So Cool In the Kitchen

MISS ME?!

Even if not, I missed working on the dollhouse! So, tonight, I intentionally carved out a pocket of time to see if I could finish a project I started a little over a month ago! (The digital age of taking pictures provides the date stamp for when I began something I thought was so simple and would take a day or two ... 👀)

No matter how long it took, it's finished! Check out the refrigerator make-over! It started out looking like this:

It was a part of an entire kitchen set I bought at an estate sale. It was a 5-piece set from Michaels! See?!

Back in the day when there were price
tags! And, assuming a 40%-off coupon was
used, the set should have been about $35.
Not bad!!

Okay, anyway. I really like the set, but I wasn't loving the grooves on the refrigerator. I don't need the fridge to look like it has wooden planks. And, the inside looked a little worn.

So, I took care of all of that! First, I schmeared on the wood filler:

'Think I used enough?!

And, after drying for many days -- because I didn't get back to it, not because it needed it -- I sanded the dickens out of it:

A fresh coat of paint and polyurethane later, and voila!

But, wait. There's more!

I decided the fridge needed drawers on the bottom. Because, duh! I really didn't know how to make them, so, I just winged it.

First, I took some cursory measurements of the interior where the drawer would go. And, by "took measurements," I mean I started by cutting the nearest paint card/sample thing I had in front of me to the size I thought it should be to create a drawer side. Then, I stuck it in the fridge to see if it worked. I whittled the piece down until I got it just right. Yeah, so, no tips for exact process here.

I used the plastic top of a sushi tray I recently saved from the recycle box to create the side pieces. I cut the four that I needed and promptly lost two of them. They're on the floor somewhere. I think. I honestly don't know. I didn't try too hard to find them, though, and, instead, just cut two more.

I did the same, awesome-exacting measuring process for the bottom pieces. Here's the one for the freezer side:

Don't let the cutting mat nor the exacto knife NOR the metal edge fool you. While I earnestly tried to use them, the plastic pieces were just too small and slippery. I did end up using my small guillotine paper cutter to get the edges straight, though. THAT was a handy tool!

From there, I used the Quick Grip glue. Not only does it dry as clear as it's allowed (it's not its fault if you're a goopy gluer), but it dries super-fast. I wanted that to go fast so the pieces wouldn't slip around while drying.

And, so, I put the sides together, bang, bang, bang, and what do you know but the freezer side drawer was too wide! Something about not really measuring comes to mind ...

No matter! I pulled it apart, recut by hand the base to be more narrow taking a guess as to how much was needed, and put it back together again. I'd say it turned out very okay!!

If there's something I can do about the goopy parts of the dried glue, I'll figure that out another time. I'm pretty sure they're a big part of holding these little suckers together, so I'm in no hurry! Oh, and the handles you see are the edges of strawberry containers. They provide the perfect little ledge and are already angled without my having to create that.

Here they are in action!

I know they're a little hard to see, so spend
some time oo-ing and ahh-ing over the
interior paint job, too!

Here they are in real action:

Pretend those are apples and oranges in the
drawer. And, yes, that's a pumpkin in there.
Because this family really has no
refrigerator food.

A little perspective shot. And, hello, new
kitty!

So, there you go! The cool, refrigerator make-over! Pun intended.

What's next? I really don't know! I have trim painted and ready to go for the interior doorways. That I have it painted is a miracle, but the doorways aren't ready because I haven't sanded them down from filling them, like, 2 or 3 months ago!

I have accomplished obtaining new creatures for the house, though! Seeing as the little kitty up there peeked in on the fridge shot, I should introduce her mom:

Big, lap kitty!

I found those kitties as a pair at a garage sale last weekend for a quarter. 😁

So, it's time to survey the land and determine the next project! Stay tuned ...

A Little Gathering Of Joy

While the inside projects patiently await pockets of time for progress, I had to make sure the outside got just a smidge of attention to celebrate:

The front porch springs to life as it should be!

Some of the grandkids flock Grandma
Laura to get the beloved chocolate bunny
-- white and milk chocolate to accommodate
favorites!

That little scene just makes me *happy*.

