TBC- To Be Completed

I have a problem. I like to start projects and then not finish them. It has gotten so bad that I currently have 14+ projects that are half done. So, in an effort to make myself accountable here they are. I'm laying it all out there. Don't judge people.

Or the trim in the kitchen Complete! 7/19/2013

This sliding door project for the bedroom? Nope, not done. Complete! 7/18/13

Apparently I don't like painting around trim. COMPLETED! 3/27/13 

Ceilings aren't much fun to paint either. 

That hole in the ceiling has been there 2 years.  Complete! 7/10/13

We moved the chandelier. Never patched that hole either.  Complete! 7/10/13

That's supposed to be a light switch (in my defense, this is a Daniel Project) COMPLETE! 6/2/13

I started the built-ins. Got hung up on sanding. 

My new porch gate still needs paint. COMPLETED! 3/21/13 

We never finished fixing the crack in the kitchen ceiling. 

The hood still isn't vented (**cough, cough 8 months later cough**)

I never installed the trim around the cabinets in the kitchen. 

I never actually finished painting the kitchen cabinets. 

Our bedroom door doesn't actually close. We should get on that. Complete! 7/19/13

I have a new light for this room that is gathering dust. 

I need to add more rocks to my newly expanded patio. Complete! 7/17/13 

I never got around to installing that rain barrel I bought last year. COMPLETE! 5/29/13 

Daniel and I have made a pact to not start anything new until everything else is finished. Things are going to get pretty boring around here for a while. On the plus side This is all slated for after the bathroom is finished (since that is number one priority) so you still have a few pretties to see coming up! 

Someone tell me I'm not the only one with a house full of unfinished projects. I swear, there has to be a support group out there for this. One that comes with people willing to paint.

Cheers! 

Praise Be to Anoia!

Alternately titled: Kitchen Drawer Organization.

For those of you not familiar with Terry Pratchett's Discworld series, Anoia is the goddess of things stuck in drawers (you can read about her here). As they describe her: "Anoia is praised by rattling a drawer and crying 'How can it close on the damned thing but not open with it? Who bought this? Do we ever use it?'" Needless to say I find it amusing.

I think we all have at least one of these drawers. The drawer in which everything ends up but you can't ever seem to find what you are looking for (meanwhile something is burning or boiling over). The problem begins (for me) with the lack of drawers in our kitchen. Something I didn't really think about when we remodeled but am now realizing was a mistake on my part. Drawers are the way to go. But I digress. Here's the issue; this is about the level of clutter I can take in a drawer before I begin praising Anoia.

 Not much in there right? That's about half of my cooking tools that I use on a regular basis.  But look, all of this unused vertical space. 

Of course if the cabinet maker was going to be nice he would have made it deep enough to store things standing up or made two shallow drawers. I should write an angry letter. Or become a cabinet maker.

The plan? Make a second level. I went out to our scrap pile and grabbed some 1x4s I had left over, cut them down to size and slapped some wood glue on them. Like my wooden spoon as brace?

 The ledge blends right in.

I returned everything to its place and then grabbed a bamboo organizer I had lying around.

A whole new level of storage that easily slides back and forth. 

Now I just need to come up with a goddess for perfectly organized drawers.

Even though it has been almost eight months since the kitchen remodel was basically over I am still trying to solve the organizational issues we have. Lot's of DIY projects planned so stay tuned! (you can check out my Pinterest kitchen board to see some of my inspiration).  How do you get around kitchen quirks? I thought my new blog friend The Baroness had a pretty neat solution using thrift store finds.

 Cheers!

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Glamming up the Closet

I've done other jewelry organization posts (see here) but with the new closet slowly coming together I wanted to do something different. Should I have been working on the kitchen? Probably. But this seemed way more fun.

Here is the before (closet as kitchen):

and after:

 Looks more like a closet now right? Lets zoom in a bit.

I lined the edges with just simple cork for even more storage and then glued corks on the back wall (I probably should have done it on thin wood or cardboard for removability but I'll bite that bullet when I get to it). Closer?

 I painted the jewelry box last summer in Bher's Lipstick. I love the coral hue with the natural cork color. I also added some cute antique tea cups for corralling my bangles.

Though I do feel like I should disclose the true state of the closet.

Not quite there. Once the kitchen is done we will tackle the rest of the mess in here. There is one little bonus I also included.

With such a chic display I wanted more than just your average stick pin for hanging but I wasn't really willing to go out and buy anything nicer. So, I took my boring yellow sewing pins and a few of my favorite nail polishes and fixed them up.

Much better! Now these are ready to hang my pretties. All in all the project cost around $4.00 for the cork squares. Everything else was on hand. Now I can actually wear my jewelry which is a huge plus.

I've had in-laws here and Daniel has been traveling but things are still poking along in the kitchen. We've got 2 weeks until we go on our 3rd honeymoon (yay Jamaica!) so I've set myself a goal to have the kitchen cabinets painted before we go. Ambitious I know, but if Young House Love can do it in 14 days then I should be fine! (here's their method) Sometimes you just need a hard deadline to motivate right? Who wants to take bets on whether or not I finish in time?

Cheers!
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Frugal Friday
 

Cleaning Up Again

Sometimes it feels like I am constantly cleaning up. I guess that is just part of the renovation process. The kitchen is feeling more put together but the bedroom... not so much.

It's a good thing I've got the day off. My in-laws are coming next week so I've got no excuse to ignore it any longer. Nothing like company to spur on a project right?

On a happier note I finish my Couch to 5K training today and I am feeling great! So great Daniel, my mother, my friend Deanna and I are signed up for a half marathon in October. Yikes! Gotta find a new training plan to get ready for that one. Anyone out there finish a half marathon? How did you train? This will be my first.

Cheers!

Office Tray

While we have a dedicated office, it never gets used. Daniel prefers to work at the dining room table which, as you can imagine, often means the table is covered in papers and pens and cords. It was starting to get a bit silly but since Daniel likes working there I figured we could make something work.

A few months back I read and interview in House Beautiful about a woman who liked to work at her dining room table too. She used a tray with boxes to keep things contained and as a bonus, it could easily be removed when it was time for dinner. Genius! I looked and looked for a tray I liked and eventually settled on a cheap Ikea one that seemed like it would do the trick. Add a box for pens and cords and you get a dedicated office on a tray.

We used it for a few weeks (just to see if it was worth keeping or returning) and so far it seems to be great. Everything important sits on it until it needs to find it's own home and the piles of paper have been tamed. But it felt like it needed something.

Spray paint!

The color isn't quite true to life. The tray is more teal and the box a shiny metallic gold. Alas, my photography skills still need some work, but you get the point. The box perfectly holds phone chargers, headphones, and other odds and ends.

Perfectly out of sight and organized. We don't even move it for dinner.

There you have it. Our home office tray. Daniel has been really good about using it to put things away which makes this project a success! Now if only I had a place for all of the random tools we have. One day.

Cheers!

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Frugal Friday