Mars/Venus: Decorating

Before you start worrying that my husband has turned into a total chick since we started sharing a house, I had to share these stories and photos so there are no doubts that his testosterone levels are just fine.

I'll start by showing you a Before picture of our living room. Isn't it pretty?

Trouble is (though you can't quite tell it from this picture), it's pretty long and thin. We entered this house with two couches: my khaki micro-suede couch, and the green micro-suede sectional (and ottoman!) that K bought from Heather and B after they moved into their new house.

My couch wouldn't be enough seating for the room, meaning we'd have to buy something(s) to go along with it (another couch? a loveseat? armchairs?). But the sectional might be too overwhelming for such a narrow space.

What to do, what to do ...

K really wanted to hang on to the sectional, so we put it in the living room in the best position we could find for the space. I don't know that any designers would be in love with what we've done, but it works for us. It's functional, and there's plenty of nice, comfy seating. It was the best solution we could find to utilize the back door and avoid blocking the (ginormous) TV or fireplace.

As you look at these pictures, please keep in mind that we are SO still unpacking! The items on the mantle are just there so they don't get broken or chipped before we find a better place for them. The second photo here gives you the best idea of how the room looks from the front door, but it doesn't tell you how wide the room is(n't). The third photo accomplishes that a little too well. I promise it's not a tight squeeze to get around the couch, even though that photo makes it look like it is.

The tables behind the couch are going away, too. I plan on making a nice seating area on that side of the couch with a small armchair or rocking chair, along with a nice little table. That way, you're not entering our home to see the back of the couch.

The other decorations we will bring into the room (including a painting we can't hang until we find the perfect cabinet for it to hang above) will be bright and colorful to (hopefully) make up for the neutral walls and couch color. I promise also, though, that it doesn't look as dreadfully neutral in person as it does in these photos.

And last but not least, no, we did NOT do that faux marble treatment to the fireplace. We would love more than anything to paint over it (as well as the faux marble treatment on the entry door frame), but it's actually in our lease that we can't. That's right, the owners of the home actually paid someone to do that. (I KNOW!!!)

OK, now that I've given you all the disclaimers, you can look at the photos.

That left us with my khaki couch, which K didn't want to get rid of. We decided to put it in our 3rd bedroom, which we're using as an office. Only we couldn't get it inside -- it's too wide for the doorframe, even after the movers removed the door itself. (Boo!)

I told K we'd just have to sell the couch. For some reason, K really hated that idea. I explained to him that we had nowhere for it downstairs. It wouldn't fit through any doors upstairs. "The only way we can keep it is if we store it in the garage, covered." Of course, K didn't want that either.

"How about this?" he said to me, pausing before hitting me with what he was sure would be the solution to all our problems. "Stadium seating." I waited for him to start laughing, but instead, he started trying to show me how we could put the khaki couch directly behind the sectional.

I really almost started crying immediately.

Wow.

And then there are the two bedrooms -- the master and the guest room. Both of them are good-sized rooms. This means we have a few options for the placement of the beds.

For our bedroom, I was trying to decide which placement would offer the best utilization of space. Which would make it feel less cramped?

(My fabulous rendering of the layout of our room.)

K suggested we put the bed on the right wall of the room. He moved to that area, and he hit me upside the head with another blast of male "reasoning": "That way, if you have to get up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom, all you do is walk forward to get to the door. If we put it on the other wall, the person on the far side has to make their way around the bed in the dark." As he spoke, he was illustrating his point by climbing off an invisible bed, with quite a bit of fumbling around for the person on the right side of the bed.

Hmm. Interesting. Hadn't thought about it that way. Not that I get up often in the middle of the night to use the restroom, but whatever.

Then it came time to lay out our guest bedroom. I was trying to figure out if turning the bed sideways would make the room seem more spacious.

Yet again, K used the bathroom trip scenario to show how vertical placement of the bed would be easier. I laughed out loud that the design of our home in his head revolves around getting to the toilet.

Speaking of the guest room, we took all the tape down on Sunday, and we moved the furniture back into place. We still haven't hung anything on the wall just yet. K is happy with the color, but the jury may still be out for me. Hopefully once we get more furniture and decorations, the green will balance out a little. We'll see.

But I can take comfort in the fact that even if our guests are horrified by the shocking color of the walls, at least they'll have no problem getting to the bathroom in the middle of the night!