Sunday, July 31, 2011

Vacation=Getting it Done

  As the beginning of August approaches, that means one thing for me----VACATION!  This year we are not really taking a vacation, but instead have decided to stay home and try to get the new house put together.  We have already gotten a jump on things around here, and today one of my projects was attempting to get things a bit more organized around the kitchen.  Because we have so many jars around the house, I decided to make use of them with this fun little project.  I started with some of these,

and some of this.

I took the lids off of the jars and painted just the center piece.

I applied one coat of the chalkboard paint we purchased at Lowes, and put the lids out in the sun to dry for about an hour.  After they dried, I applied a second coat and returned them to the sun.  As I was on my mission to organization, Adeline hung out on the kitchen floor on a blanket,

and Leo was outside dismantling the very poorly installed stairs the previous homeowner left behind.

After the lids had dried, I began to fill all of my jars with the things from around the kitchen in need of new homes.


After filling all of the jars I labeled the lids with the chalk I bought at O.S.J.L. for only 20 cents!  I am extremely satisfied with the finished project, and in love with the organization in my kitchen!



  Since getting the kitchen organized was my mission for today, while Adeline was napping this morning before church, Leo and I also installed these, purchased a while back during a trip to Ikea.


On the shelf are some bowls and spoons we will start using tomorrow when Adeline has food for the very first  time!  We have been waiting to change her diet until we got the OK from her Dr. because of the weight gain issue we were having, and we are positive that after tomorrow's appt, a normal diet will resume.  I have already gotten all of the ingredients to begin making her rice cereal and other foods from scratch, and I cannot wait!

Sunday, July 10, 2011

Cucumber Extravaganza

  So yesterday, thanks to Maegan, I was introduced to the art of pickle making.  Neither of us had ever attempted this before, and since we have both become obsessed with attempting to make/do everything on our own and from scratch, we decided to get together and make a couple of cucumber related delicacies.  This idea was made possible because of the amazing deal offered by her local farm share who is currently offering 20 lbs, for $20.  Yesterday happened to be the day we could both get together, so Maegan and I with the help of our long time friends, Cheryl and Kelly conquered pickles and relish.

  Because Mae supports the effort of keeping local business alive, she purchased all of the materials needed from her local hardware store.  This included items I had never seen before such as one of these,

and these


  Even though a few of the tasks were quite tedious, the whole process was actually not very difficult.  Cheryl was the lucky one who acquired the labor intensive job of finely chopping all of the relish ingredients, and I was assigned the task of snipping fresh dill.  Sounds simple right?  It takes a lot of snipping to fill a cup and a half with teeny tiny dill particles.  Over all the process was quite rewarding and we all ended up with jars of pickles in our fridge waiting for the perfect moment to be eaten.



Wednesday, July 6, 2011

Home Sweet Home

  It has been quite some time since I have written here and there has been lots of change over the past few months.  We have been living in our new house for nearly two months so I figured I should take some time to go through the house room by room.  We will start in the kitchen.

So this was the kitchen when we first visited the house, these pictures were stolen off of the realty website.  :)  Notice the wooden ducks on top of the cabinets.  Fancy.
  As you can see, there was also no stove.  Thanks to my father who gave us the money to buy a new stove as a house warming gift, that empty hole you see is now filled with a five burner gas stove that cooks like nothing I have ever cooked with before.  :)
More ducks!  There is however, a nice slab of granite over there around the sink.
  The kitchen is great, very spacious, but the decor left nothing to be desired.  So after a warm coat of almond paint, we decided to tear out the the 1990's flooring which revealed beautiful, warm, wood floors.

  What a difference the floors made in the kitchen, it looks like a completely new space.  Now, to address the cabinets, which actually are very nice, I just added some new knobs to take away the country vibe.
On the bottom are the old knobs, and on top are the replacements.  Just a little swap makes a world of difference.
  You probably noticed that there is not much counter space in this old 1920's house.  All we had when we moved in was the small section of butcher block next to the hole where the stove now lives, and the granite on the sink portion of the counter.  To address this problem, we bought 2 units from ikea and put them back to back in the middle of the kitchen.  We love them!




  We have since gotten stools to go under the table portion of the island, and added curtains and a new ceiling fan to the space.  I can now say that I love my kitchen and all of it's character.
  Because we have not really done much in the dining room, I will add it to this blog.  The paint color in the dining room was fine, and the floor had already been redone.  All we bought for this space was the rug, everything else is stuff we had from the condo.


  We also replaced the glass, and blades from the outdated ceiling fan, and still plan to replace the knobs on the lovely built in.  
  So that is the kitchen and dining room so far, and I will end this blog with a picture of the view of the deck from the dining room.  This picture was actually taken in the middle of the tornadoes.  I was trying to capture the eerie yellow color outside, but it does not really show.  Either way, you can see our deck and the wonderful fenced in yard.
Thanks for reading!