Windsor Chairs and Table

I was in Austin today running an errand and happened to go right by a store in which I had some items consigned so I decided to stop in and see if they had a check for me. 

No check, but I found a wonderful table in just the right size for my breakfast room with a really good price tag.  Not only that, but it included four Windsor chairs that I just love. 

After checking it out thoroughly and exchanging several texts with my husband, I bought the table!

I pick it up tomorrow and cannot wait.  I hope I can sleep tonight I'm that excited.

The set is maple.  The table is 58 inches round with drop leaves and includes table protector pads and two nine or ten inch leaves that store inside the table.  The absolute best part is that this table is almost exactly like the one I grew up with.

I'll post pictures as soon as I can but for now I'll leave you with these pictures of Windsor chairs posted by Elizabeth of Blue Clear Sky and Holly of Holly Mathis Interiors.

Ethan Allan from Blue Clear Sky

Holly Mathis Interiors

Cindy

My Home - A Tour

OK, I finally took some pictures of my home to show you.  We moved in December 30 and I have just about everything in place.  Sorry, this is a picture heavy post.

So, without further ado, my home:

Standing in the entry looking past the dining room alcove, toward the family room at the back of the house.

When you look to the right from here, this is what you see:

Hallway to the three secondary bedrooms.  There are two rooms in the front of the house to the right, the 'front bedroom' and the 'craft room', the bathroom is straight ahead and another room is to the left and is called the 'back bedroom'.

The front bedroom with a queen size bed.  That's a quilt in the process of being pieced together.

The pattern of the quilt is the 'Handy Andy' and is for my youngest son, Andy.

The wall opposite the bed.



The drapes in the front bedroom.  I made them 10 or more years ago for the dining room two houses ago, used them in my family room one house ago and they are now in a bedroom in my current house.

Now brace yourself because I'm going to show you my craft room.  I don't ever do my crafts in my craft room because I prefer to do crafts in the kitchen or family room.  It's really my craft storage room.

Are you ready? 

OK

I'm cringing.

I plan to make it look pretty but need some $$ to invest in better storage.  It is really convenient and I'm in there getting something or putting something away all the time.

I just needed to keep it real.

This is the opposite wall with a twin size bed and game storage.  I really need some storage with doors.

OK, now for the back bedroom:

Another queen size bed.  The drapes are made from Covington's Bosporus Toile.

I got the fabric on clearance at Hobby Lobby for $4 a yard.  I love it!



Old family pix hanging in the hall to the back bedroom.

Secondary bathroom.

Some close ups. 

I got this metal shelf at a thrift store for $1.97.  It's all rusty and I originally planned to paint it, but I really like the shabby, rustiness.

Back to the entry.  The dining room alcove is to the right.  I blogged about it here. 

The music room is to the left.

Just outside the music room.

This is a view from the family room back toward the entry and past the dining room and music room.

I blogged about my family room and kitchen here, my breakfast room here, my laundry room here and my entry here.

Thanks for bearing with all my pictures.  The only room you haven't seen yet is my master bedroom.  I'll get to that at a later date.  I gotta keep some mystery!

Cindy


I'm linking to the following:

Between Naps on the Porch Metamorphosis Monday

My Uncommon Slice of Suburbia's Tuesday's Treasures

Miss Mustard Seed's Furniture Feature Friday

I have a confession to make . . .

. . . I've been afraid to show parts of my house because it doesn't look like what I see on other blogs.  I have it mostly done and put together since our move two months ago and I really like it.  But I was afraid to show it for fear that others might not like it. 

So tonight, I decided that I just need to show it and not worry what other people think.  I need to be me.

I have lots of furniture out and pictures on the walls because this is a down-sizing house.  We kept what we could and decided that hanging pictures on the walls is the best way to store them.  Besides, we really like our pictures; they all have sentimental value to us. 

So starting tomorrow, I'm going to start featuring parts of my house that didn't show up in previous photos.  I'm also going to show the changes I've made on the parts I've already shown. 

Stay tuned . . .

Cindy

Kitchen Pot Racks

My husband and I plan to install a pot rack over the island in our kitchen.  I've been keeping a picture file of some nice examples.

 

It's a Wannabe Decorator's Life

Another use for a pot rack.  This kitchen and rest of Erin's beautiful house can be seen at It's a Wannabe Decorator's Life.

I loooove the following kitchen:

Here is another view:

And another:

Beautiful!

This is my favorite pot rack and one that we can make ourselves:

Gingham ceiling and copper pots!  Beautiful!

This isn't a pot rack but is similar to the one above:

Great look and can be done relatively inexpensively.

Do you have a pot rack?  If so, please add a comment with a link to your pictures.

I'll be off-line for the next few days as I'll be visiting with my daughter and neice in the Dallas-Ft. Worth area. 

Thanks for visiting!

Cindy

Dining Room

I want to show you what my dining room looks like for now.  I've unpacked it all but still have some projects I want to do in here.

The table and chairs were purchased second hand about 20 years ago.  I think they're from the 1920s and they're still in great shape.  The three-tier pie crust table in the corner was made by my Dad when he was in high school as a wedding gift for his sister.  It holds many of my favorite knick knacks.

The china cabinet is a recent purchase that I need to hold my five sets of china and various other plates and china and crystal pieces.

