So Far, So Good

It is far too cold to work in the garage lately, but the last dinette cushion arrived earlier this month.  I'm in love with how nice it all looks.  I'm still waiting on the sofa cushion covers but the fabric for that was delivered last week; it'll likely be a few weeks before that's completed.  I'm somewhat nervous about purchasing fabric without having seen it in person.  I went with Crypton performance fabric.  It is stain, odor, and moisture resistant as well as being planet-friendly.  I'm not affiliated with them in any way; it's just the fabric I chose and why I chose it.  

I've slowly been acquiring items for our "everyday" life in the camper: unbreakable glasses, bamboo dinnerware, nesting bowls... all of which will have to wait for a different post.  The bed ends are slowly coming together as well, but since I can't really set up both ends in the garage right now, those will have to be saved for later, too. 

What I've done so far:

• painted the cabinets
• painted the T-trim
• painted the stove cover
• painted the table support
• painted the steps
• covered the counters and tabletop
• covered the bed end trim
• made privacy curtains for the bed ends
• cut and reinforced the dinette area rug for the table support

What I have left to do:

• cushion/insulate bed end bases
• repair mattress cover
• find a storage container that will fit under the sofa
• find storage containers that will fit under all benches
• cabinet organizers
• figure out the refrigeration situation (look into the professional repair of the fridge)
• replace camper brakes

This is what the Apache looks like so far:

This is what the Apache looked like in October 2019:

We're getting there.

It Ain't Over 'til it's Oversprayed

As much as I love the light and airy look from the last post, with its white cabinets, rug, and off white cushions, we get dirty when we're camping.  If we just sat around for a week and took a leisurely stroll on paved campground roadways I'd be slathering some white paint on every surface of the Apache.  When I say we get dirty, I mean it.  We wander off on 4-hour hikes and more often than not, Garrett is laying on a bed of mulched forest floor (or mud) taking macro photos of fungi.  I have a penchant for taking breaks on fallen trees and mossy rocks.  Sometimes we're canoeing through a bog and we've got those small flecks of "swamp things" on our clothes from getting inadvertently wet.  Sometimes it's as simple as soot from the fire getting on our clothes.  Do I want to transfer that to pristine white cabinetry?  Heck no.  

My canoe bow in the Barnum Bog, Paul Smith's VIC, New York

I mentioned before that the cabinets have the appearance of wood, but are metal.  Over the past few weekends, I've been painting the cabinets without removing them first.  Actually, I've been spray painting everything that is brown, with the exception of the couch under-storage area, which no one will really see anyway.  

I've been using Rustoleum's Universal All-Surface spray paint in Gloss Black for

the cabinets, and for the furnace, which needs a more specialized paint, Rustoleum's Ultra High Heat paint in Black.  I used the same Ultra High Heat in White for the stove lid. 

I taped off, put some paper on the floor in the dining area, and I taped the old grey curtains together and used them as a drop cloth since they were the best way to cover the entire floor without having to cut my usual drop cloth.  The weirdly-shaped items that needed to be covered were protected with aluminum foil.  I could only paint for about 15 minutes at a time, taking the rest of the day off.  The roof of the Apache is taller than the track of my garage door, so ventilation was not as good as I would have liked.  I did manage to open the door a couple of feet, and I left the entry door to the garage open as well.  

Despite laying down the drop cloth, The first time I painted I did not anticipate that the tiny paint particles would make everything sticky.  So as I worked backward, I was unaware that part of the drop cloth stuck to my shoe!  The result?  Areas of flooring where those tiny particles settled.  The fix?  A light sanding with 220 grit sandpaper buffed the noticeable discoloration away!  There was one corner that really got hit with a blast of paint, but that also sanded off tolerably well.  Here are the befores:

That's gonna leave a mark

 

That's not a shadow; it's overspray

Once the weather climbs back into the 40s, I'll finish sanding the floor.  For now though, back to seemingly neverending snowfall and prepping for the holidays.

The Leisure Seekers

Our title today refers to a wonderfully poignant movie with Donald Sutherland and Helen Mirren.  Helen's character busts her husband out of the nursing home and they set off on an adventure in their family's ancient RV to Ernest Hemingway's house in the Florida Keys.  

