The foyer

The foyer is finally done. I have no idea when we even started this project- maybe last spring? The start of the project precipitated the installation of new exterior doors and spiralled into replacing all the baseboard and door trim on the main floor of the house. And then, because the new baseboard was too high, we had to re-route all the wall air/heat vents to the floor as the wall ones were too low. And while we were patching holes up anyways, we moved some thermostats and light switches. And that necessitated repainting pretty much the entire main floor. Of course it did-do we ever do anything halfway around here??

Like many 1960s houses, our front door (which was a drafty hollow core) opens almost directly into our living room, and was separated only by a half wall, complete with a copper lined plant trough in the top and shelving on one side. Made of lovely painted plywood and cheaply trimmed, it was hardly a classy welcome into our home. So, since I am totally addicted to organized storage, and lord knows we need it here, I decided to replace it with a built-in dresser which could house all of our hats, mitts, kid shoes, sports equipment and assorted junk like keys and loose change (or rocks & twigs for the shorter members of the household!). So, as you may know, built-ins are not cheap or fast, and I could see that the actual executor of this project (read:Colin) was less than enthused about designing and building a multi-drawer storage unit anytime soon. Apparently a project of this magnitude requires a workshop renovation, and that's a story for another day! Hello Ikea. Hello $400 dresser that met all my needs and dimension requirements. Hello built-in.....

Before:

During:

Now: