September 2, 2008
Oscar Challenge: 1941
I am such a slacker. We watched the pertinent 1941 flick before we moved, and I haven't written about it. It's partly because I am super lazy, and partly because I intended to watch Citizen Kane before I did my writeup, and partly because How Green Was My Valley is SO DEPRESSING.
It's apparently too depressing to write about. I've had this window open for THREE DAYS while I've tried to express how beautiful and sad this film is, but I can't do it. I am apparently not interested in telling you how little I liked Suspicion (nothing new, I've never liked it) either. Screw it. I'm going to go watch Mrs. Miniver.
Posted by Kate at 6:25 PM | Comments (0)August 25, 2008
you get what you need
All Nathan wanted to do was see the original Starbucks and watch a fish getting thrown, and all I wanted was a Special. I got what I wanted AND some Pagliacci, and Nathan got everything *he* wanted AND he got to order some cherry pie and a cup of coffee somewhere. I'm not saying where.
Posted by Kate at 5:33 PM
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August 15, 2008
Whoa, freaky. This morning the dining room was a construction site, now it has a vague resemblance to a dining room. Behold:
There's nothing like the imminent arrival of guests to motivate you to tidy up. I had help, though. Nathan got up early this morning and moved all of the manly tools and things into the garage. Then Tom popped by this afternoon to show me some paint chips, and he wound up helping me put my parents' old table back together.
I think the rug looks a lot better in the dining room. It so didn't work in the living room.
The table still needs a final cleaning and a coat of varnish. The French Provincial table sort of doesn't go with the mostly Transitional Mission style of the house, but I can't afford a Stickley table, and anyway I like this one. It was our dining room table when I was a little kid. My mom gave me "The Facts of Life" talk at it when we were sewing one day, and my sisters used to hide their peas under it.
The chairs ("Early Costco") are what they are, and there's nothing I can do about them. I'm having a hard time finding chairs that are going to bridge the stylistic gap between Provençal and Prairie School. Maybe something Edwardian will work.
Cranky, must tidy.
Posted by Kate at 5:13 PM | Comments (7)August 10, 2008
Or Not
We were trucking' right along there with the house stuff, really we were. Then the horrible tingly feeling in my hand(s) got much, much worse all of a sudden and it made me cry and I went to the doctor and he said I have Carpal Tunnel and that I have to give up knitting and I said, "You can't really just give up knitting." (Heathen.)
So that's why neither my housework nor my knitting is done. But I did manage to take a bunch of pictures at Elizabeth's surprise birthday party today. I don't think there have ever been that many people in that house, ever. There were the usual Orlanders, plus us, plus Rob and Nicole, and Steve, and Lisa Eve and Logan, and some lovely young ladies of Elizabeth's acquaintance. It was a fine, fine afternoon with much swimming, drinking of festive adult beverages, card-playing and no heavy lifting.
Is Zoe bad-ass or what?
August 3, 2008
progress is our middle name
Okay, this is crazy. Remember that crazy-ass 1970's kitchen? (I will refresh your memory.)
So we ripped all that stuff out, and after two trips to Ikea (the second of which we couldn't have done if my awesome parents hadn't come to visit), there's a hygenic wonderland. SO there are no doors on the cupboards, I need to paint over the sink where the Formica backsplash was, the window is still a piece of crap, and neither the sink nor the dishwasher are what you might call "hooked up", but damn, it looks good. And there's COUNTERTOP. Praise Jeebus. The toaster and the Kitchenaid are no longer in weird, weird places.
Also, I managed to strip (ha ha, I said "strip") and prime one of the cabinets. We dragged it upstairs and nestled it into place next to the ass-kickin' stove so I don't have to paint it outside (and we can get some COUNTERTOP.) Nobody wants bugs embedded in their cabinets.
All this progress is about to come to a screeching halt, though, as we have Casa registration and a family thing next weekend, Gen's wedding the next weekend, Kim's wedding after that, dress rehearsal for Casa after THAT, and then (you guessed it) Casa. So don't hold your breath for any more cool before-and-after pictures.
July 26, 2008
We Can Do It!
So Liz Stone came by yesterday to pick up some empty boxes (she and Damon are moving into our house on Kentucky Street, go figure) and she asked, "When are your cabinets arriving?" She seemed a bit stunned that they haven't actually been ordered yet. We were going to get sort of okay ones from the Home Despot, but they turned out to be more expensive than we wanted for cabinets we weren't absolutely crazy about. Then we thought we'd get Ikea (no, god, never again) cabinets, which are cheap enough to be able to toss out at a moment's contemplation (like when we get around to building proper period-appropriate cabinets, which is to say in, like, ten years.)
Nathan went out to the garage this afternoon and called for me to come out. He was standing there looking bemusedly at the old original kitchen cabinets which had been removed from the house and hung up in the garage in the Carter administration. We'd noticed them a couple of weeks before and wished they weren't in such crappy condition, because, HEY, THEY'RE FREE, and period, and we'd get to recycle and all that green stuff. Turns out, they're just dirty from having been in the garage for 30 years. They're actually in great shape.
There was much rejoicing. Once we'd recovered, we made our daily sojourn to the Despot and got some Citristrip. Dude, I love this shit. It makes a big honkin' mess, but it sure works.
This is a long-winded way of saying "This is why we didn't finish the kitchen floor today." That and we stopped work at 5:30 to to over to Tom and Chris' house for an ass-kickin' dinner party. But the bit of floor we got done DOES look fabulous. If it's done before rehearsal tomorrow it will be an Old-fashioned Christmas Miracle.
Posted by Kate at 11:20 PM
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July 24, 2008
movin' on up
Remember that time the previous owners of the house tore down the wall separating the kitchen from the service porch? Yeah, that was a bad choice. We put it back up.
It looks a little unkempt in this photo, but it's a good wall. It just needs another coat of paint and a frame for the door, and it will be spiffy.
I can't say we're "moved in", because the house is a maze of boxes, there's no kitchen floor, and there are new gigantic holes in the kitchen to patch and re-paint (the plumber had to put in a new gas line for the ass-kickin' Wedgewood stove), but we are moved out of the other place.
We do have a fridge, though. And booze.