I recently added the items to the top of the china cabinet to give it more presence in the room.  The cabinet is a short one because our last house had a drop ceiling in the dining room.  This house has nine foot ceilings.

The rug is one my step-son got for us in Afghanistan when he was stationed there a few years ago.

The runner on the table is a piece of silk fabric left over from curtain panels I made for our living and dining rooms in our last house.  They will soon be hanging in our music room.

Living room in my last house.



Dining room in my last house.  See the low ceiling over the china cabinet. 

That house was much bigger than the one we're in now; also more expensive to heat and cool, harder to clean, more expensive to insure, more maintenance, etc.

I'd like to paint the walls something other than white.  We used Sherwin Williams Jersey Cream in our last house and might use the same again.

Now for the side of the room that I didn't show previously.

That dresser on the left is one of my next projects. 

My daughter gave it to me.  I plan to paint it with Sherwin Williams Upward - a grey blue.

I'll post more on this room as I make more changes but for now, I like it.
Thanks for visiting.

Cindy

I'm linking to the following:

The Tattered Tag's Keep It Simple Sunday

Between Naps on the Porch Metamorphosis Monday

A Diamond in the Stuff's Time to Shine link party

My Uncommon Slice of Surburbia's Tuesday's Treasures

Kitchen and Laundry Room

I have a new convenience in my kitchen that my husband just finished for me.  He wired three undercounter lights to an outlet we had our builder install over the microwave.  This outlet is on a switch on the backsplash, next to the range.  All I have to do is flip one switch to get light on all the counters!  My husband is my hero!

This is my kitchen with the three undercounter lights turned on.

Do you see the switch just to the right of the range?  No?  I don't either.  It blends into the subway tile in this picture.  Here, I'll point it out . . .

There it is.  Oh, this is so wonderful for a woman who likes lots of light in her kitchen.  One flip of the switch and I have it!

On another note, I did a quick project in my laundry room that really added a fun pop of color.  I hung some 70s framed tiles that my parents used to have hanging in their vacation home.  My Dad just recently sent them to me.

The laundry room is just off the kitchen and doesn't look very pretty but I keep the door open during the day because I like the light from the window.  With these framed tiles I can keep the colorful theme from my breakfast room on the other side of the kitchen.  I blogged about my breakfast room here.

Now the laundry room looks pretty and adds to the colorful theme in the kitchen.

So what do you think about my 70s, framed tiles?

Cindy

I'm linking to:

The Shabby Nest's Frugal Friday

Between Naps on the Porch Metamorphosis Monday

The Tattered Tag's Keep it Simple Sunday

My Uncommon Slice of Suburbia's Tuesday's Treasures

A Beach Cottage's Good Life Wednesdays

A Little Knick Knack's Everything But the Kitchen Sink

Breakfast Room Part I

I have my breakfast room to a point where I don't mind posting pictures.  First, here is a before picture soon after we moved in:

There are five windows in this room.  That alone was a big selling point with me because I love lots of light but it meant making five curtains.  You can see the fabric on the sofa that I ordered for making the curtains for the windows. 

There were lots of problems with this room besides the lack of curtains.  Probably the biggest problem was the table.  We had our formal, mahogany dining room table with our more casual black Windsor chairs.  It gave us more room at the table but looked all wrong.  We moved our smaller, round black table into the room and it looks so much better.

I also didn't like the floor situation.  We have brown tile with brown grout.  That was a common sense choice since we have two dogs who both have a knack for finding any mud in the backyard and tracking it inside.  Our first choice for flooring would be wood, but that was out of the question at this time due to financial constraints.  I like the brown tile but not in this room.  I really wanted a rug like this:

Which is available here for only $600 plus $150 shipping.  That's too much for me.

I also like this rug from Target:

Available here for only $550 with free shipping.   Again, that was too much.

Then I remembered that we already have a rug with a blue background and is the right size.  I didn't have a place for it and was thinking of getting rid of it.  It's not exactly what I want but it does the job and I already own it so it's free.  And an added bonus by putting the rug in the room was that the file cabinet drawer stays closed.  Another problem solved.

I added some pictures to the room.  You can read about some of them here.  I also hung the silhouettes of the kids I had made at Disneyland 12 years ago and again at Christmas just two months ago.  I've also made four of the five drapes so we have more privacy and light control.

My husband started to install the chandelier but ran into a problem with some wiring that our builder needs to fix.  The chandelier is up without it's glass shades and it doesn't work yet, but I'm going to show the room anyway.

So now for the big reveal:

Do you like our sofa?  It's from my mother-in-law.  I hated it when we first got it, but it's kind of grown on me and I love it with the drapes.

It may not stay there forever but for now I like having a place to sit in the sun in the morning.

You can also see the rug in this photo.  It's a little too busy with the drapes, but it looks so much better than the bare tile floor.  It really defines the room and gives it a warm feel.  I can live with it for now.

So, again here it is before:

And after:

What do you think?

Cindy

I'm linking to the following:

The Tattered Tag's Keep It Simple Sunday

Cottage Instinct's Make It 4 Monday

Between Naps on the Porch Metamorphosis Monday

The Shabby Nest's Frugal Friday

My Uncommon Slice of Suburbia's Tuesday's Treasures

A Little Knick Knack's Everything But the Kitchen Sink

Jennifer Rizzo's Refresh Your Room Party