Farmhouse Love Episode 11: Kitchen/Dining Room

Well hello there! I was starting to think I'd never get back here to do this blog post for the kitchen and dining room which I started on back in March and finally finished in June.

We've been living in this house for just over two years now, and you might recall that this is what our kitchen and dining room looked like when we first got the keys.

I loved a lot of things about this space from the very first time I saw it. The biggest being the size. This is the most counter space we have ever had, and boy do we make use of it.

Of course there were things that I didn't like as well, but almost nothing that couldn't be fixed with some time and money.

The very first thing I did after cleaning and unpacking, was to replace the hardware on the cabinetry. The handles and knobs were wood and collecting all kinds of dirt and grime that couldn't be cleaned.

I was itching to paint this space since day one. I would gaze at the walls while eating my breakfast every day, imagining different colors on the walls.

Most of this house started out with this tan-beige color. I don't hate it, but I'm craving more cool colors for this house. I picked Sherwin Williams' Repose Gray for my neutral throughout the house, and with each room I paint, I'm convinced that I made the right choice.

Down the road I'd like to stain the upper cabinets a darker color, and possibly paint my lower cabinets. I haven't decided for sure on what color yet. I've entertained the thought of painting at least the island red and antiquing it, but I don't know if I can pull the trigger on that one yet. It's kind of cray cray, even for me.

And honestly, Peanut Head tolerated my kitchen chair refresh, but I don't know if he has it in him to let a red island slide.

I cannot wait to replace the countertops with some sort of solid surface, maybe granite, but it is definitely not in the budget right now. What was in the budget was the subway tile backsplash which I installed over the course of two weeks in March and June.

The previous backsplash didn't go all the way up to the cabinets, and it was not a first rate job. It made me so twitchy, I couldn't stand it, so I was anxious to start demo and get rid of it.

Here it is. Nope. I do not miss it one little bit.

What I wasn't expecting was for the wall to come off with the tile during demo. It was a nightmare of a job, and it took me a couple days just to get rid of all the old tile.

It was pretty cool to see the second window that I just knew used to be in Zoe's room before the addition was put on.

Thanks to YouTube and all the nice people that took the time to school me, I learned how to replace drywall.

I am by no means a professional, but I'm extremely anal so I am pretty happy with the end result.

The tile is going to help me tolerate the countertops until the girls finish college in nine years or so. Crossing fingers that I don't have to wait that long, but it could happen and I'm prepared for the possibility.

I'm going to have to wait even longer to replace the flooring in this room and others. Honestly, I'm afraid to even get an estimate for it at this point because I just don't even want to know.

In the meantime, I'm happy with changing the things that I can afford to change. For example, paint is relatively inexpensive and it makes a big difference. 

I just have to hold back my crazy side because I gravitate towards loud, bright colors. And I'm still catching flack from Zoë Bug about the kitchen chairs.

The window wall was painted in Behr's Shimmering Pool. I love this color because it's bright, but not overpowering. And it makes me happy.

Peanut Head gave me the outdoor ceiling fan for Mother's Day. It's so fancy, it has a remote. I don't have to guess which chain pull is the fan and which is the light because there aren't any chain pulls. How cool is that? On the other hand, if we lose the remote I think we're screwed.

Do you see that little tray on the edge of the kitchen table? That's for Peanut Head to put his crap in when he walks in the back door. He's always putting his dirty gloves, hat, glasses, etc., right on the table and the placemats and it. Drives. Me. Over. The Edge.

This tray is me giving in to the putting of the crap on the table. And it works . . . sometimes.

Other times I wrestle with myself to "Let it Go!" while taking deep, calming breaths. Because really, is it that important?

The first step is admitting you have a problem, right?

I have a problem and he doesn't listen to me.

Just kidding. Peanut Head largely tolerates me. I get away with soooo much.

Just look at my kitchen chairs.

Family Ditch Day. It's a Thing.

Living in the country has been full of new experiences for us. Last week, Peanut Head proclaimed that we were going to have a Family Ditch Day in the upcoming weekend.

At first I was just stunned into silence because, honestly, that does not sound like a fun day.

And I was correct. It was not a fun day. However, it was the nicest weather day we've had so far this year. At one point while we were moving the 17,689 tumble weeds out of the ditch for the second time, I was giving myself a little pep talk wherein I said "I am not going to complain about being hot. I am not going to complain about being hot."

