Woodburn Primary School

This is where I went to school in Northern Ireland.  It has grown up since we left but the old stone walls are still there, though no donkeys in the fields.  

The famous lamp post.

Mr Wright had a fright
in the middle of the night
saw a ghost eating toast
halfway up the lamp post.

Bread Baking

There is nothing nicer than homemade breads and rolls.  It just doesn't compare to the bread you buy in the stores.  I am learning to make artisan style breads and hope to someday make bread as delicious as artisan bakers!

my family loves it when I make homemade rolls

waiting for the dough to rise and adding toppings

Life in our Livingroom!

This is my livingroom where we use and abuse it everyday!  It's comfy, messy, and one of my favourite rooms in my house!

working on the tree

this is a camera app from my phone to add that 70's flavour.

love this vintage feel to this photo!

My sweet little ella!

This is Ella talking about Outflow at her school.  Her Vice-Principal made this video to share with the students at her school.  She started volunteering with me along with my niece Kristen almost two years ago.  She comes with me every month to the one we hold at our local church.  I am always amazed by the ease in which she serves people who often look rough because of their sad situations.  We get quite a few kids coming to help at Outflow under the watchful eyes of their parents;  it is one of the highlights for me!

Container Gardening...

Well, my uber talented sister along with the ever creative Matthew Mead have created another beautiful magazine all about container gardening.  You can find this magazine at newstands everywhere!

Exteriors

As much as I love my cape cod, I don't love the wide colour lock siding from 1970!  We are pondering once again what colour to paint it and or to bite the bullet and go with new siding!  I won't be able to afford wooden siding which is what I really want, but I would chose the triple 3 siding which is more traditional than the new cove siding which I personally am not a fan of.

Here are some before and afters and some photos of cape cod colours that I like...



This is our cape cod.  Since this picture was taken, we have added new stairs and decks to the front and side entrance.

This photo and the two above is of the same house with before and after pictures.

I like this colour and this is the triple 3 siding I would go with.

This house is almost identical to ours with painted colour lock siding.

I love red!!!!  My husband, not so much!  I don't like the trim work on this house, but I do love the colour!

I doubt I'll do yellow. 

I like this colour, but I think it would date quickly.

Thankful

Like everyone, I'm sure you wake each morning & have certain rituals to start your day.  For me, it is opening the blinds, opening my livingroom curtains, throwing a load of laundry on, filling the cat bowls, patting my cat, usually unloading the dishwasher all before starting breakfast for the kids or my highlight....coffee!

In the evening, I close the curtains & blinds, I check the doors to make sure their locked, I load the dishwasher and try to leave the sink clean, put another load of laundry on and I putter away at the clutter from the day.

Of  late, I find myself pausing & truly acknowledging how blessed I am.  All over the world people are losing their homes to floods, mudslides, war, earthquakes, mortgage forclosures, job loss, the list goes on.

So in the mundane, give thanks for the small but precious rituals we all repeat on a daily basis in our homes, the homes we are sooo lucky to have!

"Arise, shine." Isaiah 60:1

Drudgery is one of the finest touchstones of character there is. Drudgery is work that is very far removed from anything to do with the ideal - the utterly mean grubby things; and when we come in contact with them we know instantly whether or not we are spiritually real. Read John 13. We see there the Incarnate God doing the most desperate piece of drudgery, washing fishermen's feet, and He says - "If I then, your Lord and Master, have washed your feet, ye also ought to wash one another's feet." It requires the inspiration of God to go through drudgery with the light of God upon it. Some people do a certain thing and the way in which they do it hallows that thing for ever afterwards. It may be the most commonplace thing, but after we have seen them do it, it becomes different. When the Lord does a thing through us, He always transfigures it. Our Lord took on Him our human flesh and transfigured it, and it has become for every saint the temple of the Holy Ghost.

Oswald Chambers ~ My Utmost For His Highest - February 19th

My Pretty Kitchen is being featured on Remodelaholic!!!

I was really surprised when I received an email tonight that my kitchen was going to be featured on one of my favourite sites Remodelaholic!!!  When I was getting the courage up to paint my cupboards I found this blog sooo helpful!  So many others have taken the plunge and painted their cupboards.  I got a lot of great advice on how to do it properly! 

So, thank you for including me on your blog!!! 

Wendy

My Oh So Pretty Kitchen

 

My goal was for my kitchen to welcome people!  I love the colour!


Well, it is Finally done! Or, as done as it is going to be for awhile. There are some finishing touches that I will add over time, but for now my kitchen is done & I'm loving it! I took the time to declutter, delete things I wasn't using and to really organize all the cabinets. You can click on this Link to peek if you want to see some before shots. I will be adding more before shots with information on what I did.  If you want to look more closely at the photos just click on them.


