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peek into the private areas upstairs:
Click for Translation We eat dinners and watch tv here. One day, we will hopefully expand its use as an office for Tom. And, someday, its furnishings might move onto the back porch off the living room, if we ever get the porch glassed in and heated. That would allow this room to become a real bedroom for guests. (In the meantime, the couch is a sofa bed with a halfway decent mattress.) In case you were here before, yes, we just changed the couch... it's a new sofabed. We've also added a new wide-screen tv in a large size, so we can better read the sub-titles of all the foreign movies we so love. The wall color is taken from one of my kimonos from Okinawa. We had two single beds here when we first painted it. Then I inherited some of my parents' furniture and decided to get the sofa bed. We intended to re-paint the room in taupe when we got that; but, we just never got around to it. No drapes yet, as a result. Since replacing the sofa, we are quite satisfied with the walls "as is." This room is primarily furnished with the pieces I inherited from my parents' home... I mainly chose their pieces from the orient for the wonderful memories they elicit of my youth on Okinawa. These include a teak wood Hong Kong chest, a set of teak nested tables, and a teak secretary desk, which Mom had custom made while we lived on Okinawa, plus a pair of bench-made (in Kentucky), American Colonial style, cherry wood, end tables from her 1937 dowry. (She sold the canopy bed and banquet size dining table and chairs long ago; so, this is all that remains of her dowry.) Atop the secretary is a small collection of my mother's miniature ivory sculptures and netsukes, plus a pair of cinnebar vases from Hong Kong, a pair of opium lamps and a brass hibachi from Okinawa. She ran a gift shop on Okinawa, in the early 1950s, which gave its profits to the orphanage for Okinawan war orphans. Some of these may have been gifts from Okinawans. Other things were picked up on her and Dad's trip to Hong Kong. I might get around to adding some photos from her collection later. Meanwhile, I have been preparing some photos of "my island" ... check the Index page for "My Island Paradise!" Atop the Hong Kong chest is a Korean wedding box, a gift to me from my father, when he came home for my wedding to Jim, during his tour in Korea, in the 1960s. I also have the beautiful, Korean wedding kimono which he gave me at the same time. I must photograph that sometime! Also here is a large, carved teakwood jewelry box of my mother's. It still has pieces of jewelry from three generations of women in our family: from my grandmother, my mother, and from me. My favorite photos of Mom and Dad were taken at Mother's college graduation dance, just before they married. Above
the couch are pieces of Florentine gilt wood, which I picked up on
my first trip to Italy in 1967. To continue
upstairs... To
return to Index, Page 4, House
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