The second floor. This is really our floor. It has Gogo's room, the family/entertainment room, and master bedroom.

We're now on the first floor. This is the future home of the dining/living room and the fantastic kitchen.

When we first renovated the living room, we had picked out a color called "milquetoast" that was very plain beige on the swatch. By the time we got to painting the living room, we were exhausted with renovations. The painters first got paints that were the same number from a different paint manufatcurer. It came out very dark olive green. David came home and said, "wrong, wrong, wrong!" The next day he came home and they had painted a panel with the rigth color, but on the wall it came out very peachy. I didn't say anything because I figured David would tell them the color was wrong.

There is much confusion as to how the floors are numbered. The architect somewhat decided it for us by calling the first floor the ground floor and the second floor the first floor. This is how it's done in France - and now that we live in such a fancy building, we always have to be aware of how things are done in France. By the way, this is Benji's floor.

Keith's Office (aka The Anti-David Room) has been done in a 70's/Blaxploitation theme. I found some fantastic vintage wallpaper on the internet, a lamp from E-Bay, and pulled out the Pam Grier movie posters that David had never let me hang on the wall.

The third and most confusing floor. It was split into a million rooms when it was a dormitory. We've taken down many of the walls.

So here we are. 218 W 15th St. Formerly the Bowery Mission Women's Home. To our east is a Catholic nursery. To our west is a building similar to ours, but broken into a million tiny apartments. David said that during the demolition, several people stopped by and said how happy they were to know that the house was being used as a family residence again. I guess those Bowery Mission Women were not the best neighbors.

Here are photos of what our house looked like before we gutted it. I wish I had kept the original photos. These web versions seem quite small now. But alas, I can't find the large versions anywhere.

The first night of the fire, we had to stay at a hotel. Luckily, the W Hotel at Union Square accepted dogs.

Shortly after finishing the new kitchen, we saw a commercial for Martha Stewart. We were stunned to realize that we had unknowingly (I swear!) built Martha Stewart's kitchen....except we have a better countertop. But in terms of "look and feel" Martha and ourselves are in agreement. This is either very good or very bad. After spending any amount of time in the kitchen, you will be forced to agree that we nailed it. Especially on a summer day, the doors open to the backyard, everyone hanging around the island without me having to yell, "GET OUT OF MY WAY! I'M COOKING." You will soon forget you are in Manhattan. Let's take a tour through the kitchen with David, shall we?