Saying Goodbye to 2013

It's been a long time since I've been here to write anything at all..  I was taking a much needed break.   I won't bore you with the reasons why, let's just say I had too much on my plate and needed a rest.

Today is New Year's Eve and other than the obvious "let's party and celebrate" the day means different things to different people.  A lot of us are deciding what our new years  resolutions will be.  Personally, I find this is  a good time for reflection. I've been thinking about the past year and taking stock of what I accomplished and what I didn't quite get done.

I had two goals this year.  I was going to start a  blog and I wanted to be chemical free in my home by the end of the year.   Well I started a blog.  I've let it slide a lot in the last few months so I think it was only a partial success.  I am going to try a little harder to keep it up to date in the new year.

 On the subject of a chemical free home I am happy to say I think its been a great success.  As I look around I feel quite a sense of pride in the products I've been able to replace with more eco friendly choices.  And I know what I'm cleaning with and what I'm putting on my body.  I can pronounce all the ingredients now,  because I choose to use them.  I'm not pouring a lot of poisons down my drain and wearing them in my clothing.  I make whatever I can myself, and pay a lot of attention to what I buy that I can't make. Wild crafting and essential oils have become the norm here.

I recycle, reuse and repurpose whenever I can now, and have learned to compost every single thing that can be put back into the earth.

So Yeah.  I can sit back tonight, relax with an egg nog ( and rum :) and know I've done my part, however small.   I think I've made a great start and  it's been a lot easier than I ever would have dreamed.  I'll share my favorite DIY products and how they work in the coming months, but for now....

Have a good day everyone.  Bye for now and have a safe and happy New Year's Eve.  

This Weeks Treasures 3

Found at the CURB

Most of the yard sales for this area are over for  the season, but lucky for me there are still some curbly treasures out there.  Hubby and I went for a drive this morning and decided to head to a nearby town for some breakfast.  On the drive back I spied a bunch of  doors  and windows in front of an old motel that was closed down. We had already passed the driveway when I spotted "Free" painted on one of the doors. Well you know me enough by now to know I got really excited and I couldn't get hubby to turn around fast enough. We had been to a   re-store on Saturday and the cheapest solid wood doors I could find were $50 so this definitely warranted some investigation.

 What an incredible find.  Here were four Solid wood doors, very old, very chippy and very beautiful.  Two of them even had the glass intact.
And a bonus, a motel style double headboard. 
Unfortunately the windows were rotten and unsalvageable. 

See the pretty trim board below the window on the pink door. And the mail slot cut out. 
Fabulous.
I wish I had taken a picture of them before we got them out of my Escape.  They wouldn't quite fit so they hung out the back about a foot and we tied the back door down with the cord out of a hoodie. They do say, "Where there's a will......" 

 I have been looking at projects made from old doors recently  and am really excited because now I can actually make some of them :)




Bye for now.... and have a good day everyone.

A dining room buffet makeover

I've recently done a few pieces of furniture that I have for sale in a beautiful antique blue colour that I absolutely love. 
My buffet and shutters in my dining room needed a makeover so I mixed up a batch of my homemade chalk paint and got busy.

 

The shutters had been painted in a green that matches my backsplash but that needs a makeover as well .
My wonderful daughter in law gave me the buffet recently,  but it was dated and in desperate need of a pick me up.








 
I use this area for storage and a coffee bar to save space in my tiny kitchen.

First I got some help from hubby to lift  the buffet onto my work table and  remove all the drawers and doors. I had no intentions of being  belly to floor with a paint brush in hand trying to paint the bottom edges.

After a good wash to remove any grease and cleaning agents I got busy painting.  This is the outside after the first coat. It only needed 2 coats because this paint has awesome coverage.

I wanted to paint the inside as well. I will be using this piece a lot and the lighter colour will make it easier to find things.   And to be honest it will inspire me to keep it tidier as well :)

 
 
 
 
 
 
 

 

 Much better.

 

 

 

 

I took the handles off the doors and raised them off the work surface by setting them on a few plastic bowls.  I painted the hinges because I didn't want them to stand out.

 

 

I painted the body  with a lighter shad of the blue, by adding 1 part blue to 3 parts white.  I used the full  blue for the top of the buffet, the door fronts and the shutters and shelf.

 

I got the mirror at a yard sale a few weeks ago and thought it would look good here. 

 




I only reused one set of shutters instead of the solid shutter wall I had before.

 

Here's the buffet all finished. After painting I gave it two coats of paste wax to protect it.

 I really want to get new  handles, but can't find ones I like so for now I will use the originals.

 

 I've decorated with a few of the items I had on the shutters and shelf from before.  

 

I don't quite think I'm done with this yet. 

