The weather just keeps getting worse.  Luckily, I escaped for an afternoon on Tuesday to go see my pal Carol, of Raised in Cotton.  If I hadn't gotten a little break from being housebound, I'd be bouncing off the walls instead of just repainting them!

Its colder and there has been more snow, so even though it was cold on Tuesday, it was the best day to get out. I couldn't go anywhere today no matter how much I might want to.  So, I've been working away on my Zero Dollar Decorating to stay sane.  I touched up all the paint on the dining room walls, and repainted the base boards with a quick brush of glossy white. 

Then, I brightened the room up with a wall of mirrors that I shopped for from the bedroom and studio.  The picture in the glorious gold frame went into the bedroom to replace the large mirror. 

 

Next, I tackled the corner cabinet in the kitchen. It had been painted pink inside like the other cabinets that I redid earlier. Plus, I hadn't rearranged anything in it for years.  It looked pretty cute when I set it up, ages ago, but over time, it got cluttery and too much as I'd stick treasures in here and there after hitting garage sales.

My kitchen is getting a de-rose-ing.  I told Beth I was deflowering it and she said that maybe that wasn't the best term to use.  

I still LOVE roses and all my little pretties, so this is more of a shuffle, some went to the dining room, and some to the studio, and some will be listed to sell in the Boutique, if I ever get back to work. 

This weather has affected me mentally.  I seem to be in some weird limbo, waiting for my real life to get back on track.  Extreme cold weather always sets me off like that.  Its an odd sort of cabin fever, I start hating staring at the same walls and want to change them and everything inside them.  Combine that with the post Christmas let down, and weeks of these horrid temperatures, instead of just days of it, like we are used to in Kansas, and I have gone berserk from it!

(Or berserker,if you are a Kevin Smith fan)

Sorry, didn't mean to run on with my weather complaints.  Back to the photos….

Here is the after.

 

It is still nice and rosy, but is toned down and cleaned up.  The sides are covered in the tone on tone silk wallpaper that I had in my stash. Funny, it is the first vintage wallpaper I have ever bought, and I got it 20 years ago to cover the walls of my dining room and never used it. I'd stuck it away in the closet and found it a couple years ago when I realized that old wallpaper was a wonderful art supply.   And now, here it is, used on my home after all. 

I like to mix my china cabinet shelves up a bit and display more than just china.  A framed old print (that I tried to sale at Miss Frenchies and Silverbella, but no one wanted! I'm glad now- sometimes I think that my home is full of nothing but things that I bought to sell and got stuck with), an old Haeger pot filled with silverware, ready to set out for a buffet, a collage I did at Silver Bella, and of course, some fairies and birdies.

For me, fairies and flowers in with the dishes makes for a much more interesting look.

The wallpaper is stapled up, instead of glued. Because I know that I am fickle. It doesn't look perfect, but with so much in the cabinet, who can tell?

Its just background.  A nice, neutral, but pretty background!

 

The plates in the back corner are on a stair shaped stand, which is just what I need for my love of layering.  I also like to hang things on the cabinet walls, pictures, cherubs, plates, etc.  

Adding cake stands helps with layering too.  I try for a variety of heights, and make lots of groupings instead of just lining up a matching set of plates.  When my mom died, my sister got her set of Wild Rose dishes, and instead of keeping it for herself, she broke up the set and gave each of us a place setting.  Mine is on this shelf, with a lot of other pale pink rosey dishes.

I went for an over all sense of "white", even though other colors were used as accents.
 

The lamp on that shelf was a quick project. I got it for 50% off of $5 at one of my favorite antiquing joints a while back and it was out in my studio waiting to see what it would become.  Well, it didn't take much to transform it.  In under 5 minutes, it had a whole new look.

1-  switched the shade to an older one that I'd picked up at a garage sale a few years back.

2-  pinned a rhinestone brooch to the shade

3-  cut a page from a vintage French text book to fit the body of the lamp

4-  drizzled glue on the book page, then rolled it around the lamp and burnished it down with my fingers

I really doubt that it took more than 2 or 3 minutes to do.

After the corner cabinet, I tacked the cabinet tops.  Over the years, I'd collected tea pots, and over the years, as my tastes have changed, I edited the collection.  My last redo had mostly rose patterned tea pots lined up on the cabinets.  This time, I got rid of most of them, except a few plain white ones (I guess you can't see them in this photo, they are at the other end). I wanted to go very neutral and have much less up above.  Now you can see the vines I'd painted on the wall years ago. I'd had so much crap up there, those were hidden.

They were also hidden by filth. Ugh, it was NASTY up there.  All pottery got popped into the dishwasher, and I tried to clean the walls, and ceiling (yes, I told you I was going  stir crazy with cabin fever- I WAS WASHING CEILINGS!!) but the greasy, dusty coating that was on everything was too awful to come off with my environmentally safe Windex.  I had to use elbow grease and baking soda with a pot scrubber. And we are not people who fry much of anything. Where does all that grease come from??? 

That grease was another reason to put much, much less junk up there!

In this photo you can see a couple of the white pots that made the cut.  I redid the narrow shelves between the cabinets too.  I'd had decorated bottles, rosy shakers, and green depression glass there before.

Well, I could run on and on and on, telling you about my shuffling and reshuffling. I've been at it nonstop. You know how you take something from one room to another, then you have to redo to cover the hole that you made when you first moved that piece? Yep, that is the vortex that I have fallen into. 

I switched the dining room picture with the mirror from the bedroom, and then had to dig around and find a different bedspread that matched better in there.   Lots of those kinds of problems came up. But I am getting a new look with the same old stuff from other rooms, closets, or out in the studio, and keeping myself semi-safe from the ravages of cabin fever.

And I am getting lots of little problems solved.  Like this ceiling tin that was covering the bad patch job. It has new screws, is up tightly, and now I've got it faux finished to match the ceiling.

At this rate, my New Years's resolution for 2010 will be completed before January is even over. And not in the typical way, where you give up. I'll run out of things to fix or redo around the house!!

There is more I want to do while I am trapped here in the house, but I think I am at the end of what I can do with with I have, and keep it Zero Dollar.   I need a gallon of paint and some hardware before I go any further, and both cars and all three trucks are stuck in the driveway.

But today, I have Sugarwings.  We've been climbing up and down the ladder that is in the kitchen and sitting in the dark closet playing with flashlights. 

Now, its time to go and bake muffins, so I'd better run.