Ta Da!

Here it is...the finished pantry!  I painted the walls and did some other touch up this morning, so now everything is done...down to the hooks for our aprons!

Finally - a door on my pantry!

Built in shelves created more room, so things
are easier to get to.

There is a locking Liquor Cabinet on the back of
the door - it's super heavy, so the door is hung
on barn door sliders!

And here are our aprons...all ready to don before
cooking up something great in the kitchen!

The Chicken Hawk Strikes Again

Another weekend is upon us, and another snow storm is on the horizon.  We ended up having 2 snow days last week...pretty typical of late.  It is calm and quiet at the moment:  JP is reading, the dogs have finished eating and are snoozing on their blanket, J has just finished her homework and the girls are both "getting ready for bed" (a pursuit that can last hours if we let it.)  We are recording the Opening Ceremony of the Winter Olympics.

JP got off work before I did today...amazing!  He rushed home, up our driveway that is a sheet of ice, and moved another 7 logs from the big stack to underneath the barn lean-to.  I guess we are working on wood again tomorrow!

When the girls and I finally reached home after Voice Lessons and a quick stop at the Library, then the Grocery store, they headed out to feed the chickens and gather eggs.  J  burst into the house just a few minutes later with tears streaming down her cheeks.  "There's a dead hen!" she sobbed.

Sure enough.  It appears that our nemesis, the Chicken Hawk, has paid another visit to the chicken run.  I saw him just yesterday, swooping low over the run, then disappearing into the woods down the hill.  This time, the victim was one of our Golden Comet Hens - a superb layer.

If you have a minute, check out this clip of Henery Hawk learning about what Chicken Hawks do.

In the kitchen, I found yet another surprise.  My Dad hung the new door for my pantry while we were away!  On the other side of the door is a cabinet which will have a locking door.  I will post another picture when that is finished - if possible (it's close quarters in there!)

 

So...even though we ended the week on a sad note, things are looking up...and the whole weekend is ahead of us - hip hip hooray!

Green Laundry

JP got a clothes line up for me on Monday. About 20 minutes after I happily hung up my first load of sheets, L commented "it waining!" JP and I frantically dashed outside to pull everything in. It has been raining since then, so today was my first successful attempt at drying my clothes in the great outdoors. Mmmm...there is nothing like the smell and feel of line dried sheets! The line is hung between the corners of the "L" shaped porch, and just steps away from the washer.

I finished my pantry re-organization yesterday, and now have one entire empty shelf, and more room on others if I squish.

I get a sick kind of pleasure out of labeling things. I told JP that I did this for my Mom's sake (I kinda did!)

While I was on the pantry pics, I thought I'd snap the kitchen since it was relatively clean. I'd still like to do something with the pantry entrance since we lost the pocket door, but I'm not sure what. Right now we are using a Japanese noren as a divider...a gift from JP's sister in Japan.

This is the Dining Room, and strangely, the main entrance to the house. We recently hung faux wood blinds in this window since the dusk-to-dawn light on the garage was bothering us in the bedroom at night. There is a small coat closet just to the left of the entrance in this picture. The pass through is my work space, and the doorway to the left of that goes into the Craft Room (which also houses the freezer, extra refrigerator, washer and dryer)...I'll photograph that room later as we are still working in there.

The cream colored table on the far left was a Big Lots find. We plan to put it on wheels. It will function as a sofa console table, buffet table and pattern cutting table.

The girls and I had a fun day today: we had friends over to play in the morning (including one of L's "tiny boyfriends"), and we adults were so deep in conversation that we talked through lunch and had to whip up some mac-n-cheese quickly for the kiddos. We then accompanied them to another friend's pool for some water play. Now J is anxious for L to get up from her nap, and I'm not (since blogging doesn't really count for accomplishing anything during nap time). Ah well...life goes on!