Toaster Oven Cover

When I shared our latest kitchen updates, I mentioned that I had asked Ron to make a cover for the toaster oven. One of my decorating practices is to hide ugly stuff, and although my toaster oven is not particularly ugly, I think this new faux apothecary cabinet is much prettier! 

The plan was to add a bit of color to the kitchen. Ron applied an undercoat of black paint with the idea that I would then paint it some colonial color (barn red or my favorite Quaker Green) and distress it. But when we put it on the counter, I really liked the black! 

I did a small amount of distressing, applied a coat of Miss Mustard Seed's hemp oil, and left it at that. 

Who knows? I may end up painting it another color some day. (Or maybe not.)

I am happy to have another house-y project checked off the list! ✔

Kitchen Progress and a (Long) Story About Paint Colors

On Monday, I started a series of collected quotes and thoughts about growing older. So many of you had thoughtful things to contribute to this discussion. If you have not read this post and all of the comments, maybe you'd like to catch up? And feel free to add your own thoughts to the discussion! Then come back this next Monday for the another quote in the series.

Update on the kitchen: The new space where the wall oven once was is completed! It feels soooo good to have another project checked off the list.

Remember, it started like this  . . .

and then it looked like this . . . 

and now it looks like this!

See the difference in color? The microwave section is painted in the new color.

This is what we've come up with for the shelf under the microwave. The box on the left is a reproduction apple box, given to my dad by a salesman. (Daddy was a grocery store manager for many years.) Inside the box is my collection of my great-grandmother's cookbooks. On the right is an old mincemeat firkin that once belonged to Ron's grandfather. We store Pinky's canned cat food in the firkin. #hideuglystuff  

By the way, thanks to those of you who offered suggestions of what to put on the shelf. Many of you thought it would be a good place for cookbooks and I agree! The problem is that I have my "pretty" cookbooks in a wire basket on the bottom shelf of the island and we like how they look there. The other cookbooks (the ones that are not pretty, including a couple that have scorched spots where I laid them on a hot burner . . . yikes!) are not fit for adorning this shelf.

Who knows what you'll see there in the future! I am still thinking about baskets or more antique boxes. I have also considered cake pedestals or pitchers or a collection of dishes. I have been known to tweak. 😉

Speaking of tweaking . . . let's talk about that paint color, shall we? 

(Click away if you don't have time for a long paint story. No problem.)

Once upon a time (it hasn't even been two years ago!), we moved into Pineapple House and begin dreaming about updating the kitchen. Six months after moving in (and after painting the living room, dining room, and both girls' rooms), we began our very slow remodel of the kitchen.

Color #1 : Inspired

We peeled the wallpaper off the walls, and commenced to paint the walls and trim of the east and west ends of the kitchen (cabinets are between). We planned to paint the cabinets later on in the project, but they would be the same color as the trim so we carefully chose the color for this big job.

Bekah and I (Bek is my "house-y" partner. She loves house-dreaming. She was just a small girl when she started oohing and aahing over house plans and she'd pore for hours over the homes in Southern Living magazine. But back to my story . . . ) had fallen in love with a kitchen in Nora Murphy's online magazine and we thought that paint color would be perfect. It was Old White by Farrow and Ball. I sent for a sample can, tested out the color on the side of a cabinet, and we had the paint mixed. We painted the windows and doors, crown molding and baseboard. It had a hint of a greenish tone (I thought I had a stone/grayish off-white color), but I decided to embrace it and it was good. 

Color #2: A Happy Accident

I had learned to love Old White in our kitchen until Ron made the interior shutters for the windows. One evening, he hung the finished shutters and painted them. But the next morning, the shutters were a different color than the rest of the trim! Oh no!

What in the world had happened? Did the paint darken while it sat in the can? Did something happen to the paint to change its color? It was quite a mystery! We pondered and puzzed over what could have made the change. We were ready to take the paint back to the store and explain what had happened, hoping that they could shed some light on what had caused the change.

However, before (thankfully) we went to the store, it dawned on Ron what may have happened. He looked more carefully at the paint can and realized that he had picked up a can of exterior paint. It was not the kitchen paint at all. Rather, it was the paint for the trim on the outside of the house! Good grief.

But I liked the "new" color better. Oh no.

Color #3: Third Time's a Charm (OR Three Strikes and You're Out!)

Fast forward to about one year later. Ron was working on the new space for the microwave. He had to cut out a narrow strip of wood and add some molding to frame it out. As he sanded his work, the paint that was on the outside of this cabinet began to peel in huge pieces. Ugh. We knew that there was no way that we would be able to use this same paint to paint all of our kitchen cabinets. Cabinets get heavy use and we needed something super durable.

We were going to have to buy new paint. We decided that we would switch to Benjamin Moore which we had used on our cabinets at The Farmhouse. It had been a durable paint with a hard finish. 

