Recent Projects - from the Land Where Nothing Ever Gets Finished

As is pretty clear: new posts have been MIA lately.
I blame a lack of time, a bad habit of not finishing projects, and my constant failing to take some damn pictures of the things I do get done!

Below are a few of the projects I've been working on recently, in no particular order.
As I get my $h!+ together and finish them up, I'll post a rundown on each.

• Mounted my TV on the wall.
- Getting rid of the massive entertainment center and putting the tv up on the wall has totally changed the living room.

Makes my living room hotel-sexy.

• Worked on screening in the back porches.
- Started on this in the spring, and when it got hot outside I got lazy. 
- Came back to it his week and discovered a roadblock I'll have to overcome with a bit of rework. But, progress is being made.

Patio progress. Catio creation.

• Reupholstered 3 old office chairs for use in the dining room.
- Related pattern (chevrons) and color (pinks!).

$5 each, and now all sassy.

- And made a bunch of coordinating pillows.

Modeled by the glamour-puss.
Meee-ooow

• Customized and hung a new dining room light.
- Changed my original plan from this post, but the result is close.

Real pictures to follow.

• Refinished a mid-century modern dresser and converted it into an entertainment center.
- Waited forever for the right piece to come along, and am trying to keep it classic enough to do Don Draper proud.

This was an exercise in patience and high # sandpaper.
I cant' wait to be finished and show you more. It's crazy gorgeous.

• Picked up a couch and two chairs from Craigslist and skinned them for their leather.
- Then washed and conditioned the heck out of it.
- Then made a purse out of said leather.

Lots of oiling. And shooing away cats who wanted to lick up ze oil.

• Received a used OTR microwave from the BF's parents to replace my broken one.
- Pictured below is die kaputt maschine. Mounting is in progress for the new-to-me zapper.

Best looking appliance when I moved in: only one that totally didn't work.
'Best' being SUPER relative.

• Mounted my grandfather's antique tools.
- For display and ease of use.
- Progress has gone at the same (snail's) pace as setting up the office/second bedroom.

Aaah. Love, love, love this project.
More to come!

• Relined an antique humpback trunk from my grandmother.
- Removed the old lining and blitz cleaned 40 years of dried mold. During which; the house smelled kind of good, in a granny's-basement sort of way.

Creative fabric manipulation 101.

• Played florist and created all the flowers for a friend's event.
- Tons of happy flowers to honor the passing of her beloved aunt.

10 arrangements, 2 Xl altar pieces, and a 24' broken heart.

• Found and shined up some old silver pieces.
- Sunday afternoon thrift store browsing.
- $20 in my pocket got me both of these AND a bangin smoothie. #winning

A good deal + a little elbow grease = not-so-shabby chic accent pieces.

• Turned a retired firefighter coat into a throw pillow cover.
- Will be a wedding present for a fellow firefighter, made from his old coat.

The most ridiculously complicated 'easy' project ever.

• Made a fuse box cover.
- Out of leftover paint chips from picking my wall colors.

For an ugly eye-level fuse box.

• And spent some quality time with my favorite furry guy.
- Like all good animals, anytime his person is on the floor for more than 10 seconds(dining room chair upholstering, in this case); it means PLAYTIME NOW.

He managed to get himself stuck in a bag handle and dealt with it by flopping over and looking cute.
Good call, actually.

One of these days I will find the missing hardware, cut the last piece, install the whatever, take a picture, or write a post about each of these projects. In the meantime, they are already improving The Cabindo, half-finished states and all. 

At the end of a recent post, John from Young House Love touched on being content with a home in-progress. I'm accepting that more and more, and it helps that most of my big projects are to the point that I don't have multiple construction zones 24/7. Home feels like home when I get there, rather than a to-do list. Theres still plenty to tackle, but I'll get there eventually.
My wallet surely appreciates the lul. Though it feels too long since I've last seen my buddy Mary at the Home Depot paint counter.....

-Lindsay

Dishwashaaa

In a previous posting, I talked about my kitchen and the 'antique' appliances it came with, and how I'd replaced the stove. The second item on the hit list was the dishwasher.  Here is the story of how it's replacement came to be.

Since my new stove was nice and shiny stainless, I set out to find a new (to me) stainless dishwasher. I know dishwashers are among the cheaper appliances to buy new, but I'd been seeing a bunch of good looking ones being sold on Public Surplus. Turns out there's some mandate that all dishwashers in schools now have to be commercial grade, so they are dumping late model, perfectly fine non-commercial machines.
Through a serious commitment to lunchtime auction stalking, I saw one for sale in my area that looked promisingly modern. Sure it was white, but I could use a little paint to deal with that.
The bidding was fast and furious. Ha, just kidding. There was one other person who seemed interested, and only $10 of interested. The final price of the dishwasher after taxes, buyer premiums, and bid price was ONLY $11.86!!!! I was flabbergasted and cautiously optimistic that it actually worked, seeing as it was listed as condition 'unknown'.

A friend of mine lives out by the school district the dishwasher was from, and as is my normal food-for-help exchange scenario, she agreed to help me pickup the thing and then we'd go have lunch. I'd bought a small desk from the same school district and planned on stuffing both items into in the back of my Subaru Outback. Since a bigger item like the stove had already fit no problem, I had an over inflated sense of confidence about what could be hauled. The guys at the loading thought I was nuts, but both the machine and the not-so-small-after-all desk fit perfectly with the back seats down. I drove home nose to steering wheel and managed to lug the thing up the stairs by myself.

