Tuesday, November 1, 2016

Farmhouse Kitchen Reveal:Part1


Is a remodeling project ever really done?
I don't think so.

July 5th of 2016 we began the cabinet side of our kitchen. NEW ceilings, lighting, floors and cabinetry. Phew! All done by seniors, even installing the heavy IKEA cabinetry. 
Honest, I'm not being paid or supported in any way from IKEA. We chose this for the economy of doing it ourselves and the construction itself. If a tornado comes through our house, trust me, the kitchen will be still standing.

So all of October we have been twiddling with our Farmhouse Kitchen with finishing touches. It seemed like everyday, the island was piled high with tools for the latest project, usually with one or two step-stools set up. Back in the right hand corner you can still see the edge of the compressor/nailer, blocking the back door.

This morning I decided, it was time to take pictures NOW as it is. 
We have been cooking, eating, rearranging and moving things around for a month.



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Here was the plan I showed last Spring. This was to be my NEW dream kitchen with all the DRUTHERS! But besides being pretty, the kitchen has to function.

Did we stick with the plan, YES. We did flip the sink with the drainboard to the the left. The space above the stove fan was added and custom built from an extra cabinet and faced with a door. Same above the sink. Hubby was very creative and used matching pieces to fill in our problem spaces.

First a few OLD before pictures.

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I had never really showed a total kitchen picture of before. I always showed my kitchen in vignettes. 
Why, because it was dated(1974), dark, and depressing. 
My antiques were far more interesting than the room itself. 

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The room was cut in half by a soffit which also topped above all the cabinetry. 
Removing the soffits was shown HERE.
They are great for hanging plates, but were responsible for lots of wasted space storage space
Don't you love how the light bulbs stuck out of the old recessed lighting? 


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When I look at these pictures now---I think I cluttered it all
 in an attempt to disguise how horrible it was underneath.

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 I never showed the floor---LOL, this is the tile that was on the floor.
 I used a new piece or two in the Barbie house.
Installing the subfloor and vinyl plank flooring was covered in this post, HERE.


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No matter how many light fixtures were turned on, 
or how much I lightened pictures -the OLD kitchen was dark.

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The corner cabinetry was a dead space, no cabinet access to the corner. 
Don't you love the Mediterranean hardware? The worst part was all the lower cabinets had added wire baskets, but shelves were stand-on-your-head/twist-and-reach. 
We are not really able to be pretzels in our late 60's anymore.

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Looking toward the eating area. All my strainers hung from the ceiling, no place else to keep them.
The island always seemed to have an appliance on it, because of the hassle of putting them away.

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Black fronted stove didn't help. Every inch of counter was covered. I had no room for dishes; note the platters and plates on top of the microwave.

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My 18" OLD pantry which I never showed, totally crammed with appliances and food. 
Some of the containers are tipped in order to get the maximum number into the pantry.
Removing the wall to the left and the pantry was shown HERE.

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Here is the NEW 30" pantry now. Love the waffle iron, 3 electric frypans, and George Forman right where I can see them and USE them on the shelf.

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The pantry is located to the left, we stole a bit of space from the clothes closet at the front door. 

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I love the lower drawers, more room for small appliances, staples, and my grinder/sausage maker, which I may now actually use since it isn't buried in the basement. 
Homemade chicken-sausage anyone?


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The middle drawers hold smaller food items.

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They hold canned goods, packets, etc. This is still a work in progress. I have more dividers to use when I figure out what works best. A real plus with the IKEA system is everything is flexible and inter-changeable. 

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Top shelf in the pantry, a big soup pot and my woks.
We are going to lower this shelf, I think.


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Hubby still has some cords to bury, and a bit of finishing behind the stove. 
 I love the new extended fanhood that works well with my double oven stove. We did not do new appliances as all of ours were less than 8 years old. 
He still has a panel to add to the left side of the stove. 
The microwave cabinet is wonderful and was an existing shelf in the IKEA shelving 
department and rated for the extra weight.
One drill hole for electrical access and it's a microwave shelf.

