Pantry Clean Up

We are still in the midst of nesting the empty nest. I know that expectant moms nest before the birth. I have never heard of anyone nesting an empty one, but it seems that is what we are doing. 
I showed you all the picture of our pantry immediately after the last chick left. 

It has been the most ridiculous and frustrating pantry in the 18 years we have lived here. The shelves are not very deep and not one shelf is tall enough to stand up a cereal box. Are you kidding me? A four bedroom house. Apparently the builder didn't think the children living in three of the bedrooms would want to eat cereal. I am not a morning person. One of the first things I taught my children once they were weaned was how to pour their own cereal. 

I am kidding! (sort of) 

I cleaned out all the stale crackers and the expired cans of sweetened condensed milk. I don't know why I had 3 cans of it. I guess I thought that the zombies would want 7 layer cookies during the apocalypse. That is my new excuse for having too much of something. I can just tell Mr. Bill that the zombies need a lot of pillows on the couch and bed when they arrive. (That sounded very southern when I read that back to myself)

I raided all my cupboards for any baskets, bins and containers. I also stopped by my local thrift for anything they had. I promise that a trip to the dollar tree or the thrift can yield enough containers for stuff. 

These were $11.00. I loved the lined ones. I missed that bandwagon in the retail shops because I was too cheap. So I was happy to find these cute lined baskets. I popped the liners in the wash and  I gave the baskets a run through the faucet with some Clorox Clean Up. They were clean and didn't look used, but I still wanted to spruce them up. 

Mr. Bill gave me these tags as a stocking stuffer.I wasn't sure what I would do with them. Bill would like me to open a shop, but I don't see that happening. I thought they would look cute labeling baskets of like items. 

Here are some shots of the pantry after just a few hours shopping for baskets, pitching expired items and cleaning. I just relined the shelves last summer so fortunately I didn't need to do that. 

I love my sprinkles corralled together! 

 Bill's breakfast bars. No, I don't cook him breakfast. 

He thought he was getting that kind of wife. Poor man, he has also suffered because I am not a morning person. I can't even speak until I have had some coffee. 

I love my Vera Bradley shopping tote. It is hanging on a galvanized hook I found while hiking. I felt very "farm chicks" when I found it. I have been in a very galvanized mood lately so it fit right in. 

I collect these 1950's cross stitch aprons. They are hanging on a "over the door" hook. I have used them occasionally and they are a fun pop of vintage. 
It was a quick fix for a very dysfunctional space. 


There is still more I want to do. I would like to get an old door like this one.

I told you about this blog I love.  http://downtoearthstyle.blogspot.com/ 
This woman is a genius repurposer and I love that she builds things herself. 


I will update pictures of the pantry if I can talk Mr. Bill into going on a "date" to the home restoration warehouse.


I hope you have a happy Monday. Go ahead and do some organizing today.

Here is how my amaryllis looked in full bloom. 

Sprinkled with baskets and organization,

Katie

The Blog!

The blog is a little over a month old. I am tickled that I have had almost 500 people look at my site. I'm annoyed by the people from Russia who are probably trying to find out information about me so they can scam me, but to them I say. "I am just a lowly preschool teacher, I deal with poop and pee almost on a daily basis. My identity is not really one you want to steal unless of course I fulfill my dream of winning or just being on "Dancing With The Stars."" I am one step closer to that dream if I become famous for this blog or I win the reality show I have created called "Last Pre-School Teacher Standing."
As a contestant on my reality show, early childhood teachers  have to win series of challenges. Like the "juice box challenge" where they have to open 10 juice boxes in the shortest amount of time. Or how about the mandarin orange challenge where teachers have to open those little cups of mandarin oranges without spilling a single drop. (Try it, those things are tough to open.)  Today was the "Gogurt Challenge." If you twist those little sucky tubes of yogurt they will open if twisted hard enough. Can you tell most of the challenges involve opening food for a table of hungry, not quite self sufficient little ones?
There are oodles of other challenges and obstacles, but most of them involve bodily fluids so I don't think you want to hear about those. It would be a "Fear Factor" meets "Survivor" kind of thing. It has potential, right?
But enough about that. I just love blogging. I should have been doing this years ago. The things I write about for you are every day occurrences around here. What I have realized by chronicling this past 6 weeks is that this is how Bill and I really live. We are always in the midst of projects. I love it when I find before pictures on my computer for one of my posts. Most of the time I'm so excited about my projects I forget to photograph them. And Rebekah says that I always say "It will be awesome." about something I am working on.
So in the days to come, I can't wait to show you what else we have been up to at the manor. My profile states that we are DIYers. But we are also proponents of "don't do it yourself" "DDIY" I will be honest about projects that are just better left to the professionals. I am excited about doing a post about the 5 best and 5 worst decorating mistakes we have made. Oh, and I can't wait for gardening season.

