vintage — Page 14

Rediscovered While Cleaning

January 12, 2018 at 10:44 am by Claudia

I think I need a few more green McCoy vases for the top of that cupboard, don’t you?

The cupboard remains one of my favorite deals; it’s big and substantial and has shelves inside. I scored it for $100 at a local auction and I’ve never regretted it. We needed storage and the room needed something tall. This guy fulfilled the bill.

We watched Lady Bird last night and thoroughly enjoyed it. It’s a coming-of-age story about a teenager in her senior year of Catholic high school in Sacramento and it’s absolutely charming. I’m a big Laurie Metcalf fan and she is excellent, as usual. Saorise Ronan is luminous as Lady Bird. Excellent cast, excellent screenplay and direction (both by Greta Gerwig.) Thumbs up.

I just threw this in here as I posted it on Instagram yesterday. And I’m thinking of starting to do some needlepoint again, spurred by that framed project I made for my Mom years ago. I inherited it after my mom and dad passed away. I used to do a lot of needlepoint in the seventies and eighties, with each new niece and nephew getting their own needlepoint Christmas stocking. I’m thinking about doing some pillows for the sofas in the living room and den.

I cleaned out the closet under the stairs yesterday; a daunting project because it involves crawling about on my hands and knees. I threw a lot out and it looks much better. It holds paint cans and the pillows used on the Adirondack chairs and extra vacuum cleaner attachments and the Christmas trees. I wanted to make it easier to access all of that without having everything fall out of the closet when I open the door.

While there, I rediscovered a little shelf that I was using to hold paint cans and towels. The towels are a story in themselves. I stashed them in there and often used a stack of them when we gave the dogs a bath. We don’t need them anymore and they take up valuable space, so I washed them all and I’m going to see if I can donate them to an animal shelter or hospital. I used to work for a veterinarian and we always needed towels.

So, back to the shelf. We used it in our bathroom when we were living in San Diego. It’s not my best paint job, but it still sort of works. Don suggested putting it behind the couch because I had been talking about wanting more space for plants and pottery. (Big surprise, right?) It doesn’t take up much space so it doesn’t overwhelm the sideboard or access to the front door.

There it is. I’ve always loved the scallop-like edges to the shelves. And it’s appropriately chippy. (That’s the back of Don’s head.)

See? He’s wearing headphones so he didn’t even know I was there.

I rather like that splash of color. It will look even better when I’ve added some things to those shelves, but I’m in no hurry.

Yes, the tree is still up. Every day I ask Don if he’s ready for it to be taken down and every day he says no. We have reached a deal. I am taking it down on Sunday. I took down the tree in the den and the little green tree upstairs in the office yesterday. This one is still pending.

On reflection, Don said that he thought he was reluctant to say goodbye to the tree because it symbolized his vacation and he’s not quite ready to go back to work. I understand.

So it will be up through the weekend. Who knows? I may wait until Monday!

Happy Friday.

A Petite Santa

December 23, 2017 at 9:57 am by Claudia

Boy, am I having a hard time waking up this morning! I feel drugged. Sometimes, when I go back to sleep during the early morning hours I will fall into what I call a ‘hard’ sleep. When I finally wake up for the day, I feel incredibly groggy. Plus, I must have been dreaming something dire because all my muscles were tense and my back hurt. Yikes!

Anyway, I’m on my second cup of coffee and I feel better. Just moving slowly – both mentally and physically.

I ran a couple of errands yesterday and one of them was a stop at a local antique mall that is one of my favorites. I ended up with three smalls, one of which I’ll show you now.

This little guy. He’s about 2 inches tall, if that, and I love him. The vendor had five of them, all dressed in different colors. But they weren’t inexpensive, so I only got one. He’s on skis and he’s holding a bell or a cymbal – not sure.

For some perspective, here he is next to a modest sized vintage Christmas ornament.

Now, of course, I want to go back and buy the others. Isn’t that always the way?

What’s on the docket for today? Some wrapping, I think, and another batch of linzer tart cookies. I want to take some with us when we celebrate Christmas with our pals, Rick and Doug. Don and I had two each last night while watching Christmas in Connecticut and moans of happiness were heard throughout the house.

