The View Through.......

I used to hate the view when I opened our front door. Now I love it. It used to include our very horrid kitchen and dull magnolia walls in the hall. Now I'm greeted by our vibrant yellow hall walls and the view through to our lovely new kitchen. I look up the stairs and see our photo gallery that is taking shape(sorry, I've cropped all but the very edge of that off the picture) and the jolly blue gingham curtains I've just completed. I've even grown quite fond of the twirly 1960s banister now. Somehow it sort of works in this house and with the yellow walls. 

I had a dream of living in a home decorated in shades of elegant neutrals but I've really realised with this house that you have to listen to the building. It was painted all over in neutral cream when we moved in and after living with it for a year we realised that it just didn't work that well. It's a 1960s house with no interesting architectural details and  huge windows that let in a lot of light. It was crying out for some colour. When we first started rolling on this yellow I did have a moment of mild panic. It looked unbelievably bright. But now it is finished and we have pictures and curtains up it just makes me so happy. 

You'll see from the above photo that there is some neutral going on. We've painted the living room in a Dulux shade called white chiffon but we do have a feature wall in the dining end of the room that is a deep cherry red. Despite the fact that the walls are painted in there, it's still a work in progress so I won't give you a look at that just yet. You'll see that the skirting boards are still the hideous orange wood we inherited and we're living with the horrid blue curtains that the previous owner left behind. The woodwork will get done in bits I suspect(unless S has a fit of energy during half term!) and we don't have the budget for curtains for now unless I can find some super bargain fabric or cheap but lovely ready made curtains on line. 

I'm very happy with my little kitchen now. I love to spend time in here cooking and baking. We decided to go for colour in here too as the units are neutral. I initially picked out a blue that was almost the exact colour of my cornishware collection but then decided it was too deep and was going to make the room too dark. This is perhaps the smallest window in the house and as the kitchen is north facing I didn't want it to feel dark or cold so we plumped for a paler shade of but still with the same tone as the Cornishware. I'm really happy with how it has turned out and I love the contrast of the red gingham blind against the blue. Are you getting the fact that I love gingham? I really do. I'd have it at every window if I could get away with it. In fact I'd quite like red and white in the living room but in a much bigger check. Something like a 2" square if I could get it. I haven't run this past lovely S yet though and somehow I'm thinking that he wouldn't be up for that idea. He's definitely getting better at accepted my taste but we've still had a number of 'discussions'. For example he thinks that our bedroom is too feminine and girly. It's really not. I'll share some pictures of that soon and you can let me know what you think. So I'm going to slowly work on the idea of the large gingham check in the living room.

Back to the kitchen. Here's the view from the door. Well at least some of it anyway. The view to the right was looking a lot less tidy but I was feeling impatient to write this post so you're just getting the tidy views for today! Can you spot our little 1960s serving hatch? It's still wearing the orange pine look as well so needs a coat of paint when we do the woodwork through on the other side. I hated this feature when we first looked around the house. 'How naff' I thought. But I have to say it is absolutely fab. I couldn't live without it. Because the kitchen is too small for a table we use the dining table through on the other side all the time. This hatch saves so much carrying. When preparing a meal I just put everything in the hatch then walk through hands free to collect it from the other side. And clearing the table at the end of the meal is a breeze. Just pop everything back through the hatch ready to be dealt with sooner or later.  Love it! It's also great for when little F is sitting in his high chair and I need to go through to the kitchen for something. I can still chat to him through the hatch while I'm preparing stuff. Great!

Well I hope you've enjoyed the little wander through my hall and kitchen today. See you later in the week. I'm hoping I might be able to do a baby blanket 'ta da' soon. 

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