Our living room

Phew, what a few weeks! In the last 3 weeks or so our house has gone from a shell with very little furniture or character to a cosy home.

Today I'm going to share with you our living room. It is so lovely to come home from work and have a nice room to relax in. Here are some before photos:

 

As you can see, it was pretty boring with cheap laminate, brown chimney breast, single glazed windows and magnolia everywhere (much like the rest of the house...). There wasn't even a radiator in the living room! It is much warmer and cosier now with carpet, double glazing and a radiator. 

And now, after:

 

The settee is from Ikea, as is the matching footstool. The arm chair is a hand me down which was once my great-grandmothers. The curtains are from John Lewis (although not our first choice, we did want Sanderson dandelion clocks in red but the widths weren't right and made to measure ones too expensive, maybe one day!) and the telephone box cushion is from b&q. The coffee table is a second hand find and the bookshelves are hand built by Scott. 

Now that we are settled in the house, it is so nice having free time in the evenings and weekends. Hopefully this will mean I can get back to blogging, because I have missed it so! I will soon share the dining room & kitchen too. Tonight we're off to the Liverpool halloween lantern parade at Sefton Park, we went last year and it is so good! Hopefully I will be able to snap some half decent photos although it was quite hard to last year. Hope everyone else has been enjoying the halloween weekend!

Goodbye cake

Dress - Dorothy Perkins

Belt - Asos

Shoes - Clarks

Last week 2 of my colleagues left to pastures new so I was asked to bake a celebration leaving cake for them. I made my traditional triple layer sponge cake with lilac butter-cream decorated with pretty sugar flowers (shop bought, not handmade!). It was also my first time experimenting with icing writing and I think it went quite well! 

I've had a super busy week this week, I've been working two 6-day weeks on the run and am really in need of a break! I have a week booked off in a fortnight though which is when we are going to officially move all of our furniture into the house, I am SO excited! I will be able to share some proper finished photos with you all! 

Oh and finally I couldn't post without mentioning Steve Jobs. Having an iPhone has changed my life (some might say for the worse, as my Mum always refers to it as my 'hand extension', but I think it's for the better!). Apple make some amazing products and they are so iconic, he will be missed. I also think it is a testament to the popularity of his products that most people found out about his passing using Apple products. RIP Steve Jobs.