Kitchen Makeover

My boyfriend and I have worked hard during our summer vacation. We have transformed our kitchen!

Before

What it used to look like from the dining area (we had started investigations to figure out how the load-bearing wall was constructed and that's why the wall over the door looks like it does)

Now

What it looked like from the dining area earlier today - notice how the linen closet isn't there anymore and how much wider the door opening is.

Before

This is what the sink-and-oven-side of the kitchen looked like. Everything was at standard measurements from the mid-60's (low counter tops and strange sizes for drawers). The dish washer was placed at the far left, between the stove/oven and the wall to the dining area.

Now

And this is now! The white countertop is just temporary and will be replaced by black granite in about a month. After that, we'll get white tiles up on the wall. The dish washer is now over by the window, next to the sink.

Before

This used to be the fridge side of the kitchen. The fridge was placed with its back to the side of the linen closet you can see in the first picture. Next to the fridge we had the pantry. Our freezer stood over by the window.

Now

We now have a combined fridge/freezer and an oven placed at counter top height. We've added a "breakfast bar" to sit at. No more fridge or pantry sticking out into the room as everything is placed at the wall.

Before

There used to be a door between the house's entrance hall and the kitchen. The wall on the right is the side of the pantry and the microwave oven has its back to the back of the linen closet in the first picture. To the left is the bookshelf we used for extra storage and the freezer.

Now

No more door! And no more free-standing freezer! The wallpaper is a picture we've taken ourselves and transformed into wallpaper with the help of www.perswall.se.

We love our new kitchen and spend lots of time in it!!! Even without it being all done. :) We've done what we can up 'til today and the rest of our work has to wait for the new granite counter tops. We have tiles to put up. A fan to install. Two "boxes" to build from the top of the higher cupboards to the ceiling. Splines to put up where the walls meet the new ceiling and the new floor. We also have to fix the corners of the new door opening as they're still raw.

And I've forgotten to mention how proud I am over us! How could I?

What's going on?

Well, since I wrote here last I've slept and walked on this:

The Great Wall between Jinshanling and Samatai

and we're right now in the middle of this:

This is called a kitchen renovation...

January in our garden

With spring working its way to stay, I thought I'd show you some pictures from January 29th this year. Our garden was completely covered in snow for the longest time this winter... For being in the south of Sweden at least... :)

Snowy orpins

Glistening snow covering our lawn

Our grill had been out since last summer

JumJum observing the snow

Skorpan playing with some snow

Exciting Tuesday :yawn:

With the time change a week ago (yes, Europe changed a week ahead of North America) the mornings are really dark around here. This morning I found it particularly dark when eating my breakfast and it took me some time to realize that our lamps on the bookshelves weren't lit even though the timer was set for them to be on...

I was late coming home from work today and opening the front door I, again, noticed that it was dark in our living room/dining area. I asked my boyfriend, who was sitting at the table eating sandwiches, if he had done something to the lamps. Turns out he noticed yesterday that they were dark, but had figured I'd been tampering with the timer or something.

Trying to sort out what had happened to the lamps, we ended up with a corner of our living room looking like this:

Bookshelves that are partly emptied and moved out of position

What a mess we had to make to get one of the cables out from behind the bookcases! It took us almost an hour to figure out how things were connected, get some books out, to move the three larger bookshelves and two smaller ones, get the cable and put the shelves back in position along the wall. It was heavy work!


(And looking at this picture I'm really motivated to get everything out of the bookshelves, sort through things, and put it all back in order. There are too many shelves taken by stuff that doesn't have to be, or even should be, out in the livingroom. And we've bought too many books lately that we have to pile them on top of the others...

I'm motivated! And will take care of it this coming weekend. I think... :) )

EFIT - August 1st, 2009

Saturday was an EFIT-day (Ett Foto I Timmen/A Photo Every Hour) and I participated as part of a challenge in my 101in1001-project. The idea of EFIT is to take a picture an hour as sort of a diary.

