Famapa of my funny eye: Show & Tell Home Tour

Meet Famapa of the pretty blog my funny eye. Famapa is a full-time mum to 6-month-old Omar and a part-time blogger.

Today, Famapa gives us a Show & Tell Home Tour inside her home in North London.

Come on inside ...

Famapa, tell us a little about your family and your home.

Our home is a 1,657 sq. ft. (154 sq. m.) Victorian house in North London, where I live with my husband (who works as a Director of Photography), our 6-month-old son Omar, and our cat Little Mo.

The house was built in 1901, but unfortunately virtually all of the original features have been stripped away by previous owners. When we moved in, all the rooms were painted a very respectable creamy white, which we lived with for the first year.

Over time we’ve put our own playful stamp on it. I say playful as it doesn’t feel like a particularly “grown-up” house; there are toys everywhere and they’re not even Omar’s! My husband collects vinyl toys, which are on display throughout the house. As for the neighbourhood, we’re very lucky to live in a kid-friendly and relaxed part of London with lots of green spaces, which we enjoy daily.

How do you approach decorating in your home? What's the most important thing?

For me, the most important thing is beauty in the details as well as comfort, warmth, and cozy lighting. I’m a firm believer that everyday objects can be beautiful. Every time I go back to Stockholm (where I’m from), I buy small knickknacks for the house that I can’t find here in London, things like graphic trays, tea towels, and posters.

I also have a very Scandinavian aesthetic that manifests itself in a love for bright and graphic patterns; I think they liven up the home.

It’s pretty inherent of being Scandinavian that lighting is important, which is why I prefer dimmer lights (I loathe overhead lighting). It means that a room can instantly feel cozier, and I also burn a ridiculous amount of candles. I guess it’s those long dark winters up north that makes us Scandos obsessed with them!

You have a new baby boy, your first child. How does his STUFF influence the look and feel of your home?

Apart from lots of baby necessities like the bouncy chair, baby gym and play mat, I’m quite surprised by how little his stuff has spread through the house. Having said that, just because you have baby stuff, it doesn’t mean it has to be ugly. You can still get a funky high chair for example and fun things for the nursery.

I love how Omar's room turned out in the end. There was no great plan for how it should look other than I thought that pale grey walls with splashes of colour would be nice.

As it happens, it has a sky theme (by pure coincidence), with lots of clouds, airplanes, rain drops and Space Invaders dotted around the room. We joke and say he might become a pilot or a weatherman as a result!

In which room in your home does your family congregate most often?

It feels like we spend most of our time outdoors these days, but it would be a draw between the kitchen and our living room. Our kitchen leads out to the garden and is a suntrap all year round, so it’s a very cosy room to be in.

The living room on the other hand is where Omar gets to roll around, and we tend to spend our evenings there.

Great design can be expensive. How do you get the most bang for your buck?

I’m a real cheap skate, but I don’t have the patience to scour flea markets for bargains, which are hard enough to find in London anyway. We’ve actually been very fortunate in that most of our big furniture has been hand-me-downs.

The rest of our stuff is mostly from IKEA or eBay.

Tell us about the best deal you have gotten lately for your home and love.

Our best deal by far (not including the hand-me-downs) is the set of Eames chairs we have in the kitchen that I found on eBay. They were about £300 for four, which is cheap on this side of the pond!

 

What is your most important everyday ritual at home?

At the moment, it’s breakfast. We’re weaning Omar so whilst he has some purée, we all sit down and eat together at the kitchen table.

You are a part-time blogger and you take a lot of photos. Do you have a room or space of your own?

We have a small study that my husband used when we moved in, so it’s full of his bits and bobs (mainly toys!). I’ve since taken it over as that’s where I blog and edit my pictures. I’d love to make the space more personal to me, but it doesn’t feel that important.

I do find it funny that I’m surrounded by lots of little figures watching me work!

What household chore do you hate? Any household chore you love?

Sadly I don’t enjoy cooking very much. I say sadly because I love food. It definitely feels like a chore.

I’d say laundry is my favourite though; there’s really nothing to it, especially when I don’t bother with the ironing haha!

 

In your home, what is one indulgence you give into?

A huge TV with surround sound and a memory foam mattress. We don’t go to the cinema often so we watch a lot of DVDs and after years of waking up with sore backs, we finally bit the bullet and splashed out on a fancy mattress last year. It’s amazing!

Wait… that’s THREE indulgences!

What are your favorite stores to shop for home?

I would say IKEA, occasionally Habitat and in Stockholm, I get little trinkets from Designtorget and Åhlens. I’ve also got a few things off eBay.

What Home & Garden blogs or websites inspire you the most?

I like otis & frank, DosFamily, reykjavik fragments and Mamamekko.

***

To read more from Famapa and enjoy her photos and snippets of her daily life, visit her blog my funny eye. You may also see more Show & Tell Home Tours.