Most of our stuff is still in boxes, and the kitchen floor isn’t done, and the garage is choc-a-bloc with painting projects, but there’s one room of the house that makes me sigh with happiness when I see it, and that’s the living room.

Mostly, it’s the big black fireplace that makes me smile every time. The matte soot paint is SO good–it’s got so much depth, and it varies so much with the light, sometimes pitch black, sometimes inky blue, sometimes an iron-y charcoal gray. Everything looks good with it, I’m pretty sure.

And yes, the fridge is still in the living room and our food is still in the garage. But that heap of boxes full of tools etc. along the left side of the fireplace has been relocated to the shop since this photo was taken. Progress!

This is where we sit an sip coffee every morning and delude ourselves that the house is “basically done.”

That’s Ben’s portrait of Julius Nyerere, first president of Tanzania, on the wall, in case you were wondering. Naturally.

That rug is one I scored at a thrift shop in town last year, but I’m thinking it’s too small for this space, and I’d like to get a really BIG one, like 10’x14′ maybe, but it’s not urgent. And of course you recognize the beautiful coffee table my brother made for me.

It’s nowhere near “done,” but it’s definitely the most relaxing room in the house at the moment, our oasis of calm in our sea of house projects.