Ron said, "I hope that they can match this color perfectly."

And I said, "Ummmm . . . "

Oh no.

The longer that I had lived with the beautiful sage-y grayish green on the trim, the less I could envision it on all of the cabinets. Cabinets are on both sides of our galley-style kitchen and that would be a lot of green. I imagined that we would grow tired of it after a while. And so . . . since we had to buy new paint anyway . . . I hesitatingly suggested that we get a different color. Then I quickly suggested that we just think about it. (The look on Ron's face made me suggest the "let's think about it" part.) 

In the end, we all decided that a change was in order. Ron confessed that he really didn't love the green anyway. If we were going to change colors, now was the time to do it. 

We chose Linen White by Olde Century Colors. At the Benjamin Moore dealer, it was difficult to color match so we went with one of their colors that was almost identical. The Ben Moore color is Kangaroo, but I just can't wrap my mind around a Kangaroo-colored kitchen, so I will hereafter refer to it as Linen White. 🤣😁

This week, we have been (re)painting the kitchen in Kangaroo Linen White. We hope to finish it on Saturday. That is, finish painting over the "happy accident" sage-y grayish green. 

This is only one of a number of paint stories in our history! Does anyone else have crazy paint stories . . . or is it just me? 

Library Closet Makeover

Our first project of the year was re-configuring the closet in the library. 

{Read ~here~ about how we transformed our fourth bedroom into a library.}

Since this room is no longer a bedroom, we needed the closet to serve the room as we are now using it: a combination of library, school room, and office. 

First, we removed the clothing rod, then Ron added another shelf all the way across, doubling the storage. (If we ever need the library to be a bedroom again, we will simply remove the new shelf and put the clothing rod back in.)

He also added an outlet so that we would be able to put the printer and the shredder in this closet, behind closed doors. (I am all about "hiding ugly stuff.") Finally, we painted the whole thing antique white. 

On the left side of the closet, adjacent to the desk, we put the filing cabinet and a metal basket with copy paper. On the new shelf is the wireless printer, shredder, and electric pencil sharpener. The top shelf holds decorative paper, card stock, and construction paper, as well as a few scrapbooking supplies.

 

On the right side of the closet, a plastic drawer unit holds craft and office supplies. Puzzles for tiny tots are on top of it. The new shelf holds lots of "grand" supplies, like coloring books, colored pencils, crayons, other art supplies, and more puzzles. The top shelf has some of our school supplies.

The closet makeover was a pretty quick project, but it made a big difference in how this room functions! You'd never guess how much "ugly stuff" is hiding behind those closed doors! 

And now the kitchen project continues . . . 

New Media Cabinet

Here is our brand spanking new media cabinet, homemade by my hubby! 

We hadn't been at Pineapple House a week when we purchased the TV stand below at a bargain basement price, but we knew then that it was a temporary solution. 

We had plans (but not time) to build something that would house all of our media components: TV, blu-ray player, iPod, Wii, DVDs, CDs, etc. Whenever possible, I like to "hide ugly stuff" so I wanted a cabinet with doors. I also thought our room needed something tall, because most of the furniture was the same height. 

When we rearranged the living room in August, we knew that the time was right for this project! So after Ron completed the project he was working on (making shutters for the living room windows), he got to work and created the cabinet I saw in my mind's eye! 

See all the "ugly stuff"? I love that it's behind doors when we're not using it.

The television is mounted on an extension bracket. It can come out of the cabinet just a bit and it can be angled toward the viewer(s). 

A few years ago, I was looking for a way to store our collection of DVDs and CDs which were taking up way too much space. The solution was to ditch all of the cases (eek!), put the discs in paper sleeves, categorize them, and store them in these media baskets. 

My solution may not be for everyone. In fact, I had to do a sales pitch here at my house! But if we need to know any of the information that was on the case (the year the movie was made, who the actors are, etc.), IMDb is there at the click of a mouse with all of that and more! 

Full disclosure: A few movie cases were squirreled away because the owners could not bear to part with them. 😉

The original plan was to paint the media cabinet the the custom color I had mixed for the smaller TV stand. I asked Ron to paint black as an undercoat . . . and then I liked it, so black it was! 

(I think the color reads a little blue in these pics, but it is really a true black.) 

And so the last project on our "Pineapple House living room" list has been completed! 

Changes in the Living Room

So what happens when you "shop the house"?

You get to furnish and/or decorate a new space without spending a lot of money. Like we did when we created our library from our extra bedroom. We pulled the wall cabinet from the dining room, the desk from our bedroom, and the wing chair from the living room. We purchased very little specifically for the library. Other than the materials (wood for the bookshelves, paint, overhead light), we only bought a rug and a mail tray.

