You may have noticed in my last post that I detoured from the usual renovation posts to talk about something else, in this case, my pregnancy. I also recently changed the blog header and tag so it reads "home renovation + life along the way." I decided I'd like to write more about the things we do, trips we take, good recipes we find, crafts, sewing projects, etc. etc. And since I knew we were going to have a baby when I redesigned the header, I figured some of my family might like to be kept up to date with the kiddo once it gets here. Thus, you will begin seeing more posts that are non-renovation related, as well as posts about the house as we complete more projects.
Speaking of projects, this week I'll have pictures up of our "almost finished" kitchen--90% of the cabinets are in, the countertops (minus the bar) are in and the sink works! Woohoo! We also completely cleaned out our garage on Saturday--to the point my car can actually fit in there! Besides more little things in the kitchen (think backsplash, trim, installing the bar, securing the pantry cabinets), we have a laundry list of projects to accomplish by the time the baby gets here. We'll see how far we get. Things we'd *like* to complete include: finishing the ceiling in the living room and hallway, painting those areas, maybe redoing the floor in the mudroom and, of course, repainting a room for the nursery. Unfortunately, I've been told I can't paint (can't say I'm terribly sad about that!), but stay tuned as I try to find ways around that...
Ready, set, approximately 25 weeks to go!
Showing posts with label renovation. Show all posts
Showing posts with label renovation. Show all posts
Monday, November 14, 2011
Thursday, October 13, 2011
Baking in the remodel
The events of this post happened about two months ago...oh well :)
So two months ago we were in August, and the kitchen remodel was in a similar state as it is now. That seems sad--we are making progress, just had a little hitch that I'll get into in another post. My friend Kristin's birthday was July 31, and my friend Laura's birthday was August 5. (You can read their blog here.) To celebrate, Kristin's husband, Mike, decided to have a little party for the two of them.
One day he handed me the August edition of Rachael Ray's magazine and showed me several fun birthday cake ideas. Kristin liked one in particular, but there were a few others she thought were pretty cool, too. I told him I'd make three of them: one that looked like pancakes, one where the cake is baked inside ice cream cones and one that was a rainbow-colored cake. Each was pretty easy and used a box mix, and two of the three were smaller looking so I figured it would be fun to have options. Now remember, I have no sink in my kitchen and no counters. I did have a working oven, though, so I assured Mike everything would be fine.
Fast forward to August 9, the day before the party. I got a call from Laura's husband, Caleb, asking if I might be able to pick up a cake he ordered from a bakery in Easthampton. At this point, I was unaware that anyone else was bringing dessert. He said it was a cake that he and Laura had tried and loved and that it would feed 20 people. I'm really glad Caleb called me because I knew we wouldn't have 20 people at the party, meaning I didn't need to bake three different cakes in addition to the one he ordered.
On to August 10. I decided to go with the pancake cake since that was the one Kristin really liked. Here is a picture from the magazine of the finished product:
I gathered all of my ingredients together on an IKEA cabinet that we were using in the living room.
You need a yellow cake mix, whatever the cake mix calls for, powdered sugar, water and sprinkles. I then got my set-up ready on the stove. Remember...no counters. (I didn't end up using my big mixer--it was easier to do my hand.)
I melted butter in my pan, had my cake mix ready in the bowl and then got to work. You pour the cake batter in your pan a little at a time the same way you would to make pancakes. Now I like Rachael Ray, but I will say I feel like the recipe lied a little. The cooking time given was about 8-9 minutes on the first side, then a few more on the other. I'm pretty sure I only needed about 2 minutes on the first side, then about 15 seconds on the other. Just cook them like you would pancakes--wait for the bubbles before you flip. It is a little trickier to flip cake batter as opposed to pancake batter, but if you work at it, it is possible I promise! (Andrew benefited from my mistakes, though!) Here are some cooking pics:
Once you make a stack, you can then make the icing drizzle for the top. The recipe said to mix powdered sugar together with water, then drizzle on the stack. I read on another blog that you could also use milk or orange juice. So I headed to the bathroom--my source of water--and made the topping, drizzled it and added sprinkles. Here's the finished cake--the icing doesn't look as thick as the one in the magazine, but it worked!
At this point I got really worried. The cake didn't look so great to me, I thought it would get too soggy since the party was in another hour, on and on. Andrew said it tasted good, but I wasn't convinced. I finished it up anyway and hoped for the best. I broke a wooden skewer in half, cut out a triangle of card stock, wrote happy birthday on the card stock, then taped the flag to the skewer. Voila! Who needs candles?
