Another One Bites the Dust

Another vestige of The Disgustington's tenure in this house is now gone.  I won't go into all of the details, but I spent much of this weekend doing a serious spring cleaning and making some slight changes to the decor of the house.  One of the things that I did was replace all of the cabinet and drawer hardware in the kitchen and both bathrooms.  

Here is what was in the bathrooms before:

I really dislike things that are made to look like something they aren't--these handles are an example.  They appear to have a lock, but it is filled in.  Who thought of this?  Just make plain handles--you aren't fooling anyone.  I have a similar dislike for shirts that are made to look like two tops are layered and shoes that look like normal shoes from the front, but are backless and therefore not real shoes.  Anyway, I removed the old ones (and good God, I cannot describe the filth I found beneath that was certainly not my filth) and put on some new handles:

New glass knobs for the medicine cabinet:

The new handle design on the top and the old one on the bottom:

I also dislike handles that look like the ones that swing out when you pull on them, but are actually just stuck out permanently like the one that you see above.  I have a lot of opinions about seemingly insignificant things, but you probably already knew that.

Here is the downstairs bathroom vanity with new hardware:

Luckily for me, The Disgustingtons used the same hardware in both bathrooms, so I was dealing with the same measurements for all of the cabinets and drawers.  Here is the upstairs bathroom vanity with the old hardware (the kind with the fake locks and permanent swing-out):

New hardware:

The change in the kitchen is much more dramatic.  The old hardware was really too country for this house, so I replaced it with something more classic.  The filth beneath these was unimaginable--I had to pry several of the handles loose from the same dirt-covered grease that took Mother of Ken and me two days to remove from the stove when I moved in.  Here you see one of the new knobs on the left and one of the old ones on the right:

New drawer pull on the top, old ones on the bottom.  Kenna especially loves these because the design of the ends is called "paw."

The new hardware is heavier and nicer and it is shiny and new, so I'm hoping that will help us sell the house.  Here's what the kitchen looks like now:

In addition to the cabinetry update, I also cleaned all of the windows and window sills, dusted all of the logs and ceilings, washed all of the light fixtures and ceiling fan blades, and cleaned every room thoroughly.  Then, we did some work outside, deadheading some of the plants, cleaning the porches, etc.  I thought you gentle readers might enjoy some photos of the flowers in the front yard:

The world's largest volunteer viola below:

I tried to get Kenna to sit next to the viola to give you a sense of scale, but she wasn't cooperative.  She really just wanted to eat grass and then gag.  Fun times.

Doesn't she look exhausted from all of this work?

Change of Heart, Part III

For part three of the story of the transformation of this house, I present the kitchen and the laundry room.

First, the kitchen. This photo is a view into the kitchen from the living room before I moved in. It not only shows you the dining area in the kitchen (on the left), but it also gives you a taste of just how craptastic the decor really was--you'll see this photo again soon.

Here's what it looks like when you walk into my kitchen now:

And the dining area:

A view of the south side of the kitchen before--note the baskets hanging from the ceiling. Last summer, I took my hammer and crowbar to the nails that were in the beams. I removed 35-50 nails and didn't even get them all.

Here's what things look like now:

The north wall of the kitchen before I moved in (those shadows come from all of the hanging baskets):

Today:

And now onto the laundry room.

The south wall of the laundry room:

A detail of my new organizational tools--one bag holder for small bags and one for large ones as well as a special rack for mops and brooms. I love this kind of thing.

On the other side of the south wall, I have my utility area with my toolboxes and my extension cord hung on the new hook that I got just so that Father of Ken would stop complaining every time he comes here about how tangled it gets.

Pretty curtain hung on the new window:

The shelves on the north wall, newly organized:

My pretty new washing machine that I had to buy when the transmission died in my old one from c. 1980. I just couldn't have this lovely machine in a dingy, disgusting laundry room, so I knew I had to paint it.

I found some old hooks that I think I took out of a closet in one of my Hood College dorm rooms and screwed them to the wall to hang my aprons and my wood gathering coat.

And there you have it--another taste of the amazing transformation that has happened here over the past three years. There's more to come, though, so keep coming back!