9.00/9am - A tiny cricket on our dining table

10.00/10am - Me knitting out in our garden

11.00/11am - The blue sky with an airplane cloud

12.00/noon - Watering plants in our garden

13.00/1pm - Fixing a mistake in my knitting

14.00/2pm - Ironing one of my favourite shirts (bought at Eddie Bauer in Chicago when I was there earlier this year)

15.06/3.06pm - A church in a small village in the south of Sweden that we passed while out driving

15.57/3.57pm - A black hollyhock at the friends' we visited for an afternoon "fika"

18.01/6.01pm - An amazing "äggakaga" (sort of a creamy and dense omelette with many eggs in it) - a specialty for southern Sweden. Boyfriend and I had dinner att Skivarps Gästis.

18.58/6.58pm - Up one of the trees in the garden outside Skivarps Gästis where we had dinner

20.00/8pm - Taking in laundry that's been hanging out to dry all day. Bed sets from IKEA.

20.58/8.58pm - I released Skorpan from his cone so he'd be able to wash himself and relax some. After five minutes of very intense licking, he settled down and fell asleep.

21.59/9.59pm - Watched TV. This is the end of a show about Norwegian scientist Thor Heyerdahl's second attempt to cross the Atlantic on a boat made out of reed.

22.51/10.51pm - Time to go to bed. Bed sets from IKEA. The blue side is mine!

Melting away

My boyfriend and I have literally been melting away the last two weeks. The summer hit us with high temperatures and we suddenly remembered why we last summer started talking about getting blinds for the living room and dining area....

We have big windows facing southwest.

And we can't really get a draft going through the living room as the windows are all on the same side. The sunny one.

We've had big towels hanging in our windows. In the evenings, we've locked the cats in the laundry room and have opened up every door and window in the house to try to get some air moving. It's worked somewhat okey for a bit, except for in the living room...

This morning was the coolest we've had in our living room in two weeks; at 6am the thermometer (unfortunately placed in the coolest part of the living room) showed 25,5 Degrees Celsius/78 Degrees Fahrenheit. It felt lovely to be able to breath some in there... Friday night we had 30,5 Degrees Celsius/87 Degrees Fahrenheit at 22.30/10.30pm. And these are the temperatures we've been dealing with for two weeks. Indoors. In the coolest part of our living room.

We're melting away.

And I can't knit in these temperatures. My brain is soggy. And my hands are sweaty.

Irrational behaviour?

Something strange happens to me when I spend the night at home on my own.

I've never been afraid of the dark and I know there's no reason to be afraid of the dark in itself. The dark can't hurt you. Things/People in the dark might, but not the darkness itself...

I'm not overly worried about madmen, rapists or other wrong-doers. In my everyday life I try to be cautious and not do too crazy things to put me in danger, but I don't fear much. And I don't let worry stand in my way when travelling or experiencing new things.

But when I'm left home alone over night?

Boyfriend spent two nights away from home in November and I was surprised to see how anxious I got when it was time to go to bed. Up until then everything had been fine. I had been enjoying the silence, the power over the remote control and the cuddles of my cats without interruptions. But when getting ready for bed I got the shakes. Suddenly I saw all sorts of disasters and bad things happening. Someone breaking in to steal things. Someone breaking in to rape me. Someone putting our house on fire. Someone vandalizing our property....

All the sorts of things I never worry about.

I ended up sleeping on the cough for two nights. With my scaredy cats as my watch dogs. 'Cause somehow that made more sense to me than to sleep in our bedroom which is on the main floor (our house only has one floor) facing our small street... Our living room has huge windows and I would be in full sight had anyone gone to the back of our house and entered our garden...

I blame my weird reaction and behaviour on sleeping on the first floor on my own. For the first time ever. I have always had a bedroom off the main floor. (Except for the year I lived with my boyfriend in the country side, but I never slept home alone there...)

Yesterday boyfriend left for a workthing again. I was doing fine. But started freaking out when I got ready for bed... Images of disasters started to crawl back to my mind and I heard strange noices I couldn't identify. I was about to get my duvet and pillow and move out to the living room cough again, but decided to fight my worry.

I fell asleep. In our bed. But on boyfriends side of it. The side furthest from the window and closest to the door.

I'm most likely doing the same tonight.

Had a fun afternoon and evening?

Monday I went to see someone about my back and my hips. He adjusted and aligned me to the degree where I could actually sit on both of my sitbones when he was done! That was a first in four weeks time...