When we're in the woods, I often sit quietly and just absorb the nature around us.  At Buck Pond, we listened to loons call each other for hours until we fell asleep.  In the Smokies, we enjoyed our morning coffee with a herd of deer and several titmice.  We try to get a campsite next to water if possible and are completely spoiled when we wake up to views like this:

Minister Creek Campground
Allegheny National Forest

I don't want the interior of the camper to compete with the views outside the windows, but I don't want it to be basic either.  I've seen more than a few remodels on Pinterest that I like a lot but won't translate well in a small space.  So, I'm focusing on a simple aesthetic on a very tiny budget.  Our biggest expense will be recovering the cushions and we're going with an upholsterer for that because we want them to be in the hands of someone that knows what they're doing with upholstery weight fabric (aka. not me).  

Since the Apache is straight out of the 70s, I wanted to honor that with what is probably the most popular DIY craft of that decade: macrame!  I found a tutorial on Pinterest, spent $5 in supplies, and learned how to tie a square knot.  

Am I seriously going to put a plant hanger in the camper?  Unlikely, but I like the idea of it and it kept me busy before I brought the camper home, so it's a win-win.  I ended up with an unspent gift card leftover from my birthday and did a little shopping, coming up with this:

Not bad for an initial idea

I quickly changed my mind on the peel-and-stick paper there, and while I love the gold metallic spray paint I don't think there are a ton of accents that I can spray paint gold.  

I love this.
Snagged from Pinterest that redirected to a sketchy not-original-post site
so I have no idea who to credit it to.

This is gorgeous.  I love how airy it all looks, but there's too much white for the amount of dirt that our kind of camping and hiking generates.  I have white kitchen cabinets now and it seems impossible to keep them really clean.  But overall, I love the vibe that this gives off.  Simple, understated, restful.

There are four more months before our next camping trip.  

It's Been a While

Three and a half years have flown by.  I was completely unable to keep up with the blog and home projects for the simple fact that all I did was work, sleep, and take care of the girls.  That said, things have settled into a good rhythm.  The house is pretty much the same as I left the blog a few years ago, which is quite comfortable on my end.  The eldest child is halfway through university, the middle child is in high school, and the youngest is trudging through her last year of middle school.

As they do, some of the young trees in the orchard died over their first winter, and one was senselessly massacred by deer when I didn't notice that the cage around it had popped open on one end.  At least they had a good snack on the apricot tree.  We lost the apricot, plum, and mulberry trees, as well as the Northern Spy and Calville apple trees.  We've planted a Yellow Transparent apple tree which is thriving.  On this spring's agenda is to replace the Calville, Spy, the mulberries and the apricot.  I have a herd of 4-5 deer at any given evening in my yard, so the battle rages on.  They eat everything that isn't covered or caged!

I had a few great gardening years, but between this year and last year, we totaled two tomatoes.  Two.  I've tried everything but nothing can really remedy really wet summers.

I grew up foraging with my mother and aunts and the past two years I've really honed in on wild mushrooms and fungi in general.  We've done a lot of camping and hiking:  we've enjoyed the Great Smoky Mountains and the Adirondacks, and so many small forests!  I've come across more rattlesnakes than I'd like, more bears than I'm comfortable with, and more narrow hiking paths than you can shake a stick at, but I wouldn't trade any of it!  

Our camping adventures really made me realize that while I love the great outdoors, I hate sleeping in cold puddles when there's a downpour.   In the Smokies, there was such a deluge that my 14-year-old tent's rainfly sprung its first leak--or should I say leaks?  We couldn't escape dripping water and it was that night that I pledged to save enough money to buy a camper.  

So, that's exactly what I did a couple of months ago.  We had admired an Apache pop up camper that was in the site next to us while we were in Tennessee.  It had zero canvas and I had never seen another like it.  We lusted after an Oliver travel trailer, but those start at a price that is way, WAY out of my budget.  A used pop up was in the budget, but I didn't want the headache of having to make sure the canvas ends were dried out completely before storing it for any length of time, and the "for sale" listings were littered with pop-ups that had to have their canvases replaced or patched.  I wanted something solid, so we started looking for an Apache, only to find that they're not made anymore.  They had a heyday in the 1970s, but did I really want a 40-something-year-old trailer?  As fate would have it, I did.

I had a notification on Craigslist that a 1975 Apache Royal was about an hour away.  I messaged the seller and scooped it up the next day.  While the previous owner did a lot of work on the mechanical aspects of the camper, very little was done to the interior.  The details on that will have to wait just a little bit longer, but here is what it looks like from the outside.

