EEEE new kitchen almost done!!!

We still have to finish painting the cupboards, the hinges to the cupboards, the doors to the cupboards, and all of the trim, and we still need to hang one more piece of pegboard over the sink to hang the dish drainer and pasta strainer on, but most of the kitchen is done and since I am super, duper excited about it, I can't wait to show what we've been doing!

In case you forgot, this is what the kitchen looked like before:
http://adayania.blogspot.com/2012/03/before-pictures.html

And this was the plan for the colors:
http://adayania.blogspot.com/2012/03/plan.html


And this was the plan for the space:
http://adayania.blogspot.com/2012/03/plan-for-our-kitchen-storage.html

Now, things look like this:

You can see we replaced the dog kennels with a dog bed, brought in a green house to keep fresh herbs in the kitchen, and replaced the two black metal shelves with red pegboard for storing our pans.

Our breakfast nook has a cushion on the seat, a basket for hanging fresh fruits and veggies above it, and a coffee mug rack you can juuuuust barely see next to the fridge.

I forgot to get a new picture of this, so this is from a few months ago and its not as crowded over here now.  Between the breakfast nook and the counter is a little coffee bar with a toaster, electric kettle, and coffee maker.  Above the breakfast bar is a pegboard that holds our teacups, hot chocolate mixes, hot cider mixes, coffee, and teas.

We are still removing the old microwave and cart from the middle of the kitchen, so you can see it in a lot of these pictures.  We kept the pantry, and got a wine bar, and for the moment the blender is on top unless I find a better home for it.

This drop leaf table matches the wine bar, and provides extra seating.  When we don't need the seating the table holds our appliances, making space on the counters for food prep.  We installed pegboard behind the door for hanging brooms, mops, swiffer vacs, etc.

Jason installed this amazing backsplash in a shockingly short amount of time (with a lot of swearing).  It looks great and it protects our wall.  

Jason mounted this microwave over the range so we could replace the nasty 50 year old hood vent and save space with getting the microwave up.  You can also see more of the backsplash here.  With the appliances moved into the spaces freed up, we now have space to cook, cut, and prep!

You Never Know.

Mr. Rogers was an ordained minister, and that is something that inspired his career a lot.  I've read most of his books and most of the books written about him because he is a great hero of mine.

In one of his books he talks about his training learning to be a minister.  He and a friend had drove several hours to see a very renowned and famous minister give a sermon.  When he arrived, he was bitterly disappointed to learn that the minister was out of town and they had what-you-call-a-substitute minister.

He and his friend sat through the dry, boring minister.  He thought the sermon was terrible, and towards the end of the sermon he turned to the lady next to him to make a snarky comment about the quality of the sermon.  When he turned and looked at her, he saw she was so moved by the sermon that she was sitting in her pew bawling.

The Kitchen is Actually Happening!

After tons and tons of planning and talking and goal setting, the kitchen is actually becoming a reality.

It got a major jump start one night at Menards.  We were looking at hardware, backsplash, and paint ideas whe we saw the mistint section.  They had a green mistint, two gallons of it, for $5 each.

We had already decided that green was the color we wanted our walls, and I figured one green was as good as another, and that price was certainly right, so we bought both gallons and came home.

Before I even had a chance to steel myself for the excitement of painting, Jason was off and running with the painting:

And I thought, boy, that is not at all what I thought that was going to look like!  But, because I am scared of my own shadow, I didn't dare say anything to him.  He kept painting:

And asked me what I thought:

And I said, "I like it!  It looks good!  You're doing a great job!"

He finished this section of wall and stood back:

And he said, "You like it?"

And I said, "Yeah!"

Then I took a deep breath, gathered my nerve and said, "But do you think maybe its a little too green?"  "Or maybe it might look Christmas-y?"

And he said, "Hmm...I don't know.  What do you think?"

And I said, "What if... I hated it?"

And he said, "You don't like it?"

And I shook me head.  No.  I don't like it."

And he said, "Good.  I hate it."

And I said, "I hate it too."