Plumbing is something I know nothing about and as there are immediate, serious, and super bad consequences for doing it wrong: I figured a professional installation would be worth every penny. Luckily, my Bf's parents gave me a very generous housewarming gift which covered all those pennies.

I've since painted the dishwasher to match the stove. I used appliance enamel on the top and bottom, which my girl Mary in the paint department was able to color black.
On the front panel, I applied two coats of aluminum paint to ensure good coverage. When they were dry, I painted on a third coat that I let dry halfway and then dragged a stiff brush through horizontally. This gave the panel a brushed look which made it look closer to real than just flat painting. I then over-fiddled around and it turned a bit splotchy. I need to learn when enough is enough. Perhaps in another 30 years. It will be an easy fix with another brush-dragged layer at some point, but at the moment, the general appearance of the kitchen is much improved.

Old and New

i take pictures like an off kilter drunk apparently
sorry

Stainless tile backslash post later. :)



-Lindsay

Kindness is a new stove

My kitchen is right by the entry balcony of my unit. One whole wall of the room is glass and you actually walk by it to get to the front door. 

its my house in a box

You can see some cabinets, the fridge, a bit of the sink, and some wall space as you go by, but the stove is tucked away in a corner over your left shoulder. When I walked up to The Cabindo the first time, I marveled at the pretty new maple cabinets and the attractive kitchen counters. I cringed at the white fridge and shiny rust wall color that made the spacious room look greasy and small, but hey: good lookin' structurally sound cabinets and counters?!? #winning

Then I went in, and there they were: the miss-matching ancient bosom buddies. Side by side. A decrepit taupe dishwasher and an ancient stove; complete with a collection of dead bugs behind the egg timer glass. 

uhh. you said something was pretty in here.....? 

This had been a rental property for many years, so I understand why none of the appliances were from this last decade or matching. That's fine with me; I'm definitely not one of those House Hunter snots who simply muuuuust have all granite and stainless, in their first home, right off the bat, no exceptions. HA! Anyway, I was so excited and smitten with the place: I really didn't care. The appliances worked, which is the most important thing about them, and I thought ok; its not a good looking room right now, but once I paint:

peach walls with green accents
to open up the room and compliment the counters and cabinets

install a back splash:

subway tile with an interesting edge

 put stainless film on the dishwasher:

$20 to fancy

yadda, yadda, yadda....(insert unrealistic expectations here).....it'll be great! Just that easy!

So I bought the place, and upon hosting my first event, used my ugly-but-working (home inspector approved) stove and dishwasher. Errrr....turns out that while they switched on and didn't start a fire, they didn't really fulfill their particular functions. The oven sent out a noticeable waft of gas (up from the delicate one it seemed to emanate even when off) and took forever to heat up to temperature. The btu's it was throwing out also got the room way up in temperature. We lived, peeled off a layer, and had another beer. After dinner, dishes were quickly rinsed and put in the dish washer. Surprise! They came out dirtier. The look on the faces of my and my Bf's mothers were pricelessly: 'disgusted-but-smiling-because-it's-thanksgiving-dammit' when they went to unload it.

So the hunt for affordable replacements began. For safety reasons, and the fact that I can wash dishes by hand but not bake pizza by the power of my gaze, a non-gas leaking oven was first on the list.
I'd struck out on Public Surplus and the ReStore for gas ranges, but hit the jackpot on Craigslist. I saw a lot of high quality gas stoves in the $200/$300 range all over the DC area, mostly far away from me, and still more than I wanted to spend. Then one popped up of the same quality, but offered at $100 and right by my fire station. I immediately called the guy and he said it was still available and would I like to come see it. Yes please and thank you sir!
An important part of Craigslist is the buddy system, so I promised a hearty breakfast after duty the next day to one of my firehouse buddies who lives around the corner in exchange for backup and help lifting.

We get to the seller's house and he was welcoming and friendly. He see's my friend's fire station sweatshirt (this happened right before Christmas and it was cooold out), and tells us about how he's been a long time supporter of the station, takes his grand kids to all the open houses, watches the Santa parade,

donates football tickets to a Redskins game every year for the fire fighters, etc. etc. Again, salt of the earth, lovely, lovely guy.
Oh, and the stove was great too.

hey there shiny britches

So he's having the new stove installed the next day (double oven, Christmas gift for his wife), and we would come back then to pick up the old one once its disconnected. We are going to leave and I try and hand him the advertised $100, and he shakes his head and says, 'how about $75?". Um.....ok!!
We arrive the next day to pick up the oven, and he and his wife hand me an envelope.
It has $75 in it.
I look up at them, and with big smiles on their faces they say: "Thanks for your service. Merry Christmas!"
Well shit.
I don't think it would be appropriate to hug them, and I'm trying not to cry at this point because that's the kindest thing ever and I'm easy to tears, so I just babble profuse thank you's as we lug the thing out the door. Mr.Nice Guy is smiling the whole time and telling us what good cookies the thing bakes. Ugggh, my heart strings are all pulled and my faith in humanity is bolstered.

waiting for installation
the holiday spirit is strong with this one.

Kindness is a new FREE stove.


-Lindsay