This weekend was the best one we’ve spent in the new house so far. We managed to get a lot done while still having lots of time to lounge and actually enjoy the space. We only went to the hardware store once (I love the hardware store, but it’s getting to where the employees all know me by sight). We even got away from the house for brunch and a picnic with friends on Sunday.

Unfortunately, I failed to get a photo of the most manly event of the weekend. After brunch on Sunday, Ben and four of his guy friends pulled a stump from the yard with the help of some serious chains and one friend’s big truck. It was majestic.

We also got some little projects done around the house this weekend, though. Time for another round of What’s New?

What’s new in the dining room? Well, the radiator for one thing! I installed it Saturday and I’m very excited about it. Obviously, we don’t need heat yet, so it’ll be a few months before we really know how well we like it, but we love its clean, modern look.

Installation was super easy. A few electrical connections, a few mounting clips to hold it in place–the hardest part was finding studs.

Here’s another exciting angle, looking in from our front door:

(More on the living room, shown in the background, to come later this week.)

One upside to the new baseboard heater is that it’s more efficient than the old one. That means it can be a little shorter. One downside to that upside:

I would have liked to center it below the window, but the junction box for the electrical was at the far end, and I was not up to the task of trying to move it. Plus, we’ll have to take it out again when we get around to painting this wall, so it didn’t seem that important right now. The downside is, of course, that big block of mis-colored wall, riddled with holes (I had already patched them before this photo) from the old radiator, and the missing piece of baseboard.

I know from replacing the kitchen ceiling fixtures that I am not going to be able to match the off-white of wall here, so I’m not sure how I will handle this. The baseboard will be easy enough to replace once we get around to it.

One other new thing I love on this side of the room is my little brass planter in the window.

I had to find some plants that can take the brutal hot sun that this south-westerly window gets. Two little aloe, two little cacti. Perfect.

Over on the other side of the room there are a couple little changes, too–

We put the pantry doors back! To hide the craziness that’s going on inside–

It’s an organized chaos, I promise.

Since we’re out of the city limits, we have to start separating all our recycling, so I put some labels above the paper bags–

And I finally took down the fridge magnets the old owner left behind (some butterflies, a frog magnet, and one that said: “I live in the garden, I only sleep in the house”), and put up some Stickygrams from our trip to Spain and Morocco earlier this year.

These photos are so bad! Time to get a new camera, for sure.

Below the Stickygrams hangs the Jade Cabbage bottle opener, which I got in Taiwan. There’s more about the Jade Cabbage on Wikipedia.

In case anyone’s wondering, I love the Stickygrams. The quality is excellent and I’m definitely going to order more at some point.

I love being reminded of our trip every time I look at the fridge, and it’s so much cleaner and more cohesive than posting actual printed photos on the fridge with other magnets.

For the originals, check out my instagram feed @sidonie_s.