Grandma Staege's Sewing Table

I showed you the shelf I put in above the washer and the dryer.  
I also did some furniture shuffling. If you are following this riveting story, you might have seen the white desk post. 
;) 
One of the changes I made by default was moving my great grandmother's sewing machine table back into the laundry room.

Emma Marie Emilie Staege Lueke was so proud of her New Home Sewing Machine.

That is a mouthful!

She took such good care of it that I still have some of the original accessories to the machine. 

I certainly couldn't use it as a sewing machine anymore but it didn't make a good end table either. At this point in my life I prefer to have things that I can use for something not for purely sentimental reasons. 

So I took off the cover and the sewing machine and stowed them away. 

I love using the laundry room as a makeshift butler's pantry during a party. I had to do something about the well in the middle of it if I was going to use this piece as a little serving table.

The well served a purpose when this was a sewing machine but not as a table for overflow food.
I had hoped that we had a piece of scrap lumber about the right size so I could make a top. There wasn't one so I asked Bill to cut one for me. 
He cut the piece and then put an edge on it so it will set securely over the top of the sewing machine table. He cut the top about three inches deeper so we could have more surface. 

I still wanted the cute details of the drawers to show.

I did however want to disguise the dryer hose that runs behind it.

I made a little flirty skirt out of drop cloth material and stapled it to the middle drawer. I don't notice the vent when I walk in the room and the skirt matches the paint on the top. 

I love having a lamp in the laundry room. 

We've gained some floor space in this tight room. 

I painted the top of the table with a coat or two of CeCe Caldwell chalk paint in Vintage White.
 

I love being able to use family stuff in a new way.

We already used this for two dinners over Christmas. 
It was great to have a place to set the desserts until we finished dinner. 
The challenge now will be keeping it free from clutter!
Stay tuned for the next spine tingling chapter in this story; the pie safe!  
Katie 
Linking with,
Savvy Southern Style   
Common Ground   
French Country Cottage

The White Desk

I loved our little desk in the kitchen.

   

I loved the little desk after I painted it white.

For some reason, I just wasn't wild about the desk in the kitchen after it was white. 

It didn't make sense to me but I had a plan. 

I originally planned to swap the pie safe from the laundry room and the kitchen desk.

The desk could go in the laundry room and I could use it as a sewing table. 

The pie safe could go in the kitchen. (I liked the pie safe in the laundry room but it was a bit big.)

I measured the height of the pie safe but I forgot to measure the width of the desk. 

Rebekah and I moved the pie safe into place and then realized that the desk wouldn't fit. 

I loved the pie safe in the kitchen so there was no way the desk was going  back into that spot.

I decided that the drop leaf table from Aunt Louine could be given away and in it's place we could put the desk.

Please don't cry any tears about us giving away the drop leaf table. I realize that it was probably almost 100 years old and it could actually be called antique but it was dysfunctional. I felt so sorry for the kid who always had to straddle the side when we used this as a kitchen table. 

That child (the baby) probably needs years of counseling to get over the fact that his parents would not invest in a table that we could all fit around. 

Oh my gosh!

(light bulb moment)

Maybe that is why Jonnie told his Jr. High teacher that he was a mistake. 

(He confused accident with mistake. Whoops.)

ANYWAY, his teacher thought we were horrible people for telling our child he was a mistake, something we would never have done, but we did mention that he wasn't planned when he was old enough to understand. 

:/
Oops!

Okay back to the desk.

 Love, love, love. 

White desk under white shelf.

I left the shelf the same as it was for Christmas. I added the darling tin chalkboard. Bill and Bekah found it at Target. It was my favorite thing in my Christmas stocking. 

Why didn't I think of this before?
The curvy lines of the desk mimic the lines of the shelf.

Ay, yi, yi!

I've spent angsty years looking for a perfect match for that shelf. 

Happy Accident. 

Jonnie is one too.

:)

Have a lovely day,

Katie   
Linking with,
Common Ground
French Country Cottage

Little Shutter Cabinet

 My brother inherited a quirky little cabinet from my parents.  
I assume my dad or grandpa made it. It was just a simple box with a shelf but the doors were shutters. I didn't necessarily covet the cabinet but I did love it. 
I had an extra set of shutters left over from a whole slew of them I found at garage sales back in 2006 or so. 
 I asked my sweet husband if he could build a copy of the cupboard for me. 

I used it as the hutch to a desk for a while until I moved the desk into the kitchen.   

Since then it has been kicking around. Bill wanted me to give it away but I love the things that he builds for me so I worked to find a spot for it.

 This spot has confounded me since we have lived here because there are 5 doors in one little hall!

The door to the powder room is a hobbit sized door and so the space always feels tight. 
Whatever I put here can only be about 5 inches deep. 
We've only had three pieces that fit that criteria. 
I realized this little cabinet would work. The cabinet itself was natural wood and the doors were white so I gave it a coat of CeCe Caldwell Chalk paint in Vintage White.
It needed some feet because it looked a little odd without them. 
I cut four wooden blocks and drilled them into the bottom of the cabinet.

I added little brass knobs that I spray painted oil rubbed bronze.

The little chalkboard was made from an old decor piece we've had forever.
It was from the 50s judging from the pseudo cowboy look to it.