Turns out, the cake was great and everyone loved it. It definitely took more work than I anticipated--mainly because I was running through my house looking for better spatulas to flip with or trying to find a ladle for the batter, etc. Cooking and baking is definitely harder when your supplies are spread throughout your home.
One last note: The batter lasted me forever. I read on another blog that someone got 9 pancakes out of their batter. I got about 16! I made 7 or 8 for Kristin and Laura's party, then made the rest for Andrew and our house guest, Aaron. I made several of the pancakes, then I think just made a bowl of the icing for them to dip it in.
So two months ago we were in August, and the kitchen remodel was in a similar state as it is now. That seems sad--we are making progress, just had a little hitch that I'll get into in another post. My friend Kristin's birthday was July 31, and my friend Laura's birthday was August 5. (You can read their blog here.) To celebrate, Kristin's husband, Mike, decided to have a little party for the two of them.
One day he handed me the August edition of Rachael Ray's magazine and showed me several fun birthday cake ideas. Kristin liked one in particular, but there were a few others she thought were pretty cool, too. I told him I'd make three of them: one that looked like pancakes, one where the cake is baked inside ice cream cones and one that was a rainbow-colored cake. Each was pretty easy and used a box mix, and two of the three were smaller looking so I figured it would be fun to have options. Now remember, I have no sink in my kitchen and no counters. I did have a working oven, though, so I assured Mike everything would be fine.
Fast forward to August 9, the day before the party. I got a call from Laura's husband, Caleb, asking if I might be able to pick up a cake he ordered from a bakery in Easthampton. At this point, I was unaware that anyone else was bringing dessert. He said it was a cake that he and Laura had tried and loved and that it would feed 20 people. I'm really glad Caleb called me because I knew we wouldn't have 20 people at the party, meaning I didn't need to bake three different cakes in addition to the one he ordered.
On to August 10. I decided to go with the pancake cake since that was the one Kristin really liked. Here is a picture from the magazine of the finished product:
I gathered all of my ingredients together on an IKEA cabinet that we were using in the living room.
You need a yellow cake mix, whatever the cake mix calls for, powdered sugar, water and sprinkles. I then got my set-up ready on the stove. Remember...no counters. (I didn't end up using my big mixer--it was easier to do my hand.)
I melted butter in my pan, had my cake mix ready in the bowl and then got to work. You pour the cake batter in your pan a little at a time the same way you would to make pancakes. Now I like Rachael Ray, but I will say I feel like the recipe lied a little. The cooking time given was about 8-9 minutes on the first side, then a few more on the other. I'm pretty sure I only needed about 2 minutes on the first side, then about 15 seconds on the other. Just cook them like you would pancakes--wait for the bubbles before you flip. It is a little trickier to flip cake batter as opposed to pancake batter, but if you work at it, it is possible I promise! (Andrew benefited from my mistakes, though!) Here are some cooking pics:
Once you make a stack, you can then make the icing drizzle for the top. The recipe said to mix powdered sugar together with water, then drizzle on the stack. I read on another blog that you could also use milk or orange juice. So I headed to the bathroom--my source of water--and made the topping, drizzled it and added sprinkles. Here's the finished cake--the icing doesn't look as thick as the one in the magazine, but it worked!
At this point I got really worried. The cake didn't look so great to me, I thought it would get too soggy since the party was in another hour, on and on. Andrew said it tasted good, but I wasn't convinced. I finished it up anyway and hoped for the best. I broke a wooden skewer in half, cut out a triangle of card stock, wrote happy birthday on the card stock, then taped the flag to the skewer. Voila! Who needs candles?
Turns out, the cake was great and everyone loved it. It definitely took more work than I anticipated--mainly because I was running through my house looking for better spatulas to flip with or trying to find a ladle for the batter, etc. Cooking and baking is definitely harder when your supplies are spread throughout your home.
One last note: The batter lasted me forever. I read on another blog that someone got 9 pancakes out of their batter. I got about 16! I made 7 or 8 for Kristin and Laura's party, then made the rest for Andrew and our house guest, Aaron. I made several of the pancakes, then I think just made a bowl of the icing for them to dip it in.
Friday, June 17, 2011
Hauntingly Funny
Remember the rat skeletons? They weren't the only skeletons hanging around our house...
I went to check the mail earlier this week and was distracted by something white I saw in a bush:
I convinced myself it was a bird skeleton. I saw it in the day--saw the little ribs poking up and thought I saw a jaw. Of course I grabbed the mail and went back inside immediately. A few days later I remembered to tell Andrew about it while we were having dinner with our friend Sarah. We like to call her Aunt Sarah because she often takes care of Sherpa when we're gone. As does our friend Kurt---Uncle Kurt. But I digress...
