Vinnies Trolley Revamp

 

A Bloggy hello to all of you out there in cyberspace:)

 

I've been observing my "stats" and I've been pleasantly surprised to see that my pageviews are increasing. So a special hello to anyone who reads KATcapers and hasn't introduced themselves....I'd love to hear from you if you feel so inclined to comment.

 

This weeks DIY project is a wooden trolley that I picked up at a Vinnies store not far from us.  I liked it's simple lines and I particularly like the old casters.  She's now been christened the Trolley Dolly.

 

Like all my projects, the Trolley Dolly is naturally a "she".  One of these days I'll make a boy (ie furniture DIY not baby!) but given that we're a house heavily disposed to the female hormonal inclinations I'm going to keep referring to this one in the feminine.

 

I'm imagining that she was once a drinks trolley?  Her veneered shelves held the odd bottle of sherry and some delicate glassware?

 

 

In our house she's being re purposed as a printer trolley.  She's the perfect height to slide under the desk in the kitchen (photo above).

 

Note the relatively neat desk top and the lack of electrical cords below?  Hmmmmnnn another example of my OCD behavior which I need to confess to - I installed some hanging baskets (ie the spice rack variety) to get the bloody cables out of view!  This deserves a post of it's own...stay tuned:)

 

 

First job was to whip out the Bosch palm sander and get to work taking the stain off her.

 

Note to self - next time don't be lazy and do this in the back room with no mask on!!!!

I managed to accomplish sanding, dusting her off, wiping her down to get the remaining dust off and started undercoating her before school pickup.  Fifteen minutes before I was due to depart, it was time to get out of my painting attire and get myself presentable for our after school activities.

My essentials for a few hours of DIY:

• Radio tuned to 702 ABC Local Radio
• My painting tracky dacks
• My painting 'smock' which is an old linen dress now reserved for painting duties only
• My Birkies (ie my Birkenstock sandals for those uninitiated of you out there)

 

FYI toes are currently shellacked to an inch of their life...I'm finding Shellac on my toesies very easy and durable.

 

Aaaahh if only I could spend all day doing this.  Alas, children, chores, preparing dinner get in the way.

You can see that my trolley dolly has lovely bones beneath that unattractive dark stain.  Unfortunately the veneer shelves don't come up as well but I'm not fussed as I just needed to get enough traction going for the undercoat to adhere to.

Next post will be to show you Trolley Dolly with her undercoat applied and perhaps (optimistically) painted up in her finery.

What's the verdict my lovely readers?  I'd love to hear your thoughts:)

The Swiss Cheese Approach to household jobs

I know I'm not alone here at KATcapers in having the Groundhog Day experience when it comes to household jobs.

You know the ones...where you think "how many times am I going to tidy these exact same toys/counters/bedrooms....fill in the blank!  Worse still, it's not just the cleaning to be done but the actual organizing of mountains of "stuff" that surrounds us in our house. 

Some days the amount of re-doing that I should be doing is insurmountable.  I walk around the house and feel completely overwhelmed by the immensity of simply staying on top of things.

This is particularly the case at the moment as I'm hamstrung by an aching and tender left arm which is taking its own sweet time to repair itself.

So when I returned home this morning after dropping off the oldest and middle KATs at school I decided that I would take the Swiss Cheese approach to my housekeeping.

Have you ever been taught the concept of Swiss Cheese time management???

We all know what Swiss Cheese looks like...lots of holes

I learnt this concept of time management early in my career with IBM when I was a business admin specialist (a nicer word for clerical person).  Thankfully I moved on to sales after a few years and left the admin to some other poor unsuspecting young girl (or boy).  The concept is portable though as there's always something to procrastinate about in life.

According to Dr Google, the technique was introduced by a famous time-management specialist, Alan Lakein, in his book "How to Get Control of Your Time and Your Life".

We can all be guilty of postponing 'complex or unpleasant tasks' the collecive noun for anything housework related as far as I'm concerned. 

The bigger the job (or the more annoying the task of sorting it out the more this concept applies.

According to Lakein, the Swiss cheese method helps to make your global and even monumental tasks transparent and easy to complete.  Sounds good doesn't it!

According to Lakein, “the underlying assumption of the Swiss cheese approach is that it is indeed possible to get something started in five minutes or less. And once you’ve started, you’ve given yourself the opportunity to keep going…Swiss cheese is supposed to lead to involvement.”

How to use the Swiss cheese technique in real life? Just do not postpone your important tasks for better times and try to do a small part of the task even if you have 5-10 minutes of free time. Returning to the task again and again during the day, week or month, you will notice that the task is moving along. Some day you will make enough holes in your task like in Swiss cheese and you will easily 'eat' your task like a tasty cheese.

So I endeavoured to "attack" one of the holes I've been dealing with lately....my kitchen!  Despite a renovation that has made it a much more pleasant space, it still lacks a bit in the storage department.  Hence, I have become the queen of the glass jar for stuff that won't fit in the pantry and my unending supply of baskets has been useful for storing all mannner of things from tea-towels to plastic snack bags as well as kitchen utensils.

Nonetheless, there were elements that have been driving me up the wall. 

After giving the kitchen a top to bottom clean (yes this did take more than 5-10 minutes!!!) I rearranged some of the 'stuff" and I am quite pleased with the resulting orderliness (at least until the KATs get at it!).

Lest you think I'm a smug self-absorbed wanker, here's some shots of the rest of the Swiss Cheese that have still to be addressed:)

Saint Mike's business/tax paperwork sitting underneath that nice and neat set of shelves in the 1st shot!!!!  Note the useful positioning of the tissue box on top....paperwork and tears go hand in hand!

Laundry that is clean but yet to be folded!

The back room of our house...wardrobe purchased on eBay that I am yet to paint, bags hanging and assorted pictures/shelves and other crapola that needs to "go" somewhere!!!!

So, have you adopted any useful approaches to time-management that rival the famous (or not so) Swiss Cheese Approach?

A blue day - time for some favourite things

For lots of reasons I'm having a 'blue' day.

I've put my back out and am in quite a bit of pain. 

I think we all have an 'achilles heel' and mine is my lower back.  I've been lucky with it for months so can't complain I suppose....but it really hurts and the sciatic pain that has hitched a ride is even more annoying!

To cheer myself up I've been playing with my new iPhone and using Instagram to capture a couple of images that are making me cheerful. 

As you know, I love a little blue and green and this little vignette above is my favourite at the moment :)  The lamp is a very special piece that my mum has passed onto me....it is at least as old as me and may possibly be buried with me I love it that much!!  The vases are a Freedom purchase and the fabric wall art in the background is a Designers Guild fabric I had stretched over a frame many years ago.

The hall stand is something I painted a while ago in a lovely Porters Paints blue...it used to be a stained timber the same as the sideboard and I decided it needed a change :)

My latest DIY has been our coffee table...I'm not quite done but here's a sneek peek!!

Like the hall stand, it was previously stained but years of little ones using it as a drawing and craft surface had left it a little worse for wear!  I've stripped it, sanded it and used a Porters wood wash to give it a distressed 'coastal' look.

I started this project about three weeks ago (impulsively which is usual for me!!!) and I still need to do the drawers then I can show you it in its full glory :))

May take another three weeks for that to happen...........

Just doing this post has cheered me up...I know they're just 'things' but I'm a creative person and playing with these things brings me pleasure.