Invisible Miriam's Profile

I also bought all the bamboo flooring for my house in Northern California -- their service was fantastic. I had a local carpenter install them for me and I love them. In fact, I'm really, really looking forward to coming home to California for a lovely six weeks this summer.

Meanwhile, in Tokyo I finished my kitchen/family room re-do. I'm very happy with the results, and instead of being somewhere we avoid, I'm finding that my kids come in and keep me company while I cook or take on baking projects themselves. I put up a few "after photos" in my Tokyo apartment Flickr set, starting here. My housekeeper also loves the new setup, and she feels like this is her space when she's working.

Renee, that's very funny about your SO being frustrated with the changes. I tend to get that way too when things are in progress and I don't have a good road map to the end. I told my kids about this spring cure, but they were all, "Whatever, it's one of mom's nutty internet things."

I ran into a week's delay on my project due to some difficulties with Japanese translation, but I'm back on track and ready to start thinking about art in my family room. Right now I have on one wall a grouping of artwork made by my kids, and on the other wall some photos of them. It's a mishmash, really. I'm thinking of putting up some photographs of California ranching life (a group of three) on one wall, but I'll have to think about what would go with that on the other side. In fact, maybe that would be a good theme to soften up the very minimalist lines of the MUJI furniture.

I'm also thinking about this space really being the nerve center of our family's business - cooking, laundry, bills, garbage (yes, managing your garbage, or gomi, is very big here in Japan), homework, etc.

How is everyone else doing? Are you tackling art yet?

This weekend I'm trying to figure out a floor plan for my kitchen and looking at possible options for adding more counter space that can double as eating space. My kitchen is a very long, narrow room with patio doors at one end, and it's a challenge to figure out how to keep things flowing, especially since these are the patio doors we use the most frequently. So I'm trying to refrain from going shopping immediately and actually sit down and plan first.