House tweaking

Unlike many women I know, I'm not into redecorating the house just because it's been awhile since I last did so. First, I find decorating exhausting. There's all the shopping, decision making and spending money. Yuck! Plus, I'm still pretty happy with most of the choices I've made, even the paint colors I picked out 12 years ago. That said, there are a still corners here and there that could be improved.

Take the eat-in corner of the kitchen, for example.

It was functional, but I never loved those framed postcards that I picked up at IKEA a month after buying the house. And the silver frames didn't go with anything else. So I finally replaced them with a Marimekko tea towel that I bought years ago, in an IKEA Ribba frame.

I loved the new art. But while the kitchen table had sentimental value, it was never that comfortable to sit at. While looking for new chairs to replace our broken ones, I found a used small round table with two drop leaves and three chairs online for $75... a good deal. But I immediately regretted the purchase once I got them home because they looked rough in decent lighting. 

Then the boyfriend had the table sprayed white as a surprise and instantly it went from trash to treasure.

My giant 21lb. cat makes this small table look tiny.

I liked the style of the chairs, but they were covered in a faux wood laminate that was pretty hideous. The boyfriend voted for painting them white to match the table, but I wanted to do something different.

I eventually picked out a bright yellow (Benjamin Moore's bold yellow actually) that matches the tiny splash of yellow that in the tea towel and we had them sprayed recently. I love them so much. They bring a much needed bold pop of color in the kitchen.

 

So that's one more corner done. When it comes to home decor, are you a serial redecorator or a tweaker?

Life Lately

The weather was perfect for our mid-week farmer's market, and I picked up some tasty 

heirloom tomatoes, among other things. Oh, and roasted eggplant with garlic is now my favorite.

 Seeing this neon pink zinnia glowing in the garden makes me smile

It was raining during Saturday's farmer's market, but I saw a picture of 

these heirloom cucumbers and for sale and I had to have them.

 I love the way this recycled planter turned out this year. It's bursting with
zinnias, Veronica Speedwell, nasturiums and mallow.

Today we installed the first four refinished cabinet doors. Cabinets with doors!! So exciting.

And Mikko is still doing amazingly well despite a serious heart condition, thanks to his medications (knock on wood, cause I'm superstitious). He doesn't love taking them, and I don't love making him do so, but we manage.

Plus the weather has been lovely. I've had the AC off for two whole days, 

quite amazing for late July in these parts.

How are things for you?

Why the Open Shelving Trend Is Not for Me

I'm ecstatic that its spring and warmer weather is on the horizon. Not just because this means we can stop being cooped up in the house and enjoy being in the garden, letting in the fresh air, etc. What I'm really happy about is that its almost outdoor painting weather. Which means I can stop looking at the scene above every day.

Every single thing in the kitchen cabinets has been on full display for the past six months (almost seven actually) since our outdoor cabinet spray-painting project was interrupted by, of all the nerve, winter. That's since last the end of September. Last September! As I'm more of a "hide all the stuff where I never have to look at it" kind of neat freak, this has been rather disturbing.

All-in-all I've handled it pretty well I think. I haven't murdered anyone, or had any major breakdowns (at least not since I spent a week painting the cabinet boxes). We even had some guests stay for the weekend. But as we get closer and closer to outdoor painting weather I've been itching to see my dishes and food stuffs hidden behind freshly painted white doors. And kitchen drawers! Remember self, when we had kitchen drawers to store stuff in? Oh, the luxury!

In a way, I guess I could take this experience as a great exercise in learning what we really need for day-to-day living. There is a rather large blue IKEA tarp bag hidden in the basement full of kitchen stuff from the drawers and cabinets that we've lived without quite easily for the past six months. I went from one drawer of cutlery and a second for utensils to a single drawer of both, and yet we were still able to cook. As I think about it, I'm not even sure what all is in that bag besides extra dish towels and the remains of the junk drawer.