He massaged. He used acupuncture. He "shot" my spine with a metal thingie that moved the vertebraes ever so slightly. He put six small metal spheres in the cartilage of my left ear.

And before I left he told me to keep away from doing dishes, taking care of laundry or vacuuming for at least five days so I wouldn't put unnecessary strain on my spine and make it shift again. I liked that...

Yesterday I spent a great afternoon with an American blogger visiting Scandinavia. I saw her straight after work and didn't get back home until 20.55/8.55pm (five minutes before Grey's Anatomy). The whole house smellt of cleaning liquids. The floors where spotless and shiny. And the dinner table was completely cleared of stuff (mostly 'cause my pile was moved to the desk in our office). The dishes were done and put away. I could see my reflection in the sink. The laundry was folded and carried into the bedroom.

Boyfriend just laughed at me and rolled his eyes when I asked if he'd had a pleasant afternoon and evening on his own... I wonder why...



(My body felt good on Monday. And so did my mind and spirit. Tuesday morning I woke up shifted again. And my body has been achy since.

Apparently the muscles in my back, my stomach and hips are too weak and can't carry my tall body properly. I need to build muscles... Which doesn't surprise me to be honest...)

EFIT - May 1st, 2009

Yesterday was an EFIT-day (Ett Foto i Timmen/A Photo Every Hour) and I participated. The idea is to take one picture every hour of what you're doing or where you are. It's kind of a diary entry on what you did that particular day.

This is part of my 101 things in 1001 days-challenge.

9.14/9.14am - Our bathroom floor

10.10/10.10am - Parts of our garden with the new willow fence we've put up this spring

11.05/11.05am - Reading Nando Parrado's Miracle in the Andes (in Swedish)

12.07/12.07pm - JumJum sitting among forget-me-nots in one of our flower beds

13.07/1.07/pm - Preparing for grocery shopping

14.07/2.07pm - Boyfriend with our groceries

15.07/3.07pm - Brownies with feta cheese and raspberries in the oven

16.14/4.14pm - Winding yarn for a pair of Spread Spectrum Socks from Knitting Socks with Handpainted Yarns. The yarn is Lorna Lace's in Black Purple.

17.07/5.07pm - Swatching to check gauge

18.43/6.43pm - Ovenbaked corn chicken with polenta and artichokes - soooo good!

19.22/7.22pm - Measuring yarn to make butterflies for my Spread Spectrum Socks that are knit sideways and in intarsia

20.22/8.22pm - Skorpan checking out a brownie on a plate...

22.13/10.13pm - Watching tv. A comedy performance by an Australian duo called The Umbilical Brothers.

23.14/11.14pm - Before brushing my teeth and getting ready for bed

EFIT - September 6th, 2008

Yesterday was an EFIT-day (Ett Foto I Timmen/A Photo Every Hour) and I participated for real for the first time. The idea is simple: take a picture of what you're doing or where you are once an hour.

This is one of the challenges I've set for myself in my 101in1001days-blog.

Here's my Saturday, September 6th, 2008 (Warning: The 9th picture shows a spider...):

8:20/8.20am - Breakfast time for Skorpan and JumJum

9:15/9.15am - Part of my breakfast - egg sandwich and tea

10:20/10.20am - Waiting for a friend at a bus stop

11:20/11.20am - At Panduro Hobby (a craft shop) in Malmö

12:20/12.20pm - Chocolate from my favourite local "chocolaterie" (Cacaofoni)

13:25/1.25pm - Chair at our lunch stop (Lilla Kafferosteriet)

14:35/2.35pm - Fruit and Veggies

15:45/3.45pm - Admiring the 450grams of Kauni-yarn I bought at the Textilmässa på Chokladfabriken

16:40/4.40pm - One of the spiders we have in our garden

17:50/5.50pm - Looking for Kauni inspiration on Ravelry

18:40/6.40pm - Dinner! Pork chop, pasta, mushroom sauce, asparagus, tomatoes, ruccola-mix and lingonberry jam made by boyfriend's aunt

19:50/7.50pm - Making and writing cards for my brother and my sister

20:50/8.50pm - Watching TV

22:20/10.20pm - Hanging laundry to dry. The fabric will become cushions for our couch.