 

 

 

I love these little glass jars I got at a yard sale.   And of course a chocolate and a vanilla candle will make everything smell awesome as well.

 

 

Just a bit of what's on the top shelf.  The tins were my grandmothers. The dark blue tin always had buttons in it and the light blue one still has a little label on the lid that says ribbons and bows.  Memories of grandma's sewing room at the end of her hallway linger with the tins

.



And of course I love the old mason jars, one is a Ball and the smallest is a Crown .











I have a small collection of old wooden rolling pins and a few pieces of old style kitchen tools.  I'm considering the shutters as a display area if I can find a new home for the old family photos. And maybe a nice large piece of subway art between the shutters. What do you think?









WOW!   I'm not even done with this project and I'm already trying to figure out how to change it up. Oh well. It's really a lot better than it was.  I'm really happy with the buffet and that was my main goal here. I love having the extra storage space too.  All in all  I think it was a well spent weekend.



Bye for now ... and have a good day everyone.
 

Back to school lunch choices

This post is a bit out of the norm for me but I really wanted to share this. 
I saw this post for a really great idea for back to school lunch prep that allowed kids to choose their own lunch and snacks each day for school. 
I remember from the days when my own boys were still in school how frustrating  it was when their lunch boxes came home half eaten because they weren't happy that day with the choices I had made for them.  I also remember how hard it was to get them to eat healthy from a packed lunch. 
This post is about a way to let your kids pick their own lunch and snack items and still know they are getting a healthy balance of food items.  It also means they might actually eat their lunch because they picked it themselves. 
I know a few well organized moms who do up a ton of food choices on the weekend to make lunch making easier through the week, but why not take it one step further and actually let the kids pack their own lunches.  This method lets them do that while still maintaining the control over their diet that you need to keep them eating healthy.
An added benefit of this idea..... it helps develop good decision making skills. 
 
I recommend this post to anyone with kids.  Just click on the highlighted words above to read the complete post with the instructions.


Bye for now ... and have a good day everyone.

This Weeks Treasures 2

The long weekend in September means different things for different people. End of summer vacation and beginning of school being the  main one.
For me I love that it's a huge yard sale weekend.  People tend to put out things they have a hard time letting go of. But now  its the last chance before winter and if it doesn't go now it's  a long time until the next big yard sale weekend.  Around here that's usually the long weekend in May.

Here's what I brought home this weekend. Actually I went to a few places and got a head start by picking out a few things during the previous week.

I brought the table in this picture home on Tues evening because I knew it would go early if left for the yard sale scheduled on Saturday.  I think the word is out that I'm looking for stuff to do over, otherwise I wouldn't have heard about this one. It's really nice to get the inside scoop. :)

This coffee table was a pre- yard sale  purchase as well.  It's very old pine and still in good shape. I think this one is a keeper. We have been looking for the right sized  table for it seems like forever.

I found a bunch of little wooden craft projects at one of my first stops on Saturday morning. Of course they need some attention and maybe some re-inventing. 

And this home made rack for holding 2oz. craft paints was almost a steal.  The lady that had it  said her husband made it for her but she wasn't painting anymore. And it came with all the paints you see here. I hope she knows it has a good home now, where it will be appreciated every time I choose a paint colour for a project.  This piece is definitely not for resale.

You can never have enough shutters.  I think that should go without saying.

And this stash of windows and crates I found at a single stop.  The top crate is for bottles of HP sauce and someone has written on the side "for Haliburton". Probably the original delivery instructions. 










So... what do you think of this weeks finds?
Did you find anything wonderful this weekend?


Bye for now ... and have a good day everyone.

Little desk and message center.

I can't wait to show you the  message center in the corner of my kitchen .. It didn't start out as a planned project,  but for some reason it just ended up as the perfect pairing.  Does that happen to you too?  Things just seem to go together naturally.

First I fell in love with this little yard sale desk set.  It's very petite by todays standards, but it's the regular height of a modern desk and chair. It was made in the early 1900's long before we needed extra space for all of our electronics. Back then people still wrote letters .





It had some little scratches  on the desk top and the chair was broken at the top cross bar.  A little Gorilla glue fixed up the chair and the hole was filled with some wood filler and sanded.

 
 
 
Just look at this seat,  its hideous.  It is definitely going to need an update.

I painted this set in my favorite (right now) colour, and after a little distressing and wax I thought  it was looking quite beautiful. 

 

 

And the damage on the chair? Can't even tell where it was.

 

 

Isn't this a pretty colour? It's no wonder I'm hooked on it right now.  :)  It's such an improvement over the dark brown finish and those horrible harvest gold flowers. 

 

 

Take a look at this stash of stuff again. Do you see those rectangle shaped trays piled on the desk. There are four of them and they are truly ugly, and cheaply made. 