Have a blessed day,
Sprinkled with humor,
Katie

Three Day Weekend Makeover Revealed

The pot roast is cooking and the three day weekend is winding down. Mr. Bill is running one last errand and will finish up his little project before dinner. 

I have asked him to be a guest blogger, because his projects are amazing! Like this chair he covered in leather. 

But... he says that he can't blog on "something called Sprinkles." I think that he can. 
Since he won't blog, I will do a blog about this chair sometime.


Are you ready to see what color I painted the dish dresser? First let me tell you that I am so excited about this piece again. I haven't been this in love with it since it was brand new. Here is what it looked like before. 

It really had been a junk stop for stuff that had to go out to the shed or garden.

I started the project Saturday morning after I had coffee in my favorite stay at home and drink coffee mug. As soon as I was finished, I got to priming. 

I used Prime and Seal by Behr. 

It was a beautiful, warm, sunny day on Saturday, just perfect for quick drying on the primer. If it had been raining I would have postponed the project. 
I used the primer so I would not have to strip or sand. I hate sanding with a passion. This piece is not going to get high use, so I think the primer will be fine. I would sand if I were painting kitchen cabinets or a table. 
I used some freedom and creativity on this because Bill said he was not attached to it. In fact he said I could give it away. I think that released me to do some things I wouldn't normally do. This is in our sunroom. which he enclosed. (Can you say guest blogger?) We tend to go a little bit more country out here than in the rest of the house. Okay, I go a little more country.

I used an oil based paint from Sherwin Williams called White Duck. I let it dry overnight.  Painting with oil based paints provides such a nice finish. It takes longer to dry and the clean up is more difficult. To speed clean up I throw the brush away. Don't  judge. I conserve in other ways. 
I staged it Sunday with some accessories and then thought about what else I could do. 
The embellishments came from Home Depot. 
I love this blog.http://downtoearthstyle.blogspot.com/p/tour-my-house.html
She does the cutest stuff with numbers.

The numbers have significance. They were $1.48 each.
One hook was left over from a Bill project for his closet. The other one was $3.29.
The hammered pulls on each side were only $2.58. They look so vintage to me.
The cloverleaf grille was the most expensive element. It was $32.98. It was brass so I spray painted it flat black.  I have seen the sheet metal used to make radiator covers.
I am hoping it will give the dog hair a resting place instead of the way it floats around the room.

I am so excited about other uses for this stuff. I have a little left over so I will be experimenting. It cut very easily with tin snips. 

I screwed it in. The edge shows so I put the cut edge toward the front of the piece. The factory edge is towards the back and bottom, so it looks nicer. 

The decoration on the front was a brass piece I have had kicking around in my junk embellishment bag for ages.



I will have tons of fun staging this through out the seasons. You will love my vintage strawberry collection. 
I didn't go with black paint on this piece because most of the art in my little vintage collections have black backgrounds. Much like the pear below. I thought my collections and my black transferware would get lost in a sea of black. I have used black furniture elsewhere in the house and was ready for something bright. 

I have a whole set of these little fruit appliques. They came off of a wool skirt made for my step mom by her mother-in-law. It was given to me when I could wear a size two. I had the skirt for years and never wore it. I finally cut out the line of applique and made a vest during the 90's. Once the vest craze was over I took the vest apart and framed the strawberries. I have an apple and a plum as well. I love them. The handiwork on these little pieces of fruit is amazing. 
I went with pears for this seasonal display. 

My dear daughter did some pear watercolors in school. I will frame them, as soon as I can find where I put them. 
I have been into the galvanized accessories for a while. They showed up in my Christmas decorating. I got the two teared holder at Hobby Lobby on half price metal day. It was about 4.00. I also still love my mom's little stove.

There is another three day weekend in February. I'm excited about more refurbishing. 
Sprinkled with pears,

Katie

 Linking up with Funky Junk's Saturday Nite Special &

Get Schooled Saturday @ Too Much Time On My Hands

Holiday Weekend Makeover Project

It is a holiday weekend, so I have three days of blogging and posts to come up with. Now that I have tried my hand at painting cabinetry to pretty satisfactory results and I still have the supplies, I think I will try my hand at the dish dresser. Mr. Bill made the dish dresser in 1988 or so. It was one of his first furniture attempts and I have always loved it and cherished it. It was in style in the 80's. We were rocking the country, shaker look. It is based on the style of hunt boards or dish dressers. That is what I have always called it. It isn't a shelf or a hutch even though it could be.
But here is the dilemma. I love it but the color of the stain is very outdated. We stained it in the stain of the day and it matched the dining room table my dad made in the 50's or 60's. Her is a close up of the stain.

