The French Cleat System updated

Remember way back when - you know, long, long ago - when we put up the French Cleat System in the kitchen?  Well, we finally (finally!) made the little shelves that actually go on the darn thing. Took a while to decide what I wanted, to fit something non-essential into the project list, and to just get it done.

And I'm so happy with how it turned out.

Functional and decorative - woot!

There are shelves for supplies, recipe boxes, and a basket for printed recipes that I'm about to try. The little metal recipe box is from my Grandma and has lots of family recipe cards in it. The larger green metal box is more current and is full of 4x6 cards that I've filled with recipes I truly use. Nothing in these boxes that isn't actually made on a regular basis.

Easily reached recipes

I also wanted a box for organizing my cookbook recipes. I hate not being able to find a recipe I know I own...somewhere, in some book, maybe. So Chris built me a box that I'm using as a card catalog. Just the recipe name, cookbook title, page number, and any notes I think relevant. This way I don't have to write down the full recipe - cause why do that if I own the cookbook?  

Cherry custom box

I've also got some decorative items up there. Butter paddles that my Mom gave me before she died and a pretty blue enamelware ladle from her too. The carved wooden butcher we picked up when we lived in Poland back in 1996/97. Chris added a cleat to his back and now he has a special spot off the counter.

The cleat (and cleaver)

I asked for a cookbook rest so I could showcase what book I'm using that month. I culled quite a few of my cookbooks back in the "recipe a week" resolution period but I probably definitely need to get rid of more. So I'm looking to cook from a book a month to see if there are enough recipes to keep it or just get it from the library from now on.  

This one is a keeper

And this is the book rest. I didn't want it to function as a holder-opener (what else would you call that kind of thing?) since I don't use this counter for cooking that often. I just wanted something to show the front and this works great.

Maple with walnut accent

This is the cleat for the book rest. They look a bit clunky from the side, but on the wall, that all disappears and they do a great job of showcasing the items on them.

The cleat

I've still got room on the wall if I want to add more stuff, but for now I'm happy with the spacing and function. Everything I use regularly is in easy reach and stuff that used to take up cabinet or drawer space (I'm looking at you antique meat grinders) are now out and visible.

New wool rug for the living room

Have you ever noticed that when you're trying to find a "before" photo this is all you can come up with?

Technically, it shows the living room...

I went a bit further back and did find this one though. The back wall is missing the clock, the side wall doesn't have any paintings, and there aren't any curtains, but at least it shows the floor, right?

A bit more like it

The point of all this is that I finally received the custom-made rug that I purchased way back in February when I was in India. It took them a full 5 months to hand tie the wool rug and I was nervous as all get-out that it wouldn't be as good as I remembered. Or rather, as good as I imagined since I didn't really have an example in exactly my size and colors. That's right, I got to specify size and color. No pressure, right?

Carefully packed

Seems a bit small for a 10'x10' rug...

When we got it rolled out, I was amazed at the depth of color and the feel of the wool. This thing is simply gorgeous. Kind of hard to photograph a rug that covers this much area, but this is about the best I could do.

It's wonderful

It's a deep, dark blue with sage green palm trees. It fills the living room floor and pulls your eye so that the room looks wider. Nice effect and it feels fantastic under your bare feet. I can hardly wait to see how it feels when the floor heat is running this winter.

Another kitchen update

"Another post soon" - famous last words for a blogger. When last we left the kitchen cabinetry we'd finished the South wall and were getting ready to turn the corner toward the stove. And then Thanksgiving and Christmas happened and it took a while to get back to it.

The corner has not only been turned, it's reached the stove. Hooray!

Chris chose to build the corner cabinet in place rather than do it out in the shop. It's big for one thing and the thought of carrying it into the house was daunting. Also, it's been freezing cold outside and it didn't make a lot of sense to heat the shop. 

Building a massive corner cabinet

I've got three shelves in the cupboard. The bottom shelf is (obviously) full depth and will hold lots of heavy, bulky items like crockpots, canning equipment, fryers, and other small appliances.

That's how big that cabinet is! Fantastic storage.

The second shelf is a bit over half as deep (15 inches) and is 11 inches off the bottom shelf. Why 11? Because that's how tall my tallest pot & lid combo is. And the 15 inch depth? We got there by having me lean into the cupboard to put away the crockpot in the very back corner. Chris then measured from the wall to see where my head was; so I can easily reach into the corner without whacking my noggin. Very practical, these measurements.

