MLK Day

I am too young to have known much of Martin Luther King while he was alive.  I was nine years old when he was killed ... living the Army-brat life in Italy ... isolated from the turmoil in the US in the late 60s by culture and distance. 

(I borrowed this graphic from FB)

 

In my adult years, I have come to admire what Dr. King was ... and I wonder what further accomplishments he could have left behind.

 

Anyone who professes love and peace and understanding is someone that I hold in high esteem. 

 

Civil rights are HUMAN rights!

 

Bless you, Dr. King ... may we all do the best we can to live up to your Dream.

 

Sunshine At Last!

I was standing here in my usual spot at the peninsula in the kitchen earlier this morning, catching up on happenings in the cyber-world while the dogs and cats were finishing their breakfast, and something wonderful happened.  After seven consecutive days of grey, wet weather, we have bright sunshine and blue sky outside! 

View from my spot at the peninsula through our dining room window, toward our barn at the back of the property.

 

 

It is windy and cold, but that's okay ... the sun is out, and I am going to need sunglasses when I go out to the store later today.  There sunshine puddles throughout the house for the cats to enjoy, and the baby roses in the greenhouse should be warm and toasty by mid-afternoon. (I'm not running the heat in there this winter, so solar heat is all it gets.)

 

Later today, if everything goes even remotely as planned, I expect to be hanging clothes in our new master bedroom walk-in closets!  (cue the happy dance!)  Finishing the outer part of the new wall, with all the doors and molding?  I'm going to make like Scarlett O'Hara on this one ... tomorrow (or whenever) is another day.

 

Hey, Connie, How is Daniel Doing?

It has been almost exactly six months since our eleven-year-old greyhound, Daniel, was diagnosed with T-cell Lymphoma of the spleen.  You would never know by looking at him now that he was anything but a happy older gentleman dog.  I am thankful for the expert care he has received from his oncologist.  Look at that sweet face!

"Mom, is that cheeseburger for me?"

 

 

Daniel has received six doses of CCNU.  It is an oral chemotherapy drug, which is powerful against his cancer, but usually has minimal side effects.  (liver toxicity and low white blood cell and/or platelets are the most common.)  Only once did he feel even the least bit puny after one of his treatments.  Other than that, you would never know by his behavior that he was receiving treatment of any kind.

 

He has been steadily regaining the weight he lost earlier in the year before his diagnosis and treatment.  My normally 70-pound dog bottomed out at 58 pounds.  He is up to 65 pounds, as of his last vet visit on Christmas Eve. (that's why he's wearing his red velved holiday collar.)

 

"Yes, Daniel, it is.  Here you go, Sweetheart.  You were such a good boy for the doctor."

 

 

Daniel is the dog that picked me seven years ago.  I remember that day so well ... the little voice in my gut was screaming, pleading, begging me understand that this precious boy was meant to be mine ... what a wise little voice! 

 

Cat safe?  Yes, he is!  

 

 

As far as Daniel's lymphoma goes, we are making his treatment decisions one vet visit at a time.  He has a less-common low-level type of lymphoma, and we are taking our cues from him about how to proceed.  So far, he continues to be in remission ... eating well, gaining weight ... with a cheery attitude and a great quality of life. 

Where to Put the K-Cups?

My favorite coffee maker died last year.  It was a Broan, it used the V-shaped filters, it was easy to fill and clean, and I was really sad to see it go.  I looked and looked for a replacement, and I couldn't find a model that I liked as well as that one. 

As an interim solution, I borrowed a coffee maker from our daughter's wedding presents and used that for a few months.  I never liked this one ... there were times when the carafe and the filter basket would get misaligned and the coffee would overflow the basket and make a mess on the counter.  The best thing I can say about it is that it was better than nothing.

Right before Christmas, The Husband brought home a shiny new Keurig.  We had talked about maybe getting one, so it wasn't a surprise that he decided to go ahead and buy one. 

With the arrival of the Keurig came the dilemma of where to store the K-cups?  I thought about it for a minute, and I realized that I already had the perfect thing!

