The Failed Perfectionist

I’ve decided to take a break from the yardwork to attempt to further my culinary skills.  Being rather lazy in that area generally, I turned to the egg section of the cookbook.  Several days of procrastination later, I give you Frittata!  My perfect weekend breakfast (with plenty of leftovers for lunch and dinner).

Step 1-Cut a bunch of stuff up

Mise en Place

(bamboo cutting board courtesy of Mom for my Birthday)

Step 2-Cook the stuff.

sizzling hot

Step 3-Add the Eggs and stick in the oven.-Voila- Frittata!

Sliced Frittata.

Now I just have to make some coffee and get on with the yardwork.  Cheers!

Or more accurately, digging a giant hole under the driveway to figure out why the rain and other fluids aren’t draining from my house properly.  It’s an ongoing saga.  I’m working from home once again and wishing I had shower and toilets properly functioning.  This is week two of the excitement.  Still no fix in sight.  We did establish that the home warranty will not cover this particularly spendy portion of the repair, so I’m pretty annoyed with them now.

Here’s what the chairs looked like before.

Partly stained, partly worn off.  Some stained really dark, and some painted red in the middle.

Antiques road show be damned, I wanted something I could live with and somehow I doubt that this set was ever gonna get sold on e-bay for thousands.  Here’s a close-up of one of the tops.->

The finish color wasn’t actually that bad, but where it was rubbed off, the wood was very dry and lighter colored.

So after a week worth of stripping and sanding and staining and refinishing, I finally wrapped up the hard stuff yesterday.  The seats got recovered with some bargain brocade fabric that I found on sale at Jo-ann fabrics.  I’ll put up pictures of the matching table when I find someone to help me drag it into the house.  Here’s the finished products:

Here’s the captains chair like from the before photo.

Close-up of the top after refinishing.

And the fabric is below, although my camera kept trying to use the flash which kept making the silk reflect like crazy.  It’s a pretty dark brown.

This was what the wall looked like before - there was lots of old adhesive from where the old formica countertops got torn off.

Here’s another shot of over the stove there were also multicolored paint from inside of the old cabinets, probably 50 years worth; every color from pastel blue to mustard yellow.

And check out the new sink, faucet, and dishwasher: pretty scary looking with all the ick on the wall.

So after much deliberating and debating of tiny glass mosaic tile versus porcelain tile versus the size of my stimulus check, I decided on white subway tiles with a blue stripe.  Here’s what they look like so far.  Should have everything grouted up and sealed by next tuesday (thanks to another kind professional contractor, not my broken down renovation skills.)

The side island will also have two rows along the side walls, and here’s what the stove area looks like now .  By the sink, there wasn’t room for more than one row, so I went with something a little different

Everything is moving along nicely; if only I could get the motivation together to repaint the blue window frame and door (that was the old cabinet color, fyi).  Very shiny and kitchen looking.  I also need to unpack all my dishes so I can stop living off of cereal and pizza.  That’s all I have for now; stay tuned for more adventures in home ownership.

Today has been very cranky thus far.  First, there was the tile guy who didn’t show up until 9:30, making me super late for work.  Then there was work.  It feels like a lull, which probably means I’m dropping or forgetting something critical that will come back to bite me later.  Thank goodness it’s a three day weekend.  Apparently taking two vacation days to move does not actually give me the refreshed mental health of a vacation.  So I’m back to counting down until I can go home and check on the tile.  (yay tile!)  I’ll post pictures when it’s all finished.  Still no idea when I’ll be able to afford to have the lighting installed (and no estimates from the electrician yet-more phone tag there).  But move-in able, useble cookable kitchen is the first order of business this week.  Then I plan on making fabulous dinners and packing lunches to save money and pay off the shiny new kitchen.  bleh.  Boo mondays…

I’m sunburnt.  Apparently mowing the lawn is too long outside for my pasty self.  Just thought you might like to know…