Test fitting a few items

And the top shelf is 9 inches higher than the second (yup, that's the height of my tallest stock pot/strainer combo) and is 8 inches deep. I designed the top shelf to fit my frying pans. The handles extend into space and are easy to grab. I don't keep my cast iron on that shelf simply because it's too heavy to grab out one-handed, but all the other flat pans go there. The very corner of the top shelf is not 90 degrees. Instead it bridges the sides so that I can put something a bit deeper there (like my grill pan).

The shelfs are made of cabinet grade hardwood plywood and Chris faced them with cherry. They looks so nice that I'm rethinking my plan to put cabinet doors here. I may leave it open instead (for anyone wondering why there is light peeking through from the top, the counter wasn't complete when I took the picture).

Starting to put stuff away

Connecting the two counters was tricky. We decided on a stepped pattern rather than a mitered corner. We like the visual texture better but that darn ash is really moving around on us. We're going to leave it, gaps and all, for a year to see what the summer weather does to it. If it stabilizes we'll fill the gap with copper, much like we did on the stair landing. 

We were worried (okay, not worried really, but mildly concerned) that the new section of counter wouldn't stain the same as the sink section. Remember we're using homemade natural stain. It varies. A lot. Well, we needn't have worried. Came out great.

Hard to tell we stained them weeks apart and with different batches.

We decided to put a double edge on the back of the counter. Design-wise it sort of matches the floor trim, the shaved raw wood edge at the top, the same curve to the bottom. So I like how it ties everything together. Functionally, it solves the problem of shrinking boards. See, it's actually mounted to the wall, not the countertop. The bottom trim edge is wide enough to hide the gap when the boards shrink. I confess we felt pretty darn clever when we thought of that.

Backsplash

So now Chris is working on drawers. I specified depth and he mocked one up. Drawer depths were again determined by the stuff that will reside inside. The top two drawers are 3.5 inches deep for utensils, pot holders, and knives (I like enough room to actually lay stuff out flat; I hate jumbled tools. I'll have to do a post on what's inside the drawers when we're all finished). The next two drawers are 5.5 inches deep and will hold smaller pots and their lids as well as my braising pan. The bottom drawer is 7.5 inches deep and fits my 3 and 4 quart saucepans with lids. The drawer fronts are cherry and will darken to match the vertical cupboard edges. I really think the whole thing is going to look wonderful - and be incredibly functional.

Testing the drawer design

I've been playing around with ideas for the drawer and cabinet pulls. Not sure what I'm going to land on yet but so far stones or old silverware are the front runners.

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The Kitchen Sink

Way back when I started dreaming about our new house I had very specific requirements for my kitchen sink. My Grandma L had this wonderful porcelain cast iron sink - two deep sink bowls and a drainage area on the side. I wanted one just like hers. More or less. Well, really less. Because while I did want a porcelain-enameled cast iron sink, I hate deep sink bowls, and double bowls, and the one bowl I did want had to fit my Grandma OB's baking sheet, and I wanted two drainage areas not one. So pretty much, exactly like hers but totally not. Right.

Armed with Grandma OB's baking sheet I went to antique festivals, flea markets, and restoration shops. Either the sinks were in horrible shape, the bowl was too small for the pan, or they were WAY too expensive; I couldn't find the one I wanted. And then, magically, Chris was on Craig's List one day and there it was. A woman was redoing her kitchen and was getting rid of the original cast iron sink. A single bowl, double drain, white porcelain sink that had been in active use in a normal household kitchen, not a barn, not sitting out in a field. For $125. We threw Grandma's pan in the truck and went to see if this was the one.

It was. 

Ta da!

It was also heavier than a dead minister. (Why are ministers considered heavy when dead? Were they not heavy alive? Is my family the one who says this? Gotta look that up sometime). We really had to work to get that puppy into the truck. And then it came home with us and sat in the garage of the old house for two years. Yes, we broke a cardinal rule and bought something before we actually needed it. Given that it took about two years to find it though, I think it was the right decision. Finally we built BeechHouse and it sat in the carport for 4 more years while we worked on the house interior (has it really been four years???). 

And now, it's finally installed and I love it.

Ta da again!

