Fourth weekend of the Kitchen Makeover

Weekend number four of the kitchen makeover and it is floor sanding time. At last we can get rid of the orangey coloured varnish and the red stripes, we thought.
Emptying the kitchen made it look so very, very large. Maybe I should make the family eat standing up at the island and not bring back the table. Just a thought.
After a few hours of sanding with the big sander, the edge sander (which did not actually do right up to the edge) and the little detail sander, the horrid orangey varnish was gone. Unfortunately the red stripes weren't. We could not get them to move at all. All weekend we discussed why did they put the stripes there, what was the reason. Then it clicked with me. While sanding I found out why. The red stripes followed the nail lines and disguised them. Personally I would rather see the nails, but I guess, short of laying a new floor, we are going to have to keep the red stripes. Since we hired the sander and it was a dry weekend we thought it would be a good idea to do the hall and
and the lounge. Then all the floors would be the same colour. So we heaved all the furniture out on to the veranda and just went for it.
I quite like the minimal look of picnicking in the lounge. It was brilliant doing my morning yoga in such a big space instead of the usual squish up between furniture.
Peter arranged the furniture out on the veranda so between layers of varnishing we could sit out and enjoy the view in comfort.

For a long time

For a long time while I lived in the UK, I thought that the sea was usually grey with big rolling waves. I did not realise that in some places it is usually flat and a beautiful greeney blue.

Today's Daisy

Today's diasies found on top of a very large chocolatey cake, which we bought from a cake stall at my youngest's school. He begged me to buy him the largest chocolate cake. Unfortunatly when we got home and cut it up it was a banana cake. Not his favourite. I will have to make him a big squishy cake when the kitchen is in a better condition.

Another interesting visitor

One of the kids found this rather large spider sitting on our lounge wall. It was about the same size as the light switch!

Weekend 3 of the kitchen makeover

Things have slowed down a little in the kitchen makover. Still progressing just slowly, all the fiddly little bits that don't look like they are there, but are very noticeable if not done, are getting done. We now have a rangehood in place, maybe a bit high. The chap from Mitre 10 said that the minimum height for a rangehood is 750mm from the top of the stove. Hmm I think perhaps he was exagerating. But there it is and there it will stay. At least this one sucks not blows, which are old one used to do. Lots of the painting is finished, eventually. Earlier in the week I got another tin of paint made up, which turned out to be not the right colour. I had to wait for new stock to come in before I could get the right colour. Two days of painting lost. The edging strip still needs to be painted it will not be left wood colour. More odd bits of old benchtop have been added. Getting the proper benchtop looks a lot further off this week, but I will really appreciate it when it arrives.

Next weekend is the big floor sanding weekend. We are going to hire a sander and just go for it, sanding the kitchen, hall and a quick rub down in the lounge. Hope it will be a sunny weekend, cause all our furniture will be outside.

Comfort where you can find it

One comfortable cat.

A very, very good night

Last night I had the privilege of getting to see one of my favourite musicians, Boz Scaggs. This is one of the great things about living in New Zealand. I would never ever have had this opportunity in the UK. The evening started with the Mick Fleetwood Blues Band. Who were brilliant.
Then Malcolm MacDonald. Who was very professional and had a great bunch of musicians with him. Notice another guy with white hair. The audience and the stage was full of them.
Then finally the brilliant Boz Scaggs. I had a great time, I sang all the way through and enjoyed every minute. I never thought I would get to see him play live and it was worth the 32 year wait (I feel so old).
For the last few numbers I just could not stay in my seat any longer and had to join the dancers down at the front. I was about six feet away from Mic Fleetwood. Amazing. Apologies for the over enthusiasm, but we had such a great night.
The one major problem I had was with the people behind us, who seemed to think they were at a drinking party and that it would be a good idea to just talk/shout all the way through. While listening to Mic Fleetwood and his blues band they constantly kept saying, "When is he going to play Albatross". When they eventually did play Albatross, they then talked very loudly over it. Why do that? If they wanted to talk they could have gone to the lobby. I think the people behind them told them to shut up, because they disappeared before Boz Scaggs came on, thank goodness.

Dawn

Staggering into the kitchen one morning I happened to glance up. How could resist getting the camera out for such a sunrise. Autumn is on the way, the mornings are getting darker. But who could complain when there are such beautiful sunrises to see.