1975 Apache Royal

It looks complicated to put up, but it's not!

Late Spring Updates

We've been busy!  So busy that finding time to blog lately has taken a back seat to actually getting things done.  I'll do my best to stay current, so here's what you've missed:

The chickens live in the garage for the time being, at least at night.  Unfortunately, the garden shed that was being converted into their coop heaved when the snow melted.  I have an 9-inch gap between the ground and the bottom of the shed on one side, and the other side has sunken into the ground enough to make it impossible to open the door on that side.  My trusty landscape guy is going to shore it up, and figured that the previous owners never put down gravel before the concrete, which caused it to heave.  Lesson learned on taking shortcuts!

Cue running around like a fool

With the help of my friend, Reilly, I got the raised beds in last weekend.  I'm just now waiting for trusty landscape guy to deliver my topsoil, which will hopefully happen this weekend.

The kitchen backsplash has been complete for a few weeks, delayed by a miscalculation on my part when I ran out of grout and only had about 8 inches of tile spacing to finish.  It looks amazing, though, and I've decided on my days off that involve rain, that I can work on getting the kitchen cabinets painted and the countertop done.

The back porch walls have been painted.  I picked up some Sherwin Williams' porch enamel so that I can paint the floor next week.  Once that is done, I'll be moving furniture in and making it a usable space.

What's left?  So much!  Here's the list of projects that still need to be tackled:

• Paint both of the girls' rooms.  
• Paint Evie and Emily's bunk beds
• Finish removing glue from the entry and paint that.
• Paint the master bedroom.
• Decorate all of the above.
• Install a pea gravel patio in the back yard.
• Finish chicken coop and chicken run.
• Paint porch floor; decorate porch.
• Plant the gardens.
• Paint kitchen cabinets and swap out hardware.
• Resurface kitchen counters.
• Remodel bathroom.
• Add some curb appeal to the front door.

I'm sure I'll find more to add to the list.  For now, I'm just going to be exhausted for a bit.

We Don't Need No Stinkin' Ruler!

Someone, somewhere on Pinterest printed out a load of Instagram photos, framed them, and made a rather fabulous photo wall with them.  I set out to do the same, only I didn't want to have to use a tape measure or a ruler to evenly space my frames.  The whole thing just screams of tediousness, and I'm not about that.  I wanted an easy, foolproof way to hang my photos.  I had my photos printed through Snapfish, but I've also used PostalPix.  Just use whichever printing service you like, as long as you can get good quality 4x4 prints.

Here's what I used:

• Tiny Mighty Frames - I ordered these from Amazon in the 20-frame package.  It may look pricey at first, but once you tally up ordering twenty 4x4 wall frames individually, it's actually much less expensive.
• 3M Command Strips - I used a value package of 4 medium and 6 large, then cut them all in half.
• Graphing paper - I have a strange affinity for the stuff
• Frog Tape or other painters tape
• A level
• A pencil

Lay out your frames on the floor before you hang them on the wall.  

The first thing I did was apply a vertical line of tape to the wall, making sure it was level.  Then I laid out the filled frames on the floor until I liked the composition.  I tried to make sure that I didn't have clusters of pictures that had either one or two people in them; I wanted to spread that out so that the image as a whole would look balanced.

This is what the wall should look like when you hang your first photo

Taking out my trusty graphing paper, I laid a sheet over the frames on the floor.  The spacing I had was about 4 blocks around each frame.  I traced a frame onto the graphing paper, moved it over 4 blocks, then traced another.  All four of the frames don't fit on the paper, but what you really need to take away from it is the idea that you're just graphing the spaces between the frames.  I had a space to the side of my frames due to the margin on the paper.  In hindsight, I could've just cut them off and aligned the frames with the tape.  Then I simply cut out the squares that the frames made and gave them to Emily to use for drawing paper.  I taped the graphed grid to the wall, making sure to line up the side of the paper with the tape line.  After level-checking the top of the graphing paper, I stuck a Command strip to the back of the first frame, lined it up with the opening in the graph paper, and stuck it on the wall.  I worked in blocks of 4, so that I had two frames over two frames before I moved the graphing paper.  

When your first block is done, move the graphing paper.
Realign it to the taped section and the frames above/beside.

Stand back every few rounds to make sure you're not off track, or that you don't have an off-kilter frame.  When you're done, stand back and admire!  I love that the photos can be switched out and changed by season, or holiday, or by whatever you feel like just by changing out a Command strip.