It used to be in the boys room when they were little. 
Don't you just love the faux longhorns? This probably hung in my grandfather's basement/bar/mancave at his lake house.  




Bill wanted to purge this too until I noticed it's unique shape if the horns were taken off. Oh and I'm recycling those horns! 

I thought about cutting a little piece of wood to make the chalk board. You know how pictures have layers of cardboard behind the glass and the print? Well I painted one of those layers with chalkboard paint. It worked beautifully and was a cheater fix. I put the glass back in the frame behind the new chalkboard layer in case I ever want to turn this back into a regular picture frame. 
Now I don't have to worry about where the glass is. 
Sorry no pics of this. I was really off my blogging game when I did this project.



I have to say that I just love it. 
I was going to turn it into a key holder but changed my mind when it didn't fit on the key wall.

The watercolor was a $1.00 at a garage sale eons ago. I love finding original art if at all possible even if it's by a novice. In all this time I never could find a frame for it because it was such an odd size. 



I finally ended up trimming the piece and putting it in a vintage frame. Modern frame sizes differ from those in the past so keep that in mind when shopping for frames at thrift or antique stores. The frame also got a coat of paint.



My second batch of Paperwhites hasn't bloomed yet so 
these are from Pottery Barn last year. They have cute faux ones with exposed bulbs showing sort of like the real thing.

I'm kind of deciding that I don't really love the way real Paperwhites smell so I may have to go with the faux from now on.    

This little nook is coordinating better with the lighter and whiter vibe I have going on elsewhere downstairs. Rebekah had an aha moment and said I was trying to turn our house into a Pottery Barn.  :) 
I wish!  



Thanks for coming by,
Katie 

Linking with,
   Between Naps on the Porch
Coastal Charm 
My Uncommon Slice Suburbia   
Timewashed

Thrifting

I got out yesterday to do a little junking.

I wanted to make sure that I put concealer on in case I got accosted by another cosmetics counter salesman. 

Him: "Can I be honest?" 

Me: Ummmm. I'm not sure?

Him: You have such dark circles.

Yes, thank you for pointing out that I look like death warmed over because that is how I feel after being cooped up in the house for three days not feeling well. 

I didn't say that but I certainly didn't buy his make up.;) Which, by the way, sunk into the fine lines and tiny wrinkles around my eyes making them look not so fine nor tiny.



So armed with concealer, I hit the thrifts on the other side of town.

 Oh, Jerry Jones has done a bang up job trying to clean up that side of town. 

Fortunately, the growth and development hasn't put the junk stores out of business. 

My first stop is always Thrift Town. 

It is the nicest of the lot. 

I have bought books, lamps, chandeliers, bedding, and clothes here in the past. 

Now, I almost always stick to the china. 
I've gotten a little more squeamish lately. 
  

Thrift Town's china is organized by color. 

I usually check out the white first. Then I'll look at the other shelves hoping to find something in one of my accent colors.

 I found 5 big off white ironstone looking platters for 99 cents each.   

I also saw a cute blue and white teapot from the 50s or 60s and a pink rose creamer. 
There was nothing I couldn't live without so I left. 

The next stop was Collins Park Thrift. 

They still had some Christmas items but everything was really picked over.
But, 

I found a new big Starbucks mug and a little stack of plates.

The plates didn't look that interesting until I recognized a brown transferware pattern close to the bottom. The stack was all taped together so I couldn't get a good look at it but I was willing to gamble for $2.98. 
 I always run my finger around the edges of china to feel tiny cracks or "fleabites", as they are called.

Unfortunately, there was a naughty child in the store near me. I wanted to give her one of my best teacher looks but she must have sensed a disturbance in the force because she wouldn't look at me. 
She was a little sassy pants.
I realize now that I must of stretched the limit with my children when they were small as well. There is only so much shopping little ones want to do.

I hit the toy section just as they were heading to some other section.  

It was a good day for toys. I guess all the moms in town have been cleaning out the toy boxes because I found two bags full of little trinkets. One bag was full of little plastic pets which will make a great pet shop for one of my teachers. The other bag had some stuff that will replenish our dwindling prize box.

In my attempt to avoid "Varuca Salt", I rounded the corner and there was a cart with stuff fresh from the sorting room. I spied a beautiful silver pitcher and an adorable red and white hotel china gravy boat.

The water pitcher is Wm. Rogers silverplate. It was only $7.98. I love buying silverplate at thrift stores because most of the time it is black with tarnish. Polishing it up is like unearthing treasure when it is clean and sparkly.
My favorite thing to use right now on silverplate is Bar Keepers Friend. 
It is a very mild, slightly abrasive cleanser. It does the job without scratching. 

I could have hit Texas Thrift or the Goodwill store on the next block but I was feeling a little peaked so I headed home. 

The total thrift store route can take all day and it encompasses 7 stores. I have done it before when my brother comes to town but it wears me out.

 I was tickled to find that the taped up little plate was actually a turkey saucer in the His Majesty pattern by Johnson Brothers.

 It will look cute tucked in with my vintage turkeys next Thanksgiving.  

  

I spent the afternoon resting and reading in my big comfy leather chair.

What have you been up to?
Happy Friday!

Katie