allioak's Profile

I love, love, love having an alarm system. I live in a kind of marginal neighborhood and basically everyone on my block has been broken into at one point or another. When my house got broken into, the (deafeningly loud) alarm must have scared the theives off -- not a single thing was taken. None of my other neighbors have been so lucky.

Also, it gives me huge piece of mind when I'm traveling. If anything happens, I get a call. I know there's no risk that the house has been broken into and remained opened.

I think the initial cost was about $150 (get the sales person at the end of the month, when they're trying to make their sales goals, and you'll have better bargaining power). It's been about $40/month after that. Worth every penny for me.

Thanks @Phred and @sunsoaked!

Can I echo the request for some paint colors? Specifically, the master bedroom?

Thank you! Your house is gorgeous...love the color palette.

Want to live here. Love the color palette and the natural light...

Those steelcase cabinets are super rad!

ah...jealous...and inspired! thanks for sharing!

It's not MCM! Yay!

So many design inspirations here! I was particularly struck by how you created the sense of a fireplace from a grouping of candles. Don't think I've seen that before. Maybe that's how I'll get the fireplace I dream of! Thank you!

My house is dark, small and way too easy for anyone walking by to look in, so window film was the perfect solution. It takes up no space inside the house, lets light in, yet provides really good privacy. So, I'm rocking a somewhat excessive amount of window film. A couple notes from my experience:

I have the Orba in my bedroom and I'm just not that happy with it. Even though it's sooo expensive for what it is, the pattern printed on the screen wasn't crisp. It almost looks like the "printer" that creates the pattern was streaking a little? Reminds me of the output of my injet printer when it needs a head cleaning. Anyways, I was in a bit of a bind to get it up, so I am just living with it.

On some other windows I have some window film from Scandinavian Designs. I love it. It was easier to put up, cheaper, and the pattern looks great. Check them out here:
http://www.scandinaviandesigncenter.com/Products/usd0/Home_Accessories/Window Screen Films

The major downside to both the films (particularly the Scandinavian Designs film) is that they are small! Measure your windows and desired coverage area before ordering. It would be freakin' difficult to stitch together two pieces of film on one window (like you might want to do if your window is big) because the patterns at the edges are near impossible to match up. I tried that and gave up.

I just redid my bathroom and I seriously picked out the exact same things for myself. Funny. Anyway...I want to take this moment to publicly praise Steele. They are amazing! I called them up and told them I wanted a basket on casters that was as large as possible, but no more than 17" high. They're totally mom-and-pop operation and the guy I spoke with on the phone offered to run out to the warehouse for me and measure their baskets. They were all too tall, so he ordered me a customized basket (it had a different caster set up). It was the exact same price as the standard options. In general, there stuff is a tad pricey, but it is BOMBER (he asked me if I was planning on putting more than 400 lbs of stuff in the basket before he ordered the smaller casters...um...just towels, thanks). Highly, highly recommend Steele!