i think they peeked into my kitchen......

to get their inspiration from my current makeover.  

i say current 

because my brother-in-law is convinced 

that we are losing square footage in our house because of all of the painting 

we have done in the 11 years we have lived here.

i got this

 in the mail the other day.  it was in with a request for a subscription 

for house beautiful magazine.  those colors look very familiar... 

 this is the new flooring we are putting down in the kitchen.  soon.  you hear that don?  soon!!

here is the backsplash tile...

this is the dresser i just painted for the kitchen and the blue mason jars that i love.

the walls are a light grey

the cabinets are in the process of being repainted creamy white for the top 

and medium grey for the bottom

the kitchen table and chairs

the new rug....

great minds think alike....  ;D

progress....

remember this dresser?

a craigslist find from a few months back.

it came with this mirror

 and, be still my heart, these handles....

why doesn't anyone reproduce these handles?  they are gorgeous, don't you think?

i would have bought the dresser just for this hardware.  

anyway...$40.00 for the dresser and mirror....

and those beautiful handles.....

since i am lightening up my kitchen, i thought this would be a great piece to replace the black console table that was in there before. 

so i brought it in so see if it fit in the space.  it fit perfectly

so i started painting it.

 rather than painting the whole thing the same color, i opted for a white top and colored bottom. 

i used the annie sloan chalk paint in old white for the top and 

duck egg mixed with the old white and louis blue for the base.

 the detail was much prettier painted than it was in the less than attractive white with gold overspray....

the detail on the drawers is pretty too.  

but then disaster struck....

i tipped the dresser forward to touch up the paint on one of the back legs and all of the drawers slid out and landed on the floor.  

this was the result..

 crap!!!!

 oh well, nothing that i couldn't fix with a little carpenters glue 

 and a clamp....

good as new!!  

i sanded to distress around the carved detail and the edges;

i didn't paint the hardware.  i love how it pops against the color and brings down the white top.

i know that the handles are on differently, i wasn't sure how i wanted them to go.  i will stick with the way they are on the left side.

i painted the market fresh sign onto a broken dresser drawer front

that i pulled out of someone's trash.  its the one in the back that says "pants".

i painted it and stenciled the letters on.  i love the way it looks.

this dressser helps also, to lighten up the kitchen a little more. and it adds 6 drawers of storage.

and who doesn't need more storage in the kitchen, right?

what do you think?

oh, and i got this rug at ikea for $19.99.  i got it mostly to cover up the paint marks on the floor under the table. 

 when don painted the base of the table for me, (he was bored when i was out one day) he didn't use a drop cloth....(yes, that is the drop cloth right next to the table) but we are replacing the flooring anyway.

i will be painting the mirror that goes with it too and replacing the black one there.  i am just trying to decide if i want to paint it old white like the top of the dresser or duck egg like the base.  any suggestions?

i am also linking up to robyn's blog for the mountain of giveaway for annie sloan chalk paint.  i could sure use some more and if i don't have to pay for it, that would rock!!!

i'm a hottie.....

as i'm sure, is everyone else in the country this past week....

the temps have been dreadful for about 10 days.

high 90's and last thursday we hit 99 degrees.  the heat index was 110 degrees...

it hasn't gotten much better in the last few days.  it is almost too hot to do anything.  i have been taking my morning walk between 6:30 and 7:00 am and i come home in a dripping sweat.  and the dog starts tugging at the leash to go home after the first lap around the subdivision,

even though he knows we always go 3-4 laps....

he plops down on the kitchen floor when we get into the house and tries to flatten himself to get every square inch of his body onto the cool floor.

I have been very grateful this past week for: 

central air-conditioning

the neighbor's pool

air conditioning in my car

electricity to run the air conditioning

shade

air conditioning

the chance to see this

and this

during austen's baseball tournament in grand haven, michigan....an adorable little lakeside town on the west side of the state where we had the opportunity to spend last weekend.  

poor austen baked in the sun during his games

which were played in a school yard surrounded by a parking lot, a street and fortunately for me,

some trees right next to the field which kept us nicely shaded and cooled.  

they (the team) didn't do too well, only winning one game out of four but we had a really fun weekend with breakfast out at a great little restaurant in town, a great hotel with a pool, a team picnic with food that we all brought and great company with the other baseball moms and dads. 

the night before we came home, we headed to the beach and pier for some sightseeing and an ice cream cone....

i only got a few pictures of the pier but i loved this one of austen who is getting tall enough to block dad's face.  

and this one of both of my guys

and austen got this one of us

as we were leaving the pier to go back to the hotel.   

it has been too hot to do any painting lately, i just don't have the motivation or desire to fight the heat. 

i did finish up this cute little table before i left though...

painted in a striped beachy style.....

and i am getting ready to let this one go.....

a sweet little craigslist find for $20,
repainted and dressed with a paint drop cloth.

 it started out looking like this

and i will be sad to see her go......

i'm so lame.....

i know it's been a while since i've posted but there has been tons of this

 and another tournament this weekend....  it looks like we will have good weather though...

and i am really sad about this

being the end of an era.  i am excited to see the final movie but it will be bittersweet for our family.

we have been big followers of the harry potter movie series since it started and have read all of the books.  we even have the books on tape and have been listening to them in the car lately.  like every time we get into the car...

we went to the midnight showing of the movie last night.  our local theatre showed part 1 and then part 2 so we watched both movies...

i loved part 2 but there were some scenes that i thought they could have done better and 

been truer to the book.

oh well, it was still great.

i will be back next week......have a great weekend.

kitchen cabinets stage one......done

the last two days i have been working very hard to get my kitchen redo into gear.

yesterday, the place was a mess....

it kinda sorta looked like this

one half started cabinet paint job....

the whole house was a mess because i worked all day on this project and then austen had baseball in the evening at a baseball field 45 minutes away.

the garage was paint central

don had started painting the cabinet doors with a brush...icky brush strokes

my new love is a foam roller..

painting was a breeze and it went way faster than painting with a brush.

this morning,  the kitchen looked like this.......

ugh....don't judge me!!!  this is why i don't have glass doors on any of my cabinets....lol

this afternoon, stage one is done

i still have to put up the moulding because we added wood between the cabinet top and the crown moulding to give the builders grade cabinets a little height and elegance....

you can see the gap here a little better....

the trim is in the garage drying right now....

spray painted with dark gray and will be dry brushed with the same paint as the cabinets.

nice and bright!!!

and i am loving the change in the space.
i am sure that you noticed that i have 3 different colors of appliances.

someday, i will find my killer craigslist deal on a new stainless steel set of appliances that actually match...but for now, they are all working and in good condition so i can live with the variety.

let's call it "eclectic" shall we? 

this is what it looked like two days ago....

and what it looked like one month ago

quite a change, i think......

i still need to paint the bottom cabinets, but i can live with this until i get the energy to finish.  

right now, i need to clean my house....