In December 2009 we moved from Point-St-Charles to Laval. We quickly fell in love with our neighborhood. There’s a few parks near by, the Riviere des Miles-Iles minutes away, bike trails and a great local pizzeria. I’m excited to share a few photos of our space…
We live in a townhouse. We have all the benefits of a home without the maintenance. All our yard work, plowing, and our communal pool maintenance is taken cared of. Our house is split on 3 floors.
On the ground floor there’s a vestibule and a large family room (my sister is currently living there) with direct access to a private terrace.
The first level is open plan. It includes a kitchen, a dining area with access to another terrace, a half bath laundry combination and a huge living room with large windows and a front balcony that seduced us.
In the second level, there are 3 good sized bedrooms, including a large master with a walk-in closet and french doors and our bathroom with a separate tub & shower.
Here’s our floor plan if you’re interested! (Maybe its the designer in me but I’m always interested in how spaces connect!)
Ground floor
First floor
Second Floor
Entry Way
On first impressions: When we first moved from Montreal, we were struck the lack of a community feel in our neighborhood. We chose to live in town homes to be close to our neighbors but everyone seemed to be into themselves! I had envisioned that people would be more welcoming. Our first week we baked a bunch of cookies and introduced ourselves to all our neighbors, some people didn’t even accept our cookies, but some were warm and invited us in. We had to persevere to make it into the community we want to live in. Today I can see we have great friendships in our neighborhood and a neighbor even told me ”Its nice what you and your husband do, we don’t see that anymore”.
Kitchen
Dining Room
On Family meals: I do most of the cooking for our family! My husband hates to cook but he’s a good helper, he’ll shop all our veggies meticulously and he’s great at filling a dishwasher! Because of my husbands crazy schedule we don’t eat meals together during the week, he’s off before our son wakes up and he comes back late in the evening just in time for bath time. It used to drive me nuts, specially that there are a lot of people who say it’s good for a family to eat meals together. I was afraid that if we don’t eat meals together we are not a good family (whatever that means). Instead of fitting into a mold we found something that works for our family, we eat all our meals together on weekends .
Living Room
On using second-hand furniture: Pretty much all of our furniture except in our master bedroom is second hand. By nature I love a good deal and there is nothing better then second hand furniture. This sectional was found on craigslist and was brand new but the seller didn’t measure their space properly so they had to sale it. We bought it at 750$ though the retail price at the time was a little over 1000$!
On painting the walls: Growing up my parents didn’t like colour on the walls. Everything was white! Although they allowed me to change furniture around in the room that I shared with my sister. They refused for me to paint. When I got my first apartment at 21, I went all out and had the oddest paint combinations like navy blue and orange in my kitchen, or pink and gray in the bathroom. With time my color palette has softened a bit! We painted our home with earthy colors, except for my son’s room. We love it!
On keeping plants: We have quite the collection of plants! I love them, they bring life to any room. If you don’t have a green thumb I recommend getting succulents. They are very easy to take care of. In order for me to remember when to water my plants, I simply put a reminder in my Google Calendar!
Master Bedroom
On using white noise: I used to be a deep sleeper until I had a baby that woke up every hour to be fed! Now I am a light sleeper and I swear I can still hear him crying at night in my head! To remedy the situation I started using white noise in our room, we turn on the humidifier and I sleep like a well fed baby!
Main Bath
On displaying memories: With the digital era with live in, it‘s easy to keep pictures saved on a desktop! We make it a point to print out pictures regularly so our home looks like us! The sand pictures in the photo above were taken on our honeymoon almost 9 years ago!
Ezra’s Room
On teaching my son the alphabet: Ever since our son Ezra was born, his name has been inscribed on the wall of his room in a contrasting colour. I would often talk to him and tell him about his name on the wall and what it means (Life saver). I was surprised a few weeks ago when he pointed at the letters and and said: ”E-Z-R-A”! Its often hard for me to see the fruit of the little things I do, but when that happens I celebrate!
My Office
On launching a business from home: I run my home staging and business firm entirely from the third bedroom which we’ve converted into an office. Working from home has been an adaptation, because I’m an extrovert. I miss bouncing up ideas with a coworker! In the beginning I used to turn the television on just to have some background noise but now I am OK with being my myself. The main aspect that I am working on is to be careful that when the day is done, I stop working. That has been difficult!
Outdoor space
We fell in love with this house’s multiple balconies! We have one in the front and 2 behind the house!
On keeping things tidy:
I am well known in my circle to be a neat freak! I grew up in a family where appearance is everything. You are judge by how well you dress and how clean your home is. I also love the idea of control! Cleaning gives me a sense of a quick fix, it’s something I can do and get instant gratification. After becoming a mother I loss a lot of the illusion of control! I have the choice to be a mother that is present and spend quality time with my son, to be an entrepreneur who is creative or to clean something… I choose quality time and creative work! Cleaning still needs to get done but I’m not consumed by it. I went from spending 2 hours a day cleaning to spending 20 minutes a day. Doing a little here and there and having good habits like putting things back in their space and purging every 6 months helps a lot.
I hope you enjoyed my house tour : )
