Five Green Acres

We had a little mouse problem.  Mornings would find our kitchen counters littered with mementos from the night’s visitors.  Yeah – gross.  My studio became haven to a particularly up-and-coming colony of mice who chose only the nicest of fabrics to build their nests in and the beginning of any new project was usually heralded by a cascade of teeny-tiny seeds stashed away for winter.  In The Boy’s room, a scuttling could be heard from above in the wee hours of the night.  From our bedroom, too, a flurry of activity from WHERE, exactly!? could be heard almost nightly in that groggy period of drifting off to sleep.

Something had to be done.  The Mouse Trap Setter could not keep up, what with his day job and all, and we were running out of peanut butter to bait the traps with. Those mice were getting wise to the traps anyhow.

The last straw came when Andrew pulled out the second dead mouse from the exhaust system of his car.  The first, along with its nesting materials, was yanked out by professionals last winter after the car’s fan mysteriously started acting up.  It was quite a bill the rodents incurred, but they nevertheless remained in a sort of grace period, whereby we only tried to kill them intermittently.  (not because we were granting periodic clemency; we were busy)  After this second mouse, however, Andrew and I uttered two sentences we never thought we’d utter together.  Maybe we need a cat, I said.  I’ve actually been thinking the same thing, said he.

And with those very words the ironclad, cemented-in, kevlar-wrapped, bullet-proof, wind-resistant ban on cats was lifted.  Just like that.  Never mind the fiercely uttered, I-don’t-care-how-much-our-daughter-who-will-probably-have-me-otherwise-wrapped-around-her-finger-wants-a-cat NEVER! promises that were made and repeated like a mantra.  Never mind that a voting majority of the house is allergic to cats and their dermatitic baggage.  (Sneeze Cats are what we call them) Never mind that, in a game of choosing sides, we’d unequivocally and triumphantly march to the side of Dog People without a moment’s thought and start making lists on why we thought dogs were superior.  Never mind any of that.  The ironclad ban had a loophole:  the Barn Cat Mouser clause.

Without further ado, I’d like to introduce you to our two kittens.

This is Cat Stevens, a handsome tiger named by Daddio.  Of course.

This is Ruby, a sweet girl named by Isadora, with some name suggestions from Momma.

There are two of them because I believe in pairs of animals, at a minimum, for companionship.  They live in our basement, as we’re found lacking a barn at the moment, and the basement is where they currently spend all of their time tracking and eating mice.  Which is perfect, I think, because the basement must be the gateway for them all.  There is the occasional (forbidden) foray upstairs when the doors are ajar and the pugs are negligent sentries at the top of the stairs.  And there are great plans to restore the dog door in the basement to grant them unlimited access to the outdoor mouse population.  Read: garage.

Even as smallish, young kittens, they’ve already proven their worth in the disposal of two mice that we happened to see – many more that we’ve not?  If I may be so bold, I think we all love having them – they’re sweet and soft and not yet sneezy.  As for our list of ‘why we dislike cats,’ we have plans to prevent them from ever procreating, (so we shall not be contributing to the glut of unchecked animals) we hope to bring down the stench of the litter boxes by letting them outside and more diligent cleaning, (my fault) and think we can keep the sneezes to a minimum by quarantining them to the basement.  We’re also allergic to mice, we’ve learned, so basement sneezing will persist.  Sneeze Cats are of course more cheerfully tolerated than Sneeze Mice.

Should the moment come, however, when one of our cats is seen terrorizing any member of the outdoor bird population, native or poultry, we will have to immediately reconsider the Feline Truce.  Fair warning.

Weeks ago, I hinted at some major redecorating going on at the Acres.  We had received our new wood burning stove with much cheering and fanfare, the energy of which I immediately harnessed and converted to “Now we have to finally paint the living room!” vigor.  What a process it was. (and still is – not quite done)  That paint chip you may have noticed wedged in the molding of a doorway for nearly three years was magically transformed into gallons of paint the color of limeade.  Oh, how we love it! We flexed our muscles and found we had the wherewithal to do some tile work:  a trip to the ReStore for some lovely travertine tiles, a borrowed tile saw, and some grout the color of mocha frosting quickly turned into a hearth pad.  We have yet to finish the edges, which we plan on doing with more tile.

An unused front entryway was opened up, cleaned out, and spiffed up to house our LR wood stash, winter gear, a bench, and our fleet of trucks.  (missing from this picture is the one Errol was riding)

Having sold my antique school-bench-turned-plant-stand that offered winter refuge to my perpetually-blooming geraniums, I needed an alternate solution.  It’s handy to have a heaping pile of exquisitely-aged barn wood out my back door, and handy too that Etsy is only a click away, offering vintage cast iron shelf brackets.

The cream/off-white piece hanging on the wall is one from a series I did years ago, featuring a recipe collection from a woman named Dorothy, the entirety of which I stitched together onto three canvas pieces.  While it’s not new to the living room, it is much happier set against the lime color.

This new solution to our dress-up-clothes-and-gear nightmare was no doubt germinated years ago by something I saw on SouleMama. Either she did this very thing with a vintage trunk or did something so similar I jumped up from my chair and filed away the idea for my very own vintage trunk, that same one I’ve had since college, when I paid a cab driver to help me haul it from a thrift store, up the elevator, and to my second-floor door.  (I doubt I tipped him nearly enough) That same trunk that has served as coffee table, TV stand, and nostalgic pack-rat memorabilia stash place has now fully come into its own as a clever Dress-up Clothes Containment Device.  But the props here go to Amanda for the idea.

All of the switch plate and outlet covers remind us of where we’ve been and lamentably, how long it’s been since we were there.  Hmm.  That sounds rather depressing, no?  Perhaps they merely sit in encouragement for a trip back to Europe soon!

To be noted:  vintage iron rests make the absolute best wall sconce reflectors.  Needlework piece was thrifted, cleaned, and then resurrected after a painfully-long stint in triage before being re-stretched and hung.

Got a little thing for suitcases.  Vintage ones, of course, but you can only have so many suitcases around stashing this and that. (not shown in these pics is the vintage suitcase lined with a blanket which serves as a stylish dog bed)  At some point, though, I had an amazing breakthrough, when something in my subconscious suggested opening the suitcase up and making a shelf out of it.  I’d be surprised if you didn’t see more of these popping up in my house in the future.  (Fair warning, Dear) The internal shelf divisions are made from fabric covered foamcore, so you know how limited they are in what they will support, but are perfectly suited for holding our modest speakers.

So there you have it.  Stop by sometime and we’ll rock a bit in front of the fire, sip some tea, and remark how remarkably-transformed the room is, that room which was so cold and inhospitable in winters past.  The air will smell faintly of wood smoke, the kids can play dress-up or dig into the basket of musical instruments at hand.  Assuredly, though, our fingers will be nimble enough for as much knitting as our time will allow, thanks to the ample warmth of the hearth.