This weekend my dear friend's sister went home to be with the Lord. I am at a loss for words to comfort her. There is nothing that I can do to ease her grief.
For years now I have been collecting this and that to fill shoe boxes. I spread the collection of items over the year and it is rather rewarding to say the least.
I include some toys (the recipients are kids you know), some school supplies and basic hygiene items and anything else that I can find.
Some years I go to the shoe department and ask for empty shoe boxes and other years I find a location, like our church, who supply us with the official Christmas Child Shoe Box.
In this picture my camera captured droplets of hail as it fell from the sky.
Here I am with my bare naked toes. You can see it accumulating at my feet.
Don't worry. Be happy. This large 'hail stone' is not as it appears. During the summer I had frozen a ice cream bucket of water so that I could cool a large thermos of drinking water for a church picnic we had. Here is what remains of it after days of melting on the grass.
Our picnic table was covered with drops of glass.
I had purchased this curly metal hanger a LONG time ago hoping one day to incorporate it into the room. My Tupperware strainers fit perfectly on it don't you think? We made a trip to Home Depot and purchased a very inexpensive double track light to replace the ugly single light bulb fixture we had been using. The new one is brown metal and matches the curly hanger.
Next came all the dish sets that I have been finding at Thrift Stores lately. I had promised to show you them, so here is a sweeping view. Hopefully later I will set up some Tablescapes so that you can share in my new found joy.
Wow, looks like I may have gone a bit over board!
All in all I am so pleased. Items are shelved in an orderly fashion, the room is clean and bright, and everything is easily accessible ... I wonder how long this will last? :o)
Next hubby put up the new wire shelves on the back wall. Oh baby ... they are beautiful. We chose to get the 16" depth shelves. 12" was too shallow and 20" seemed too deep. 16" was just right!
Hopefully tomorrow I will have filled the shelves and have the Butler's Pantry complete.
Then came the cutting in of the paint. We chose a pale beige or tan. Small room calls for lighter colours.
The room was painted with two coats to cover the original green walls. The floor was washed and baseboards put in. So love-i-lee.
A little bit of thin crown mouldings at the ceilings and the room is ready for occupancy!
It now overflows down the hallway, into the kitchen and some even ended up in the foyer. The mess that this has produced only presses us onward to complete the task ... sooner than later.
Inside the room we first removed all built-in shelving that hubby had quickly installed 14 years ago. Back then we were completely renovating the entire house, so money was even tighter then than it is now. He used old bi-fold doors to make shelves along the back wall. They served their purpose over the years, but they were ugggg-lee.
One thing that was neglected in the past renovation was to wall off a window to the outside. You see our Butler's Pantry used to be the bathroom. Thus a window was in the room. When we moved the bathroom down the hall, this room became the Butler's Pantry. Probably a last minute decision. The window was simply boarded off and actually with all the shelves of stuff in there, I hardly noticed the plywood.
If it were a larger room, we might have decided to punch out the window for natural lighting. But the room is smallish and we need the wall space for shelving. Here is Hubby putting up some dry wall after he put some boards up in the space, and stuffed in some insulation. It is probably one of the most insulated bit of wall in the whole house!
Now we are patiently waiting for the 'mud' to dry. Hubby is out in the work shop finding lengths of baseboard for the floor and bits of crown moulding or quarter-round for the ceiling. It is an exciting time!
As you can see by these pictures, we haven't given it much thought in the past many years. But really, doesn't EVERYONE have a closet or storage room like this behind a closed door??? If the answer is NO, then continue to another blog. If YES, then you will rejoice with me as we renovate this one.
The funny thing about such areas is that the owner usually knows exactly where everything is. I know that is a fact with me. The organization system just don't look pretty!
We are not planning on putting in a lot of cash into the renovation, just smarts. Most of the invaluable (?) items I have in this room will remain, but we do have to purge somewhat. I want to incorporate my recent fetish for dishes.
A dark picture to be sure, but somewhere underneath all these dishes lies my dining room table. It has only been a few weeks, but we want it back!
Today is Sunday, November 1st. Another month has passed and begun. In church this morning our pastor challenged us to remember God and His ways this month as November 11th is Remembrance Day here in Canada. Yes, we are supposed to wear our Poppies in our lapel, and remember those who fought for our freedom, BUT we are also urged to remember Him.