He is risen! Tell it out with joyful voice ...

The Island

So, I'm pretty proud of myself on this one!

We hop down from the third floor to the first to take care of a little kitchen issue I've been having! The problem? It's the same problem most people have in real life: Not enough counter space!

I really love the kitchen set I have. It, along with almost every other piece of furniture in the house, is a score from an estate sale! It's white just the way I wanted, and it has the right pieces. BUT, I still want more counter space to display things! So, here's what I did ...

You might recall that I have a plethora of sinks with cabinets. One of them came with the bathroom set, but I didn't use it because it's a little wonky and weird. I bought two others that are in use in the bathroom and in the craft room. This kitchen set came with one, but it's not the one in the picture. HOW I ultimately ended up with FIVE sinks is beyond me. But, it got me thinking ...

Here's the wonky-weird one:

I thought if I pop out the sink, perhaps I could sand down the side to make another cabinet piece. More accurately, I wanted to make a kitchen island! I just knew I could even though I really had no idea what I was doing or how it would actually turn out.

So, I went for it! The top came out with absolutely no effort ...

Old glue certainly allows for easy
disassembly!

... but, the back of it was something I didn't want to deal with:

Eww. Besides, the front doors don't open,
so I'm not interested.

I put that aside and fished out of my box the sink that actually came with the set.

It's okay, but I like the one I have in there better. The faucet on this one is loose and just spins around. Plus, one of the doors is missing its hinge pin:

Suddenly, I had the vision to just take the doors off so I could actually see the stuff stored there! That's way more fun than hiding it behind doors!

My first step was to pop the sink off which required more effort than the first one:

Oh, snap! Literally!

Whoops! It didn't quite come off in one piece. So, I went for it again:

And, then I fixed it up in case this sink is ever used elsewhere:

From there, I got out the box-o-balsa and, as luck would have it, the large pieces are the exact width I need!!

That was a little gift because I'm not a huge fan of cutting balsa with the grain. It's flimsy and temperamental. Like I need the inanimate stuff to have a 'tude. But, it does.

Anyway, after a quick marking for size, I cut the width:

I do love being able to just use the scissors!

This balsa is super thin, so I used two pieces for the perfect thickness.

After a good schmear of Tacky Glue coating the entire surface, I put the pieces on top of each other to dry under a piece of hard plastic weighed by a water bottle. This would ensure the pieces dry all the way to the ends.

The next day, I gave it two coats, while drying in between, of semi gloss polyurethane. This not only brought out the color of the wood perfectly, but it also helped give stability to the balsa. All said and done, that piece is plenty hard to put things with a little weight on it. I also sanded the corners:

It's like I'm a professional.

Finally, I yanked the other door off of the cabinet piece, and I glued the top on:

With a piece of wood to cover the surface, a couple of cans of poly serve yet another wonderful purpose weighting it down for a few hours!

As a finishing touch, I dove back into one of my jars of beads and found the "wheels":

I used the Quick Grip here so those little suckers didn't move once in place. One of them bounced off of the cabinet and onto the table and onto the floor. I still can't find it. Anyway ...

The result?!

Yaaaaaaassss!!!

It's PERFECT in there! It gives the narrow kitchen better dimension to me:

I also like that it can be moved around to create the space I want where I want it:

Out of the way against where a wall would be to open the
space in the middle! Oh, and, don't mind the guy in the doorway.
Just ... don't. That's a story for another time 😀

I love, love, LOVE it! It was so simple, yet, I feel amazingly accomplished!

Oh, but that's not all in the kitchen! Stay tuned to see the latest, coolest makeover!

The Girl's Room

With the toys and books filling the room, I figured I should focus on "finishing up" the little girl's room on the third floor! (Is it ever really finished? Um, no ... That would take the fun out of it for me!)

One of the last pieces for that room to actually create was to make a wall hanging I envisioned. I found a pineapple pin at Hobby Lobby that I loved, and I assumed I could figure out how to get it on the wall. It was actually way easier than I expected:

I cut the pin mechanism off of the back with some wire cutters, painted a scrap piece of wood the perfect color before giving it a coat of polyurethane, and used ye-ol-Tacky Glue to put it on wood. Let it dry overnight and Ta. Da!

