Family Photos

We recently had some family photos taken of the three of us as a fundraiser for a local Kinder. I thought they would make easy awesome christmas presents for grandparents etc, so I paid the hefty price for the package. I had a promo coupon from Huggies for a 30x30 photo canvas from Snapfish, and thought "what the heck, might as well treat ourselves".

So we ended up with this photo above our TV. Being the awesome bargain hunter I am *scoff* I was patiently waiting for a sale on Snapfish, Big W or any other random photo site. The gods delivered and Snapfish had a half price canvas sale, so I ordered the other two poses.

I do love that picture of Eliza!

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Chair

Freedom, though it isn't listed on their website

Many moons ago, when I was waddling like a duck (ie pregnant) I spotted a chair. The snuggliest of chairs you ever have seen. And because I was pregnant and waddling like a duck, I sat in it. Oh my lucky stars, it was like sitting in a cloud.

Unfortunately the husband baulked at its price tag and pointed out that we don't have space for said chair.

Humph!

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Cushions

I would love a couch that could take cushions, but they don't really work with our current lounge. I am however trying to work out how I could make this cushion work in our house somewhere.

I am thinking maybe in the office on the bench seat.
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Spikey Ouch

Whilst out and about recently I spotted a ceramic cactus that I NEEDED (I blame pregnancy hormones). So I brought it with no idea where I was going to put it.

When I got it home I made a discovery: like a real cactus it was spikey! Really spikey!!!

 Blood may have been drawn - it was that spikey.

Which required desperate measures to get it out of the box - someone remind me to buy new oven mitts at some point too - mine are super stained. The gloves worked though.

Lucky it is pretty. It is currently sitting on the side table in the lounge, but I am starting to think it may need to go into the tv unit where it can be observed but not touched. Would you look at those spikes though!

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A Gassy Issue

So we left off with the wait for the gas company to do their thing, and the plumber ordering the heater.

When I rang the gas company I was told it would take 4-6 weeks to have a new connection completed, after which the plumber could install the pipework, and then they would send us the meter for the plumber to install. I kind of expected a bit of a wait, so that was ok, I was more glad that we decided to do this in autumn rather than wait for winter when the baby arrived.

So imagine my surprise when after a week, the gas connection man rang and said he was going to start digging up our lawn that afternoon, and would be back a few days later (it was a Friday) to get the pipes bored under the street to connect our house to the mains.

When that was done, our plumber did his thing and we rang the gas company to order our meter. It was actually when I was sick with a cold and the husband was away, and the very lovely lady at TXU Energy put an urgent status on our metre for me when I explained I was sick, had no heating, and was pregnant. Unfortunately the man who finished the ordering of our metre did not care in the least and maintained he would not be making our metre urgent and we would be waiting for 5 business days for our metre. This was slightly concerning as the plumber was due to come back in 2 days before he went on holidays to finish the job for me.

The husband took a day off work when the plumber was due to come, and was most suprised when the plumber commented about the metre on the side of our house - neither of us had noticed it had been installed the day prior and it had infact arrived as an 'urgent' order!

Anyway, I went to work that day, and came home to this sight

My curtains were hiding a lovely suprise

A Rinnai 1004FTR heater!

We just need to have the curtains altered to clear the top of the heater, as currently when it is in use we can't close them. But in the meantime, I am loving our programable heater that switches on 10 minutes before I get out of bed in the morning and automatically turns off when I leave for work at 7.55am each morning. We even have it set up to turn on at 5.20pm each night (I get home at 5.30pm) and off at 10pm each night.

It wasn't cheap (coming in at just under $3,000 fully installed), but it is well worth the cost.



Oh, and there is another fan of the heater in our household Pin It

A Cold Issue

Our house really is quite small, a mere 13sq all up, and the only heating source we have is our wood heater in the lounge room.

