My Sweet Little Beach Cottage

Hello dear readers!  I hope you are having a great weekend. It's a hot one here in Ohio. Hope it won't be like this the whole summer! A strange thing happened to me over the last several years, I actually prefer the quiet and solitude of winter.  And rain, I love rain. Not torrential storms, but gentle, misty rain, cool breezes on my face. And the beauty of gray skies.

So, I'm stuck in the A/C, and damn grateful that my sweet little beach cottage has brand new central air.  Whew, hew!  What luxury.  I'd like to mention quickly that I have the best landlords in the world. I will be talking about the all-important landlord/tenant relationship in a subsequent post.

Since I'm stuck in the A/C I'm cleaning the place, and of course rearranging. Who knows what the place will look like by Monday, so I thought I'd show you it's current incarnation, minus the mess.  I receive emails saying hey there's no way your place is that neat.  Well yes and/no. I do keep it simple. But I don't usually photograph it when it's messy.  Maybe one day I'll do a post of it messy. But not today. :-)

So...you remember the new painting I've been talking about?  It was intended for over the sofa, and ended up in the dining room.  I'm still contemplating if I'm going to put a painting over the sofa. In the meantime, I found a large, blue throw pillow at Gabriel Bros. for $6.99. What a deal. Since I can't paint as often as I like, I've grown very reliant on textiles for color and coziness. This place was freezing when I moved in. So luckily, I had a small collection of blankets, sheets, scarves, pillows, rugs, all of which can be moved around on a whim - and all of which came on the cheap.

Here's a little secret about my living room. I use it like it's a studio apartment. The back pillows come off the sofa - which is actually a very old Danish mod daybed on its last legs,  not a futon. It's just not in the budget to have it repaired and reupholstered.  It's amazingly comfortable to sleep on. And while it's small, it's actually helped my sleep because it's taught me not to toss and turn. Sometimes I'm too lazy to put the pillows back on.  There are two bedrooms that are too small to put beds in!  I'll have more to say about these little rooms in a subsequent post.

Little dining area is a study in using what you have. This is actually an outdoor table from Target. Have you noticed how cute outdoor furniture is? It can easily be used inside. I love the simple shape of this table.

I love my kitchen!   

It's the perfect marriage of form and function.  I'm not gonna say too much about the kitchen now, because I'll be talking about it in a subsequent post. But, don't the landlords have great taste?  Love the tile. And dig that awesome hanging glass lamp in the window. Oh, and a window, what luxury!