Maybe I'll add some polkadots...

So I’m listening to someone drilling holes into my house… or at least that’s what it sounds like. Our house is now officially one year old, which means we had a warranty walk-through a couple weeks ago to find all the little problems in the house that are covered under the warranty. For the last two days, we’ve had painters, electricians, plumbers, and maybe a couple random guys off the street (I haven’t been able to keep track of everyone) working all over the house to touch-up paint, caulk cracks, add insulation, fix leaky faucets, and generally make the house a slightly better place to live. Which brings me to the drilling outside – what IS that guy doing, exactly? I think it has something to do with the weep holes in the brick, but honestly, he COULD just be drilling things for the fun of it…

And with the one-year anniversary of our move into this house (coupled with the fact that it’s no longer for sale and we’ll be STAYING here for a while now) I’ve started thinking about some decorating projects I might try to tackle. I haven’t done much with the house so far, mostly because we didn’t think we’d be here for very long. And there seem to be two schools of thought when it comes to selling a house – some people believe the more sparse and plain the house looks, the better. That way prospective buyers see an “empty canvas” and can imagine all of their OWN belongings in the house, and can think about what sort of decorating style they might bring to the house. But other people believe a house should be fully furnished, decorated, painted, etc., because it helps buyers form an “emotional connection” to the house.

Now, I happen to agree more with the “empty canvas” idea. But apparently there are quite a few people who go for the “emotional connection” idea, because an entire industry has been built around “staging” houses. People will actually come into your house and tell you what furniture you should keep out and what you should hide, what you should keep on the counter and what you should put away, how you should organize your closets… and then, for an extra fee, they will decorate your house in an (I suppose) “emotionally connective” style, with artwork and fancy vases and artificial flowers and tapestries and candles – all of which is supposed to invoke some sort of primal “must… have… house” response in the people who view it.

But I don’t really buy all that (thank goodness – because those house stagers are expensive…). I think someone who walks into a totally empty house and can’t picture where they might arrange their OWN furniture and their OWN artwork and their OWN small appliances in the kitchen is just sorely lacking in any imagination or creativity. So when we realized that we might be moving to Chicago, I decided to just leave the house as is – no painting, very few pictures on the walls (not as many nail holes that way – just nice, new, pristine walls for the next occupant), and generally not much clutter or color anywhere. An empty canvas…

But now that we’re staying here in Austin, I’m realizing that my nice “empty canvas” is quite lacking in personality. So I guess it’s about time to personalize it. I’m thinking of starting with a bit of paint in the kitchen… probably red, since I already have some red accents (a few dishtowels, a rug, an oven mitt) and red looks really good with the dark cabinets and countertops we have. Then once that’s done, we’ll have to tackle the media room – I am anticipating much purple (although I haven’t settled on a color yet, so I may go with something else…). Hopefully all of this will help me settle into this house – a house I don’t feel I’ve ever really settled into.

But it has been a whole year, so I guess it’s about time… :)