Already creeped out by the rats we found, I'm pretty sure coming over to our house was dropping on Sarah's list of places to visit. I commented that it could have been string, but I couldn't be sure and didn't want to touch it. We dropped the subject, finished dinner and moved on.
Later that night, Sarah was bringing me home from house church. I remembered the skeleton and drug everyone outside to see it.
I think Andrew was even a little spooked because he didn't get too close. We took some pictures and that was going to be that, but I insisted we move it. My theory? A bird (or squirrel, or chipmunk--basically any small animal) got in our bush, five feet of snow came and he suffocated. Andrew put on a glove and grabbed some wire cutters to remove it.
The closer we got the more interesting things became. It started to look less like a bird and more like a human. Remember...we're a little creeped out-- we did just find two perfectly intact rat skeletons in our wall. Crazy thoughts ran through my head, but Sarah and Andrew, the practical, mathematical kids they are put a stop to that. Sarah mentioned Halloween, but I immediately disregarded that because we didn't decorate for Halloween. Nor did I ever see this white boney thing in our bush before. And I do check the mail pretty regularly.
But like it does 99.9% of the time in my life, logic won out over my paranoid brain. You may have even seen it from the start. Here are some pictures to document our discovery:
I went to check the mail earlier this week and was distracted by something white I saw in a bush:
I convinced myself it was a bird skeleton. I saw it in the day--saw the little ribs poking up and thought I saw a jaw. Of course I grabbed the mail and went back inside immediately. A few days later I remembered to tell Andrew about it while we were having dinner with our friend Sarah. We like to call her Aunt Sarah because she often takes care of Sherpa when we're gone. As does our friend Kurt---Uncle Kurt. But I digress...
Already creeped out by the rats we found, I'm pretty sure coming over to our house was dropping on Sarah's list of places to visit. I commented that it could have been string, but I couldn't be sure and didn't want to touch it. We dropped the subject, finished dinner and moved on.
Later that night, Sarah was bringing me home from house church. I remembered the skeleton and drug everyone outside to see it.
I think Andrew was even a little spooked because he didn't get too close. We took some pictures and that was going to be that, but I insisted we move it. My theory? A bird (or squirrel, or chipmunk--basically any small animal) got in our bush, five feet of snow came and he suffocated. Andrew put on a glove and grabbed some wire cutters to remove it.
The closer we got the more interesting things became. It started to look less like a bird and more like a human. Remember...we're a little creeped out-- we did just find two perfectly intact rat skeletons in our wall. Crazy thoughts ran through my head, but Sarah and Andrew, the practical, mathematical kids they are put a stop to that. Sarah mentioned Halloween, but I immediately disregarded that because we didn't decorate for Halloween. Nor did I ever see this white boney thing in our bush before. And I do check the mail pretty regularly.
But like it does 99.9% of the time in my life, logic won out over my paranoid brain. You may have even seen it from the start. Here are some pictures to document our discovery:
What I thought was a jaw is now starting to look like a human skull.
Definitely a human skull...still creepy though.
Yep. It was a little rubber guy wrapped around the bush.
We all had a pretty good laugh after that. I am still suspicious though. I've never, ever seen it before, and we've lived here a year. It was pretty dirty, which means it should have been there for awhile. Even if it was there when we moved in, the thought of the previous owner--an elderly woman with Alzheimer's--having decorated with tiny rubber skeletons is a little over the top. My new theory? There are quite a few pranksters we hang around...only time will tell.
Wednesday, June 30, 2010
Pictures!
I realize it's been over a week since I last posted, and I feel terrible for it. Comcast isn't able to get to our house to hook up Internet until after the 4th of July, so until then I have to find time when I'm near wi-fi and not working to update. I wanted to post a few "before" shots of thehouse while I have a minute.
This is the outside of the house (obviously.)
This is what the floors looked like before we sanded them. They had dark stains in several places, so we sanded them and plan to stain them darker. This way we didn't have to sand terribly far down, which takes more time and effort. We were able to rent a belt sander from a local hardware store for $55 for 24 hours. We only used three pieces of sandpaper (one that was on it and partially used) so the total came to $65.
"Before" den
"Before" kitchen wall. Hand painted wall...not sure what was going on here, but I'm ready for it to be gone!
Sanded floors.
I'll post a few more pics later with an update of our work and planning over the last week.
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