 

 

I bought these wooden sewing machine drawers a long time ago, and they have been sitting unused in my sewing room forever.  They still wear their original finish and I love the patina ... I need to put some sort of a top on them, tho.

 

 

 

Morning coffee is one of life's essentials for me ... my family knows that it's best not to get between me and the coffee pot when I get up in the morning.  I love the fact that this new machine will brew a 12-ounce cup of coffee in only about a minute.  That's MY idea of instant coffee!

Happy Sunday, Everyone!

Family Room Bay Window

As I was sitting here in the family room this morning , with my laptop on my lap, trying to catch up on correspondence and other stuff, I looked up and I realized that I haven't shared with you the new state of our family room bay window.  We have these four-sided bays in both front rooms of our house, and they are a very significant architectural feature of our home's Gothic Revival style.  They have also been a thorn in my side, decorating wise, because everything I have tried to do with them has looked weird ... until now ...

( FB peeps have already seen this.)

 

 

I bought these antique oak chairs at an auction last year.  They were an impulse buy, and I got them for a ridiculously low price.  (They are in absolutely perfect condition.)  I figured that I would hold onto them until our living room was renovated, and that they would look good in THAT bay.

 

When we were packing away the Christmas decorations, and we removed the tree from the family room bay, I had a brainstorm.  I sent The Husband to retrieve these chairs, I grabbed this round table from his office ... and it is perfection! 

 

No more wasting such a great feature by using it to hold Ruby's crate and big dog beds.  (you can see Daniel napping on one of the beds that is now to the side of the bay.)   I'm thinking of moving Ruby's crate to where the walnut table is at the end of the sofa ... putting a wooden top on it (which I already have).  Her crate can stay where it is right now ... it's not in the way of anything but an air conditioning vent ... and we won't be needing a/c any time soon.

 

My one concern about using these chairs in the family room was wondering how they would go with the curtains I have planned for in here.  As you can see by the swatch of fabric taped to the wall, the upholstery on the chairs and the curtain fabric look really great together.

 

I love it when beautiful things happen as if by accident.  Serendipity, I think they call it.

 

Closet Construction, Days Four and Five

Today was Day Five of construction of our new-and-improved master bedroom closets.  I won't keep you in suspense, so let's start with a photo of what the closets looked like as the crew finished up this afternoon ... are you ready?

This is what we see now, as we walk down the hall and through our bedroom door.  All of the major construction is finished.  The only thing left for the crew to do is some minor sanding of the drywall and to install a few remaining pieces of molding.

 

 

Day Four (Monday) was all about taping and mudding the seams and patches on the drywall inside the closets.  Sam (drywall guy genius) arrived at lunchtime, and he was finished with the whole job by 7pm.  (that's what a professional can accomplish with fast-setting drywall compound.) 

 

Here is a peek at what the patches in the left closet looked like before Sam started.  I didn't take any photos while he was actually working, because I didn't want to get in his way and slow him down.

 

Strips of drywall patched in where the old closet walls once were.

 

 

Tuesday (Day Five) the whole project came together.  Before I knew it, all four of the doors were up and most of the molding was, too.

 

This is Peter, fiddling with the fit of the door to the right closet.

 

 

Still fiddling.

 

 

The top of the new wall has this lovely two-piece crown detail to finish it off at the ceiling.  My part of the job is to fill nail holes, caulk seams, and give everything a good paint job.

 

 

 

The new wall is built around the heating element of the baseboard radiator in this room, which continues into the closet.  I have to cut the radiator cover to fit, and work out some sort of trim to finish off the hole where it goes through the wall.

 

The block broke, but it's a clean break that will be easy to glue back into place.

 

 

Dorothy is inspecting the new space.  This is the right closet, which has all of its baseboard and inside door casing installed.

 

 

 

While working in the left closet, Peter ran out of baseboard molding.  I will pick up some more tomorrow and have it here when he comes for his last day.

 

Patching the floor is also one of my parts of this project.

 

 

All of the doors are now wearing the restored brass hinges that I told you about yesterday.  The two center doors are operable, and the two stationary outside doors have hinges for continuity and decoration only. 

