Simplify.

Every once in a while I get an itch to go shopping and get something new.  It only happens a few times a year (I don't like to shop) and I recognize that 9 times in 10, what I really need to do is clean out my closet, or clean and re-organize some part of my house- whichever is tempting me to roam.  The answer is usually that I need to simplify, not multiply.  I always feel better when I do, I appreciate what I have more, and then if I do run into something awesome sometime, there's a place for it.

Last week I woke up and decided I was a little tired of my kitchen as-is.  So spur of the moment, I drug everything off of the counter/cabinets (I just reorganized the insides of the cabinets earlier this summer, for the same reason).  When you get the itch, you just have to surrender to it.  It's like working out.  You're always glad you did it once you're there.

It took a whole day, and some of the stuff that was waaaay up high was super dirty, but I felt so much better when it was done.  I didn't realize how much it had been irritating me. 

I got rid of a boat-load of stuff I didn't need anymore.  Mostly it was things people had given me that I felt obliged to keep.

While I worked in the kitchen I had Grace and Patie clean out the bench at our table.  For years the kids had it filled with table activities- puzzles, crayons, etc. that they could use while I was making dinner and needed to keep an eye on them.  They're older now and we've fallen out of that habit. 

So,  I told them to sort it, clean it up, and find a place for it all in their school room.  Grace loves to organize and tidy things up, Patience loves to take things apart and put them back together- and they both love finding those "lost" things that inevitably pop up when you super-clean.  They make a great team.  Lily and Hudson love being left to their own devices all day.  Win-win.

Now I am using it for easy-access to candles, napkins- entertaining stuff. I'd been wanting to get to this for a long time. 

My kitchen is spruced up and way cleaner, I feel better, and I didn't buy anything.  In fact, I have a lot less, and it feels great.

Thrifted.

Almost everything in our house was given to us, or came from a clearance shelf, thrift store, or garage sale.  When our kids were younger and my house was not yet fully "in order", I went out thrifting and to garage sales at least once a week.  Now I'm not finding I need that much time to escape the house be by myself.  Also, our house is sort of "set" now- I spent several years finding simple, useful pieces of things that would last a long time and now here I am.  I just don't need anything, so I don't need to go looking.

Now I just run to thrift stores when we need something specific, like new jeans, boots, etc. or new seasonal clothes.  So, not more than a three or four times a year, really.

But this morning I had the itch, and Grace and Patience came along.  Girls after their mother's heart, they love combing through a thrift store.  All of it.  Not just the kid stuff.  This is the key, people.  You have to enjoy the hunt.

We found some great things, and Grace got herself a new pair of golden ballet flats and a new sweater.  Patience found a new pair of pajamas.  The entire purchase was just over $30. 

Now this afternoon Jim and his parents took the kids out rollerskating.  I have the house to myself, my windows are open on an unseasonably warm day, and I spent the afternoon drinking french press, listening to a live performance of Don Giovanni from the Met on MPR, and blogging about what I found.

Here are my little finds.....

I found two sets of hug mugs and saucers and I will add here that I wanted these so badly about two years ago around the holidays but couldn't bring myself to buy them in the store.  It was meant to be.



I am always on the lookout for wooden trays and bowls- they're awesome for entertaining, along the lines of these.  I found this really great tray that will be perfect for bread, olives, nuts, or candles.  I was so jazzed to find it and it was only $2.99.



(Case-in-point: In the photograph above you will find a half price television, two clearance picture frames, a gifted vase, a flea market iron cobbler's tool, a thrift store cobbler's wooden shoe-thing, and all of this sitting on a free dresser.  Oh, that picture frame on the wall was free, too.)



I also found a super-warm twin-sized wool quilt.  Another thing I'd really been wanting to find somewhere- I was hoping to sort of change up my bedroom a bit and subdue the colors somewhat, without spending a lot or changing much.  This is why I finally finished this project- and I think this quilt really works in here.



It has a cool V-shaped pattern that I loved.

(OK- just for fun I'll mention...the round mirror was $20 from a flea market (even years later I remember the prices of things I got a good deal on.  They are like trophies.)  The prints you see in the reflection were free, the lamp was $8 new, the vase was thrifted, the bed, mattress and side table were all free, the bedding was clearance, so was that little brown pillow... the sheets are clearance too, but those are newer.  I just got them this winter at Target.  The IKEA tray...I paid full price for that.)



Lastly, I found a cute little belt, which, coincidentally, looked great with what I was already wearing.