How are you all doing? Are you rushing around madly, trying to finish up your To Do list before Christmas Eve? Or are you finished and enjoying family and friends?

It’s raining here today and it’s gray and rather barren looking out there. The forecast for Christmas Eve now says 3 to 5 inches of snow overnight! Looks like Don will be doing some snow blowing before we can make our way to Rick and Doug’s house. (Good thing that one of his presents is a pair of heavy duty gloves to wear when snow blowing! Shhhh.)

Happy Saturday.

C’est Fini. For the Moment.

August 7, 2017 at 9:36 am by Claudia

My plan to work on Act 4 yesterday was shelved when I decided I would rather get everything organized in the kitchen, finish painting the trim and get all the crap off the table. I’m not a person who can leave a mess behind. Some people have no problem with that, but I’m someone who cleans and straightens up before I leave town. I did assign Don the bathroom; heaven knows when he’ll take care of that. Most likely, when he knows I’m two hours away and headed home on my day off. Same with washing the sheets. I will wash them before I leave and I think I can rest assured that he’ll leave them as is until absolutely necessary.

Not the best picture as it’s dark and rainy today, so I had to take it with the lights on so the yellow looks darker than it is, but you get the idea. Still have to re-mount the roman blinds and hang a few things here and there.

Anyway – all done! For now. We’ve decided that we want to paint the entire kitchen yellow, which isn’t as overwhelming as it sounds because we have lots of windows and trim and all the cupboards and a door that will be painted ivory white. And the ivory white I’m using is lighter and brighter than the current paint color. That’s just fine with me as I’ve never liked the paint color in this house, which is the same in every room, save the two bathrooms which I painted not long after we moved in. This house was flipped and I am absolutely sure that the flipper had every wall sprayed in this same blah color – not white, not beige, but somewhere in between. In a flat finish. When was it ever wise to paint a kitchen in oil-based paint in a flat finish?

We’re coming up on 12 years in this house and I’m finally getting around to painting the kitchen, which I’ve been threatening to do for years. I doubt I would have started painting, knowing me, but then we fell in love with the vintage stove.

And I’ll do anything for that stove.

The process will take a long time. I’m going to do it a section at a time and I’m headed off to Hartford for five weeks, so there’s that.

Again: dark, rainy, the floors look darker than they are but here’s the table. I find I’m really liking it. Don tells me he had no trouble cooking last night and the pots and pans and baking supplies are in another cupboard now that is much closer to the stove. The crate under the table holds miscellaneous items, including dish towels, some rarely used utensils, etc. I think it will work. Eventually, we’re going to replace that microwave with a smaller one in white. (I’ve never liked this one, but it came with the house, so we accepted it.) I’ve also never liked the black stove and the black dishwasher. The dishwasher doesn’t work. It’s never worked. Right now, we’re storing supposedly essential kitchen items in there. But we never use them. So they’re getting tossed and we’re getting a new dishwasher. In white. None of this will happen immediately, but with the paint, the new dishwasher and the vintage stove coming, we’ll have a mini makeover.

Oh, and I hate the tiled countertops.

You can see how the yellow changes depending on the light, the time of day and whether I have to resort to turning on the overhead pot lights.

The other item I purchased on Saturday was not a need, but I fell in love with it, so it came home with us. It’s almost impossible to take a good picture in the den because there are windows on three walls and it tends to stay dark in there until late in the day.

This table. Fell in love with the shape, the paint color – everything. I had no idea where it would go but this seemed like the right place and Don agreed. Excuse the laptop cord, but hey, this is real life. This is also pretty accurate in terms of the color. I had to close the blinds to get it that way.

And for those of you who asked, here’s the former island on the porch. I haven’t really done anything with it yet. No time.

It does look pretty there.

As you will see, it’s facing the entrance to the porch.

I have to find some place for the bench that was there – it’s currently shoved over to the left.

What do you think?

To sum up: Photos, but none of them very good. But there you go. It is what it is.

Okay. Acts 4 and 5 today and then Tuesday and Wednesday are for shopping and laundry and packing.

Happy Monday.

Rediscovered While Cleaning

A Petite Santa

C’est Fini. For the Moment.

Lambs Like to Party

A Note

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