Now these two pieces are not even in the same room. Bill was okay with giving it away. I don't want to do that, because I think she can have a second life. This piece was supposed to be in our breakfast room, but we don't have a wall for it, so it is in the garden room where it gets seasonal displays.
Here it was last spring during my lemon period.

The bowl of lemons was not supposed to sit there but this pup kept stealing the fake lemons and hiding them under the deck.

Who Me?

                She is much better about that now. She hasn't stolen a pine cone at all this winter. 

At least not that I know of. 

Here is my quandry. Do I go with a distressed white finish or should I paint it black? 

Here is the other furniture in the room. The settee was at my grandparents lake house. 

The spool cabinet I got at a garage sale, same thing with the French cane chair. They were both 5 bucks.

The trunk belonged to my brother. The ice cream table was a freebie from one of my co-workers. 

(I love that little table to pieces.) Oh and the painting was a watercolor I found at a garage sale. It is a copy of picture found in the old "Victoria" magazine. I recognized it immediately because that has always been my favorite publication. The oil lamp was my parents. 

White would be cute. I have "pinned" at least a dozen white furniture shots on Pinterest. 

Black would be cute because I have so many black accents in that room.

I will keep you posted with a finished shot of my weekend project. 

Sprinkled with paint,

Katie

Living Fine Everyday

I have 10 tips for living "fine" everyday. Remember the "Fine Living Network"? I don't think they have it anymore. They changed it to "Wealth" or some such thing. It got even more pretentious than it was. I liked "Fine Living" better, because you don't have to be wealthy to live well. I believe that we all should live well everyday. How that looks is up to each of us.

I don't know what has happened to the word "fancy"? Nobody really uses that word anymore. 

 

Don't you love her? That is a hat.

Now, I find myself saying high-end instead of fancy. If Bill says fancy he is usually being sarcastic. I remember when we had fancy dishes, linens and silver for company. I have good china and it very rarely gets used. What a shame. (I think I will use it tonight!)

I had some favorite fancy things when I was little. One was my gold stretch bracelet with a heart. I also had a cute dalmatian pin. My sister and I love collecting and wearing our pins. Back then I could only wear my jewelry to church. I am sure I was also sporting my black or white patent leather shoes. I even had a pair that required a shoe hook. I'm sure I just dated myself with that. I still have a thing for black patent leather shoes. 

Shoes c/o Christian Louboutin 

These shoes are my holy grail shoes.

I remember when we were cleaning out my grandparent's house. My grandmother had boxes of new nighties just stacked in the attic. I guess she was saving them for a special occasion, but that special day never came.

My husband's grandmother, on the other hand, used her fine things. I cleaned out her house when she went to assisted living. The estate sale man didn't really buy much because there was very little that was not chipped or cracked. She used her wonderful things. That is how I want my stuff to look. I don't want to be a new pajamas stacked in the attic type of girl. 

So here are some things I do to live fine all the time:

1. The sterling silver shell (spoon) is always in the sugar bowl. (The rest of the service may not get used all the time, but I see something from it everyday.)

2. I fix coffee house coffee everyday. There are so many cheater recipes online. Plus it is sooooo much cheaper. I'm sorry about the amount of o's in so, but I had to get my point across.

3. I have a cloth on the table all the time. Initially it was to protect the table top, but I love how it looks and feels to dine with a tablecloth. Your thing could be placements, but the idea is the same. The table cloth thing has been the bane of my family's existence because invariably they spill on a fresh cloth. Sometimes we even use cloth napkins and napkin rings. 

4. I have a centerpiece on the table all year and I rotate it for the seasons. No pushing the mail aside to eat. 

5. We light candles during dinner. Okay, they are lanterns. Okay we just started this since all the kids moved out, but I love it. 

Most of the above is assuming you eat at the table. You should. At least some of the time although I love eating in front of the T.V. 

6. Having a cup of tea or coffee in one of the good cups is such a treat. 

7.  I wear my jewelry. It doesn't just sit.

8. Get the best sheets you can afford. Bill and I got Peacock Alley sheets at Tuesday Morning. They are soft and wonderful. They were double what they would have cost at Walmart, about the same as Bed, Bath and Beyond, but they are so worth it. I'm resisting the urge to add more o's to my so. 