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Under the microwave, the cabinet drawers hold the glass covered dishes I use in the microwave.
Note all the 'vintage' cookware, yes, when you are married in 1968, you have some vintage.

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Below that is a lid drawer for with dividers and a frypan.


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All the drawers are pull out, no more standing on your head 
and twist/reaching to find something buried in the back. 
The top drawer holds tools for cooking, I missed taking a picture of that.

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To the right of the stove is this handy pullout shelf system for those bottles you use all the time, 
with room on the bottom for the large ones 
which originally lined the stairs to the basement (which was so attractive).

Above that is is a spice cabinet and two shelves, which is a work in progress.
 I think that will need some creative solutions, when I solve them, lol.

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The corner cabinet which was dead space before, now has a 'LOVE the carousel' filled with my pots and pans. We added rack divider on either side for the large electric griddle that replaced our old ones and the large boards and stove griddle. 

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I still have my mixer on the counter. It just doesn't quite fit anywhere
 because it doesn't come apart, but I use this quite often. 

I plan to edit the countertops, as we get used to having a place for most things. 
After two weeks with no blue jars on the counters, I had to put them out, lol.

We added a divider rack to the right of the mixer for cutting boards. Putting them away in the pantry was a pain, and overhead was dangerous when a second would come out. 

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My large spices work on the upper cabinet carousel, with tall plastic containers and pitchers working well on the top. I still have space on these shelves.

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In the cabinet next to the refrigerator, the lower two drawers hold glass oblong bakers, 
potholders and plastic food containers. Here are the top two drawers with cooking related tools.
I love the drawer within a drawer. Shallow drawers are un-crammable, 
you can't help but be organized. I bought organizing trays at IKEA for under $3.00
 and smaller ones at the Dollar store.

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This is an early picture as I started to stock the glass doored entertainment cupboard.

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The glass shelves are 36" wide and can only hold twenty-four pounds, 
so stocking them is a bit tricky. We still are working on this. 
I need color in my world, and balancing that with displaying some of our 
favorite things is still a work in progress. I expect they will get a REDO several times a year.

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Here is the finished cooking side of the NEW kitchen. We added clear silicone counter protectors found online for the edges the butcher block counters. They also cover the edge for crumbs or tools from falling between the stove and cabinets.

 The under cabinet lighting is a wonderful addition and can dim or brighten. 
They turn on and off with a small remote disk switch. 
 Hubby turns them on and off---all the time. 

We have had the island counter for four years now with butcher block and loved it. Hubby did give it a light sanding and an oiling when we did the other counters. We did mineral oil, until the oil sat up on the wood and no longer would be absorbed. We add a new oiling maybe three times a year.
So we did the counters for the rest of the kitchen.
The woods makes a nice connection with the vinyl plank flooring and the trim throughout our home.


Stay tuned for Part 2: The Island, Lighting, and the Sink wall. 

Resources: 
Cabinetry-IKEA
Cabinetry lighting-IKEA
Countertops-Menards and IKEA
Hardware-IKEA
Flooring: Menards
Bead board Ceiling: Menards
Exhaust fan: Menards online
Flooring: Menards
Dimensional Subway tile: Home Depot
Elbow Grease: Three Seniors and Family

Thanks always for visiting. 
I will try and respond to every comment and answer every question.

All the opinions and photographs in this blog are my own, I have not been paid or reimbursed in anyway for my opinions or posts. Please do not use photos without linking back to this blog without my permission. Thank you for your cooperation, Sandi Magle




Sandi



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Monday, October 24, 2016

Fall Transferware Buffet


I'm finally able to put a few Fall items out as the house morphs back to some sort of normal.
We had company last week. So after I found the top of the buffet,  I tried to make it Fall.
I still haven't found my Fall totes of goodies in the basement or the garage.


After cleaning and digging in a closet, I pulled out these OLD transfer ware pieces I honestly haven't seen in maybe ten years.



Because of using antiques on the tiled buffet, I started with an OLD vintage Quaker Lace tablecloth from the 1940's. This makes a great safe base to keep my antiques on a soft surface.



