The Honeymoon Cottage

I was sitting in my pre-furnished aparment,

missing some of "my furniture" today...

and after looking through some pictures,

I realized I never showed you our house.

Not our "flat,"

but our "house" from before we moved.

A 1930's art-deco bungalow

in a preservation district

that also doubled as the best neighborhood in the world.

{They have a block party & parade for everything!}

It was our first home,

other than the upstairs of my parents

and we lived there for two really sweet years.

When we moved out and locked up for the last time,

Tyler looked over and saw me in a panic to hold back some big tears.

Not because I wasn't excited to move to England,

but because it felt like a goodbye to such a sweet time in our life.

We re-did this house all by ourselves.

Not because we wanted a DIY- 

but we didn't have money to pay someone to do it.

So we worked hard to blend new with old,

nice with thrifty,

and things we loved with things we didn't...

But thinking back to the memories we had there...

our little house of 1095 sq ft

will always be a special chunk of time to us both.

Yep.

It was in these cozy walls

{that I repainted at least 12 times, seriously},

that I learned that I'm a bigger fan of a happy home

than a well designed one.

Our Christmas Card, 2008

And that's what keeps me smiling 

as I sit on the teal suede loveseat 

in our flat in Oxford.

*pics are from an iphone. sorry they are grainy!