So the next day we went back to the paint store.  Several paint stores: Mendards, Wal-Mart, Lowes, and Home Depot.  And I looked online.  And I grabbed what seemed like thousands of paint samples.  And they are looked SO different next to each other. 

I spent hours and hours holding paint samples up to the "inspiration kitchen colors."  After all of this, I determined that the colors on our laptop must be off. 

Finally I picked Glidden's "Spanish Olive" for the color, but we went to Home Depot and had them color match that with Behr Premium Paint, because Jason said it was the best and I believe him. 

Cats and Neighbors

As many of you know, my neighbors have nicely asked me to keep our cats inside.  This is a really big challenge because before we got our cats they were indoor/outdoor cats, and based on their behaviors since we've adopted them I am guessing they were mostly outdoor cats.  They are very motivated to go outside, much more motivated than I am to bother to keep them in.  And they are excellent escape artists.

Its a perfect storm.  I don't care about them enough to keep them inside, they are determined to go outside, and our neighbors hate them going outside.  I don't blame them for hating the cats either.  They are a retired couple who has invested a lot of time, money, and energy into a beautiful garden so they can sit on their patio and watch the birds come to the sanctuary they have created for them.  They don't want my cats scaring off the birds.  And I can appreciate that.  But not enough to do battle with the cats all day every day.

Today Jason opened the door to take something outside and both cats bolted through the door.  My hands were full of screaming, hungry baby and Jason was busy and stressed out.  Not in any shape to deal with the screaming, hungry baby that had a deathgrip on her milk source.  So neither of us were inclined to go hunting down the two cats and gave up on getting them back inside.

I nurse my screaming cherub until she is calm enough to go outside.  Then we head out armed with gardening gloves and a kneeling pad to clean the leaves out of the flower bed.  We are out there ten minutes of so, wading through the goopy guck and worms, and I look over at my neighbor's gorgeous yard. 

While looking over, I noticed my neighbor lady is sitting on her porch.  Or she was.  When I look over, she has a book and she is violently throwing it over and over again at the glass window of her porch.

As I've said before, they are an older couple and very sweet.  I am always afraid they will get sick and die and drug dealers will buy their house, corrupt my children, and drive down the property value of our house.  So I consider myself very invested in making sure they haven't devopled dementia, alzheimers, or have gone crazy. 

So I stood up, watching her repeatedly, violently throwing this book at her window.  I said to the baby, "What on Earth is she doing?" 

Once I stood up, I could see that she was looking at the ground.  I also looked at the ground and saw the fatter, dumber of my cats, Yoshimi, was on the ground hissing at my neighbor's cat on the other side of the window. 

I groaned, knowing this was going to be embarassing. 

Carrying the baby on one hip, I came over into my neighbor's yard and tried calling the cat.  Which looked at  me and laid down.  I talked to her very softly, moving slowly so I wouldn't scare her.  Once I got close enough, I grabbed her and threw her on my other hip.  Of course she started hissing and clawing me trying to get away.  I had to hold her a little further from me so she wouldn't claw the baby at the same time. 

I think the neighbor lady was a little embarassed I'd seen her throwing a book at the window, so she yelled to me, "They were having a confrontation!"  (Through the glass, where no one could have been hurt).  I said, I know, I'm really sorry.  We are really trying to keep them inside."

Then I carried the yowling, clawing mass of black fur into the house, acting as a barrier between the baby and the cat.  I got to the door and I yelled to Jason to come open the door.  He arrived, terribly put out that he had been interrupted to open a door.  I told him we need to fix the screens on the porch to keep the cats in.  I will let you know what happens.

 

Betty on Mad Men

OMG BETTY LOOKS HUGE!  I don't believe in judging women for their looks, but thats all she's got going for her!

Teething

Poor Ceci is teething.  This means she is in pain, cries a lot, and wants to be held constantly.  You can imagine what my house looks like.

Confession

Since Jason works from home, all day long her chases me around bugging me to rub his head and scratch his back.  Which I refuse to do because I don't like to encourage begging.  But once he falls asleep I rub his head and scratch his back for awhile.