If you've never installed a sink like this, it's designed to sit on a base like the one in the first picture. Or it can be hung from the wall. Or placed on legs. Lots of options which makes the underside of the sink really weird to work with as there are slots and wings and supports sticking out all over the place. Chris had to get in underneath it and cut holes in the counter in order to have it lay flush. Nothing like cutting into your brand new counter, eh? 

It's also not quite as deep front-to-back as the standard depth counter. Since I didn't want it recessed it had to sit proud of the wall. So Chris built a back section with a cherry shelf. Now my dish soap has a place to live and isn't in the way. The faucet? Another item that I bought well in advance just because I saw it at HD one day. Not in the expensive sink & faucet section but in the basic plumbing area. $10 and it's actually brass with chrome cladding. Heavy, excellent action, great flow. And no longer available. 

So we broke our own rule, twice, and got lucky, twice. I'm not going to mention the errors in judgment that caused the rule to be put in place though. Just know we won't be breaking it again anytime soon despite this resounding success.

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A New Mattress

Mattresses are funny things. They are critical to a good nights rest yet we choose them based on 5 minutes of weirdness laying atop them in a store. Or we order them online and hope for the best. At least the online versions now come with 100-night guarantees, right? Although the materials are typically non-sustainable, chemical-laden, and smelly. And the cost? Ouch. But what are you gonna do? You can't just accept back pain and poor sleep, right? You gotta get a new mattress when it's time.

When our mattress gave out we figured we'd do some research before spending a small fortune on a new one. Looked at both commercial mattresses and DIY mattresses (straw anyone?). And eventually found someone who sells - wait for it - buckwheat hull mattresses! And we decided, despite the cost (less than a commercial mattress but not cheap) and the risk (no return policy), to take the chance. Yes - that's right, we're officially hippies. We now have an organic mattress that we constructed ourselves. 

This is what it looked like when it arrived:

Our new bed

5 boxes, 37 pounds each, of washed organic buckwheat hulls. And one box of woven cotton sleeves for forming the pods. The UPS man thought it was hilarious.

Buckwheat hulls

 You fill the sleeve with 5 pounds of hulls and then tie it into a pod.

The first pod

Then you pile them up next to each other in a staggered pattern to form the mattress. We put them on the guest bed so we'd have a staging area. Chris couldn't resist giving them a try.

Testing it out

Doesn't look comfy, does it? We were having serious doubts at this point. But we persevered and filled at the pods. We then moved them into the permanent bed frame, covered them with a quilt for padding, and went to bed.

In their permanent configuration 

And here's the thing - they're not comfortable in the traditional mattress sense. You don't lie down and go "ahhhh". But you do a wiggle and a scrunch and your whole body is cradled perfectly and before you know it it's morning and you've slept better than you have in years. No waking up with a sore back. Or a sore knee. Or a sore anything.

We've had it for two months now and we love it. If the pods get a bit squished, you just poof them up when you make the bed in the morning. If sometime in the far future they fail to poof up, you order some more hulls at a very reasonable price and replace those pods, not the entire mattress. And when you're eventually ready for a whole new bed you take them out to your garden and compost them. No landfill waste.

We will wear the hippie label with pride showing in our well-rested eyes.

Finishing up the mudroom

Some projects seem to really hang around, don't they? You finish up the big stuff and the little details remain: decorating, organizing, utilizing. The mudroom has been that type of project. And though the decorating still remains, the important stuff - storage - has been addressed.

First up: sweater boxes. My niece saved me her diaper boxes (so strong!) and I cut them to fit the space. Then I cut up some old sweaters and glued them to the boxes. And voila! Neat and pretty storage.

The raw materials

Letting the glue dry

Next up were some wooden crates for the smaller shelves. Chris spent a good bit of time cutting scrap wood into strips for me (hooray for band saws!). Then I used the small nail gun to pop them together.

Assembling the boxes

Ta dah!

And here are both sweater boxes and wooden boxes in place. I think they look great and the storage is wonderful. I added a bit of ribbon to the bottom of the sweater boxes so that it'd be easier for me to grab them and get them down.  Easy and attractive.

So much storage!

Oh, and we finished the upper cabinets too. So now there is closed storage at the very top.

With the upper cabinets in place too

I'm working on creating knobs for the upper cabinets. I'm collecting nifty rocks on the property and glueing them to a flat head screw as a know. I'm still testing these for durability so they haven't been installed here yet.

The larger cabinet has purchased totes but the wooden crates were created by me. They're quite a bit deeper than the smaller cabinets and I've yet to fill them completely.