 

I have quite a bit of work ahead of me to finish priming and painting the doors and molding.  It doesn't matter, because even seeing it like this makes me smile ... despite its unfinished appearance.  (I will wait to until all of the painting is finished before I install the restored doorknob hardware and glass knobs.) 

 

 

 

When Peter and his crew arrived five days ago, our wall of master bedroom closets looked like this.

 

 

 

Tonight, we have this!

 

 

 

I am thrilled with how it has turned out, and especially giddy about the promise of having all of our clothes visible and accessible in these new closets!

 

 

 

Thanks for following along to this point.  I will report back when I have progress to show on my portions of the project ... soon, I hope.

 

If you are just now joining us, click the links below to see the other posts that brought us to this point.

 

The Plan

Closet Construction, Day One

Closet Construction, Day Two

Closet Construction, Day Three

How to Strip Paint off of Vintage Hardware

 

******************************

The work on this project was done by:

Peter Csemez

Homebrite Renovations

540-295-1337

(If you are in northern/central Virginia and you need a contractor, this one comes highly recommended ... by us!)

 

How to Strip Old Paint Off Of Vintage Hardware

The hinges and door knob hardware that I am using on our master bedroom closet project is all vintage.  Some of it I salvaged from the doors that we are using in the project, and some of it came from Caravati's (a wonderful architectural salvage yard, about an hour south of here in Richmond.)  All of it was covered in layers of globby, peeling paint and had to be cleaned.  This is how I did it.

Here is the Before and After of a polished brass door rosette.

These brass door hinges had at least four layers of paint on them that all had to come off.

My main equipment for this job is a $14.99 crock pot that I bought years ago at Walmart.  This particular pot is ONLY used for stripping paint ... I have another one that we use for cooking.

Fill the crock pot about 3/4 full of water, with a small squirt of dish soap ... add the hardware, put the lid on the crock pot, set it to High, and walk away from it for a few hours.

The beauty of this method of stripping paint is that you don't have to time it or watch it, and you can be off doing something else while it's happening.  After a few hours, you'll see that the paint on your hardware is getting really loose.

I used tongs to remove one of the hinges.

See the loose paint?

Working quickly (and carefully, because this thing is hot), peel off the loose paint.  As the piece cools, the paint will harden ... this is okay, just peel what you can and put it back into the pot for a while to soften up again.

This is all I could get off this hinge on the first try, so back into the pot it went.

After the hinges had stewed for a little while longer, I removed them one by one and used the edge of a plastic card to carefully scrape off the remaining paint.  (I used my Panera card, which is now ruined.)  Do NOT use a metal scraper or a wire brush, or you will scratch the brass.

To remove any remaining little bits of paint, and give the brass a good shine, I used 0000 steel wool.

These are the original 40+ year-old brass-plated Stanley hinges that were installed on our doors when the master bedroom was added to our house in 1967 ... looking as good as new again.

I would have liked to have left a bit of patina on the hinges and other hardware, but it wasn't possible ... considering what it took to get all the paint off of them.  Since they are unlacquered brass, I expect it won't take any time at all for them to start to oxidize and darken again.

The jewelry on this project will be late-1800s (or early 1900s) pressed glass Mercury-filled door knobs.  There were a few of these on some of the doors in our house when we bought it, and I have added more when I find them for a good price.

Here is a word of warning:  Before you try this method of paint stripping on your own hardware, take a minute to determine exactly what you have.  Old iron hinges shouldn't be boiled like this, because they will rust.  If your hardware has a unique patina or finish, scrubbing it with steel wool will probably ruin it.  In my case, the hardware I am using is plain polished brass ... and this didn't hurt it a bit.

At the end of the day, all of the hinges, rosettes, escutcheons, and screws were clean and shiny ... and they are all ready to be used as the beautiful finishing touches on our closet doors.

******************************

If you haven't been following our master bedroom closet project, click these links to get caught up.

The Plan

Construction Day One

Construction Day Two

Construction Day Three

Construction Days Four and Five

Overview and Final Reveal