Originally, I intended it to be IN the room. But, that was the vision before I created the beloved half wall. Now, it is seen from the room, and that's enough for me!

It looks cute there. And, it matches the cat bed hanging out at the top of the stairs. It's held on to the wall with the Elmer's awesome putty stuff, too.

So, back in the room itself, my vision came to life this past weekend with the addition of the fairy lights and wall decorations!

The lace flowers and the sparkly butterflies are just little packages of embellishments from craft stores. I absolutely love how this turned out! Again, they are hung with the Elmer's putty stuff. That is a GREAT product! I've had zero issues with things falling or marks left when I move what I've hung.

The dollhouse in the corner came from another antique store. I was SO excited to find it! And, as my friend Cindy pointed out, its walls are warped just like mine! It's like it was meant to be ... The other houses around it are from some mini Christmas decorations with which I grew up. They are actually decorations from when my Dad was a kid!

In the room, we have some other fun things, too!

I love the basket of toys. The basket is the container part of the crocheted top I turned upside down for a cat bed. The Potato Head in there was originally a Christmas ornament. You might have seen Mrs. Potato Head in other pics. I found it at a craft fair for a quarter. The Eiffel Tower on the bedside stool is actually an earring. I found a pair at an antique store for $2. I had to get it. This room reflects my own Girl, who is fascinated by Paris, so it was a must. I particularly love the Teddy Bear and dolls on the bed with a kitty keeping them company!

This particular pair has a lot of sentimental value to me. Meet Sally (left) and Sue (right):

When I was in second grade, Santa brought me an A-Frame playhouse set which included Sue and Sally. I played and played and played with that set and these two. That same year, my aunt and uncle sent me my first dollhouse which happened to be the same scale. So, Sue and Sally had their house as well as their vacation camp site. I absolutely adored these two!

A couple of years later is when I picked out the dollhouse my Dad made for me from a kit. And, as total luck would have it, it was the same scale as what I already had! So, Sue and Sally could move right in and bring all of their stuff with them. I don't know what happened to their A-Frame, but their furniture made the move. It's red and orange and yellow and white and very, very Hello, 1970s! It co-exists with the first dollhouse's pink, blue and brown furniture. So, it's not winning any lifestyles awards, but it is beloved!

I gave the house my Dad built to My Girl when she was about 6. (I'd have to check the archives to be sure.) And, OH, how she LIVED in that house for years and years, and we even still decorate it for Christmas most years! I let her use Sue and Sally, but they got the boot when all of the Fashion Pollys moved in. That was totally okay, but, I never really learned what happened to Sally's hair. She used to have some, Like, when I gave them to My Girl to use in the house. I'm just sayin'.

That's okay. It just adds to the story!

I also love this:

While he looks absolutely nothing like my Dad, he represents him in my little world here. Meet Grandpa Buddy who is happy to be in any room doing anything. He particularly likes hanging out with the grandkids just being happy. Currently, he's taking a break from reading stories and is, instead, napping with the kitty. That his eyes don't shut really isn't his fault. 😁 I found him on Ebay or Etsy. I really can't remember. But, he was a must-have.

So, there's the girl's room! I think it's finished enough to move focus to another. Ha! Did I say FOCUS? Yeah, that's not happening. But, the creations keep coming!! Wait and see what I cooked up recently ...

Maze Craze

In today's crafting report, I pose this question: What do you think will come of these supplies?

It's going to be a TODDLER BEAD MAZE, of course!!

I loved playing with those when I was little. Honestly, I loved playing with the one my kids had! I loved the sound of the beads clicking, and the smooth glide of a bead around the maze was rather soothing. So, I figured my little peeps needed one. With all supplies on-hand, it just had to be done!

First, I cut a piece of balsa down to the size I wanted which is probably a bit big for scale. But, I don't really care. Besides, it still has to be big enough for me to work on without buying special tools just to hold little things.

After sanding the balsa, I stuck the thumbtack in to make a little hole for the wire.

This is a step that almost immediately became unnecessary given how soft balsa is. So, this is the first and only time you will see the thumbtack in use for this particular project ...