This transferware is multi-colored and from the Aesthetic period, 1870-1900 had Oriental influences as well as sliding into the Arts and Crafts Movement at the turn of the 19th century.
The entire premise of this period was to live a beautiful life with hand-crafted and man-made items.
Of course items made by hand during the new Industrial age were expensive.

I purchased the pitcher, bowl and waste jar...maybe thirty years ago for $45.00. 
Like many of these sets, they were used everyday and sometimes multiple times each day.  I love the Oriental influences apparent in the Aesthetic transfers, The sides are glazed in a rich blue, and trimmed with gold. This set was expensive in it's time and very heavy and large. All the pieces have dings, and cracks and crazing, evidence of their hard use.


I had a washstand in my bedroom for years with the Pitcher and Bowl displayed on it. Here you can see the lovely coloring of the flowers and the grasses. The transfer itself was actually in mulberry tones, and the detail colors were added after the transfer was fired into place. The color would have been added much like porcelain painting during a final firing with the gold details. 


The waste jar, or slop jar, held the used water which was taken away. Before indoor plumbing the maids would be busy running hot water up the stairs and these waste jars, down the stairs.

A complete bedroom set would often be ten or twelve pieces, including a hair receiver, a smaller pitcher for drinking water, cups, glasses, soap dish, powder dish, bottles, and the under the bed 'thunder mug' or porta-potty.  The small doll-head is of a composite clay casting by an artist in this century, but she easily could have been made in the 1890's.


I believe this set to be American because of the barn motif which is mulberry/red. 



This is the mark on all three pieces. I have never been able to find exactly by whom or where it was made. Best guess is somewhere in the Ohio Valley. The clay body is grayish but very close to stoneware. It's a heavy dense body, and the glaze is very solid white, with the blue on the sides. 
 I have only found one piece similar, a slop jar, from the same mold with the same blue glaze and gold, but with an entirely different scene on it. 




I did a REDO of the cut-glass bowl with some Fall scented pods and a cute little owl. I thought the setting needed some extra light, so I put an old pumpkin bottom light in the bowl with the mesmerized owl.



So many bowls were passed down through my family. These bowls held many a fancy pudding or trifle made by my grandmother. I think this is a later piece, but heavy crystal and reflects the light.



What's more Fall then a pumpkin?  I placed a large pumpkin on a 2" thick square of floral foam and then encircled the focal point with 2 large apple/berry picks, some leaf branches., and some artificial grasses, which echoed the patter win the transfer ware.


My lady bust quietly admires the Fall leaves.


 I let the grasses and vine tendrils do their own thing...
sometimes you can 'over arrange' an arrangement.
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My mom's favorite rocker received new OLD cushions last fall from a thrift store. I was going to buy them just for the foam, the set was $4.00, but when I got home the colors worked so well, I just laundered and they fit the chair perfectly.


I actually used brass and silver candlesticks, because that is all I could find until I get into the storage room downstairs and locate my extra metals tote, and the Fall totes.


The silver candlesticks are vintage from 1953, they were my grandparents'. The brass here is reproduction from the 1950's. The brass one on the other side along with the grater are from the late 1700's and have been passed down. Denmark artisans were strictly regulated and everything was hallmarked, which makes it easy to date most items and where they were made.


My mom would like sitting here, surrounded by some her familys' treasures and mine, too.



Happy Fall from my house to yours. 

Thanks always for visiting. 
I will try and respond to every comment and answer every question.


All the opinions and photographs in this blog are my own, I have not been paid or reimbursed in anyway for my opinions or posts. Please do not use photos without linking back to this blog without my permission. Thank you for your cooperation, Sandi Magle






Sandi





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Friday, October 21, 2016

Junkin' Finds:October 2016




October has flown by here. I have snuck away from the dust and mayhem for a few hours of junkin' in some thrift stores here in Illinois. I have a few things to share.

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My vintage finds for a couple of weeks. I have been restrained with so many things still packed away from the house remodel. Totes of goodies, I will have to sell, donate, or reuse in some way.

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 This sweet print in an old frame painted a hideous mauve, I mean dead mauve or mourning mauve, we used to call it. That kinda-purple-gray-mauve you wouldn't want anywhere and it was so popular in the late 40's used with gray and teal and lime green, ugh! In the floral design world, I was so happy when mauve morphed into burgundy in the 1990's.

