• Home
  • Read Our Blog
  • Who Are We?
  • The House
  • The Garden
  • List-O-Doom

Kitchen Progress

7/23/2014

0 Comments

 
I hate our kitchen. I mean really hate it, over the last 3 years it has become the dumping ground for many, many projects and furniture that was waiting to be sold. In a house the size of this one that is crazy, we pretty much need every square inch. 

A few years back we brough some 1950s English Rose kitchen units, they are beauiful but sadly need a hell of a lot of work and what with more pressing projects this one has got put off again and again, so this spring I decided I couldn't take it, we had to make the kitchen at least usable. This mean ripping the current wall units out and revamping the base units to make them nicer.
It also mean finally painting over the awful magnolia paint on the walls, horray! We always assumed the plaster in this room was crap judging but how bumpy the paint was but we actually found it was meanly layers and layers of paint which a few weeks ago I started chipping off.
Picture
Then lots of fillers where the plaster had chipped, then I could begin painting!
Picture
Picture
The colour change made a huge difference, as with the rest of the house the white just bounces more light around making this quite a sunny room. 

As storage is at a premium in here we realised we would in fact need some sort of wall unit just to house bowls, glasses and mugs, however the old melamine one was too big and oppressive so was donated it to a neighbour for his workshop. I managed to find on eBay a 60s glass fronted wall unit for around £12, this had spend a few weeks sitting around getting in the way but Rich finally got it fitted on Sunday!
Picture
Picture
I love this, it goes so well in this room, the glass also helps to bounce much needed light into the space and the slightly sloped front doesn't make it feel like it intrudes into the space to much.

We had a game fitting it, these things really aren't meant to be taken on and off walls to much and the old brackets for it where missing so Rich had to make new one (which still need painting!). This is the only slight issue with working with older furniture, especially fitting stuff, mostly it really doesn't want to cooperate and you end up cursing your decision and vowing to buy a kitchen from B&Q next time! It was worth it in the end as we are really happy with how it looks and a bargain at around £15 with the new wooden brackets.

The next thing was to replace the counter tops, the ones here are ok but just really bland colour which I loathe! We nipped up to Ikea in Bristol last week just to take a look after failing to find anything on eBay or Gumtree, we spent ages in the kitchen department deliberating and agonising over the costs! It been a while since I did a kitchen but bloody hell their expensive and just for counter tops! In the end we decided to sleep on it as it was also 10 mins till closing time at this point, on the way out we spotted Bargain Corner and nipped in where we found two solid oak 3meter works tops both at 58% discount!
Picture
They have slight scratching and some dents where they been dropped all of which we should be able to work around with no problems.
Picture
These we are super chuffed with, they should have be £120 each but where down to £50! We will have to wait a little longer to fit these are Rich has a job on this week, he's also still having to go careful with his arm so lifting them is a bit hard work, but hopefully in a few week we should be able to fit them. We will swap out the doors on the base units saving the frames which will save us a lot, the whole thing is on a tight budget as we do intend to eventually it the English Rose units but this takes the pressure off that project for a while and means I wont go insane in the mean time!

Wow, all this just so I can display my mid century china better!!
0 Comments

Shed Base

7/8/2014

0 Comments

 
As part of revamping the old derelict greenhouse base ready for the new shed we needed a load of bricks, we'd shopped around online and as usual where horrified at the prices that nice old red bricks go for so as usually happens when we cant afford something I turned to good old Bath Freegle.
A really nice family over the other side of the city very very kindly gave us over 300 red edwardian bricks totally for free! So we spent most of sunday collecting them, out poor little Rav would only carry about 70 at a time so it did take a while.
Picture
This should be more than enough for the shed base with enough over the build a raised bed or two. 

We also needed to be able to level the top of the exsiting base, we had through we could just do that with concrete but again we would have needed tons which was out of our budget, luckily I managed to find a lovely couple giving away 2" thick ex-council pavers which we can level up with sand. 
Bloody hell these where heavy! We managed to get 14 of them which should be enough.
Picture
Rich has made a start on the foundations, his new healed arm is giving him some problems so he's having to pace himself a bit (which he's not very good at, once he starts a job he likes to blitz it!).
Picture
Consequentially the garden now looks like a builders yard!