It was a good day, and it's not over.

Finished.



I have been meaning to finish this project for....three years. 

Some of my Audubon prints (taken from an old and moldy family book.)  On the wall.  That's all I needed to do. 

18+ 4 broken $1.50 frames from Michaels, a headache and a pain in the neck later, it's done. 

The frames were a pain, but they do look nice, especially from a distance.  And the prints look exactly as I wanted- together, in thin espresso frames against my grey walls.  Nice and big impact.  Pretty low-budget.

Never, never, never buying those frames again!

The Wall.

The goal for these boards is to have one place where our whole family can know what's up for the week, what we're eating, and read messages, quotes, etc, that will change randomly.  I thought it would be fun since Grace and Patie are both more than able to read "anything" now, and Lily is working on it, so I thought they'd like the idea.  They really do- they've been really into it, which makes me happy and glad I went for it.

Also, I had the idea that I could take a snapshot of the board every week, for archiving.  I think it will be fun to look back on.

Blue.

One of my goals to finish by the end of the summer was to paint this dresser blue.  Well, it's been a goal to paint it for a long, long time.  But I made it a priority to FINALLY finish it before school starts.

I went back and forth on the new color for a while- between a deep, burned orange and blue.  Any friend I asked said they liked it as-is.  I really like this color too, but couldn't make peace with it with my current curtains, which are a taupe/olive faux silk.  I really, really liked those as-is.  At first when I painted the dresser, I'd thought those drapes would go to my bedroom, but then that went a different direction, and I really like them where they are so....the dresser needed to change.  It wasn't a glaring problem, or I would have done this, say....2 years ago.

So, the back and forth, and then I saw this and this, and my mind was SET on the blue-  I like this blue, but have almost nothing in that color, and it will really pop well with the types of colors I typically have out.  It's interesting, but not crazy.  Seasonless.

So.... to finish it quickly, and cheaply, and try out the new shade, I used spray paint- Krylon Oxford Blue in Satin finish.  (I've spray painted before with good, lasting results.)  The entire project took three hours (including all the drying times between coats) from start of dismantling the dresser and contents, to putting the stuff back in.  This is my kind of hands-on project.

The only thing I would do differently is not apply the clear coat afterwards, which dries unevenly, no matter what I do, any time I use it.  Apparently it doesn't reliably do what it's supposed to do, or, I am doing it wrong, despite following directions.  The paint looked best before I clear coated it- but since taking these shots, I "sanded" the clear coat down a bit with paper towels and that actually helped a ton.

This is what the dresser looked like originally, when I saved it from the trash.

This is how it looked yesterday...

And three hours later....

We keep useful and ugly things inside, like a drawer full of DVDs, a drawer full of kids' games, and a drawer full of Wii remotes and games, etc.

Dining Room

I've been aiming to change up my dining room wall for a long time.

I wanted to add a large-scale chalkboard, and begin extending the gallery wall in our living room into the dining room- just the beginning stage- so it can grow and evolve over time.

You can see what used to be on this wall here at Pinterest.

And you can see this pin board for the things that inspired me as I decided what to do with the projects I've done lately, as well as the after-shots.

I ended up with this (please excuse the non-artistic wide angle shots from my point and shoot that you are about to see....)

In the future, I can write all kids of things up there- quotes, a menu, notes and messages, whatever.  I like that there are two and they are divided- I can use them as one, or do two different things.

See, I'm wanting the wall from the Living Room to flow into the Dining Room, with room to grow and evolve over time, eventually rising higher and bridging the gap above the doorway up the vault...

I also didn't want to spend any money on these projects I've been doing.  Other than the chalk boards, so far so good.

This is my Mom's rolling pin, which she barely used, but I have fond memories of it (and pie crust) when I was young.  I used my picture-hanging kit and attached a claw hood to the back of it so it's secure on the wall.  Originally I didn't know how I'd display it, then I saw this and had a lightbulb/why didn't I think of that moment.

This is the platter my Mom always put turkey on at Thanksgiving and Christmas.  I thought I'd write messages etc. on it with glass markers (which I originally have for this).

I purchased the vinyl chalkboard panels here, and Jim put them up for me last weekend.  They stay where you put them, clean off with ease, and create very little dust because they're softer than a regular chalkboard.  I highly recommend them.

And that is all.

Recipes.

Yesterday I sorted through all the recipes from my Mom's recipe box...

And placed some of the more interesting/treasured ones here in our kitchen.

