moving files: the upcycled kitchen, part 1

"errhmm.... You might want to put in a new kitchen...." the broker said, when he first showed us the house. Although brokers are usually not too happy pointing out necessary investments to a potential buyer, he just couldn't deny this one: the kitchen was indeed beyond hope.

Wait, would you like to see it?

hmpff...

What you are looking at is a patchwork of everything: a small vintage kitchen with beside it some weird extra cabinet with a piece of weathered wood, and a gap next to it where our oven just didn't quite fit in. Oh, and did I mention the styrofoam ceiling, the range hood that didn't fit and the tiles with a color of moldy eggnog?

Something definitely needed to be done, but buying a new kitchen, as the broker suggested? no..... we have something much more fun in mind!

DIY leaf printed fabric

After the heavy rainfall of last week ( which created a temporary rivier in front of the house), the plants and trees in our garden are growing with such an astonishing speed, that I almost suspect that Hagrid has been toying around with them. So of course; what else could I do but giving today's blog post a botanic twist?

I really love the recent (well, kind of recent) botanic trend, but rather than hopping off to the nearest interior shop and buy the same botanic inspired that everyone else buys, I decided to make my own version of it, by printing fabric with leafs!  And guess what; it's really simple, and gives an awesome result! So why don't you give it a try as well?

DIY: backpack becomes... well, a backpack.

"Ugggh, I can't move..." I sighed last Monday, whilst hobbling through the house like an old lady. 

Yeah.. After a couple of years being lazy in the city center of Groningen, those bicycle rides (31 km a day) are something to get used to, if not for the sore muscles, than at least for the damage that a saddle does to your butt. I'm not gonna describe the situation of my bottom in detail ( I've got boundaries, people! Not many, but still some!) but let's just say that if I had been a baboon, they surely would have thought I had my fertile period. 

Luckily, the view during my cycle ride is not too bad...

See that tiny white house on the left? That's ours!

As I soon discovered, not only my butt and bicycle, but also my collection of bags is not entirely adjusted to the long bike rides: I only own shoppers and hand bags, which aren't very useful on a bike. So, I decided to make myself a backpack!

countryside things! On elderflowers and family.

I was nine years old when my parents moved to the countryside. Moving from our modestly sized family house to a large farmhouse in the middle of nowhere was quite a big change, and from the first weeks of living there I remember most vividly the smell of grass and blossoming flowers, my fear of getting lost in that big house, running around throughs the fields, and my unshaking conviction that there was a vampire living in our chimney.

On an especially warm evening in June that year ( we had moved in a couple of weeks earlier) , my mother looked up from unpacking boxes and said: "let's go pick elderflowers, so we can make lemonade with it." I still remember her saying that because for me, it was the summum of countryside living: just picking some flowers to make lemonade! How cool was that? In my mind, lemonade came from the supermarket, and the fact that you could not only make it yourself, but make it from something that was simply growing on the side of the road amazed me.

So I threw on the most romantic, countryside dress that I could find, we picked up a basket, and went picking elderflowers, just down the road near our house. Even now, years later, the smell of elderflowers brings back those memories: picking flowers and making lemonade with it. So, when I saw that the elderberries near our new house were blossoming, I told Joost: let's go make some elderflower-lemonade!

The moving files: gotta have friends and family!

It has taken a few days, but I am very happy to announce that our hallway is as good as finished, Hurray hurray etc etc...

Let's quickly recall what we started with, okay?

Whoooooo!

okay, so as you might recall, we then got that weirdish period where we painted everything white but it looked like a milk carton..
But luckily, we came to our senses and decided to cut the wood into wainscoting.

Still a lot needed to be done, but we got some help, as our friends, Bram and Marcella, came by to lend us a much needed hand!

The moving files: the work continues...

Hi!

As I am writing this, I am catching some rays of sun on my very own lawn. whooooh!
Looking to my left, the neighbour's chickens -who are not to be stopped by fences- are happily destroying my newly planted border, and looking to my left, 3 extremely grumpy cats are staring at me through the window, annoyed with the fact that those chickens are outside, whilst they are not. So far my attempt to make you jealous ( did I succeed? )

But back to business, because there is a lot of home improvement to be done!!

Last post I told you about painting the hall, and as you might have guessed; I wasn't entirely pleased with the result..  Wait; let me refreshen your mind: this is what it looked like...

it's okay, but not terribly exciting..

The problem was not that it looked bad, it was just a bit... boring. further, the paneled walls just felt a bit like a weird choice for such an old farmhouse. But then I thought of something: wainscoting.

While many of you may associate this with frumpiness, wainscoting ( or well, the Dutch type of it) was actually the regular type of cladding for farmhouses like ours. The main reason for it was practicality: if your 1900-husband would enter the house with his wooden shoes covered in mud, spraying lumps of it all though your hall,  it helps to have a wall you can easily clean; hence the wainscoting.

like this! ( this is a house we actually considered to buy)

I figured that transforming the panels into wainscoting shouldn't be too hard, so I called my dad and asked if he would lend me his circular saw ("please don't cut your own fingers of, girl"), cued the music and set to work!

The moving files: chaos, cats and crappy paint

before I go on with this post, I feel obliged to show you the dark side of our moving skills:

wowza!

well, one member of our household enjoyed the mess..

"Boxes!"

the moving files; things that can be done in a day

Break out your champagne, people, we are proud owners of our own house!



(in absence of champagne we made our own wine-labels for the occasion)

For those of you whom I haven't yet bothered with details of our house-huntinh, we bought this 100-year old farmhouse:

I still have no idea how we managed to buy something this cute.

easy like sunday morning, and an upcycled lampshade

Yesterday, as Joost and I were hurrying through the house and packing things, one member of our household that did not feel the stress at all:




Purrr....
Oh, sometimes I really wish I was like Broen... I'd even accept such hairy legs if that would be what it takes ;)

moving houses, moving schmouses.... and a refashioned dress!

Hi guys!

First of all, can I have permission to say 'UUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUURRRGGH'!
and then some more uuuuuuuuuuueeeeeeerrgggg... and well, more of that.

moving houses sucks so hard, that if I could put all that sucktitude into a machine, you would have the best vacuum cleaner in the world. I banged my toes against Every. single. moving box in the house. I have turned three boxes upside down looking for scissors, and now Joost is calling from the kitchen, asking if I know where I packed the nutmeg (!) which i know, because I packed it at the bottom of a box, but I have no idea which one. So, yeah I think I will start liking moving houses again as soon as we've got the keys to our new place, but so far, I am hating the guts out of it!

But to cheer myself up, yet another throwback-refashion! ( I will soon be making things again. promised!)