Delicious Wallpaper

When we had four children still at home, you'd think it would be harder to keep the house tidy and clean. But you'd think wrong... The first time I had an event at my house when they'd all moved out, I was mentally scrambling, wondering who was going to help me get this mess sorted. The empty nest is a whole challenge on its own, but when your helpers disappear, a new paradigm forms. The idea of actually keeping up with things as I go becomes important. I tend to operate on a floating mentality, where I bounce from one thing to the other until an event or shower or the pressing issue of company arriving causes me to focus and get everything done at the last minute. There's sweat, heart palpitations, stress, some yelling, and then anger at myself for not paying attention to these things on the daily. I just had another birthday, and it's pretty late to be figuring it out. But I need to, if we're going to keep doing important stuff and making our home a haven for friends, family and wayward souls. Wayward is a pretty good definition for my homemaking skills. I love all the beautiful things, but they indeed need dusting. I don't think minimalism is going to catch on over here any time soon. They say that Maximalism is back, and if so, I'm a rock star...

We recently had several events at our home -- there's Easter (my absolute favorite) with the family, then 30+ women over for popcorn and a movie (ladies' night for the church folks), and then our shepherding group (Ken's a deacon) which turned out over 40 people for soup night last Friday. We spread them all over the house and I'm still marveling at the lack of "mess." Everybody did their part and cleaned up, thank heaven. As Ken and I plopped into our recliners when the night was over, he said, "no more socializing for awhile, okay?" We should have left for Tijuana or something, but the Sunday nap was pretty epic. 

I typically use these "events" to put pressure on myself concerning something that needs doing in the house. Ken works on the yard while I paint something or finish a project. This time, after Easter, I decided to finish the kitchen. It has been evolving for a couple of years. The cabinets are amazing; the former owner did us good with that, but the floors were ick. I bought tile and now they are in a herringbone brick pattern with a creamy colored brick tile. The countertops were next... I searched and searched and of course landed on the most expensive one, Taj Mahal, a pinky-creamy quartzite that I plan on staring at forever. Then we had to re-do the backsplash (If You Give A Mouse A Cookie...), so that became a Victorian pattern in a creamy white on white. It is an east-facing room, with morning light. I didn't understand what that means, decoratively, until after I had painted the thing four times. Mind you, we've only lived here 14 years. An east-facing room needs warmth. It always felt cold, each time I painted. This last, fifth, time, I just painted the top part "Sherwin Williams Antique White" and the beadboard trim was "SW Alabaster." That was really just a holding pattern until I figured out a color. This white stuff just ain't for Yaya, I have to say. 

Elizabeth, my daughter, showed me a lovely picture of a wallpaper in a kitchen similar to mine. I swore off wallpaper a few years ago, because I'd put miles of it up and then removed hundreds of miles of it over the decades. Never, I said. Once again, however, I began gathering samples from every website known to mankind. I found a yummy one with flowers galore, but still wrestled with the fact that it looked strikingly familiar to my last kitchen -- a literal bouquet of bodacious cabbage roses that took over my 90s house (my sister still has the leftovers plastered in the foyer of her house!) Never let it be said that I repeated anything in my life. I must pivot on every project. I spent a ridiculous amount of money amassing said samples and finally, finally settled on the perfect one. It was a funky,  different pattern with an Old World feel. It reminded me of a cover of a book that I read and kept in my bathroom basket for a long time, just because I loved the art (The Lost City of Z, by David Grann). There were monkeys, cheetahs, snakes, a jungle, an emu-looking creature and lots of flowers. I ordered a kit to help with peel-and-stick paper application and started dreaming but ended up calling Anatolli, a gifted Ukrainian dude who spoke very little English but did magic on those kitchen walls. I go in there every day and put my hands and face on that paper and thank God for the perfection of it and that I didn't have to do it myself. Of course, the beadboard required a new color. Next week's project is to glaze it with a rich, dark espresso color. I don't eat cookies, but I'm all about the next thing. Thankfully, yummy is not just about food...