Everyday I walk into my kitchen and feel Happy! The colour of my cupboards makes me smile everytime I look at them! I love the wall colour...I was really going for that clean swedish look yet still be cosy! Our house sits on a heavily treed lot and is a challenge to me when it comes to choosing colour! But thankfully, I am happy with the results!  The colour is Timothy Straw by Benjamin Moore & I used their Aura Paint with no fumes.

 

Even on the dullest days in November my kitchen is still cheerful!




For a galley kitchen it is very spacious!

Okay, I realize my fridge looks messy...but beside it to the left is an area for your laptop and more open shelving.

You can't really see it, but we added beadboard as a back splash.  Very inexpensive & pretty!  I used melamine paint for the beadboard and months later, and many scrubs behind the stove it is still looking new!

I love my beadboard which I know is hard to see.  In my next post, I will show more before & after shots.




I love my floating shelves!  I bought them at Mardens for $10 each and only had to paint them white.  They hold my new everyday dishes perfectly.  The white glass cabinet is a work in progress.  The inside is mactacked & I need to paint over it. Vintage 1970! 







I love my new yellow cabinet that I bought for $5 at a yard sale.  It is a hospital bedside table which I painted.  The Ikea shelves above I purchased on Kijiji for $20

We added new countertops & the microwave above the stove.

This cupboard is one my brother in-law Paul built for me many years ago.  I didn't want to paint it as it had aged to a beautiful honey pine.  But it didn't look so good anymore in my new kitchen so I painted it this lovely yellow...which was actually a colour I had chosen for my cupboards but then changed my mind.

This dining set was given to us by my mother inlaw.  However, we hope to paint it at some point as the top isn't in such great shape.   I had worried it would look to old & dark, but I actually like it!  I love my vintage tablecloth.  I've had it for years and only bring it out for Thanksgiving.  So, I am enjoying using it on this table.

Oh...& a big thank you to my friend  Heidi who took the photos for me!  She is a great photographer and has a beautiful camera!  All my pictures were dull looking with my cheap camera!  So Thank you! 

Holiday with Matthew Mead

I can't wait to receive this beautiful magazine that my sister has helped to create! When I stop and think about how someone from our small but beautiful town, has managed to live out a dream of writing and decorating for someone as talented as Matthew Mead well, I think that's kinda cool!

I encourage you to support ...this magazine. Matthew Mead has chosen to publish this magazine with minimal advertising. Instead, focusing on creativity & content! Someone has finally heard the frustration from readers who feel all they end up buying is another magazine loaded with advertisements and minimal content!

You won't be disappointed!

Beautiful Fabric

Today I was out with my mum and we wandered through our local Fabricville ever hopeful to find something unique and fun!  We left disappointed!  Then I headed to Calais, Maine for the afternoon with my husband and peeked through the fabric department at the local Marden's.  They actually can be a great source for drastically reduced, pretty fabric.  I managed to buy my Waverly fabric for my tent trailer last summer for only $1 yard!!!!  Anyways, nothing inspiring today!

I love fabrics...I only wish I had a budget for the many amazingly beautiful fabrics available online.  I discovered some beautiful fabrics by Heather Bailey at her online store.   Her fabrics are inspirational!  I realized that I enjoy sewing.  So far, I have only been sewing for practical purposes.  I have made slipcovers for my camper, curtains, pillow covers, etc...but I'm itching to sew some things for the house that make me smile on a daily basis, not just when we go camping!  Can't wait!

Kitchen Reno...Finally! Part 1

After much feet dragging, excuses, laziness, lack of inspiration, fear of committment, we finally began the long, tedious process of giving our kitchen a lipstick makeover! I could go into all the tedious details involved in prepping & painting old cupboards but I will spare you all the details

Dining area.  

I will say this...it is my goal in life to NEVER do this again! I am deeply committed to doing a great job...but wow...it is stressful! I want a kitchen that reflects my tastes, our family lifestyle, my love and need for colour,

yet won't involve expensive, time consuming neutralizing for when we do sell our house someday in the future.

The hideous painted peeling tile...Gone!

Priming the walls.

Then came the patching and sanding of the walls, replacing heaters, electrical plugs and switches, and finally priming and painting the pea green walls! The colour I chose is called New Brunswick Sky! As I write this, I am not 100% passionately in love with the colour...but I do love it! I have learned to wait until the end to see if the ideas  bubbling around in my head actually looks as nice as I hope they will be!

The nightmare of finding the right colour!

One thing I did was fill in where the knobs and handles had been with wood filler and sanded them which added extra work but worth it!

A sampling of the old wallpaper.   Vintage 1970's