I heart IKEA!

I seriously love IKEA. Great design (most importantly)and great prices! It's been over a year since I've been to an Ikea, so last weekend Dan & I drove south of Boston for a visit! What a treat! We drove the hour and a half to look for some inexpensive chest-of-drawers for our master closet. (Note to self: do not go to Ikea on the week-end....) The plan is to place two chests back to back in the center of the closet and top with the piece of stone in the previous post to tie them together.

While I love all the departments at Ikea, the lighting is my favorite! When I had my antiques business one of our specialties was lamps. Dan made all the lamps. We would take "found objects" like green glazed terra cotta balusters from Singapore, iron fragments, antique glass demi johns, etc. and turn them into lamps. I have a huge obsession with lampshades, so this was a wonderful outlet. I still buy lampshades for lamps I don't have just because I love the shade! The lamps in our house might have hand-made beaded and smocked shades that cost hundreds or shades from Walmart (a great source btw!) that cost $18! It doesn't matter the source as long as it is a good design! So.... because all of our lamps and chandelier were antiques, and we already had a house full I was never able to buy any lights at IKEA- until now!! I'm a happy girl! Here are some of the wonderful hanging lights from their lamp department!

Aren't these fun?! I'm contemplating the largest one for the barn room "outhouse" bathroom. It would be overscale for the room which I think would be fun.

Very cool, and great texture.

These shades are opaque and come with a diffuser in the bottom so you aren't looking at a bare bulb. They have a high gloss sheen and it also comes in black.


Too fun- and check out those prices!



This is the little number we picked for the center of the master closet! Hard to see in the photo, but those are silver bands that wrap the shade horizontally. It hangs from a silvered pole. All that fun for $49.99!!

A progress report.

Things are really happening fast around the house! Everything is going very well and we are making lots of progress. We are at a point were you can finally get a tiny, little glimpse that we might, just might be on the home stretch!

Since my last post:

- most of the rooms in the farmhouse (with the exception of the kitchen, the master and guest baths) have received one coat of wall and ceiling paint and one coat of trim. After the floors are finished the final coats will go on the walls, ceiling and trim. Post on Paint to follow!

- the floors on the second floor have been sanded and as of today they can't be walked on until they get stained. Sanding of the first floor began today. The sanders use a dust-free sanding machine that is amazing! No dust at all- none! The floors will be stained a medium brown that has honey undertones, and then will have a tung oil finish, using four coats of low-VOC tung oil. The finish guy brought by about 6 different samples after I had explained what I was looking for, and immediately I honed into this one particular stain that read "exactly as I had envisioned!"

- showers have been tiled. Guest bath marble floor has been laid.

- beadboard and trim is going in in both the master and guest bathrooms. All new windows are being trimmed to match the original farmhouse window frames.

- the garage floor has been dug out and the concrete is almost ready to to be poured for the floor. Retaining walls in the garage area were installed to reinforce the original antique granite stone walls.

- I set the kitchen soapstone and marble templates on the stones at the fabricators today. All stone will be delivered next Monday!

- the underground electrical lines have been pulled and we are just waiting for the electric company to come to hook it all up. Then we can pull down the current overhead lines.




The magic "no-dust" sanding machine! The original honey finish is seen on the edge which was then sanded by hand.

Sanded guest room floor. All the "dots" in the photo are the antique square-head nails that have been counter-sunk.

This is a sample of my "new" choice of marble for the kitchen island . The left side shows it polished; and the right shows it honed. I am having it honed.

This is my new choice of marble for my kitchen island. The piece of cararra marble that I had originally picked out had a fissure in it and my fabricator decided it was too much of a risk and would probably break, so I chose this marble piece which is called Bianco Venatino (... sadly, this choice also doubled the price of my island from the cararra- but what's a girl to do when one falls in love with a piece of marble?!!) The darker portion shows my template and placement for cutting. The slab is currently polished, but will be honed for installation which will soften the veining.

The stone fabricator's shop. My soapstone is templated and laid out in the bottom left of the photo.

Templated soapstone.

Fabricator marking my templates! I used two full (extra large sized for soapstone) slabs for the perimeter countertops in the kitchen. You can see how close he is to the edge. We had very little waste.

Marble slab with my cut-out for the sinks in my master bath vanity top. We chose to place the faucet and hot/cold water valves on angle to the basin (as opposed to a straight line) which looks more authentic to an antique house.

This is the piece of marble that we chose to place on top of two chests-of-drawers that will sit in the middle of the master closet. The upstairs laundry room is just outside the master closet in the master bath, and this way I can just march the clean clothes to this marble top- fold/hang and be done with them! The marble is Breccia Oniciata. I love coral and this slab has a beautiful coral color to it.

Our driveway, aka-the parking lot of contractors! (there are at least 7 cars/trucks that you can not see in this photo!) God bless 'em for showing up every day to get this house completed!

This photo shows the 2-plus feet of dirt that was dug out to make room for the new garage floor.