Here are a few views of what it looks like:

I posted this on Instagram the other day.
Lily was begging Liz for her coffee!

The view from the couch.  Art3mis seems to know whenever I'm trying to take a photo.
My pets are definitely hams!

View from the kitchen and dining room.
I like that I can see it from different rooms.
Also, we have plenty of amazing ideas, just no chalk at present!

One Shade of Grey: A Progress Report

The day I posted my last post, I finally closed on the house.  In fact, about 15 minutes after I posted about how impatient I was, my attorney's paralegal called to let me know we were good to go.

The first thing I did was remove the weird shower curtain rod + too short regular curtain rod above the living room window, as well as what we have dubbed, "the Jesus curtain" which I'm pretty sure was a shower curtain, but it had bible verses all over it.

two different lengths, two different rods... the stuff nightmares are made of

Currently, the window is naked, and a new rod (one that'll fit) has been purchased.  It is the same exact rod that is in the dining room, which I just love.  In fact, I love just about everything that is going on in the dining room now.  Gone is the tomato soup orange-red, the apple-trimmed cafe curtain, and the feeling that the room is a lot smaller than it actually is.

The only thing this color should be on is a Barchetta (it's never too early for Rush humor)

The dining room is now light, bright, and definitely updated.  First, I covered the walls with Behr's Ultra Premium Plus paint that was color-matched to Benjamin Moore's Edgecomb Gray.  I had no idea that you can just walk into Home Depot and ask for a color from a different paint supplier, and had samples mailed to me from Benjamin Moore first, which cost a pretty penny--the shipping was more than the paint sample!  Now, I just find colors I like, go to Home Depot, and buy an armload of samples until I figure out which color I want.  Consumer Reports rated the Behr paint as their first or second interior paint, not to mention that Home Depot is a mere 30 minutes from my house (the nearest Benjamin Moore store is over an hour away).  It's a light grey/beige that looks equally good with the blues, wood trim, and beige ceramic tile in the room.  Since you can also see the kitchen cabinets due to the open floor plan, it was important that those colors work together until I figure out what I'm going to do with those cabinets.

The only red things left are the apples

 My dining table has a story, of course.  In the summer of 2014, I went to Massachusetts to visit my mom.  Whenever I visit my family there, I stop at what I think is one of the best Goodwill stores in the country, just over the border in Nashua, New Hampshire.  I walked in during that visit to see this gem in the window with a price sticker on it for $9.99.  TEN FREAKING DOLLARS!  It just so happened that it was marked down on the color sale for that week, so for five bucks, that puppy was MINE.  Unfortunately, as the employees moved it from the window into the area that one picks up large items, one of those tripod legs snapped from it's attachment.  When asked if I still wanted it, I said, "well, if you can knock half off..."  The manager said, "Done."  So that's how I got my dining room table for $2.50.  My friends Jason and Trinda helped to take it apart and load it into my minivan, and we made the trek back to Pennsylvania with three kids and a table.  Some Gorilla Wood Glue and an overnight of clamping fixed it right up.  It has been well worn and loved, and still extends another foot for when we have guests.

I love, love, love my table.  Oh, and the seats of the side chairs match the stain

The first time I saw the chandelier on the Young House Love website, I gasped.  It's flipping gorgeous.  When I saw the price at West Elm, I wasn't sure if I could swing it.  I slowly started saving for it, but at nearly $400, I wasn't confident that I'd have enough money to buy it before it was discontinued.  By my birthday in September, I was about $175 from my savings goal when I gifted myself $100 (hey, it's my birthday, I do what I want).  The following week, it was on sale for 20% off, and I snagged it for $75 off of the original price.  Sometimes waiting has it's benefits.  Everything else came from Overstock.com.  The table runner and fruit basket came from trips to HomeGoods and T.J. Maxx, respectively.

curtain detail

This window is eventually going to be a door to the backyard.  Currently, I either have to walk around from the front of the house, or to go through the garage, onto the back porch, then out that door if I want to access the back yard.   I think a door and a stairway here would provide a faster route, and once there's a patio there, a great extension of our dining room to an outdoor dining area.

The dining room is no where near completed yet.  I still need to put something on those walls and maybe add a buffet or something that'll add some personal touches to the room.  I love how it's turning out.