You might be asking why we even need to clean out the ditch, and I'll tell you, because that was my first question. I mean it's a ditch, right? How fancy does a ditch have to be?

Well, since this ditch is how we get water to flood irrigate our pasture, it has to stay clear.

And just because you clear out the ditch doesn't mean it will stay that way. It's kind of like cleaning your house. You can't evict your tribe just to keep it that way.

This is the ditch after removal of the multiplying tumbleweeds.

My Zoe Bug is little, but she is mighty.

As you can imagine, Peanut Head was the Task Master for the day. Most of the day the girls and I were working together and he was off working in another area.

That was a good thing because we did a fair amount of whining. I'd see Peanut Head coming and I'd whisper shout "Shush! Don't let him hear us whining. He'll get mad and give us more work."

So we'd put on our happy faces and ask him what the next task was. One time I let slip a little "Your Highness" and I was scared for myself for a few seconds. It's like it was out of my mouth before I even knew it was coming.

It's so hard to control the snark. Even in moments of extreme danger.

This was one of many loads of tumble weeds which I lost count of quickly.

The only good thing I have to say about tumble weeds is that they burn very, very well.

And fast. It's really quite fascinating to watch.

No pyromania here.

One of the jobs the girls had was to walk the field and pick up rocks, while I drove around and waited for them to put the full buckets of rocks into the ATV trailer. I had the cushy part of that job.

Then we had to walk the buckets of rocks into the corner of the property where Peanut Head was using them to shore up the eroding portion of the ditch.

Sadly I couldn't even carry one bucket without making some very unladylike noises and hobbling forward a few inches at a time while leap frogging the bucket as I went. After thirty seconds and eighteen inches of this, Stinkerbell rolled her eyes with a huff and impatiently took my bucket away from me.

She's a big show off. 

This is just some of Peanut Head's handy work. Thankfully we did not have to carry any of these rocks. Peanut Head humped all those in by himself, and then some. Ooh-rah!

Stinkerbell can back up a trailer like nobody's business. I have tried and tried and tried to learn how to do it, but so far I have been an abysmal failure.

Zoe Bug kept trying to sneak in little breaks wherever she could. I really can't complain because she's a very hard worker.

This was a little over the top though. She was supposed to be opening the gate for me to drive through. I really need to get a big air horn mounted on the ATV. It can sit up there with my pitch fork, don't you think?

In the end, Family Ditch Day lasted about nine hours. It was nearly the longest day of my life. I almost cried.

It's over though, and Peanut Head was very appreciative for our help so I guess it was worth it.

He doesn't need to know how much whining we actually did. What he doesn't know won't hurt him, right?

Farmhouse Love Episode 10: Home Office

I'm a tad bit behind on my home improvement posts as this room was mostly finished between Thanksgiving and Christmas.

If you can picture it, this was the original kitchen in the formerly teeny, tiny farmhouse. It's actually part of the reason I fell in love with this house, because I could envision it as an office or a sewing room.

That window used to look outside, but then two additions later, and now it looks out into the garage--not a pretty sight on the best of days. Although it is somewhat useful for warning me when Peanut Head arrives home, so I can leap to my feet and pretend like I've been busy and not sitting on my buttocks the whole time he was gone.

I don't know why I do that. It's not like I'm not allowed to relax. It must be a list maker thing.

And now he's going to know because I put it on the internet. I feel so much lighter now.

I've dreamt about how I would paint this room and what colors I would use. I was surprised myself when I finally put the brush to the wall, on account of I kept changing my mind about every little thing. In the end, I'm very happy with how it ended up.

As you probably noticed right off the bat, there is too much "wood" in this room. The floor is actually laminate, but it competes with the bead board, which I happen to love. I could get down with new flooring, but I can't get down with the required funds for new flooring.

I really struggled with painting the bead board, even though I love it and I knew I would love it. I just couldn't turn off the voices of my great grandparents in my head, telling me that I should never paint wood. I pushed through it, but I still feel the guilt.

I love the white on the bead board. I think it looks so much better now. In fact, the pictures don't do it justice. The bead board had a lot of gaps, holes, and wonky alignment issues which I was able to camouflage with caulking. Once that was done, I came in with paint and covered all that mess up. If you haven't experienced the magic of caulk, you must become friends. It hides so much.

