A little peek at our work-in-progress kitchen

Our kitchen makeover is beginning to feel like it should bear the title "the never ending story". And it's not that we're slow workers, or that there is an insane amount of work to be done. The reason this project has been dragging on and on is because we've got so many other things in the works. But that's the best way to keep things interesting. Right now we're in the final stages. Tightening up the little details, arranging, and then rearranging. One of the little details that makes a huge difference to the overall look is the scallop border that we added to our half wall of tan. Last week when I had shared a tutorial for my Mixed Media Cute Girl Ornaments, I included the below pic of the finished ornaments hanging on our tabletop tree, and you could spy the incomplete half wall in the background. And truth be told...I can't stand seeing pics with unfinished projects. I find myself wanting to time travel so I can fix things to the way they should be. So, there's the half wall of tan...plain, boring, without flair. ha!

My plan was to top the half wall with a scallop border...very much like we did with the walls in our studio. We shared a tutorial for that, and it's pretty much done exactly the same, except the scallop that's on the studio walls is much larger.

For the kitchen we wanted a small cute scallop to soften the line between the top and bottom portion of the wall. The little scallop trim transforms the half wall. Without the scallop, a half wall can look institutional or industrial. With the scallop, it can look like Grandma's vintage kitchen.

Aaron is the technical guy. For the most part, when we do stuff that is symmetrical or requires a ruler, Aaron will handle that part of the project. I believe he used the lid of a jar to trace the half circle shape for the scallop border. He used a yardstick to draw a long line on a piece of poster board, then repeatedly traced a half circle with the jar lid, and then he cut it out...voila: scallop border template complete. Next, he went around the room and with a pencil he traced the scallop border all along the top of the tan half wall. And then after that he handed me a 3/4" round paint brush and said "get to work little lady". Yep, we had to delegate...while I painted the scallops, Aaron was sanding die cuts.

I know...when you see those hundreds of little scallops it might appear as if I got a raw deal. But honestly, it looks way more difficult than it actually was. It's all about using the right sized and shaped paint brush. The scallops were easy to paint...just one curved stroke...repeated hundreds of times...but simple nonetheless. Kinda the same strokes as painting your nails.

I love the way it turned out. It just completed the look we were going for. Soft and sweet. And you may notice that some things that were hanging on the wall have changed locations. Namely, our new shadow boxes. We found a better spot for those, and we'll share those pics when that part of the kitchen/dining room is complete. I was happy to give our "Cakes" chalkboard a central spot on the wall. We've had this piece going on 15 years.

And we've had these adorable oversized Fork and Spoon candle holders even longer than that. I love these. When picking paint colors for our kitchen I kept pulling these out to make sure that the paint that we picked would coordinate nicely with them.

And yet another little paint project. This awesome shelf! It needed some lightening up.

You may remember it from our kitchen decor, pre hurricane Sandy. When we first moved into the house we painted all the walls bright white, and painted most of the fixtures and accents black. So...here is this corner of the kitchen as it was prior to hurricane Sandy. And you can see the new incarnation of this exact corner below.

Here it is. Now with a chalkboard wall and stainless shelves. Everything but our "Eat" sign has changed.

And here's the newly lightened up shelf. It looked great when it was black but it simply did not work with the new decor. I'm going for a softer look overall. I love the way my creamy, crazed, and cracked platters look hanging on this wall. And the shelf, now that it's creamy white with aqua spindles, is the perfect place to display my little vintage baking items.

And having the black paint underneath worked out great when I lightly distressed the edges of the shelf.

These are new to my collection and I love them! Got them on ebay. Funny story...I was trying to get them with a last minute bid but I had forgotten all about the auction and totally missed out. And the opening bid was 99 cents! Well, it turned out that nobody bid on them. So, the owner re-listed them...and when they did I contacted them and asked if they'd consider putting a buy-it-now price. They said "make me and offer."...So I said, "how about 2 bucks?" (since they were listed at 99 cents). But then I never heard back from the seller. Maybe the 2 buck suggestion was an insult? ha! Anyway, long story short...this time I didn't forget to bid...and I got them for the cool price of 99 cents! yessssss!

Clearing out our cabinets and came across so much vintage melamine. I'm a sucker for this stuff!

I love these vintage Baileys teacups. They were a gift from my mom many years ago. They crack me up.

And as we clean up, redecorate, and rearrange, one thing becomes apparent...We've got a whole lotta faux cakes hanging around! I caught this group just chillin' on this old bench, acting like they don't have a care in the world. Seriously, people are secondary citizens in our kitchen...you must give up your seat to cakes. I think this is just a temporary home for these guys. They'll find proper spots soon enough. That's it for the mini tour of our work in progress kitchen. Once Spring hits for real we'll be re-painting our kitchen cabinets and sanding and refinishing the wood floors. We're waiting for warm weather obviously so that we can have the windows open for those projects. Ok, thanks again for checking in! xo, Jenny...and Aaron says hi!