The other side

So that's where we are on the mudroom. Fully functional and well on its way to being decorated.

Designing the stair landing

The main staircase to the second floor has been in construction mode for a long time. It's safe, it gets us up and down, but it's got temporary stair treads, a plywood landing, and rough railings. Chris decided it was time to start finishing this area and has been planing wood (flame birch for the treads and white oak for the landing) and coming up with ideas for the landing. He wanted something decorative on the landing and we decided to do some inlay. A compass to be specific.

High tech way to draw a circle

Drawing the design

Labeling everything

Cutting out the pattern

Itty bitty pattern pieces

He's going to take those tiny pieces of paper and use them as patterns to cut out the wood (walnut for the dark parts of the compass rose, birch for the light, copper inlay for the circles) and do an inlay. My part was easy - help design the compass rose, draw it, cut it out - I'm done. Now he gets to figure out how to do the artistic stuff. I'll have many more pictures to come.

Already moving things around

As I've mentioned many times, I like to live with something for a little while and tweak as needed. Sometimes it's a big tweak like tearing out windows that are only a year old, sometimes it's just a matter of moving the butcher block yet again.

With the bed raised and all the boxes neatly tucked underneath it, I had a chance to utilize my room a bit. Although the function was good, the aesthetics were not.

I wanted to build a desk at the foot of the bed for office work. Then my sewing table would reside under the window for the good light. The plastic tables in the middle will be replaced by an island with storage underneath. Sounds pretty good, right?

The desk was supposed to bridge the bed and second file cabinet

But over in the Northwest corner, things weren't working for me. This dresser was just too tall. It looked and felt wrong; crowded; visually jarring.

Great storage. Wrong place.

So we got to work and moved things around again (my poor husband; he's really great about this stuff). The dresser now sits at the foot of the bed; Sheila (my sewing dummy) is in the dead space between the dresser and the wall - easy to get to but out of the way when not needed; the sewing table   is next and still gets good light but is no longer centered under the window.

The boxes will be hidden behind a curtain (see first photo)

And the file cabinet moved down to anchor the Northwest wall.

Temporary - it's all still temporary

So now I'm living with it again and it's working better. For the most part. I now know that I want a long work table on that North wall to extend from the file cabinet to Sheila. I'll use that as a combination work area, office space, and sewing table. The filing cabinet will actually move underneath the island, opposite the other file cabinet (now I can paint them both like town houses and it'll look so cool - like they're across the street from each other). The red office chair will have to go; it just has too big a footprint for my limited floor space. I'm leaning toward a small rolling stool instead. Maybe an antique piano stool or lab stool would be cool. We'll have to see what I can find.

I also have plans for utilizing the blank wall space. Just need to get the floor plan finalized to make sure I have easy access to anything I wall mount.

At least I can work in it now

My room continues to come along. The armoire is painted and organized. 

The top is for extra baking supplies & platters

The bottom holds craft & sewing supplies

The twin bed has been cleared of non-bed related stuff (flat surface syndrome had struck it hard). The filing cabinets are being used as a temporary desk area. 

The antique sewing table is in place and is once again being used to support a sewing machine. I even got to do a bit of sewing! 

For some reason I didn't take a photo of the sewing table alone. Huh.

The boxes that were on the chrome bakers rack are now either in temporary storage upstairs or they are on moving dollies under the work tables (love my moving dollies!). Chris has been busily planing the rough cut pine boards smooth so that he can build my semi-loft bed - that will get the twin bed off the floor and give me storage underneath (that's where the box/dollie combinations will reside). 

And we moved the Craig's List dresser in today. It's in good enough shape that I can use it as-is. I'll paint it at my leisure (guess that means it's a craft project rather than a task. It's all in how you think about it). 

All clean and ready to store sewing materials

The china cabinet now holds the fruits of my summer canning labors as well as empty canning jars ready for next year's crop.

I need to cover the back with a cloth so the contents show better

The work tables in the middle of the room are temporary - they're there to give me an idea of the size I want for my work island. I'm thinking  42" x 42" at the moment, which is actually slightly smaller than the two tables. I want enough surface area for good workspace but need to be able to easily move around the table as well. There are lots of small and large tasks to be done, but the goal will be to keep the room usable throughout the process. Seems doable now.

The bed succumbed to FSS. Again.