One-sided forms for concrete walls which were poured to reinforce the original granite foundation in the garage/original barn foundation.

The concrete truck!

Our concrete guys "hand pouring" the retaining walls. The guy on the right is the owner and he almost came to blows today (for a different pour) with the concrete driver man because he was mixing the concrete too wet and it wasn't to his exacting standards! 


Look how gorgeous the wall turned out! I love how the new concrete wall conforms to the original stone. Dan & I both thought the garage would be functional; we didn't realize that it would also end up being beautiful! The floors will have radiant heat which will help to keep the floors dry in the winter months when snow can drop from the car and then melt/freeze on the floor and then make you slip and break your finger.... Dan is also putting in floor drains and a hot and cold water tap so he can hose off snow from the cars. For those of you who don't live in a wintry climate, the salt and sand they put on the road to make travel safe can wreck havoc on your car's paint job!
The concrete guys were really proud of their work, and rightly so, as it turned out beautifully. All the subs on the job have "garage envy"!!!

Kitchen Ingredients

I am so excited about this post!

Here is a preview of my dream of a kitchen! The kitchen cabinets have arrived and are installed! Before I get to the goodies and the photos I thought I would explain some of my basic kitchen design ingredients:

-I've always been a white kitchen girl, so a painted white kitchen was a given.

-Our previous house was a 1950's ranch with drawers under the counter tops and cabinet doors under that. My lower cabinet shelves were stationary (they didn't pull out), so it was always a pain to have to get on hands and knees and dig to find something way in the back of the cabinet. While I'm a pretty organized person when we were moving out I still found many items I had forgotten I had because they had been pushed to the back. About a year ago I read a kitchen design article on the benefits of using of lots of drawers instead of under-counter cabinets and because of the aforementioned issues I loved this idea! Even if you have the pull outs with cabinet doors, it's still a two-step process. I was all about making the kitchen functional, and easy to use. So, I'm using lots of drawers (with a self-closing mechanism); that way I just open a large drawer next to the range and lift the heavy LeCreuset right up!

-All my cabinets (drawers!) were custom-made by a local cabinetmaker. His work is beautiful, but I had issues with his finished product because it looked "too perfect." His baked-on paint finish read plastic to me and my hundred-and-fifty-year-old house, so... I am having the cabinets hand painted at the house. This way they will have brush marks and look more like they've been there for a long time instead of brand new (no one I'm working with seems to "get" my want for imperfect perfection, but it makes perfect sense to me!)

-Because of our beautiful views, I opted for windows instead of more overhead cabinets. The overhead cabinets that I do have flank the sink and have glass-fronts. In the cabinets we will use antique glass taken from salvaged windows and doors from the house. Cabinets are very tall and go to the ceiling. (I have issues with that "dust shelf" on top of cabinets.)

-As previously posted, counter tops will be soapstone and the island is honed bianco cararra marble. Island is 3 x 7' and has a dual-zone 24" Kitchen Aid wine refrigerator which will have a paneled wood overlay rimmed door (made by the cabinet maker.) Island will also have a 24" cabinet with slots for cookie sheets, cooling racks, pizza paddle, etc. Oh, and drawers, lots of drawers!

-Backsplash will be real wood bead board. Ceilings will be tongue-and-groove boards .

-The island will have two antique glass pendants lights above it, and there will be a pendant light above the sink.

-Hardware on the perimeter cabinets will be polished nickle pulls, bin pulls and cupboard clasps. Hardware for the island will be reproduction iron bin pulls to match the original antique iron bin pulls on the built-in cabinet to the right of the fireplace. (I was thrilled to find an exact reproduction!)

-Floors are random width wide plank Eastern White Pine from Carlisle Wide Plank Floors.

-A walk-in pantry with a window!
-Oh, and almost forgot: a see-thru gas fireplace that I'm sure will always be on!

In this photo you can see a hint of the tongue-and-groove ceiling going up.

A glass front Sub Zero will go in the built-in at the end of the island.

There are no overhead cabinets going in on this side of the kitchen...

...but this is!

A 48" Wolf dual-fuel range with 6-burners and a griddle will find a home beneath the hood cover!

This photo shows all of the overhead cabinets installed.

All the kitchen windows are wood casements. I love the morning light in this photo!

My Shaw's Original single-bowl 36" fireclay apron sink! Isn't she a beauty!

A close up of the cabinet doors that will have the antique glass. The brown panels are templates for the glass.

Here's a photo of our new kitchen french doors. They aren't staying however. I designed them, and they are supposed to have a larger inset panel on the bottom, so corrected ones are being made. The kitchen dining table will sit approximately where the table saw is now, and you can see the brick fireplace wall in the right of the photo.

Other kitchen goodies:

Perrin & Rowe bridge faucet in polished nickel with side sprayer.

Bosch dishwasher (note the flattened handle, you'll hear about it again!)