You might have noticed that we took the ceiling fan out and replaced it with a booby light. The ceiling fan scared me because it was so rickety and wobbly. Also, the light it provided was extremely inadequate.

I'm using both of my IKEA Expedit units in the office. I love them so much.

I used cabinet paint for the insides of the shelving which used to be the kitchen cabinets. It's supposed to hold up a little better than regular paint and provide a more durable finish.

This view is looking outside from inside the office, towards what used to be the original dining room. Now it's mainly a pass through area to get from the elderly part of the house to the young part of the house. Yes, I'm personifying my house. It's my baby. 

As I paint each room we've been changing out all the electrical switches and outlets from beige to white. We're also using rocker switches for the lights, and putting some lighted switches in some areas.

Peanut Head was doing it all for me, but with the office and sewing room he taught me how to do it myself. Again. He's taught me before, but I have Goldfish Brain. And did I mention that I'm terrified of electricity? It's one of my nightmare causes of death. Right up there next to burning alive and drowning. 

Peanut Head helped me turn the window into a gigantic magnet board. I've been obsessing about doing this for over a year. You can't imagine how happy it makes me to have this thing up and doing its thing.

Here's how we pulled it together.

First, Peanut Head cut a 3/8-inch thick piece of plywood to fit inside the window frame. We chose that particular thickness in order to position the magnet board to meet the existing window trim, so that everything would be all matchy-matchy.

I then bought a sheet of 18-gauge galvanized steel, cut slightly smaller than the dimensions of the plywood. The plywood is 35" x 36-1/4" and the steel is cut to be 34-1/2" x 35-3/4." Basically I deducted 1/2" from each dimension so that I would have a quarter inch border all the way around the steel sheet. I did that simply to avoid having sharp edges flush with the plywood. Because if danger is near, I'm a danger magnet, and I really would like to keep all my digits.

I bought the piece of sheet metal at Vernon Steel in Idaho Falls. I just Googled sheet metal in Idaho Falls, and then I went to their website to see what they carried. When I visited their construction trailer office, I told the nice gentleman who helped me that I was making a magnet board, and he walked me into his office to show me his magnet board. It was gigantic! I had magnet board envy. He schooled me on magnet boards and helped me with my order. I went in on my lunch, and I was able to pick the cut piece up after work.

I have to tell you, it was super dirty when I picked it up. That's because the metal has an oily coating on it to keep it from rusting, and because of that, dirt sticks to it. It gave me the willies to touch it. When I got home I cleaned it as best I could with paper towels and windex, and then I cleaned it five times more with rubbing alcohol. The alcohol removes the oily residue. Magnet Board Man told me to do it.

Once it was clean, I covered it with cotton fabric which I pre-washed and ironed. Then I sprayed the sheet metal with fabric adhesive and stuck the fabric to it. After adhering the fabric to the front of the metal, I sprayed the corners of the back of the metal and tucked the corners of the fabric in.

Then I folded the sides in last.

The next step I do not have a picture of, but I stuck the fabric wrapped sheet metal to the plywood with construction adhesive. I'd show you a picture of the adhesive I used, but I used the whole tube, and that was a month ago, so it's long gone. Basically I went to Home Depot and found a person in an orange apron, told him what I was doing, and he schooled me on the various adhesives and their benefits. Since I was adhering the metal to the plywood before installation, it was going to be on a horizontal surface until it dried, so I could go with a cheaper adhesive. If I were adhering it onto a vertical surface, it would be a little more expensive because it then has to fight gravity.

I left Home Depot with my adhesive and popped it in my caulk gun when I got home. Friends, it was an unsightly, gooey ooze, let me tell you. It was the color of snot when you have a sinus infection. It was grody. You should thank me for not taking a picture of that mess.

After spreading the adhesive all over the plywood, we positioned the fabric covered sheet metal onto it and squished it down. Then we strategically placed 300 books atop every square inch of that thing and left them there for three days and three nights. At least.

The final step was to pop it in the window frame and secure it with small trim pieces, which Peanut Head cut to size and routed with his router. I don't know if that makes sense, but basically Peanut Head made his own trim pieces with his router.

I love, love, love the end result.

So now my office is done, and I'm this close to finishing my sewing and craft room too. It's all painted and about 95% unpacked and organized. I'm not a fan of the effort required to finish projects. I much prefer starting projects. Finishing them usually involves yucky stuff that I procrastinate because I don't wanna.

I will conquer procrastination though! Just wait.