Another thing the "great open cabinet winter of 2013" has confirmed is something I've long suspected. The trend of open shelving and open cabinetry is absolutely, positively, not for me! When the boyfriend's mother came to stay, she kindly remarked that she liked the open cabinets so much she thought I should leave them that way. While I'm glad that not everyone thinks the current state of my kitchen is as hideous as I do, there's no way I would choose this look on purpose.

Please don't misunderstand, I've seen pictures of some absolutely gorgeous kitchens that feature open shelving  and open cabinetry. What I question is the practicality of this trend. Perhaps if one lives without pets, hair, and has only beautiful dishes and kitchen items, then it's a lot less hassle. But for us, with three cats, one boyfriend, and my long hair, it's a disaster. I've been vacuuming the shelves because there is some hair, and a lot of dust everywhere. Do people dust their shelves and cabinets every week? Because more cleaning and maintenance is not my idea of fun.

I've also had two open shelves ever since I've lived in this house. I use them to store my decorative-only collection of vintage Pyrex. And they are purely decorative in part because you would need to to scrub them before every use due to the dust and sometimes bits of grease that find them. They look nice from far away, but I always hope visitors don't get too close and wonder if all my dishes are so sketchy. (They're not, pinky swear).

Readers, I'm curious, what do you think of this trend? And if you have open shelving in your home, how has the maintenance issue been? Do we just live in a freakishly dusty and furry house?

Cabinet Painting: Gun, Brush, or Roller, Choose Your Weapon

It's a lovely 60F day in Ohio in early December, and I'm glad it's raining. Why? So I have an excuse not to spend most of the day sanding and painting cabinet doors, guilt free. When colleagues and friends ask what we did over the weekend and I reply, again, painting cabinets, their overwhelming response is, 'you're still painting cabinets?' Yes, yes we are, and we've still got a long way to go-- at least five more coats on some doors. ARGH! I just want the doors to be done and back in my kitchen already.

Of course I have no one to blame but myself. This is what happens when you start a painting project in fall that has to be done outside and you live in the northern hemisphere. With the short daylight hours and the late fall temps, we're only able to paint one coat per day if we're lucky.

We could be done by now if we'd (a) started earlier or (b) were willing to paint the doors with a brush or roller, which could easily be done indoors, anytime. I tried to brush and roll the doors, I really did. This is part of what made this project take so long. First I tried Benjamin Moore Advance paint, because I saw rave internet reviews about how well it self-levels while still being water-washable. I brushed it as carefully as possible, tried rolling it with three different kinds of mini-rollers (they don't call me a perfectionist for nothing), but we weren't that impressed with the results, especially not for the price.

Then we tried Cabinet Coat, which leveled much, much better. On a small area with a carefully applied brush  Cabinet Coat looked almost sprayed on. When dealing with an entire cabinet door we couldn't quite replicate those results, but it was still an improvement over the Advance. I figured the painting application issue was resolved and we started moving forward.

Then we had a chance to borrow and try an airless paint gun from friends. You can read more about that here, but basically, the airless spray-painted results were amazing, but so was the mess caused by the overspray. After seeing the smoothly-painted surface achieved by spraying, however, the idea of going back to brush marks was very unappealing. Luckily, the boyfriend was able to borrow an HVLP gun from work, and finally we had our answer.

In the meantime, while between borrowed paint guns one day, I tried a hybrid solution. I rolled on primer, which we could do inside before spraying the finish coats. That was a DISASTER. I used those little, white high-density foam rollers that other DIYers rave about. I must say, I don't get it. The results were just awful. Am I just super sensitive to the texture rollers cause or am I a rolling buffoon? I don't know, but the resulting texture on the doors resembled the peel of an orange and it took 80 grit sandpaper and an electric sander to get all that blasted texture off so we could re-spray them. If I wasn't able to spray paint the doors, I would brush them, no question. Those little white foam rollers are pure garbage.

these are the devil - avoid them at all cost

So when it comes to painting cabinets, for best results, my solution is:

• Spray-paint with an HVLP
• Use Cabinet Coat
• Don't wait until fall

What's your recipe for painting success? And if you love those dastardly foam rollers, what's the secret to using them?!