 

 

 

A coat of blackboard paint and some paint on the boarder to match the desk set and look at them now. It's cool how you can turn almost anything into a blackboard now.

 

 

 

 
 
 
 
 
 
There were four of them so I labeled them according to what I needed most.  I actually missed  a shower invite on the weekend which inspired one of the labels. I won't forget another invite again.

 

And here they are in their new space, doing a wonderful job of keeping me organized ...... If that's possible. Just enough room inside for my daycare schedule and a phone book.

 

Of course all my pieces are for sale, but I won't be too sad if this one doesn't go for a long time.

 

 

Bye for now.... and have a great day.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 



Giving an end table new life.

Last weeks treasures post had a picture of this really great mid century, barrel shaped end table. It was one of the reasons I was so thrilled about my finds. Every thing I picked up that day was really good but this was a perfect jewel. Except for the finish.

 

 

It had such beautiful details on the bottom edge and on the legs, as well as such pretty little feet.

 

 

 

The door has this great chicken wire detail along with just the perfect hardware.  I absolutely fell in love.  It went straight to my work room from the truck. All it needed was the perfect colour.

 

 

I started by removing the hardware and giving the whole piece inside and out a good wash with some vinegar and water.

I mixed one part blue paint with three parts of white and made up my chalk paint mixture.

Then I painted the inside with the lightened blue. Have I said how much I love this colour of blue.  Once the inside was dry I gave the outside, including the chicken wire, a coat of this lightened blue mixture.  It's easy to paint the wire but you must use very little paint on the brush to keep it from clumping up.

Once it was completely dry, about an hour, I gave it a second coat of paint.  The main part was the light blue mix, and the door and top were painted with the original blue. The finishing touch was a coat of natural paste wax. And of course the hardware.

 

 What do you think?  Isn't she beautiful? 

 

Using 3 parts white with one part of the original colour makes it easy to do any piece in a two tone like this.  There is never any worry of the two colours not going together.

 Because the chalk paint mixture is porous it takes the paste wax really well and buffs up to a nice soft shine.

 













Bye for now... and have a great day.

River stone Hot Plates

I love these little hot plates I made from river stones.  Such a country thing to have in your cottage kitchen, or in any country themed décor.


I picked up a handful of these little 8 inch straw mats at a yard sale this weekend. You see them everywhere and no one really knows what to do with them any more.

My dear hubby installs flooring and river rock is really popular in showers now so there are always little unused pieces of the flooring leftover from jobs.  It comes pre glued to sheets for installation, and being the hoarder I am he brings the bits home and I take all the little stones off the sheet and save them.  Free craft material... gotta like that.

I haven't done anything using my glue gun lately and I knew it would be so much better than waiting for glue to dry.  I decided I wanted the first one to be darker stones so I separated light from dark and arranged them onto the straw mat. 

Once the arrangement was ok I glued all the stones on the mat. These stones are for the bottom of a shower so they are kind of flat and very smooth.  They are meant to be nice for your feet.  The bonus is that a hot pot will sit on a flat surface.

When I was done I did the same with the lighter stones on another mat.









Here are my hot plates finished. Aren't they cute.  I love how they turned out. Very  beachy cottage chic. What do you think?






Bye for now... and have a great day.

This weeks treasures 1

Have you ever been so excited about something that you couldn't wait to do it,  kinda like a kid on Christmas morning?  That's the way I feel about the ideas I have for repurposing this weeks finds.

This piece was given to me by my wonderful daughter in law. It's doors match the cabinet doors in my kitchen.  I've been looking for a  cabinet to use as a sideboard  in my kitchen makeover so its going to be a perfect  fit. 

Hubby and I went on a yard sale cruise Saturday morning and found these really sturdy maple chairs.  I'm not sure yet whether or not I'm going to paint them.. they do need a good clean up and some new covering on the seats. 

At the same sale I picked up this beautiful side table with storage.  Its lines were so beautiful and the chicken wire on the door was perfect. I could picture her   finished before I even made an offer.  Of course she went straight from the truck right to my work table.  What a marvelous way to spend the rest of my weekend.


The very next sale filled up our truck and put an end to our yard sale shopping for the day.  I spotted these antique beds and was so excited I could hardly contain myself.  We had to take everything out of the truck and repack to fit it all in.

These pieces are at least a hundred years old and the turned posts  have a pretty, unique shape.  The side rails are wood as well so there are extra pieces to work with. The metal pieces that attach the rails to the ends look like old square barn nails,  at least the ones that are left do.


I've never come across anything this old before.   The rails are to damaged to be fixed and the beds are an off size so they don't fit any mattresses today,  so I won't try to restore them as beds. 
Instead I see two of the most fabulous benches I can imagine. What do you think?


Bye for now.... have a great day everyone.