Spice Rack

This lovely hangs in my kitchen, under the cupboards.

The roosters make me smile.

 

I don't use it, I have to many different spices than custy labeled jars. And besides, it is on the opposite side than the stove. Who wants to walk across the room every time you think your jambalaya could use an extra kick of chili powder.

We will leave it hanging as a tribute to the style of the previous owner. That and if we took it down I don't know how we would patch the holes in the tile.

dresser redo

 When Mr. B first bought the flat screen TV back when we first started dating he bought a TV stand like this for it.

When we moved in together it work well in our apartment.

Then we bought the house. And for the past two years it has been getting to me. It just doesn't go well in the old house. It is too modern, and the black glass is a dust magnet. Not to mention there is no good way to hide all the cords from the TV and all the game consuls. And a mess of cords makes a great Gus-Bunnie trap. I went widow shopping for something new, but everything that was sturdy (not made of particle board and would start to sag in a year) and we liked was over our budget.

Enter Pinterest. I kept seeing the awesome media centers/TV stands that people made from an old dresser. Several months ago I began my hunt for the perfect old dresser. Not to big/not to small. Three drawers. Not very wide, it needs to fit between two window. And cheap. That was the hard part. I could find some amazing dressers but over $75. Oh hell no, this was supposed to be a el chepo project. Then I went shopping in my mothers basement. She had bought an inexpensive one from the Habitat Restore a few years ago for my sister to use at college. It can't get much cheaper that FREE-NINETY-NINE!

A shelf were the top drawer was some paint and new hardware and we have an awesome media center for under $30!

The cords are hidden, it isn't a dust magnet, and I have a place to store all the DVDs and games. Not to mention the pop of cheery color. The picture doesn't do it justice. It is a nice rusty red/orange color "rum raisin"

I splurged on the hardware. $4 a piece, but when you get the dresser for free you can. Besides they really pull it together.

Don't tell anyone, but I painted wood laminate. Yup that's right. Laminate. The key is the primer. I used an oil based primer and I scuff it up with the sander first. One coat of primer and two coats of semigloss paint.  

Parched

It is dry. It is beyond dry. We haven't gotten any rain this month and last month was less than an inch. I have given up on my flower beds. The only thing worth trying to save by watering is the vegetables. They seem to be doing alright; it's not going to be a fabulous crop but we will have some. 

This would be my yard right now. You not only have to wear shoes because we have birds but, the grass is so crunch on your feet. Gus seems to enjoy rolling in it and bringing all the dead grass into the house. 

Remember the hummingbird moth. He landed in a planter I had on the back porch. Look at the beautiful color and healthy flowers. 

And now not so much. I did try to save it by watering it, but maybe I didn't do it enough. 

Some sneaky geese and ducks finished it off. It wasn't this bad when I left for work this morning. How do I know it was them; they left some evidence on the porch, poo. I think it is time to start thinking about putting a fence around the back porch. 

There is a 60% chance of rain this weekend. I better go do a rain dance and see if I can up our odds to 100%.

Inspiration

Pinterest how I heart thee. You give me endless motivation to work out, then oodles of delicious cakes to indulge in. You make me want to spend my whole paycheck on bins and totes and a label maker to organize my junk. Tips on how to be upper thrifty and slash the grocery bill. I have a list a mile long of quilts I would love to make. Not to mention the inspiration for a home make over, and sadness that my much lived in house will never look like the beautifully staged photos. And much to Mr. B's dismay you have loads of info on furniture redos and up-cycling my old things. 


I could spend hours looking for at this sight and pinning my latest finds. I have a inspiration board for almost every room in my house. I think I need to stop pinning soon and start doing. 

Heat wave

It is hot here in Wisconsin. I'm talking high nineties and triple digits. H-O-T hot! Gus is miserable, the geese are miserable, the ducks are miserable, and Mr. B and I are miserable. It is too hot to do much of anything except park our tushies in front of the fan and chilax.  

