2013-11-23

Welcome to My Kitchen!

Kitchen ~ Main wall
It's time to show off the kitchen!  The shelves are all painted, the kitchen has been cleaned and polished and even a few early Christmas decorations put out!  I'm so happy with how it turned out!  This view is from the dining room door as you enter the kitchen.  It's not a big room, so it's difficult to get everything in one view!

Afternoon Light in the Kitchen
This is from the Studio doorway (which was probably the breakfast nook at one time).  Thomas is happy with the new kitchen too and has been sitting in it all afternoon!  The morning and afternoon light in the kitchen is wonderful!  It's one of my favorite things about this house!

Kitchen ~ Sink Corner
Here is a look back at the sink corner.  I can't guarantee it will always be this neat and clean, but I love how it looks right now!  The hooked rug on the floor was a gift from a friend.  She had bought it to use in her little cottage, but when they renovated, it no longer worked.  It works beautifully in this space and I'm so happy to have it!

Microwave Shelves
The microwave had been sitting in the studio for the past year. Not an ideal situation.  Nice to have it in the kitchen again!  You can see the wiring overhead waiting for the stove hood to be installed.  The hood has lights in it as well, so I'm looking forward to getting this task done in the near future.  I'll need my handy BIL to come for a visit to build the wood surround for it when it finally goes up.

Kitchen ~ Stove Wall
This is looking along the stove wall.  Loving how it all looks!

Tea Corner
The teapot has moved from the studio into the kitchen as well!  It's one of the important parts of my day, so I'm glad to have it in a more convenient spot!  That yummy bread is a Red Bean Bread from Pacific Ocean Market in Broomfield, Colorado.  Each pull apart slice is filled with a tasty sweet red bean paste!  It's one of my favorites!

Cutting Boards
The cutting boards all have a spot on the counter too.  Using them helps to keep my counters in great condition!  My kids give me a hard time about having so many of them, but I use them all!  I picked up the little mouse cheese board in Vermont when I went to meet Tasha Tudor a number of years ago.  Most of the striped cutting boards were made my Brother-in-Law George.  He does beautiful work, not just putting up shelves, but with all sorts of woodworking!  My mother's cutting board is there too, as well as two tiny ones tucked out of view that my Dad made years ago when he was dabbling with woodworking.

Ready for Christmas Baking!
On the Shelf over the microwave, I set up a few things in preparation for Christmas Baking!   It's almost time!  The first Sunday of Advent is only a week away!

Daddy's Silver Bowl
On the main shelves, I was able to use a few items I've had tucked away.  Some old silver plated candlesticks that I've had tucked away and a silver bowl that was presented to my Dad as a thank you for having directed the church choir.

Christmas Dishes
Since it's nearly Christmas season, I thought I'd go ahead and get my Christmas dishes out.  It saves me the effort of redecorating the shelves again next week after Thanksgiving!  The pale green Japanese dishes that I usually use have been tucked away in the china cabinet until after the holidays.

Christmas vignette
At the garden center, I found these cute little LED star lights that I wrapped around two little faux trees.  A perfect Christmas accent!  The little silver bowl is from my Mom.  I always loved it and am happy to be able to see and enjoy it now!  She had so much silver ~ always lovely, but a lot of work to polish and keep presentable!  I only kept a few small things.

Great Grandma Nieveen's Gingerbread Recipe
While scanning photos in the past couple weeks, I found this recipe tucked in among them.  It is from my Great Grandma Nieveen on my Dad's side of the family.  I've made it before, but this recipe is special to have since it's in my dear Aunt Olive's handwriting!  I tucked it on the refrigerator door and am thinking we might have to makes some for Thanksgiving to go with the pumpkin pie!

Irish Blessing
The refrigerator also hold this Irish Blessing, one that I wish for all of you!

2013-11-21

Painting... (or Why I Haven't Blogged Lately)

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Just a couple of months ago, my kitchen looked like this.  I loved the open look of it, but dish storage was in short supply with no upper cabinets!

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My sister and brother-in-law kindly visited in October and put the shelves up that I had designed!  We had trouble getting the brackets to work and they ended up being a bit bulkier than I originally wanted. I wasn't so happy with how the kitchen seemed so much smaller with them up either.  I missed the open look.

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The past couple of weeks, my daughter and I have been working on getting them primed and painted.  How much happier I am with them!  The whole space is brighter and the open feeling is back!  There is still a bit more painting to do as the wall behind them needs a fresh coat of paint now and all the window and door trim needs painted to match.

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The microwave, which has been sitting in another room for the past year will go on the bottom shelf here.  It will be nice to have it in the kitchen once again!

Next post, I hope to be able to show you the kitchen the way it was meant to be... though it still won't be "quite" finished as I still need to have the stove hood installed over the window.  That involves adding some venting through the roof and then a surround built for it.  Maybe that will get done next year!  For now, I need to get off the computer and back to painting!


2013-11-10

Swatches

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I found two types of baby yarn at Hobby Lobby that had a thread of rayon in them.  I bought a skein of each to make some swatches to try and replicate that shawl that my Mom's friend was wearing at her wedding.  They knit up quickly and then I blocked them.

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The shimmer shows up better in this yarn and I like the way the horseshoes look in it, but the yarn feels rather crunchy in addition to being a pain to knit with.

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This one feels much softer to the touch, knits easier, but the shimmer is almost un-noticable.  So far, this is my preference.  Now if I could just find a nice slightly ivory wool yarn with the rayon thread in it.  The pattern needs a bit of tweaking to match the one in the photo, but I think I know just what to do now that I'm familiar with the pattern!  That will be the next swatch!

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I did go hunting through my stash and found this cotton and silk yarn that my mother used to weave with.  I thought I'd give it a try, but even without blocking, I can tell that it's just too uneven for a pattern like this.  Need to find something else to do with this one though!

Blessings and peace to all!


2013-11-02

Projects!

Winter Scene WIP
I've been working on a winter themed painting.  Winter is supposed to arrive here in the next couple of days, but I haven't seen the juncos yet, so it may just be a teaser.

1955.09.03weddingshawl (1 of 3)
While scanning slides, I came across a set from my parent's wedding in 1955.  What jumped out at me (other than the youthful faces of my parents, which I'll share later) was this lovely knitted shawl!  It showed up in three of the slides.

1955.09.03weddingshawl (2 of 3)
It looks to be made of an off-white yarn with a bit of shiny in it.  I love the way it drapes!  What a perfect shawl to wear to a wedding!

1955.09.03weddingshawl (3 of 3)
It also showed up in the background of another photo.  Love the crinoline skirt on that dress!

Horseshoe Knitting Pattern
I'm enamored of that shawl and went looking for the pattern and came up with this in one of my books. The shawl in the photos looks like it has a two stitch garter pattern between the "horseshoes".  I'm going to start looking for some yarn to swatch and see if I can make a similar shawl!

Slide Files
The slide scanning continues!  I'm up through 1970 now, about 1/3 of the way through the slides, I think.  The new slide files came this week and they make keeping things neat and organized a cinch.

Slide Carousels vs Slide Files
Mostly, I love how they take so little space compared to the carousels, notebook pages and misc. boxes the slides have been in.  This entire stack of boxes fits into just over two of the slide files!  Now if I could just figure out what I did with a stack of slides in notebook pages that I seem to have misplaced...

I'm still looking for a good negative storage system.  Hoping to stay away from the notebook page type things as I think they scratch the film.  

Halloween Pumpkins
Have to leave you with a photo of my Halloween pumpkins from a couple days ago!  I hadn't carved pumpkins in years ~ so much fun to be able to again!  The kids loved my Halloween Cats!