This glass front Sub Zero! I have coveted this SubZero since I first laid eyes on it! In our previous house we had a stainless front SubZ which we absolutely loved, but I think it would look too contemporary for this house. I think the glass gives it that turn-of-the-century look of refrigerators of old, and a softness and casualness that will be nice for the room. Instead of the tubular handle (as seen in the photo) which is the norm, we are using what is called a Pro Handle which is shorter in length and slightly flattened as opposed to round, which also gives it more of an older look and feel. It is the same handle that is on the Wolf range.

the barn room renovation has begun

The barn room is in the works! We've been focusing all our efforts on the farmhouse since it is so imperative that it gets finished first. Now that the farmhouse is seemingly under control (fingers crossed) we can turn our attention to the barn room. The room measures 23'- 6" x 27', with a 12' ceiling height. It is really a lovely scale to the rest of the house. If you've ever been to New England, you've seen some antiuque houses that have these huge barns attached to them... those scare me! Our barn is a really nice size- not too big, not too small. The barn transformation is very exciting for us as this was always a hard-to-visualize room since it was indeed a real barn! The room has been closed off from the rest of the house all winter because the barn door was frozen open. Just for the record... it's hard to stand in a 10 degree room and make design decisions!

We are very, very happy to say that after removing several layers of wood flooring in the barn we found our very own wide plank pine floor! This little jewel of a find easily saves us $10k! There are a couple of rotted boards that will have to be replaced, and it won't be perfectly level (but it's not that bad either), but it's ours, it's original and we couldn't be more thrilled to make this find! We will sand the boards, and then apply tung oil as it's finish. The floors in the farmhouse will be a medium brown and these will be a honey color.

This is the newly cut opening and the temporary stairs which connect the barn with the kitchen! The opening (which has the top boarded off from this side) will have a transom above it where we will use antique glass from doors and windows from the house and barn. The framed opening on the left will be one of two french doors with transoms that will flank the stone fireplace. It is hard to tell scale at this point, but the french doors with the transoms will be 9 feet tall. The door to the right of the stairs is the opening into the first floor half bath, aka "the outhouse!"

(fyi- I've cleaned my camera lens, so my best guess is that the round lights/spots you see in the photos are the houses' spirit angels!!)

This is the view into the kitchen- you can see the kitchen fireplace on the back wall. We will use old planks from the barn for the steps. I do not know what the single board holding up the barn ceiling is all about. I stand by the old adage... if you can't stand the answer, don't ask the question!!



The found chest (from several posts ago) in the outhouse! The outhouse measures 5 x 7'. The toilet will be to the right of the vanity.



Same view, different angle.



View of outhouse from upstairs guest bedroom window. The double window on the second floor above it is the master bath. The single window on the first floor is in the kitchen and is one of the windows that flanks the range. Outhouse will be shingled and painted the same color as the house.



This gives you a good view of the framing for the french door. The french doors will eventually open onto a stone patio and face the east meadow.




Between the two french doors will be a stone fireplace.



This is the south wall in the left of the photo, and the west wall on the right. You can see the outhouse door opening on the south wall in the far left of the photo for reference. The framed opening on the west wall is where the iron gates (seen leaning against the wall) will go. The area you see on the second floor is a loft area that is not open to the barn room. The iron gates divide the barn room from the barn mud room. The mud room has stairs that lead upstairs to the loft and downstairs to the garage, and a door which leads to a storage room. If you notice, all of the walls in the barn are being framed for finish walls. This will ensure that the walls are straight (which they aren't now) and allow us to insulate the room.



To the right of the iron gate opening you see the large original barn door leaning against the west wall.




The old barn door with it's original hardware will be mounted on the west wall!

The perfect piece of art for the room!



This is the north wall. There will be two sets of two over two, double-hung windows (for a total of four windows) with wall space between the two sets. I'm sure it's hard to "see" it all with all the boards and framing, but if you look close you can see the framed window openings. Once we get the windows, they'll just cut through the plywood to install.




This is the view into the barn room from the kitchen. You can see the size the door opening will be from this side once the silver board is removed. The door jamb on the right of the photo leads into the kitchen mudroom.




Yesterday, after having had snow on the ground for months it finally melted away! Then this morning we woke up to at least 5.5" of fresh snow! Isn't it pretty?! These next two photos are on the drive from the rent house to our farmhouse.

Ella in the back yard at the rent house. How 'bout that view! Toto (I mean Ella!) we're not in Dallas anymore!

floor plan

One of our sweet readers commented that it was a little difficult to tell how all our rooms fit together, so I drew some floor plans. They are surprisingly close to scale, but very primitive! I hope this helps you to see the "big picture." If you have any questions, just ask!

You can click on the photo and it will enlarge to make it easier to read.

As a reference the master bedroom is 14 x 30'; Imelda Marcos' closet is 14 x 17'!; the kitchen area (including mudroom) is 14 x 30'; the Barn room is 25 x 28'.