But . . . you also create some empty spaces in those rooms from which you pulled!

• To fill the space in the dining room where the wall cabinet had been, we shopped the basement and brought up three framed botanical prints that had been in The Farmhouse dining room. They may or may not be there permanently, but they're fine for now.

• To fill the space in our bedroom where the desk had been, we also shopped the basement and used a table that Ron had made for The Farmhouse living room.

• Alas, there were no wing chairs in the basement. So we went shopping. Not in the house. 

Here is our new chair-and-a-half . . . thanks to the library project!

We went searching for a traditional wing chair, but Ron was sold on this chair-and-a-half due to the increased seating options. Two kids, maybe even a third little one, can sit comfortably. Certainly an adult and a child. Even two very slender adults. I must admit that I had reservations, preferring the more traditional look, but now that it's here, I do love it.

I was happy with how it complemented the other furniture in the room.

But then . . .

On a Saturday that Ron was out of town, the girls and I rearranged the living room.

Bekah and I had tried a similar arrangement a couple of months ago, but there were things we just couldn't figure out so we moved it all back. But I kept seeing the sofa on that other wall (loved it there!) so I kept mulling it over. This time we had another set of eyes (Kati's) and we had all day, so we pulled and hauled everything around again and moved and tweaked some more and we got it!

Here is the wall that I envisioned. (I need to lower that mirror now that the sofa is on that wall. It's funny how photos make things obvious. Have you ever noticed that?) 

Ron has completed one set of shutters for the living room windows! (You may have noticed the two different window treatments in the photos above. We're getting there . . . ) 

Another angle . . .

And then on the opposite wall . . .

As we finished the reset of the room, we made a dash to a local antique store. I remembered seeing a pine drop leaf table there and I had tucked it away in my mind . . . just in case!

It was still there and it had an incredible bargain basement price: $49! When I told the lady who was working that day what I wished to purchase, she said, "I am surprised it hasn't sold before now!"

I love having a more open feel in front of the picture window. It draws the eye to the sun porch and to the back yard. The table also provides a place for seasonal decorating.

A few more changes are in the works.

• Ron is working on the second pair of shutters. 

• I am planning to paint the fire screen black. (That was one of my summer projects, but I never got around to doing it.) 

• Ron is also going to build a taller cabinet for our television this fall. The current media cabinet was intended to be a temporary fix, but with the new living room arrangement, the time is right for this project. Ron will mount the TV in the cabinet with an extension bracket, allowing a greater viewing range. A taller piece will also provide balance with the other furniture in the room. And the doors can be closed when the television is not in use. (Remember my policy of hiding ugly stuff whenever possible?) 

Then the living room will be finished.

(Or will it? Because is anything ever really "finished" if you like house-y stuff?)

Has anything changed at your house lately? 

Media Cabinet Makeover {DIY Paint Color}

At The Farmhouse, the television sat in a place that was designed for it: between the built-in bookshelves, in front of a window.

But we couldn't bring the built-in shelf along with us, so we were in a quandary about where to put the television in the new house. I was so excited about having a fireplace and mantle, and I wanted that to be the focal point of the room. I did not want to ruin that space (and miss all of those decorating possibilities) with a screen. Before we moved, I arranged the furniture over and over in my head (finagle the book shelves to accommodate media? set the television on a table with the other "stuff" on an old wooden box or a stool underneath?), but nothing seemed right.

We eventually decided that Ron should build a tall media cabinet, with doors to hide all the "ugly stuff" when not in use. But...we have projects galore, and this one would need to wait.

Then Kati's eagle eyes spotted this piece at a barn sale.

Yes, it was turquoise (which is a lovely color...but not with my decor!), but it was $49! Sold!

We brought it home and set up all the media components, put the baskets of DVDs and Wii remotes inside, and there it sat for several months waiting to be transformed (and sticking out like a sore thumb). 

I suppose it was okay that it took me a while to get around to it, because that gave me time to choose a paint color. Black? Tan? Barn red? Red over tan? Red over black? Tan over black? Green? (Yes, I really did consider all of those options.) Then one day I saw a photo online of a blanket chest painted in a brownish red and I loved it. Later that same day, I visited a friend and she had a jelly cupboard that was also brownish red, and I knew that that was the color for my media stand. The only problem was that I didn't have a paint strip or a color name to go by.


Here's what I did:

1) Got out a bunch of my craft paints.

2) Mixed and swirled on a paper plate until I had several possibilities.

3) Painted the possibilities on a wooden paint paddle.

4) Took my paint paddle to Home Depot (I clearly marked the chosen color on the paddle) and had them use their spectrophotometer to create a paint in my very own custom color!

I felt like a bona fide decorator...and you can too!

Do you have anything that needs a paint makeover? Have you ever considered creating your own paint color?