share price for a couple of years when we started painting.

    I will be pinning your bookcase for sure when it's finished!

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  8. It's already looking great with the white paint on it.. and I must say, I think you're really lucky that you have such well made bookcases in a room, and so many of them too!
    I've made a few trips down to the stirling book hut with things from Dad's... we're a family of book hoarders I'm afraid. I did have a laugh at your assessment of styling bookcases in modern life. I have to say, that I like to style bookcases with..... books!! Novel (no pun intended) I know! Bookcases have been overtaken by the vignette bug a bit I think. xx

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  9. Hi Millie
    Lovely to see your blogging again. I don't care what you write about I always enjoy your blog. How's life? Are you like me working way too much and trying to get all the domestic bliss accomplished as well? I've always loved design blogs. I don't know if it's overload but I'm sick of seeing over styled and unrealistic homes (well unrealistic for the way we live)
    Kind Regards
    Karen

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  10. Sweet progress!!!

    Keep Moth working and the ideas flying.

    Looking forward to your finished pin.

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  11. Hi Millie,

    Oh yes, we are looking forward to spring days - mind you it has been an unusually warm winter here, this year and very little rainfall for the month of July, according to the weather man.
    Looks like you have been busy with all the standard solver parchment paint and know how happy you will be to get your office finished - much luck!
    Enjoy the weekend
    hugs
    Carolyn

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And none will hear the postman's knock
Without a quickening of the heart.
For who can bear to feel himself forgotten?
~W.H. Auden

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