Basement kitchen, concrete patio, cabinet, and doors

Sorry it's been so long. With Easter, and spring weather, and yards, and bees, I haven't had time to blog much. But we have been working on our house. This is the outside walk-out basement area.

We're going to have a cement patio poured and we want it colored.

We're thinking terra cotta.

From the bottom right of the above chart, go over one, and up one. You'll see a little pencil mark by it. That's the color we're thinking of. What do you think?


And I don't know if you remember this cabinet, but my friend and I found it a few months ago. It was sitting by the road for 75.00, but when Dave went to look at it, the guy was mowing his yard and gave it to him. It's real wood.

So Dave did some reinforcing, and took it apart,

and prepped it for paint.

Then I painted it white.

We put the original hardware back on it because the newer hardware in stores don't fit the holes in this older stuff.

We brought home a few laminate tops to see which one would look best witht he floor.

I went with the lighter colored one. There isn't much counter top left after we cut the sink out anyway.

A farm sink like I have now.


And there you go. It looks done...it isn't. There's plumbing to do.

And this next project....I cannot tell you what a rotten horrible mood I was in doing it! You see, we ORDERED olde mustard simulated milk paint and the bargain price of $19.00 a quart. We thought it might be nice to have some color on the closet doors. Never having used "milk" paint before, be it simulated or not, I started on the inside closet door. Pretty nice. I like it. Kinda looks like stain.

But, by the time I got to the second door, I noticed the paint started getting darker by the bottom of the door. And if it weren't for Dave watching me shake and stir that paint, you would have thought I never stirred it.

This is the front of the closet door, and it's the other side to the first door picture. Quite a HUGE difference. I was NOT HAPPY AT ALL. Splotchy, and crappy brown.

And as you can see, by the time I got to the fourth door, I was livid and didn't care anymore. I slopped the paint on, went home and told Dave it looks like shit! Literally! As a matter of fact, I got a phone call during painting and I did not hold back. (Sorry Anh!)

Then the next day, we went back to the house to check on the doors and look how this paint dried.

GORGEOUS!


I had to touch up from my 'bad attitude' paint job, so you can see a few wet spots, but these doors turned out exactly as we hoped they would. We love them.

Cindy

PS - Patti B...give me a call...you can come out and see the floor now.

Living area almost done.

Dave and I like old wood. The strong, sturdy stuff that was used a hundred years ago. There is a guy in town that is an excavator, and every now and then he would allow Dave to come into a house and tear out some wood before he tears it down. It's been a couple of years since he's done this, but we have saved it to use in our new home some day. This is one of three piles that we have.


These are the pantry doors. I showed these on the bee lady blog and explained that they were really a mistake, but because they were special ordered, we are using them anyway. They are new, and it's a prime example of what new stuff is like. They practically fell apart trying to put them up, and Dave was ready to sell it all! One of my blogger friends suggested painting the windows with flowers and such...which is not a bad idea! She always suggested putting material behind them, which we had already decided to do. But.....I do have some friends who know how to paint. I'm visualizing flowers, and bees, and birds and such....Great idea "Hookin' It with Mr. lick lick"

And these are the more-than-sturdy pantry shelves, made from old wood. Love them. Do you ever just run your hand along an old piece of wood, cloth, quilt, doorknob, (history) and wonder what stories they would tell if they could tell stories?

And this is what I walked into yesterday. Dave said he could use some help yesterday. He works out there every day after work, and lately has taken some time off of work to try to get some things done. I work out there whenever he needs my help. Yesterday was one of those days. We needed to clean this room up, and out.

So we both got to work.

Here is a picture of the closet. No doors yet.

Getting there. See that wall at the end of the room? He put that up on Saturday. Took all day. Made from old wood.

Winston doesn't understand why Dave's doing woman's work. I set them both straight right away!

Taa Daaaaa!

But then, we didn't wait long enough for it to completely dry because we had too much to do.

Still....it's looking good don't ya think?

I put polyurethane on the wood to seal it. Still needs another coat. This pic is before any of the wood was sealed. (I just accidentally deleted the pic showing you how it looks, so....next post!) This wall is where the stove/oven kitchen cabinets and sink will go. So, those marks in the wood will be somewhat hidden. I love it.

Cindy

Lights, trim, and closets

Dave has finished hanging rods in the closet. There's actually a support in the center of the rods now, but I don't have a pic. You get the idea.


Trimming out the windows. He made the window sills very wide because he knows I like to set plants and such on the ledges.

And hanging lights.

This fan is in the center of the room.

There are two of these, on the walls in the bedroom area.

Ceiling fan on either end - one in the kitchen area - above....and the other one is in the bedroom area.

Here's a pic of the bedroom area lights.

This light is above the door when you walk in.

As you've probably noticed, I like older light fixtures. I pick them up at sales whenever I can and my Shug rewires them for me.

Cindy

Floor!

Check out this floor! I love it. We had it stained in the living area of our basement.

For those of you thinking about having a floor done like this, let me say a couple of things. First of all, it cannot be a sealed concrete floor. If your concrete has been sealed, it costs quite a bit to remove that sealant. Second, the fumes are horrible. If I were living in the house and had this done, I'd probably move out for a couple of days! VERY FUMEY. (is that a word?) The only maintenance is to wax it every now and then. He said a gallon of was will last us a lifetime. I hope it's a long lifetime! And the wax is a paste type wax.

We still have to grout it. We're going to do that on our own. And after grouting you can't walk on it for 72 hours! We could use a break anyway, so we'll grout it, then take a break. What do you think?

Cindy

Staining the floor

We hired someone to acid stain the floor in our living area. I know, chemicals. I've fought it and fought it, but it was either tiles or stained cement.


He stained three different samples on our floor in the closet, so we could choose what we like the best. It's hard to tell with these pics taken from my phone,

We thought this was a little light, too much floor showing through.

This was a little too dark and too many variegations.

But this....just right. He just called and said he was finished.

I can't wait to see it.

Cindy