Sources:

Upholstered Chairs

Side Chairs

Curtains

Curtain Rod

Area Rug

Chandelier

Paint Color

Shut the Front Door!

Apparently, curb appeal is the difference that sells nearly half of the homes on the market, according to Zillow.com.  Remember my whining about how my house has seriously started lacking just that?

My front door has been bothering me for about a year now.  It was natural wood.  It disappeared completely in light of the purple+magenta (purgenta?) door on the front porch that is 40 shades of disappointing.  It looked like this:

The plate under the doorknob has rubbed the finish from the door when a screw was loose.  That crack on the bottom right is a seam that bothered me as well.  None of the detail of the door could truly be appreciated.  I took all of the hardware off of the door and set out to paint.

But first... primer!

After applying 3 coats of Zinsser Bullseye 3-2-1 primer, the stain in the wood was locked in nicely.  See how the door is a yellow-ivory color compared to the siding? That was after the second coat.

on the floor to the left is a wooden shingle that came off of the house...
and on the right is our "emergency" backpack

I really liked having the front door white.  It completely blended into the siding, but *sigh* I just love how great things look when painted white.  Until I saw the color it was meant to be, that is.

I had a quart of Glidden Peacock Blue mixed in a Behr Paint + Primer high-gloss base, then cut in the first coat.  

I'm only 5 foot 4.. stepladders are all over my house

 The first coat was pretty uneventful, as was the second:

I ended up putting 3 coats of paint on the door over the course of a week to really give it an opportunity to dry well between coats.  I took the hardware off and painted everything, including screw heads, with Rust-Oleum's Universal All Surface Spray Paint in Oil Rubbed Bronze Metallic.  I had taken photos of the entire process, but due to an unforeseen error, they didn't save on my camera's SD card.  I have ordered a new one, but the rest of the photos were taken with my phone, via Instagram.

The rain started and the door seemed to be a bit sticky, so I didn't want to attach the knobs just yet.  I found a burlap wreath pin on Pinterest, saved some change here and there, and picked up supplies to make it using Stone Gable's burlap wreath tutorial.  I found that working with burlap made me sneeze a whole lot (even with allergy medicine!) but it was super easy and cost roughly $15 to make.  Lastly, I applied a very friendly "hello." from PreciousEmma on Etsy.  

This is how it turned out!

Well, it looked great, but I still wasn't done.  I screwed the hardware back in and started a little Halloween decorating a bit early.  This does have an Instagram filter on it, but this is a good representation of what the door looks like at night (and completely dry).  

I can't tell you how much I love it!  It has definitely upped the curb appeal of the house by instantly transforming the blah wooden door to a friendly, inviting, cozy sort of door.  In Dutch, those feelings are called "gezellig," which connotes a feeling of belonging and welcoming and quaint and, well, an entire cascade of feelings that make you smile.  

Even though winter is coming ("You know nothing, Jon Snow!"), I'm still slowly working on a sleeping porch.  I don't imagine I'll have much more free time this semester to work on it, but my biggest priority for it is finding a screw that will fit the bed frame.  Eventually.  When I can both have my wallet and time to set foot in a hardware store.  I'll leave you with this work in progress, though:

so much painting to do!  

Until we meet again, friends!

*while a lot of brands were mentioned,

I was not compensated or affiliated with

any of them in any way.

I did send PreciousEmma a photo

as an appreciation, and she made it

the photograph to represent her listing

with my permission.

It's All In How You Mix The Two

A dear friend of mine and I decided long ago that a person should have more than one theme song that covers different aspects of their lives.  There's nothing better than just hanging out with your good friend, not doing anything in particular-- wasting the best kind of time together.  One of our mutual theme songs is Blue and Yellow by The Used.  I thought it appropriate for the styling of the desk in the entry.

Speaking of themes, notice a recurring one?

COLOR!!!  

Since my tuition bill is looming, I have to style the entry on the cheap.  The least expensive way to decorate? Shop in your own house!  I snagged the yellow painting I made ages ago, took the Mae Chevrette print from the front porch, the green glass teardrop vase from my office, and an adorable photo of Lily.  

The whole setup still needed a bit of something.  I thought I had a sparkly silver photo frame tucked away, but it is no where to be found.  I needed a bowl for my keys or pocket change, since I didn't want to tuck it in the drawer.  I like knowing they're where I can see them and one of the kids (Emily!) hasn't wandered off with them.  

