You know how old folks (a class I'm approaching faster than I care to admit) discuss buying the "last car" or "last house" or "last washing machine" they'll ever buy before turning toes up? I'm a little creeped-out that my husband and I are having similar discussions.
19 years ago we merged two households, discarding as much as we could in light of having three teenage daughters still at home. In our huge house we stored untold leftovers before drastically downsizing 9 years ago—boy, was that the mother of all garage sales. Culled a lot of His, kept most of Mine (can I help having better taste than his or the late wife's?), and combined it into a tiny little nest for two. The teenagers became women who 1) make more money than we ever did, so who wants all our old crap?; or 2) cannot afford a house large enough to accommodate all the stuff we try to foist on her; or 3) waited till age 32 to settle down, after traveling all over the world, living in world capitols and attending school, just now beginning a career that pays so little she rents a single room from a friend. So much for saving junk "to give the girls a start."
Following the great cruise on the SS $10,000 Disappointment (our first and last) last summer, we're cocooning, spiffing up the only space we care about sightseeing for a while. And so we've come to buying "the last new furniture" we will likely buy before turning toes up.
Out go awful '60's Italian bedroom pieces and in come simple French country pieces, taller, more commodious, finer, far more with-it. Out with the Parsons-style coffee table with the glass top that needed constant cleaning; in with a big round leather-cushioned bench. (We propped our feet on the old table all the time anyway, and now the grandbabies can wantonly crash against this one without requiring ER visits.) Out with the loving-hands-at-home painted end table and in with a stylish English Regency replacement. Out with the double pedestal desk from one of Mother's marriages (the nightmarish one), for which I have no attachment; in with the handsome drop-front "secretaire" Don craved the instant he laid eyes on it. (Changing desks precipitates reorganization of office supplies and important papers, discarding the never-used in each category—why have I kept useless documents from 1991? And a broken souvenir letter opener from a senatorial campaign I worked in 34 years ago?) Down come some of the tattier pictures to make way for a few original, albeit production-line, oil paintings that "speak" to us. Soon the luxe 30-odd-year-old sofa, too low-slung in today's modern high-ceilinged rooms, will have a beefier replacement. The great old upholstered dining room chairs, which encourage lingering conversation long after dessert is finished, will find fresh new fabric faces.
These changes follow closely on the heels of last fall's dismantling of the guestroom in order to create my beloved sewing studio, and the calming of my bedroom's former lively patterns into a minimalist look that I find more soothing. Home décor, like personal appearance, needs periodic tending and updating, and next year it will be kitchen and master bath. But I can't help wondering how many of these current changes in our home are indeed being done "for the last time."
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[sigh] I too made that very same comment recently. "This will be our last house," I said, "before we either go out feet-first or go to assisted living." I wonder if "toes up" is a southern thang. My friend Karen (now toes up) used to use that phrase and she was from the south.
Sounds like you are having fun acquiring your new stuff. We bought new furnishings when we moved three years ago and it was great fun. We had lived in our last house 17 years and it was all that southwest stuff. Very shi-shi at the time but so dated now that the consignment shops asked the question right up front. "Is it southwest? We don't want it."
I have one glass-topped table; the kitchen nook table that we rarely actually eat at. I don't use it, I just clean it. I swore I'd never have glass anything again. I'm working on the family CFO to hate it too so we can replace it when we move. Why not, it's our "last house," mize well have what we want. That's my strategy, anyway.
I love the idea of a big leather ottoman to put your feet up on. Okay, upon which to put your feet. I really can make sentences that don't end in prepositions.
Dangling prepositions or not, I hear 'ya. We had a similar response from the consignment shop that picked up our glass-topped coffee table (which had cost $800 brand new, 19 years ago). It unfortunately has brass trim and brass is sooo yesterday, the guy didn't even want to take it. I wasn't surprised but MY CFO was (I have no credibility until validated by a total stranger, in this case a furniture delivery man.) I think they priced it at $125, of which (no dangling prepositions for this girl) we get a whopping 50%. Gee, you can hardly GIVE stuff away.
Gee, you can hardly GIVE stuff away.
Which is why I told Wes we needed to get all this "Italian stuff" to the consignment store before it was so outdated no one would want it either. So far, it has all sold and the darling tea cart is still languishing. Like who has tea parties? (and it is brass & glass -- like most everything left behind from another life. All the brass candleholders and plant pots are going to the thrift store; not even the consignment store.)
In many ways I expect this to be my last house too. I wish I had had more input on the design but it was purchased finished. It is a lovely house. I am not complaining!
First off...Jane Ann, you are GORGEOUS! WOW! That new pic of you is just.......WOW!
Now...where's the pics of these news pieces? Gosh, I love redecorating, for the most part that is. Let's just say if it doesn't require stripping, sanding or scraping wallpaper...I'm there! :o)
Tracey, you do an old broad's heart good! My hairdresser and I joke about the time I told her (20+ years ago), in the course of describing something that had happened to me years earlier, "I used to be real cute." She and I STILL joke about "back when I was cute!" I thought my picture needed a little updating too.
I've tried with total failure to post some pictures from Photobucket and Blogger just won't take them. And for some contrary reason, Blogger has decided I canNOT capitalize a single letter. I've tried different fonts and have "revised" probably 20 times and it's the same deal each time. Not easy for a grammar stickler like me to tolerate. If anyone knows what I'm doing wrong......
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