Giveaway

I got these shelves from Freecycle when we were re-doing the Utility Room with a view to painting them cream. Unfortunately they are just a little bit too big ... so if anyone reading this would like them, they are welcome to collect. The measurements are - Height 81 cm, Depth 18 cm and Length 110 cm.

I just wish I had room for them here .... but they just WON'T fit.

For the Shabby Chic Girls

I spotted this van at a music festival last summer and remembered it after a blog comment from one of the Shabby Chic Ladies about the nest of blackbird chicks currently in the garden ....

Kitchen

For some time I have been intending to put some photos of our kitchen on the blog. Clive re-painted our existing units earlier this year. The old kitchen was quite dark and dated and the cooker was 21 years old, as was the flooring.

So, it was off with the solid wood kitchen cabinet doors and all were painted with 3 coats of Farrow and Ball oil-based eggshell front and back (yes it did take ages). The base units are now Blue Green and the wall cupboards are Clunch - we also used Clunch emulsion for the walls themselves. The new cooker is installed, as is the wood effect flooring and I've finished the Roman Blind. It all feels so much better - cleaner and fresher - for a minimum outlay AND we saved the units from going to landfill!

Two wall cupboards and a double base unit (not where we keep the double bass) in the kitchen were picked up some years ago up the road from a lady who was having a kitchen re-fit. I spotted the cupboards on her lawn and offered her £10 for them. Recently, as a result of a house move, someone (also up the road) put similar kitchen doors and drawers in a skip at the front of their house and allowed me to have some, which Clive re-sized and fitted to our sink base unit in the utility room.

The cupboard handles were replaced by plain pine knobs from Wilkinsons - not Mark Wilkinson's (as thought by the Recycling Goddess) but from Wilko the cheapo shop! They have been waxed and now fit in quite well.



I'll post some photos of the updated utility room soon.

The Dresser

No, not the film with Albert Finney, this is the dresser that was my first furniture updating project.

The dresser was orangey pine with scratched varnish and water marks on the top. It fitted perfectly into its allocated space but I hated how it looked. Surely if I painted it, there was nothing to lose? If it looked hideous I could chuck it out (Freecycle) and get something else – much better though to try and recycle it.

This was the result – unfortunately no “before” photo but here it is being painted (3 coats Farrow and Ball Ringwold Ground) and another of it in situ and in use – photo’s a bit dark. That’s bread in the bags – not a chicken de-frosting!