Farewell, Cottage Living

Wednesday, December 10, 2008 at 8:13 pm (Cottage Industry)
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For many years, I’ve aspired to live in a cottage, which I talked about here. Yesterday, I was sad to hear that Cottage Living magazine is closing up shop — a victim of the economy. I’ve been a subscriber since the first issue appeared in my mailbox four years ago, a freebie because I subscribe to other so-called “shelter” magazines. And I’ve saved every issue — only missing a couple when my subscription got messed up during a move.

Over the years, I’ve lamented the sometimes light-on-content issues and the propensity to feature rooms done or redone by magazine staffers who obviously have the whole design resources of the magazine at their disposal. Country Home magazine has become my favorite for being consistently wonderful. But still, Cottage Living was something I looked forward to and couldn’t bring myself to give up, even as I dropped other subscriptions (e.g., Real Simple, though lovely, was expendable in the name of simplifying; Cooking Light fell by the wayside as it became too much Cooking with 27 Ingredients or Cooking Largely with Ingredients My Husband Won’t Eat). This time, the decision is made for me — and I assume I lose my unfilled subscription dollars too, which really doesn’t seem fair at all.

Coincidentally, I just got a card saying my nephew (via my sister) got me a subscription to Martha Stewart Living, so I’ll get my creative decorating (and inferiority) fix anyway. I subscribed for a year or so many years ago, and decided then it was just too darn intimidating. Now, I think, I’ll just appreciate it for its beauty. As for my cottage dreams…well, I’ll just have to nurture them the old-fashioned way — in my head.

I can envision a small cottage somewhere, with a lot
of writing paper, and a dog, and a fireplace, and
maybe enough money to give myself some Irish coffee
now and then and entertain my two friends.
                                            ~ Lt. Richard Van de Geer

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A saint for all seasons

Tuesday, December 9, 2008 at 12:02 pm (Cottage Industry)
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If you’re not Catholic, you might not realize that we have a saint for everything. As americancatholic.org explains:

Certain Catholic saints are associated with certain life situations. These patron saints intercede to God for us. We can take our special needs to them and know they will listen to our prayers, and pray to God with us.

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve cashed in on that ticket in my life…along with devotion to Mary, which, in my opinion, is the best thing about being Catholic (or being raised Catholic in my case, as I don’t practice anymore. Long story. But, if you are Catholic and remember your catechism, you know that every sacrament, from Baptism to First Communion to Confirmation to the other four leaves an indelible mark on your soul — a holy tattoo so to speak — so basically, you’re Catholic for life.) 

But I digress.

Since becoming a homeowner, and particularly over the last few years of living in fixer-upperhood, my saint of choice has become St. Joseph. (Not to mention having to sell 5 houses over the years. I never buried him in the yard, but I sure did pray a lot.) He was a carpenter, you know, so in my book, that means he was a supreme DIYer and, of course, an expert. So what if they didn’t have electricity or plumbing and he didn’t have anything to do with concrete or garage door installation or clik-lok floors. He’s my go-to guy when we’re doing any sort of home-improvement project that’s particularly difficult or frustrating or dangerous or tedious or just short of impossible — so, pretty much all of them.

This past weekend he heard from me a lot. For the past three years, I’ve been besieged by an ugly spot in the hardest possible place — on the upstairs hall ceiling above the stairs. jaggededgeOur hallway has layers of paint over wallpaper, and when I painted after we moved in, the tape I used to get a clean edge at the ceiling tore the wallpaper, leaving ugly brown underpaper exposed. I daubed some white paint on most areas to disguise them, but I just couldn’t reach that 2-foot scar over the stairway. Every day it taunted me, “You’re a loser. Martha wouldn’t tolerate me. Everyone sees me. I’m ugly. Ha. Ha. Ha.”  Kind of like the talking stain in the Tide-to-Go commercials.

Last year sometime (yeah, I know, it was on sale) we bought crown mold to completely cover the bad edge. Finally, this past weekend was “the one,” given that it was too cold to work outside on the porch. With the best of intentions, we cleared the space, assembled our ladders (one purchased months ago just for the occasion and still in its wrapping), and got to work.