Next, I just started playing with the wire. I really didn't know what I was doing other than twisting it in ways that interested me. I used a pencil to bend the wire around ...

... but, in the end, the pencil curve ended up a little too sharp for my beads, so I probably would have been better off just bending it without a guide.

In no time, I had three maze pieces in practice place:

After setting this up, I took the pieces out of the base and ran a bead along them. That's when I first learned where the sticking points were:

Once reasonably satisfied with how the beads worked on the wires off the base, I put them back on and ran beads again:

It took a bit of manipulation, but I finally got them all to work well.

See all of the holes in the base? Well, that's precisely why I took all of the pieces out and flipped the base over! It was on the new side that I put a dab-o-glue on the ends and stuck 'em in the base:

From there, in a step that I really should have done in the first place, I swabbed on some polyurethane. It was super-hard to see as it just sunk into the balsa. So, I turned the piece upside down and used the glare from the computer screen to bounce off of the base to see where I'd painted:

Okay, so, here's a you'd-think-I'd-learn story ... Remember in the beginning of the house build when I warped the house sides because I only painted one side? Because the paint soaked in like it's supposed to but had no counter-moisture? Therefore, warpage? Guess what happened to the base of the bead maze ...

The thing is, the warp really wasn't that big of a deal. Like, for real. It was minimal. I could have lived with it for sure. But, I chose not to. And, the base was still a little wet from the polyurethane. And, I just knew a little bend wouldn't hurt anything ...

HA! WRONG!

You should know, I laughed. I laughed quite a bit. Join me, won't you? Oh, my. It was just funny to me because it was entirely predictable. It was also entirely fixable/re-doable, so I really just did not care.

Back to the box of balsa I went! I poly'ed both sides of this one after doing anything else. The girl can learn ...

And, then, I put it all back together on the very lovely, flat base. Ta-Da!

But, wait! There's more ...!

That's right! This was so much fun that I had to do it again! I actually did so because I wondered if I could make it smaller using smaller wire. But, it really was super fun!

I dug into my old stash of craft supplies because I just knew I had a smaller gauge of wire in the depths of some bag. And, I did!

That paint-pen 28-gauge indicator was
written 27 years ago. I used this for some
Christmas decorations 😊.

I did the same, basic steps as the first project by getting the base ready ...

First we cut -- which could be done with
scissors on this much thinner balsa ...

... then, we poly!

I have two jars of beads that look like this:

So, I dumped part of one out to do the digging:

Some of these might or might not have ended up on the floor,
in my lap, in between keys on the keyboard ...

Next, I played with the wire which was a whole, new experience as this wire is super-bendy!

This wire is delicate enough that just a little pressure makes a dent. So, unlike the first project, I did use things such as a paint brush handle and a glue stick for wrapping the wire because it helped maintain a smooth curve. Check out the difference in thickness:

I vote the one on the left for durability and the one on the right
for allowing expanded creativity.

I also went back to using the thumbtack to pre-make holes in the base because this wire wanted to bend at the base rather than get stabbed through the wood. So, the holes were made to get the wire in the base in tact before the glue I used dried.

I also used the Quick Grip uber-fast drying glue to give the wires immediate stability. It just seemed to me they didn't need to sit unstable any longer than necessary!

After some bending and thinking (very little) and stringing the beads -- all of which ran the wire without stopping at some random bend on the first run -- I got it all in place! Check 'em out side by side:

To me, the base needed one more coat of polyurethane, so I turned it upside to keep the beads off of the wet poly. After painting it on, I rested it upside down to dry by anchoring it on some computer cords:

In case I ever wondered what those cords
are for ...

It still turned out just a bit bigger than I planned height-wise, but I love it! What really ended up happening is that I made it as small as I could manipulate without taking the fun out of creating it. And, doesn't the baby look happy?!

Granted, her expression never changes. Therefore, everything I
create will be awesome.

I love them both! The doors of the house may not be trimmed, the roof may not have shingles, and I may be using up the glue I originally bought to adhere the shingles that I still haven't even dyed, but there's a lot of happy within the house! Fun things! What's next? We'll see ...