Hindsight is 2020

It has been a while since I have posted and a lot has happened to everyone since then. By everyone, I mean EVERYONE. It feels like the whole world has been on pause. As my 18 year old stated, 2020 feels like it has lasted 200 years and 15 minutes at the same time. Work on the house has continued, but since the passing of my father-in-law, it has been a one man job falling mainly to Anthony who has done some impressive work. If you recall, one pet project of mine was the dining room. I had a very distinct but changing vision. He worked to bring my vision to life.

The dining room walls had to be stripped to the brick and reinsultated. This picture shows the previous paint and the old wooden floors. The crown molding in this room was almost non-existent. Not quite the look I had in mind.

Anthony and I went back and forth about the paint and color scheme for this room. He favored something a little bolder, and I was daydreaming of light greys and silvers. After some reflection and Pinterest surfing we came up with a color which is both bold and in the grey family...well sort of. We decided to go with a color called "Panther Black". Now before some of you begin to worry that this room will look like something out of a haunted house, let me assure you, we did a miraculous job. Anthony had to talk me into wainscoting which I am not really sure why I was against it in the first place. Anyway, he took this red room and created something completely wonderful and unexpected.

Anthony learned how to do the wainscoting thanks to our neighbor, Mr. Lynn Kemp and was able to put up the beautiful crown molding. Even though here it is not quite finished, the transformation is already astonishing.

The final product is one that is beyond what I could have ever imagined. The white wainscoting and crown molding keep the room from being too dark and dreary. We also replaced the chandelier with one that could be considered a family heirloom of mine. But that's a story for another time. The dining room table was bought in a thrift store in Ocala, Florida who procured it from a horse farm. I fell in love with the table and liked how solid and well made it was. Unfortunately this table will not stay in the dining room, but we simply had nowhere else to put it.

So as you can see, this dining room went from something tattered and torn to a beautiful mixture of dark and light. That's what this year had been. It has been an impossible year. But like this room, there are some beautiful things that will come out of it. The holes will be patched and mended and a new light will shine our way forward. We will be better than we were before.