Within 10 seconds, it got difficult.

Thinking it would make the job a breeze, we had bought those corner moldings that keep you from having to miter the corners — a nightmare task anytime but particularly in an old house where walls and corners are never true and square. Well, duh, if they’re not true and square, the corner blocks don’t fit right either. And Mike didn’t like them anyway, saying they were too Victorian and our other rooms with crown mold didn’t have them.

That left us (by us I mean Mike) with a lot of complex figuring and endless trial and error to cut those damn corners. As he perched on a ladder on the landing holding an 8-ft piece of molding over his head, and I perched on a ladder along the side wall next to the stairs, holding a 12-ft piece of molding, I prayed a lot. Over and over.

As always, it worked (rather, Mike and St. Joseph made it work). They persevered, long after I abandoned the effort to put up Christmas decorations, and got that blasted molding installed, including some complicated piecing. And without the nice nailgun we had bought for the job as well (but have used for numerous other projects in the meantime) because even the longest nails it holds were just too short. All that remains is a bit more caulking, and then painting.

Of course, it looks beautiful. I’ll share a few photos when it’s all done. In the meantime, I have some pretty serious “Thank you dear St. Joseph”-ing to attend to. Always appropriate, but especially at this time of year.

Certain thoughts are prayers. There are moments when,
whatever be the attitude of the body, the soul is on its knees. 
                                                                       ~ Victor Hugo

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SRO

Tuesday, November 18, 2008 at 9:41 am (Cottage Industry, Smile Lines)
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I like having guests and try to make their visit as comfortable and enjoyable as I can. Being able to offer a comfy chair when we settle down in the living room is about as basic as it gets. But we have a lack of seating at the moment. The two “what were we thinking?” too big, too awkward swivel-rocker-recliners we bought three years ago after we got tired looking have gone to live with Mike’s parents. I couldn’t be happier. (Mom & Dad seem to like them, too, so I hope it was a successful adoption all around.) And frankly, our living room has never looked better with its new, more open feel (with exactly 2 mismatched chairs around our very cool but giant round antique claw-footed quarter-sawn oak dining-table-cut-down-to-coffee-table that we inherited from Mike’s parents).

Now if anyone comes over, we’ll be bringing in chairs from the dining room for happy hour (or standing over them like Jeeves). Yes, we have a couch, but it’s on the other side of our long, narrow living room in front of the TV, not on the “social” side of the room. And we have a neat handmade rustic bench in front of the fireplace in the middle of the room — easily moveable and fine for plopping down to warm your toes at the stove; not fine for 2 hours of extended conviviality.

So, we’ve started the hunt for a couple new chairs. Must be small-scale. Must be comfortable. Must blend with what we already have. And, must not cost the anywhere from $600 to $2000 we’ve been seeing. For A CHAIR! When did chairs become as expensive as entire sofas? (And don’t get me started on the cost of ottomans — fortunately we have no room for one.)

Oh, we’ve found perfect chairs that we love here and here. Both costing about $1700 apiece. “It’s an investment,” said each saleswoman, in the understatement of the century. Enclosing half our porch for our sunroom will not cost as much as two of these chairs. Although, given the state of our investments, these may be a better way to go.

Oh, and we’ve looked at the discount options — all of which appear either ready to fall apart in about 2 months or are not the small size we need. (As Americans get fatter, so does their seating apparently. Ginormous furniture is the rule these days.)

I’ve checked Craig’s List (nothing at the moment) and eBay — some possibilities, but the sight-unseen aspect is a little disconcerting. We bought such a chair last year, drove 2-1/2 hours each way to pick it up, only to find that, while it was nice, it was also a bit wobbly and should really be reglued. And we needed to recover the seat (not an easy process). And we didn’t win the matching rocker.

So for now, we just admire that side of the room and the newly open view out the French doors. And we have a handle on a couple possibilities our friends know of at the antique store they frequent. Fingers crossed.

Oh for the days when floor pillows were all the rage…or beanbags, beanbags would work. We’ll just start off the visit with a few stretches or some yoga. Downward-facing dog anyone?

We dare not trust our wit for making our house
pleasant to our friend, so we buy ice cream.
                              ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

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