Off to the local Goodwill store to see what treasures I could dig up.  Sadly, there wasn't much by way of vases or decorative bits.  I did find a small, pressed glass bowl for a very reasonable 99 cents, so I snagged it.  Later in the week, I had to go to Walmart for garden stakes (the grapes need to be trained on wire) and they were in clearance for $1.50 each.  Right beside them was a glass cylinder vase for 97 cents and a mango-scented candle for $1.50.  Mine!  The last thing I picked up was a bouquet of flowers for $3.97.  

I had enamel craft paint, Frog Tape, and some Krylon Looking Glass (mirror) spray paint already, so it was just a matter of taping off the new vase, painting the outside with the enamel paint, and the inside with the spray paint.  

The hardest part is making sure the tape is even!

I would highly recommend spray painting before putting the enamel on.  I did it in the reverse and needed to wipe it from the outside.  Spray the paint in, and allow the excess to run out onto a drop cloth or (in this case) scrap paper.  I only did one coat of paint, but I think two might be necessary.  I brushed the enamel on, and I really love the texture it gives the finished vase.  

So, putting it all together, the desk looks like this now

I still think I'm far from finished, but this is definitely far more pleasant to look at than the naked "before" photo:

There is still a ton of work to be done in here.  I'm compiling a wish list of things I'd like to get and a to-do list of what needs to be done (like ripping out carpet sometime in the next year).  For now, I'll just have to baby-step it until I can save enough pennies to accomplish what I'd like to do.

I'm going to leave you with a gratuitous pic of Lily, because she has snored through the writing of this entire blog post.  

Naked and Afraid

Remember that side-of-the-road find from last year?  That gorgeous desk whose veneer had definitely seen better days?  It has been finished for quite some time and just hibernating in the dining room.  Today, I finally put it in the entry, where it shall store keys, sunglasses, gloves, winter scarves, mittens, and hats (hey, we have a ton of blustery days here).

The mirror that I revamped when I still lived in Florida has been hung above the desk.  Now the entry area looks like this

It is so... blank.  And beige.  And boring.

The diamond-weave wool rug is there to cover up an ancient floor heating grate.  Without it, the entry is freezing, since there's nothing to stop the cold basement air from chilling the room in the winter, not to mention adding a fortune to my heating bills.  It also evens up the floor surface since the grate is an inch below the carpet.  There is hardwood under the carpet, and exposing and refinishing it is definitely on the to-do list... just not until maybe next year.

For scale, that's a 7-inch tall flower pot, with a 4-inch base.  Yes, that's authentic 1960s paneling on the wall.  I know it is hideous.  The worst part of it is that the ceiling is taller than the original panel, so there's a panel seam that runs around the top of the wall, roughly 6 inches from the ceiling, as if it is trying to masquerade as crown molding.  The same paneling was in the entry closet and one day after moving in, I decided to see what was underneath.  You may want to sit down for this:

Doesn't it just take your breath away?

I simply cannot deal with this visual nightmare all over the room.  Just say no.  I'm thinking this is another gem from the 30s or 40s.  It has also been lined up so that each vignette is roughly a foot away from another one exactly like it.  If the entry walls are anything like the closet, the paneling was applied directly to the plaster.  So, the paneling stays until the entire mess (paneling, wallpaper, plaster, lath) can all be removed and remodeled.  I considered painting the paneling, but that seam drives me crazy... paint would just highlight the seam.

The entry light is a more modern addition to the room.  When I first moved in, the current light replaced a gothic, red stained glass hanging light that was far too small for the room and had a long chain draped from hooks on the ceiling.  The dark switchplate on the wall above the desk echoes the coppery metal of the light, but the design lends itself to the more traditional aspect of the house.  The closet door knob and plate are gorgeous Arts and Crafts pieces that were installed upside down.  Flipping it around doesn't work because the mortise lock is installed in that part of the door.

All of this leaves me to the current issue I'm having with styling this desk.  I need it to be functional and beautiful.  I know there is a lot going on here.  I definitely need color.  The room gets very little natural light, so a shade-loving plant that likes to occasionally be chilly?  A bowl for keys or should I stash them in one of the drawers?  Photos on the desk?  On the wall?  I considered a stack of books, but that would work better if the surface were entirely flat, I think.  There is no electrical outlet here, so a lamp won't work.  Perhaps something that plays up the silver leaf mirror?

HELP!  How would you style this?