Shady Acres is an old farm house which means no air-conditioning. None zippo zero zilch. Central Air was never installed. Mr. B and I tuffed it out the past two summers. The house normally gets a good breeze and is surrounded by large shade trees which really helps. Air conditioning is a modern convenience, not a necessity. We are young we can handle it, just take it easy and drink lots of water. Besides I want to save the money and spend it on other things. Like drywall for the mud room and new porch posts.

But this time we just couldn't hack it any more. It hasn't be going below 80 at night, it makes for miserable sleep. You have to have the fan in the window cranked on high just to keep from sleeping in a pool of sweat. Then it blows my hair around and my fuzzies tickle my face and wake me up. Miserable, I wanted to shave my head. 

Tuesday night we caved. No not caved, we were realistic. We just weren't sleeping that great. I don't think Mr. B really slept at all on Monday night. The weather forecast doesn't show this heat wave breaking any time soon and we need to be able to function the morning. Next week Mr. B will be working nights and will need to sleep during the day, that just wouldn't happen if the house was in the high eighties. We bought a window ac unit for our bed room. The rest of the house may be hot but at least we have a cool place to sleep. I am starting to think that some day we are going to have to bite the bullet and get central air. Put it on the bottom of the list, so maybe in like 20ish years we will get there..

Stars and Checkers: A Quilt

I finished this little guy last week, but wanted to wait till it was closer to the holiday to show you. He was put up for bid this weekend in a silent auction to benifit airmen and their families on the base Mr. B works at.

I had fun working on this and am very happy with the way it turned out. My seams have improved vastly over the past year, look how nicely al those corners line up! It was hard to part with this one, it would have made a beautiful seasonal wall haning, but it went to a good cause. I am sure it will be loved and appriciated in it's new home. 

I finished it late in the evening and Mr. B needed to take it in the following morning, nothing like waiting to the last minute!! I wanted to get some pictures of the finished product, but the light was just a tad on the crappy side.

Note to self, finish projects a few days in advanced so you can do a nice 'photo shoot' outside.

Cupcake Gig

I had my fist paying gig for cupcakes!! 75 of them for a graduation party. My Friday evening was spent hanging in the kitchen, slaving over my kitchen aid. Man how I love that thing!! I don't care what any one says, it was much better than getting diamonds from you sweetie for Christmas and so much more practical. 

I know Friday evening spent bonding with a mixer and doing five loads of dishes. Is that what you call them, loads? It sounds more like I was doing laundry. Maybe we should call them sink-fulls. But what I did amounted to way more than five sink-fulls. Sink-fulls just doesn't express the sheer volume of dishes as vividly as I would like. Batches? No that doesn't sound quite right either. I'm going to need to think on this for a while. 

So anywho Friday night, cupcakes and dishes not the most glamorous thing to be doing on you Friday evening. I did get a nice sugar buzz going and I swear I had a cake hangover the following morning. I made 75 cupcakes 100 cupcakes. One batch didn't turn out as pretty as I would have likes, I think I over mixed the batter when I added the strawberries.

Edible, yes.

Delicious, yes.

Pretty, oh hell no!

I couldn't sell those babies. They looked like wrinkly old lady skin with pink blotches all over. I know pictures would be nice here, but in the heat of the moment taking pictures of my nasty looking cupcakes was not a priority. I had to turn the oven back on and give it another go. Don't worry they weren't a total loss, the boys at work thought they were great. Free cupcakes, who cares what they look like!

I went for my stnd by white cake this time. Thankfully my client, Mr. B's aunt, didn't have many specifications about them just red and white. Client sounds so important and official don't it? Gives me the warm fuzzies inside. Client. 

I even went all Martha Stewart and made these cupcake toppers. I had some Wisconsin Badger fabric hanging out upstairs, some wooden skewers, and a glue gun. I blame the sugar high for a sudden burst of energy at the end. You know you need to quality check the frosting. The grad is attending UW Madison this fall. I thought they were a nice touch.

I know pictures of the cutsy toppers but none of the cupcakes. Disastrous or nice!! I had every intention of taking pictures of the good ones once they were set up at the event. But the camera got left on the counter, I blame the cake hangover.

Loads, it's loads of dishes. I consulted google and that's what it came up with. Now we can all sleep better tonight.