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I love the sweet little bluebird in the foreground with some pale pink peonies. I'm thinking a white frame will allow the cooler tones of this print pop.

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Something so sweet about a child's innocent face. If there is an artist mark, it's under the matt in the old frame. I won't find out until, I'm ready to paint it. Glass not corralled within a frame tends to get broken around here.


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Sometimes I buy things just for educational purposes.  I was pretty sure this was a repro by the feel of this piece. Too perfect, and very sharp edges, and purchased for $1.99.  I found this is a Mosser log- cabin pitcher  (I thought for syrup) and a reproduction from the 1970's in beautiful caramel colored slag glass. The originals are most often clear and go for a pretty penny.

Mosser site states:  "Mosser Glass, located in Cambridge, Ohio, has been manufacturing quality hand-pressed glass products for over thirty years. Our handcrafted glassware lines consist of Carnival, Vaseline, and Opalescent, as well as hand-decorated pieces."


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With the failure of old glass companies during the mid-century, many antique molds were purchase and then later reproduced in the 70's: think carnival, jadeite, coin glass, EAPG and many others. As the real thing became too expensive for the general market eventually new companies began to do reproductions. Mosser established in 1970, continues to produce today, and no doubt if you own a contemporary white or green glass cake plate, it was produced by Mosser.

A key to new/reproduction glass, is it is too perfect in color and often with sharper edges than originals. New pieces are often slightly smaller than the originals. Some manufacturers' mark theirnreproductions with a new mark, others none at all. This pitcher has no mark.

I don't consider this a loss, as I was correct in my original assumption. If it feels new---it still maybe vintage and 40 or so years old, like this piece. Just don't pay original prices. 

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I picked up three pieces of this perfect dresser or chair set: a large oval with the poppy motif on both ends and tatted trim, and two smaller ovals with the ladder framing and leaves only, $1.99 for the three pieces.


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The color was so rich and the linen so perfect, I had to have them.  



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A single salt shaker, probably Nippon moriage...is very enticing with its free form applied gilding over the hand painted roses. I have picked a few salt shakers for their interesting glaze or design treatments. And they can be oh-so pretty.


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This one is probably from the early 1900's.


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Unmarked, but a steal at $1.99.

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I love blue, and I love fine handwork. Two tea towels, totally covered in shades of blue stitching. 
Only 50cents apiece.

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These are very reminiscent of my Royal Copenhagen Flowers pattern dinnerware.


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Tutorials and Tips
Here's another piece I bought because it was really cheap---and I wanted to research it. Style looks to be 1920's-30's.  Marked Made in Japan and a logo (might be an elephant)in the middle.

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No luck finding this exact mark, best guess is 1920's-30's. Other styles of this type of pitcher were also made in Czechoslovakia at that same time. Painted with black and red on top of the yellow glaze, have worn off.

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The original paint was actually quite garish with striped wings and orange comb, with beady black eyes and red striped handle. I will probably scrub this clean and be happy with a yellow bird pitcher in good condition. It's about 4.75" tall.

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I love lace that is soft and made with fine materials. This particular piece had nice soft drape to it, 
probably with some rayon in the threads. It's larger than a placemat, so nice for a dresser or table center. I will put it in my stash for projects, it's just the slightest off-white.


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Lots of detail in their piece, definitely older than the 1980-90's mass produced country style 
batten burg lace. This is finer stitches and not the least bit stiff.



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This is a large table piece...probably 60x80. Again this was made with high quality 
silky cotton. Nice pattern, has excellent drape and might be wonderful worked on a quilt, or in some bohemian drapes? 

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Someone had a ton of patience in these motifs and then all linked together and it was in perfect condition for $3.00. A steal!

Thanks always for visiting. 
I will try and respond to every comment and answer every question.

All the opinions and photographs in this blog are my own, I have not been paid or reimbursed in anyway for my opinions or posts. Please do not use photos without linking back to this blog without my permission. Thank you for your cooperation, Sandi Magle




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