7.19.2010

the ugly duckling shade

Happy monday friends! I hope you all had an fantastic weekend. Ours was full of ... absolutely nothing. It was bliss. 

So as I mentioned when I revealed our landscaping, there was a reason it took me so long to show you the after pictures. You see, I spent a weekend laying bark dust (mulch? Can someone please tell me the difference?!) in anticipation of showing off my lovely new yard. That following Monday Chris mowed the lawn while I was still at work, so I set off for home to take pictures of my beautifully manicured lawn. When I arrived home though, much to my dismay, I found THIS:


Um, ew?! And yes, the first thing out of my mouth reflected *um, ew*. Friends, it's a outdoor shade. It came with the house. And my lovely husband decided to install it because ... Honestly, I'm not sure why, out of all the years he's owned this house, he decided to pull this dirty, old blind out of it's super-secret-to-me hiding spot. But he did. What's a girl to do? Well, pout of course. And not take photos of my beautiful front yard with that blindingly awful SHADE drawing all the attention. How could you possibly concentrate on the beauty of my Japanese maple, with that in the background?

And then a miraculous thing happened. Summer decided to arrive (which was miraculous in its own right!) in the NW and temperatures actually reached 100 degrees. For my little west-facing, no-insulation and no-ac home, this makes our upstairs pretty darn unbearable. The crazy part? This little ugly duckling shade pulled through in a major way and kept the house cool. And then I fell in love.

So I did a little research, and it turns out Home Depot sells these! Who knew? Okay, probably people in states like AZ. And, they come in a variety of colors:



Next year, we're so upgrading. And, most likely installing them on all the windows on the west and south sides.

So, my non-ac friends. How do you keep your casa cool in warm weather? I'm always on the lookout for new tips!

1 comment:

  1. it's a good thing it was useful. Alas, I don't have any cool your house tips :P

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