9. Make the bed everyday! It feels restful to come home to a pretty bed. 

It appears I only have 9. I'm sure I have more ideas rattling around in my Ginkgo deprived brain. 

I will share them with you as I remember them. 

Did you know that the name of this blog is an accident? Rebekah and I were playing around with names and she accidentally hit the save button. I would not have chosen it, because it is not a food blog.  It was serendipitous because I love to sprinkle my life with wonderful things.
Sprinkle yours with something fine,

Katie 

Photos are mine or freebies.  

Dumpster Divine

It's Trashy Tuesday!
You can find some fabulous stuff in the trash. 
I called it dumpster diving but I have only pulled something out of a dumpster once.
The rest have all been trash picks found on the side of the road.
This first one Rebekah and I found when we were headed to the grocery store. I spotted it out of the corner of my eye. When I first saw it, I thought it might be a new piece. I was astonished that it was an empire chest from the early 1800's. It is all hand made. It had a small problem with one of the feet, but the talented Mr. Bill cut a new foot and put it on. This piece is massive. It stands about 4 feet tall. We have it in our entry way. It had crystal knobs on it when I found it. I got these replacement knobs at Home Depot. These are much more in keeping with the original. I'm sure Rebekah was horrified someone would see us stuffing this thing into the van. 

The portrait is Bill's grandmother. Nobody else in the family wanted it and in fact it sat for years in a garage. It was painted in the 20's or 30's.

The lamp is a reproduction of an antique Tiffany. It is made by Tiffany. It was my Christmas present a few years ago. Bill made the clock using wood that his friends found on a hike in Pennsylvania.

The next piece is a little loveseat I found on my way to work one morning. It was covered in a white damask. 

I learned to recover furniture years ago. I started with chairs and worked my way up to this. Bill and I have another chair to recover. I really can't do it alone anymore because it is so physically exhausting. It takes effort to keep moving and flipping the furniture over to attach the new fabric. The fabric pieces you take off become the pattern for the new fabric. When we start on our chair we will take before, during and after pics for this blog. I got this brown chenille at Joanns and it cost about $200.00 to recover. I usually don't spend that much on a free piece, but this one needed new foam. 

The final piece is one that Bill found while out walking one morning. He had to go home and get the car to pick it up. I am so happy that it was still there.

The little trunk on the top was my grandmother's doll trunk. 

The back was cardboard even though the rest of the bookshelf is oak. Bill put a new piece of plywood from Home Depot on it and touched up the stain. It is a perfect match to the craftsman look we have going on in this room. 

I will never forget my first dumpster dive. I had my new friend Wally with me. I am sure she had never done anything like this in her refined, prim and proper life. We climbed up on the side of that dumpster and pulled down two wicker patio chairs. They were super comfortable and in pretty good shape. I got about 10 more years out of those chairs. 

I hope that this inspires you to keep your eyes peeled. If something is by the side of the road go ahead and grab it. Hopefully you can find some good stuff. 

Sprinkled with trash,

Katie

The Chicks Have Left The Nest

Happy Wednesday!

Mr. Bill and I are spreading out in our empty nest.

Here is what we looked like 13 years ago. I think it's time for a new family portrait.

It doesn't seem possible that after 27 years the nest is empty. It only happened a few weeks ago so we are still adjusting to this new normal. 
We spent New Year's Day spreading out our closets. I was able to move all my spring and summer clothes to an extra bedroom closet. I put them in the closet of the room I staged as a dressing room.
http://katietreasures.blogspot.com/2011/12/dressing-room.html


Finally, For the first time since we moved into this house Bill has his own closet. He has had to share one side of his with all of my out of season clothes. Poor thing his side was cramped. I am not exactly the queen of neat when it comes to closets, drawers, cabinets etc. My stuff tended to multiply and morph to his side. He has been so patient with me. 
He decided to build some storage. He amazes me. Last weekend he measured and got busy busting out a storage system. He built it in a day and half and then stained it the next weekend. 
Here is what his storage looked like before.

Here is what it looks like now. Completely custom to fill the space. I can't wait to show you what else he has been up to recently. 

He got a template from Rockler to do the holes for the shelves. It looks professional. 

http://www.rockler.com/product.cfm?page=25379&filter=template%20for%20drill%20for%20shelves

He can move the little brackets to adjust shelf height. I love that he adjusted the height to fit his shoes and boots. He stained this piece a danish modern color and finished it with shellac. Shellac has fallen out of favor with the popularity of polyurethane, but it gives the wood a rich glow.

I will repurpose the old components from Home Depot for my accessories closet. 

Next up the pantry.

 Needs some work! It should not look like this for just two people. 

Sprinkled with organization,

Katie