Living room, before & after

Yesterday I had to remind myself that the only way to eat this elephant is one bite at a time. So I started by completely tidying up the messes in the living room.

It's not all the way done yet, but hanging curtains and some art on the walls went a long way to making this room feel "finished."

How about a before and after tour?
This room was my grandparents formal living room. You know, the room that you only used on Christmas? I am pretty sure that couch had been here since they day they moved in in 1970.
My pottery is temporarily at home on some bookcases where the clock and the pink lamp were in the first photo. (I say temporary because I am really hoping to get a built in there with storage for DVD's and stuff underneath the pottery. And clearly the pottery needs more space, it's too crowded!)
Our IKEA Ektorp chaises are in the corner where the bookcases where. I am thinking of hanging a chandelier from that bird cage stand.
My grandparents always had a wallpaper mural on the wall behind the couch.
This after sort of blows me away. Is that really the same room? (The pictures are hung a little high for my liking, but we have a bouncy 5 year old. LOL)
The front of the room, complete with horrible vertical blinds.
The window just before we ripped it out for nice new windows.
And after hanging curtains yesterday.

It's kinda crazy good now, eh?

One thing I have noticed is that I feel sheltered differently in this house. My brain knows that the old house was sheltering us just as well, but somehow it just feels different to be here. Safer, tighter, quieter, warmer, I can't really put my finger on the feeling, but it's there.

And when I look at pictures like this I cannot even believe how far we have come in so little time.

Just wow.

Back tomorrow with more!