Ten years – My Living Room then, now and what the future may hold

Our living room is the intersection of our home. If you want to go upstairs, you have to go through the living room. If you want to go out to Lodi’s room, my game room, the main floor bathroom or our guest bedroom, you have to go through the living room. And you enter the room from a whole other entrance entirely. Not to mention the six foot glass doors that take up one wall that go out to our deck and the massive stained glass window on yet another wall. This all adds up to what is absolutely the most challenging room of the house when it comes to furniture placement.

But it is also the largest room of the home which is why my grandparents’ chose it as their living room as well. There are no other spaces on the main floor wide enough to accommodate a full living area. So, here we are with what might be our largest room, but also our most challenging.

When I initially wrote this post I dared to exclaim that there is simply only ONE spot a tv could possibly go!

And my brain apparently took that as a challenge… By the end of that day I was standing in the middle of the room with a tape measure and Lodi looking at me with concern lol.

A tape measure in my hand can mean just about anything!

We don’t need to keep our sofa (of course) but it is a very typical sofa size so, even if we did replace it, if it fits, something else will fit too.

And our L shaped sofa is getting us just about the most seating possible out of our living room.

I also love that its great for extra sleeping and just plain old lounging. If one of us is feeling under the weather making a bed out of that sofa and our upholstered coffee table takes all of three minutes and its pretty darned comfortable too.

Lodi helped me measure and my mind was blown.

Our sofa table (and the shortest arm of our sofa in front of it) will fit perfectly on the wall where the tv is now between the chimney and stairwell. Then the long arm of the sofa would be in front of the French doors making a “hall” between them to our staircase and the second floor.

Will we then have to walk all the way around our sofa to go upstairs? Yeah but I’m pretty sure we can live with that lol.

One thing that has always bothered me is furniture in front of windows. Sometimes there is just no choice and I thought that was my issue here too, but moving the sofa will get it out from in front of that beautiful stained glass window.

So, where would the TV go?

The wall with my great Grandma’s quilt turns out to be plenty big enough to hang a TV!

The quilt could then just move to where the TV is now.

The wrench in the plan: There is currently no electrical on that wall. I would have to patch in to the bathroom outlet on the other side. Not a big deal… but still something we would have to get done.

There’s lots up in the air right now that we just won’t know until we move some things around. As always, a plan is great until it hits reality.

We just don’t know if we’re going to want anything else on that wall beneath the TV.

The wonders of streaming means all we really need is a TV and an outlet. Entertainment centers are becoming something from the past which means we could find another home for my Grandma’s beautiful buffet.

Even though the buffet would actually fit perfectly beneath our TV on that wall…

But there are options!

Right now the undefined “bonus” space between our living room and kitchen is doing nothing for us. Currently it houses a corner cabinet that my grandparents’ made and a rocking chair we never use.

It may just make a lovely spot to put our buffet! And the little corner cabinet my grandparents made can go to the back corner of the living room where our big blanket ladder is now. (The blanket ladder would have to move anyway.)

The buffet may also work on the wall where the sofa is now beside the stained glass window…

Lodi had one request, “Can we get a new rug?”

Yes, hon, of course we can lol.

I also really sweetened the deal when I told him we could get a new TV too.

Does our TV work? Yes it does.

But does it also weigh about a thousand pounds? Yes it does.

Its also over 15 years old so its like the first flat screen that ever came on the market lol.

TVs today are so inexpensive that I’m willing to set my frugal self aside just knowing that once we take that heavy thing down we will NEVER have to hang it again.

Of course we could hate the new layout once we get everything arranged but the room needs a good spring cleaning anyway and, to find out how we feel about it, we really only have to move the buffet and the couch… I’m excited!

This space gave me the opportunity to do something I had never gotten to do in my adult life.

Pick out, save up and purchase a large piece of furniture all on my own.

I love all of the heirlooms and antiques that comprise most of my furniture, I can count on one hand anything purchased new here. Even the few things that I didn’t inherit are all either from the salvage depot or estate sales.

I’m still adamant that they don’t make things like they used to and I have a very low opinion of most new furniture on the market today… HOWEVER.

Picking out a new sofa was pretty sweet!

It took me months of browsing Amazon to find the right one and then several more months of saving so I could buy it straight out. I was so excited! It was my gift to myself right as I was repainting the walls and refinishing the floors in the entire living room.

I had just met Lodi then too and he helped bring it home with me.

After everything I had gone through with my ex and living here alone for years (being totally broke) being able to afford a big piece like that was an incredible moment for me.