A work in progress...

It has been almost a year since we moved into our newly-built little house.  At that time, I was doing dishes in the bathroom sink...we still needed to install more flooring, several sinks, the Jotul stove, doors, and loads of trim, etc.  We are slowly getting there and making progress. For those who have asked, here are some pictures of where we are at today.

After entering the house through the mudroom, the walk-through pantry, closet, laundry area, and a powder room are through a doorway to the left.  The pantry space still needs a tile backsplash and shelving, and the closet door will hopefully be installed soon:

We're thinking of using this marble subway tile:

Just through the pocket door is the powder room:

{We haven't even started on any of the baseboard yet}:

I have some antique brackets and a shelf to be mounted over the laundry folding counter. Underneath I am able to store my laundry cart and drying rack.  The piece of marble was a Craigslist find:

Looking back through the pantry to the mudroom hall and into the kitchen.  Most all of the trim has been installed and painted in these two areas.  Mike added the plank walls using white oak planks leftover from the floors. The pocket door still needs its hardware:

The old flag belonged to my father-in-law and only has 48 stars, probably from his Navy days during WWII ?:

More to see next time--right now it's back to my paintbrush!

Deb

Happy Autumn...

In honor of the first day of Fall, I rummaged through some of the moving boxes upstairs and found the Japanese lanterns, which I have saved for several years. They have gradually been losing a few lanterns and fading--this may be their last year.  I saw the blue-green glass bottle at the thrift store and thought it would make a perfect vase.

The house is moving along well and it now has all its exterior and interior walls. It's so satisfying to see the three-dimensional as opposed to a plan on paper. Now we have a much better sense of the space and have made some changes as we realize certain ideas just aren't going to work as we thought.

This is an old pocket door we found on Craigslist--it's quite large and requires at least two men to move it.  I have been scraping, sanding, and scrubbing this side, and I just finished painting it today.  When I can get someone to flip it around, I will get started on sanding the other side, which I think I will just sand and wax as there is no paint on it.  It will hang barn-door-style in our hallway.

The Eastlake chair is progressing slowly; I realized that the old burlap, springs, and stuffing had to go, so I removed it all, patched the wood as best I could, and am ready to start rebuilding.  I'm following the instructions in my old Popular Science book, How to Repair, Reupholster, and Refinish Furniture .  The seat will be remade with plywood and layers of foam padding, and muslin.

Happy Autumn everyone--I hope your weekend is a good one!

Deb

office chair makeover

Should you ever happen upon an ugly looking, but free office chair, have hope.  With a just a screwdriver, a staple gun, and some fabric on hand, it's the perfect candidate for a makeover.

 

In the midst of spring cleaning the spare bedroom I decided I could no longer live with the shabby-though-free office chair that Mike would sometimes use at the desk there.  It was one of those 'there's no better time than the present!' moments.  I rummaged through the fabric cupboard and came up with an Orla Kiely tablecloth that I found at Target a few years ago, grabbed a screwdriver and my staple gun, and set to work.  About an hour later it was done, and I got back to my spring cleaning.

chair covers, guinea hens, and pottery

  

 

 The other morning, as I was briskly walking the treadmill in the basement, out of the corner of my eye I realized that some one or thing was outside the window...my heart would have raced had it not already been over exerted from the exercise.  I was relieved to see it was only a few guinea hens from next door peering in at me, and who when they saw me, sounded the alarm--hard to describe the sound but it's very loud.

When I came upstairs, Fluffy was most upset about the intruders and was giving them a piece of her mind...

 

 

 

 After a long cloudy winter, we are loving the sunshine.  It has, however, brought to light the fact that some household freshening up is in order.  Now that the couch is finally slipcovered, I decided to recover the seats on our kitchen chairs.  Unbelievably I could not find a Before picture, but they were covered in a natural-colored linen.  The linen had been on for several years and was starting to look a bit worse for the wear.  I decided to go with something a little more bold and easier to clean...

 

 The fabric is Swavelle/Mill Creek Indoor/Outdoor Finnigan Stripe Tuxedo from Fabric.com.  Although I'm not a fan of polyester, this fabric is stain and water resistant and spills can be wiped up with soapy water...time will tell, since spilling here is only a matter of time.

 

While we're in the kitchen, I want to show you the little pitcher I found at the thrift store...

 

 

I only recently found out about this Polish stoneware from Boleslawiec, Poland.  The patterns and colors are gorgeous...I can't believe I never knew it existed!  So, when I was wandering through Goodwill with my 50% off coupon, I was happily surprised so see this deep blue, snowflake design pitcher which soon became mine for $1.50.  Never mind that the matching sugar bowl was no where in sight ~ apparently they became separated at some point in time ~ I love it all the same.

leather coat to leather bag project

It's been almost a year since I mentioned my hope of creating a bag from a thrifted leather coat...and, after a bit of trial and error, here is the result. 
What's left of the coat is shown in the top picture.  The sleeves and back yielded the best pieces of leather.  Some of the coat seams were incorporated into my design.  I added some long horizontal zippers--one front and one back--to join a sleeve piece and a jacket-back piece of leather to form both the front and back of the bag.  I also used some narrow bands of leather to form the top strip and inner facing.
Brass rectangular rings, buckle, and rivets, that I had on hand, were used for the strap--the strap is a thrifted Gap leather belt. 
I'm fairly sure that the lining fabric is a Kaffe Fassett print; I've been hanging on to it for years, waiting for just the right project.
The leather coat was on sale for $5, and I think the leather belt was $1; so, even adding in the zippers, hardware, and lining, I would guess I have spent less than $20 to create a leather bag for myself.  Deconstructing the coat was tedious, and stitching through the leather seams was a challenge, but overall I'm glad I gave it a try.