Its been more than a decade that we have been using grey water from our washing machine to water the backyard plants and fruit trees. Therefore, I am probably long overdue to post an update on how its affected the yard, and what has been good about it and what’s not. The set up has evolved a little bit every couple of years. Since I last posted about it, we put in a paver patio and replaced the back porch…
Normally in the winter months, the rainy season in SoCal, I have the gray water diverer on the washer machine in the off position so it will empty to the sewer, not the garden. Southern California usually gets plenty of rain to take care of the landscape until late March or April. This year is the earliest we have had to switch back to using grey water, since first using it back in 2007. We have had next to nothing…
A Vintage Linoleum Kitchen Floor in a 21st Century Home When we first told family and neighbors we were considering old fashion linoleum flooring for our new kitchen floor, we got all sorts of weird looks and concerned comments from the older generation. A few of them mentioned how terribly ugly they thought linoleum was. Really? Okay, I understand retro, mid-century, and vintage decor isn’t for everyone, especially if they already lived with it the first time it came around….
I am sorry to report, we still haven’t completed our laundry room/ mudroom remodel. It is usable, just not finished. Home improvement projects around here kind of take a back seat to other more important things, like family, the kids’ extra curricular activities, the garden, or just the daily running of our home. However, I am slowing moving ahead on the tile counter top. (Project update was added at the bottom of this post) As you probably noticed from my…
We have a really pretty lemonade jar; the only problem is, it leaks. I have tried a few different things to deal with the leak, but eventually, it ended up stored hidden away in the cupboard and unused. Rather than discard it, I decided this afternoon to make it into a homemade terrarium. Here are the photos of making it… Read more of my craft ideas here.
Off and on over the last couple of months, we have been working on the laundry room/ mudroom area adjacent to the kitchen. Eventually the room will have a work counter, a small desk, book shelves, a laundry sink, and the front load washer and dryer. It is functional right now, but definitely not finished looking. In order to make the kitchen and mudroom flow together, we recently installed and painted new unfinished maple cabinets that are a close match…
Although it was pouring rain on Thursday and a terrible day for gardening, it turned out to be a lovely day to work indoors, and I just happened to have this mural commission already scheduled on my calendar. To see a little more of my artwork, visit Murals and More by Lianne over at wordpress.com. The homeowners just bought their first house and their two daughter’s finally got their very own rooms. The ten year old, Becca, has been wanting…
This fall we decided to have our old 1944 white bathtub refinished by a professional tub reglazer. It has been needing it for about five or six years. When our kids were younger and still liked to use lots of bath toys, it seemed pointless to waste the money any sooner. When we bought our house fifteen + years ago, the sellers unfortunately already had it refinished just before listing the house and we didn’t realize it at the time. …
For the last few weeks, we have been without a working printer/ scanner but finally bought a new one this week. I decided to try it out by scanning more images from Mrs. Crabtree’s 1940’s and 1950’s home decorating scrapbook. If you want to read my post about how I ended up with the scrapbook and what’s in it, click here. It takes a while to scan and crop each picture, so I am just working on the images in…
Much to the relief of my patient hubby, I was finally able to settle on a vintage 1940s/ 1950s Formica table that fit the majority of my search criteria. No more constant browsing craigslist multiple times a day for new listings or driving half way across the Southland on our weekends to check out tables. I found a retro yellow Howell dinette set with four chrome & vinyl chairs, stamped on the under side of the table top with the…