It was 1°F (-17°C) when we left the house this morning! We take a ferry across the Hudson to the train every morning, and as of today, the river is really beginning to ice over. It’s a combination of thrilling and terrifying to be on the boat as it crashes through the mini-icebergs!

On the Manhattan side of the commute, people are wrapped up in scarves and down and boots. I love this time of year—everyone becomes an anonymous, steamy-mouthed, red-nosed, hunchbacked blob, scurrying to the door of an office building to get out of the cold.

Back home on the sofa, wool socks and blankets can’t compete with the warmth given off by a 10-pound dog. We are totally taking advantage of our little Bruno’s furnace-like body, but somehow I don’t think he minds.

Pre-haircut. Post-haircut:

Bruno needs a dog bed, but after nearly 5 years of looking, I can’t find just the right one. This seems to work, though! We’ve had this scavenged Eames shell chair sitting in the basement for a while (it’s awaiting a trip out to Retro Redo for reupholstering), and, well, doesn’t every good puppy deserve his own piece of classic mid-century furniture? Yes!

Legs removed, sheepskin added, dog inserted. Everyone is happy!

p.s. Bruno is going for a haircut tomorrow, I swear. I am aware of the fact that he is looking more and more like Sam Sheepdog every day.

Bruno got a little plaid bulldog named Nigel for Hanukkah. He wore himself out chewing Nigel’s ears off, and had to rest for a bit before starting in on his tail.

This is the goofiest photo ever! We both look like we just spent a weekend eating buttered croissants and rubbing our heads with balloons.

Happy Thanksgiving! We’re all feeling very stuffed, sleepy, and thankful around here right now.

9 pounds of dog, most of it fur. I love Bruno.

It had to happen eventually…my week off from work has come to an end and I am back in the office again. It was cold, cold, cold when I left the house this morning at 7:00! I’m slooooowly digging through the jobs that piled up while I was gone, answering emails, checking in with illustrators, etc. A nap sounds delightful right now, but instead I am eating a rather delicious apple and doing my best to recall the last three days.

First of all, thank you so much for all the curtain suggestions. I have a lot to think about! Being at home all week was very helpful, too, as it allowed me to see how light comes into the house at different times of the day. I’m thinking that just upgrading the current solution to a better quality fabric will be just the thing.

On Friday night one of my coworkers drove up from Manhattan and picked up our desk, desk chairs, and a lamp. None of them were really working well in this house, and I’d much rather they went to someone who can put them to good use than to just stick them in the basement and let them go to waste. On Saturday, another coworker came to take away our old sofa (goodbye, Falsterbo!). Now he can rehome his old futon and have a more comfortable place to lounge around with his cats, and we no longer have an up-ended sofa sitting in the middle of our bedroom! The whole house is very clean right now, emptied of all excess pieces of furniture (save for one cabinet we need to hold onto until our bathroom renovation is done). It’s so much easier to envision a future purpose for each room when the unecessary pieces are removed.

Yesterday afternoon and evening we finally put up our kitchen cabinets! They look fantastic, really. We mostly have open shelving, but I wanted to have some covered areas for storing food. Of course it took us forever (and an unexpected trip to Lowe’s, naturally), but at least it’s done and I can cross that long-lingering item off of my list.

Photos to come! I had a couple of great scavenging finds this weekend, plus some good eBay impulse buys…

See our cute new tray table? I love it! But it hasn’t always been so nice…

First I found this nasty little stool:

Then I saw this worn out Swedish tray:

And I thought, hmmm…the stool has nice legs, and that carpet probably comes right off…so…we bought both, despite Evan’s resistance. I got to work right away pulling out the staples holding the carpet (latch hook, actually!):

Happily, what was under the stinky carpet turned out to be ugly-but-smooth melamine on top of seriously water-damaged plywood:

A quick coat of flat black paint to hide the edges of the plywood, some gentle care with Murphy’s Oil Soap and SC Johnson Paste Wax (the two things you absolutely need if you have a lot of wood floors and wood furniture!) for the tray, et voilà! Stool + tray = a perfect little table, for next to no cost.

Bruno agrees (Evan does, too)!

I love how beaky Bruno looks with his snout all nestled into the pillow.

On the agenda for this weekend:
→ nice long Fall walk with Bruno
→ visit the DWR Annex in Secaucus just in case they have
something good/discounted
→ swing by IKEA Paramus to (re-)examine the Stockholm sofas
for the hundredth time (& buy fabric)
→ sew new linen curtains for living room windows
→ Middletown flea market & Iron Fish in Beacon (?)
→ finish bathroom/pantry demo in preparation for the plumber’s return
→ rearrange bedroom
→ acknowledge my birthday in some way

I couldn’t stand looking at that horrible bathroom photo anymore. Here’s some Bruno cuteness instead.

Weekend house checklist:
→ Pull up remaining floorboards in bathroom
→ Hang Elfa shelving in dining room
→ Refurbish nesting tables in living room
→ Hang coat pegs in hallway
→ Figure out what to do about living room curtains
→ Stain/poly threshold for kitchen

Bruno has had a very stressful week, defending us from the likes of plumbers, junk haulers, and oil tank replacers. A tee shirt helped to calm him down a little (seriously, it really helps), but the little guy just wants all of these strange guys to leave so he can lie on the sofa and chew his stuffed lamb/camel (Lamel) in peace. Love.

Today we went to the Dutchess County Fair in Rhinebeck, which meant lots of greasy-yummy foods and smelly-cute animals!

We started the day with deep fried Oreos. Seriously, could anything possibly be more distinctly American? They were good, but not quite as good as you might imagine such a thing would be.

Three sweet mice came to live at Door Sixteen yesterday! Flossie (top), Turtle (bottom), and Olive (camera shy) are presently getting settled into their own special home, which is new construction and requires no renovations.

You can expect Door Sixteen to come roaring back into the world sometime within the next week. In the mean time, isn’t Bruno just the cutest? Yes.