I will not mince words.  My mother was a terrible cook. 

But she was surrounded by generations of wonderful cooks- and incredibly good recipes. 

 

Grandest

We have five or six different types of lilies in our garden.  These large, white ones are by far the grandest.  The first one bloomed this morning.

My Mom's Stuff.

I've spent hours and hours this week at my parents' house and at my own sorting through my Mom's stuff.

My Dad has been working the past few months to get their house organized, as they hope to sell it in the next year or so, and he needs our help to do so when we're around.  So my brothers, sister in law, and my family have a lot of cleaning to do.  Because my mom never ever threw anything away.  Not even bills.  Have mercy.

I did take home a few special things from her house.  I thought I'd share some of it here.

Ashes from Mount St. Helens- they were always in her bedroom in a little box.

This was always in her room too, this rosary in this little pouch from my Grandma Vivian's beauty shop.  In pictures I realized this was the rosary my mom used at her wedding.

I also brought back tons and tons of jewelry- some very nice, passed down in the family, and tons of passed down costume jewelry from my grandmothers and great aunts.  I played and played with this stuff as a child.  Now my girls have a lot of it, and so do my nieces.

I've also kept some special pieces for myself.  Some because they are sentimental, many I'll even wear.  Some became much more special as I sorted through old photos and saw grandmothers etc. wearing them.

This shadowbox has an open/close front so I can take pieces out when I'd like to wear them, and still keep them safe on the wall and on display the rest of the time.

I'd never seen this vase before in my life- my mom had it hidden away somewhere.  It's about the most awesome violet pot I've seen in my life.

My mom was very sentimental and kept everything, but was never an organized woman.  You find the craziest stuff stuck away everywhere in her house.  You never know what you're going to get when you open a drawer.  So, you find things like this here and there, a clipping from when my brothers were boys.

 My mom's paint brushes.

I guess my dad gave my mom this sewing box, but she never used it when she sewed.  It always sat in her bedroom, under the window, and was completely full of my Grandma Vivian's sewing things from decades ago.  My mom sewed quite a bit when I was young, but every time she started a project she bought new thread, fabric, everything, and then saved the leftovers...and never used them again.  But she saved them, of course.  We had a ton of sewing things to sort through.

It opens up and is absolutely awesome.  I have fond memories of it as a child, thinking it was so neat, and that all the old sewing things inside were like treasure.  And they also smelled very, very old.

So I took home some of the vintage thread and thimbles, too, and put them together where I could see them. And smell them, if I like.

I brought back vases, bowls, things that were always in the house.

I also became the KEEPER OF PHOTOGRAPHS, of which, there are about 1,000 from my dad's family and my mom's, and my own family growing up, of course. 

My dad could never organize them himself, and it's something I'm passionate about preserving, so, I took home boxes and boxes of loose photos and documents from the last 100 years, and spent hours and HOURS yesterday sorting them into archive-safe boxes.  I wanted them organized so my family can come and see them, get copies etc, and I wanted them out in the open so my own family can grow up sorting through them whenever they'd like.  I think it's an extremely important tie to their history.

Here are a few pictures of my mom and dad when they were young, and I'm extremely grateful to have hundreds more where these came from.  This is how I'll remember them most fondly, I think. 

Our kids have been with Jim's parents this week, which I'm incredibly grateful for.  I'm so glad that after the services they could go run around the farm, chasing kitties and swimming at the pool while I worked to tie up loose ends for my dad, sorted this stuff out, and work on things like thank you notes.  Death is very, very busy.  I'm also grateful for my brother and his family who still live in our hometown, who have done an incredible amount of work for my mom and dad in the last few months.

And I'm glad I had these past 2 days to mill around my house, work on simple tasks, wander around at my own pace, create some art for my walls with memories of my mom, and just process.  Making order out of chaos.  It's how I decompress.  It was good therapy.

New Towels.

I got these dish towels from Jim's Grandma's house. 

They came in a big bag, bright white and pressed and new, never used.

They could have been stitched and pressed any time within the last 4 or 5 decades, I have no idea.

But there was something so special about them- someone took hours to make them, one for every day of the week, and for Market Day, Baking Day, and Washing Day to boot.

Lost in a drawer for who knows how long, and now they are mine.  And they'll actually get to see the kitchen- you see, they come from an era when a woman could not possibly have "enough" dish towels, and it was common to hoard piles of them away in a chest or closet for "someday".

The least I could do was photograph them in their pristine bygone glory, before they were put to good use.