Im still looking at sheds, now we are building the bricks round the existing base it will make it slightly large 8 x 8 square which gives us more choice in sheds, I currently have my eye on this one...
Picture
Of course now we are looking at spending money on this, our car has decided it might actually quite like a new clutch and one or two other bits while its at it! Anyone fancy trading design work for car parts or sheds?
Picture
0 Comments

Shed Daydreams

7/1/2014

0 Comments

 
So we've been shed shopping online, we've needed a proper shed for ages but what with one thing and another keep putting it off. But now we need to urgently sort the old leaking, rotting garage roof out (preferable before it collapses) so the ideas is to build a shed to house the usually garage paraphernalia while we reroof it.
Once the garage is water tight and we can move all the stuff back in we can convert the shed into a mini print studio for me! This does however make shed shopping a bit difficult as Rich is looking for a quick and easy shed to build and Im looking for something nice and pretty to work in!
The concences at the moment is a potting shed with large windows down one side to let in light when I need to work in there but should still be big enough to house a lawnmower and all our other junk.
Picture
Thoughts on a postcard shed fans!

As I have mentioned before our garden is on a slope which would mean creating a terrace but luckily we have an old greenhouse base which had long lost its greenhouse when we moved in, the concrete base has sat neglected for ages while we tried to decided what to do with it. So in the spirit of recycling and trying to keep within a budget Rich has taken on revamping the old base but adding a facing wall of old red bricks to cover the industrial looking concreate.
Picture
We are slightly hampered by not currently having enough bricks which we have been trying to source locally for free or really cheap!
Picture
We did manage to get some large ex council pavers to cover the base free of gumtree which was a bonuse. Work will progress slowly on this and Rich still doesn't have the full use of his now healed broken arm back and is also trying to fit it in between art jobs! Fingers crossed this nice weather holds out!!

This will at least give me plenty of time to dream shed shop!

The rest of the garden is looking a little wild and slightly frazzeled in the sun, a lot of my early flowers have gone over and I'm letting them set seeds for next year.
Picture
Picture
What has been noticeable the last few weeks is the massive number of bees and butterflies around, I have been tying to plant more and more things I know they like my favourite of course being Lavender.
Picture
All this hard work by the bees has resulted in the first fruit from our espaliered apple trees.
Picture
Picture
Hopefully this time next year I will be out working in my little print studio watching all the bees and butterflies close up!
0 Comments
    Picture

                                 

    August 2017
    July 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014
    May 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014
    February 2014
    January 2014
    December 2013
    November 2013
    October 2013
    September 2013
    August 2013
    July 2013
    June 2013
    May 2013
    April 2013
    March 2013
    February 2013
    January 2013
    December 2012
    November 2012
    October 2012
    September 2012
    August 2012
    July 2012
    June 2012
    May 2012
    April 2012
    March 2012
    February 2012
    January 2012
    December 2011
    November 2011
    October 2011
    September 2011
    July 2011
    June 2011
    May 2011
    April 2011
    March 2011
    February 2011
    January 2011
    December 2010
    November 2010

    Picture

    Design*Sponge
    Tales of a Junkaholic
    Thrifters
    Krim Krams
    Shedworking
    Steel Kitten
    Smallest Smallholding
    My Tiny Plot
    Milkwood
    The Owl and the Accordion
    Seventy Tree
    Tea For Joy
    Snail and the Cyclops
    Little Doodles
    Wellies and Vogue
    Lobster & Swan
    Toot as in Foot
    Conversation Pieces
    Foxtail + Fern
    Five Hundred Miles
    Nine Bojewyan Stennack
    Pretty Shabby
    Tales of Ted and Agnes
    Penny Dreadful Vintage
    Trish Hunter Finds
    Vixen Vintage
    Sandra Juto
    Seeds and Stitches
    Long May She Rain
    Picture
    Gardenalia
    Bristol Wood Recycling Project
    Bath Farmers Market
    Bath Freegle
    Bath Gumtree
    Rolfeys
    Source
    Picture
    Bath Racecourse
    Castle Combe Circuit
    Cheddar Car Boot
    Frome Car Boot Sale

    Picture

    Picture
    Visit Victoriana Nursery Gardens For Quality Seeds & Plants

    I'm a Member of UK Veg Gardeners!



    The photos on this blog are copy write of Kat Whelan unless stated otherwise, please do not reuse without permission. Thank you.

    I apologise for any spelling or grammatica errors, I am dyslexic like many artist's so find writing a bit of trial!

    RSS Feed

Powered by Create your own unique website with customizable templates.