(This photo leads me to a totally random fact, but despite all the photos of our house I have, I don't think I have any photos of our lounge room with the curtains closed. This is the best I could find, and it was taken in 2008 when we renovated the lounge room!)

For 6 years we have been adequately warm, however I wouldn't describe our house as 'cosy' in winter. When the husband brought the heater (as we had no heating what so ever when we brought the house - luckily it was summer), he brought it from the Jindara factory down the road from us as a proto-type for a bargain price. Which was all well and good, but it was barely big enough to heat our tiny house, not to mention that it couldn't take overly large logs which meant it often burnt out overnight.

When we found out we were to be expecting a baby this winter, I started to fret about how I would cope in winter with a newborn, a cold house, and a husband who quite possibly could be away for work and unable to bring wood up to the house, yet alone have the time to go and collect it from the farm.

I made the suggestion to upgrade our cooling system to include heating, but was quickly shot down due to the $5,000 price tag. Fair enough, but if certain people had listened to me when we installed the cooling system, it wouldn't have been quite so expensive. But lets now dwell on that. I suggested putting in a gas heater, but was quickly shot down as it wasn't worth having gas connected for just a heater. I can't remember what his justification was against a reverse cycle cooler, but it wasn't positive.

I left the topic along for several months, knowing that if I nagged about it, I wouldn't get far at all. And then one day in March, the husband came up with a genius suggestion - we should have gas connected and put in a gas heater! Well, who would have thought!?!

So, we made the decision to look into getting a gas heater, and rang a plumber to get some advice about it, as neither of us knew anything about gas or what made a good heater. Our plumber gave us two options: a smaller version which would just heat our house, or the bigger (and therefore more expensive) option which would heat our house more than adequately. It wasn't even an option, the bigger heater was chosen and ordered.

Unfortunately there was a wait for the gas connection to be installed, and then the heater, so stay tuned for part 2 of the heating story.
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Love this room

I have no idea where it came from, I think I saved it by mistake when looking for something else. I love how peaceful it looks.

However I think that peaceful feeling ends as soon as someone sits on that white couch and makes a mark on it!

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A New Addition

For a while now, probably since we brought our TV in 2007, we have been wanting a new tv cabinet. We just never got around to finding the right one. And then there was the talk of moving house, and we decided to hold off buying something until we were in our new house, as it would more than likely mean we would buy a new dining table, lounge suite and occasional furniture.

So we made do with our buffet being our TV unit. And it worked, as you can see.

Over time the buffet was starting to strain under the weight of our tv, and it started to bow ever so slightly. So during the week I picked up this beauty

It wasn't planned, the Aldi catalogue arrived on Wednesday this week and there it was. Best of all, it was the bargain price of $149! And it matches the colour of our existing furniture. I was a bit apprehensive about it not being overly strong, stable or cheap-looking.

Once I got it home, and spent 2 hours constructing it, I was super happy with it. It has tied in well with our lounge well, and

What do you think? Worth the smackers?

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Useful tools for winter

We have lived in our house since 2004, and until this weekend, used a random tong like fire poker. We have no idea what it really is, as it was left in the garden, and we just started using it. We always meant to buy a nice fire tool set, but just never remembered at the right times.

So whilst in Bunnings this weekend, we finally remembered (ok, it was the sole reason we were going to Bunnings, with a secret mission of looking at paint samples).

No more going outside in the cold of a night. Can't complain with that!
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Perfect Sofa Tables

On our house hunt, I have come across a common theme in new houses: open plan living.

Ok, so this is not a new concept to the vast majority of people, but to us, it is something we haven't had to consider. And suddenly we have more options.

Options of sofa tables. And from one of my new favourite stores, I found these two beautiful tables.

