essesq's Profile

I like the before. This piece looks like a Paul McCobb piece. I have a Paul McCobb desk that I purchased a few years ago that is identical to the one I had as a kid that my parents got rid of! Of course it looks nice now, but the maple has a beautiful glow that I'm sorry you did not restore.

It's a lovely homage to your mom. And by the way, did you grow up with me? Are you the missing sister I always wanted? I'm an only child. I have the same laundry folding problems! One of the ways that I honor my mother--gone almost 20 years--is making all the traditional family meals that she made--Rosh Hashonah, Thanksgiving, Chanukah, Passover. She did those meals and I do them, too, to honor her.

I live in a 1920s house with lots of detail--wainscotting in living room and dining room, lots of crown molding, etc. All of this had been painted many years ago and we didn't strip it when we moved into the house. Everything had been painted "coffee light" and "coffee dark." We painted all of the details white. My spouse would have liked to have painted the walls white, too. He'd always lived in a loft and that was the most comfortable for him. We ended up painting the walls colors. The living room, dining room, and breakfast room, which can all been seen as a whole, are painted three shades of increasingly deep yellow. The bedrooms and hallway are painted a Benjamin Moore color called "cement grey" and two other bedrooms are painted Benjamin Moore "clay beige." All trim in the house is white. I think it looks terrific. If everything is white none of the beautiful architectural detail shows up.

How about buying an Ikea MALM bed and upholstering the headboard? Couldn't be easier.