Perfect Pieces Katie

Perfect Pieces Victoria

*le sigh* One day my lovelies, one day.
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A calming space

One thing I love about display homes (oh yes, I am sure you have worked out that I did a massive Display House Tour one weekend - I infact made it around 28 houses in one day...never again!) is that they are designed to be lived in. Designed for the average Joe to say "yes, I can see my stuff in this house". In the majority of them, they are styled with every day items, from regular stores like Target and Adairs. It is one of my hates when glossy magazines show items from stores that aren't readily available. Sure, I get that people pick things up in their travels, but honestly, I hate it when I see the worlds best bookcase, to see it was brought home in a shipping container from Egypt!

This is why I love display homes for inspiration!

Oh, and I love blogs - some of my favourite house pictures are from regular blogs! So keep em coming, if you see something I should know about, email me!!! Pin It

You Light Up My Life

After much debate about this lamp, I ended up purchasing this one from Adairs.

I should explain that I didn't come up with this awesome idea myself, I borrowed it from the awesome John and Sherry at Young House Love. I loved how they put seasonal things in theirs, and thought it was something I could do myself, with things we have around the house.

And I must say, it has come up a treat! So much so that I am going back to get a second one this week for the other side of the lounge room.

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Pretty Cushions

Zgallerie

Zgallerie

Oh how I wish ZGallerie shipped to Oz. I really want that rose cushion.
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Oh. My. God

So, today I was browsing a blog (sorry blogger, I can't quite remember which blog I was reading, but it was awesome!). And they said they got a light fitting from Overstock thinking about using a shipping company.

And then it hits me. They ship to Oz! Oh. My. God.

See, here in Oz, we have to use a shipping company with most US sites. Which is kinda annoying, as generally you have to use a company that pays for the goods as well. And it means they can charge whatever they wish for postage. So if I really want the item, I pay the shipping.

Now to convince the husband we need this lamp.

I think it would look awesome in our lounge room

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New Home Idea - Lounge

I am that person who hates having electronic things on display. I hated our DVD player constantly being seen under the tv, and was more than happy to get rid of it when we got our Apple TV. Plus we never used it.

I saw this in Home Beautiful the other week, and have decided it HAS to go in our new house. I love how it has built in storage in those beautiful drawers, no wires, and no ugly DVD player. See those silver rectangles above the drawers? Those my friends, are made from mesh, and according to owner Jenny  "were an practical choice as much as an aesthetic one: The mesh panels were incorporated so that the remote controls can "talk" to the entertainment equipment". OMG, how ingenious is that!

Jenny has a beautiful home, that has many clever things about it, but that was the awesome idea I have ever heard of. I may even consider buying a dvd player for our new house now

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Just ticking about

The other day, I was flicking through Real Living, and in one of their features was a clock. I fell in love with it, but they didn't credit where it came from (I hate that). I figured I would call them when I got back to work, and find out where I could get the clock from.

Then I was wondering through Freedom, and saw it. My clock. There it was in all it's glory. And with 60% off! This is my new clock

But I wasn't happy with it being brown. It didn't match our furniture. But if it was white, it would. How do fix that I hear you ask. A spray can of white paint. Gives you this

It was a bit patchy, so a further two cans gives you this:

And as a finished product on our wall.

I love it. It gives the wall a bit of 'oomph', as we could never agree on something to go on the wall. So there you go, in the past I would have discounted it because it was the wrong colour, but with a spare hour and a few cans of spraypaint (ok, I spent almost as much on paint as I did the clock), and you end up with this.

What do you think?

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Lounge Prints

Rebecca McLean

Andy73

philt

For the wall above the couch in the lounge. I am thinking of a series of 3 or 5 (depending on size). I chose these particular ones as they are all local to our area. Not that you would know it, they are generic, which I like, as they will work in future houses that may not be in this area.

Suggestions?

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Artwork?

I am on the hunt for some artwork for our house, so far I need something for the hallway, the office, and the lounge room.

Pity I have no idea on what I really like or want. All I know is that I love thick mounted photos, either really vibrant or black and white.

So here is a few I have found that I do like

Sunshower Kim

Opticwaste

Any suggestions where I can find anything else?
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