Two little things

Here is a picture of the kitchen area of the flat.

There is a little surprise there - can you see it?  

The dish drainer is over the sink:

I have seen these on House Hunters International, so I knew immediately what it was. Who says tv isn't educational.

And here is the pretty floor tile, so nice, and the equally pretty travel slippers the Daughter of COG gave me years ago.  

Ravello, Italy

We arrived yesterday in Ravello on the Amalfi coast. Beautiful views of the snowy alps below us en route, but none of the pictures I took was any good due to a filthy window.  The COG told me as we landed that we were in the same kind of plane as the German flight that crashed in the Alps.  He said he waited until we landed to tell me.  I asked why he couldn't have waited until the end of the return flight, or, maybe, never, to tell me.  He did not see my point.  

 We are renting Sea View Cottage for a week.  This was the view when we arrived yesterday. Unedited - I'm sure the COG will be posting better photos soon.

The flat is 2 rooms, side by side so they both have the same view.  We can see this view as we lie in bed. The COG woke me up this morning before dawn because the view was sooooooooo beautiful.  It's a combination of pink and blue that we have seen in other beaches we love - Ipswich, Brighton etc.  The sea and sky are shades of soft blues and then there is a layer of pale pinks and mauves between.  So so so so beautiful, it just fills the soul.  

Walking to the cottage last night I was rather distracted by all the excellent pottery and feeling chuffed that we had ended up in a place where I could browse shops.  But, then, seeing the just-before- sunrise mist and colors I remembered that no amount of pottery, no matter how good, could be worth filling my eyes with this. 

Today we need to go out and investigate Ravello and, then,  try to figure out how to get back to our little flat.  

Kitchen Improvements, too.

With the Ikea frenzy going on, the kitchen got a little love, too.  New knobs for the newly painted upper cupboards.

And two little shelves for coffee cups.  (Pip-aholic Alert: the second and third cups from the left of the bottom row are my new Pip Early Bird cups.)

There are actually a couple more little things as well, but enough for now.  I promise better pictures of the kitchen in a couple of days. 

Before and After

I've been busy.  Most recently, I had a bunch of stuff delivered from Ikea.  The biggest bundle of stuff was for our wardrobe.  I have hated these doors since we moved in.  How do I hate them, let me count the ways.  I hate that you can see through them - they always look dark and messy.  I hate that they slide, making it hard for two people to use them at once.  I hate that they are glass and metal - too cold.  I hate that they are so.... horizontal.

Before: Yesterday morning:

AFTER- Here is the same closet today:

And here is the inside - drawers instead of shelves.  I still need to do some stuff to the 'vanity area,' but you can see where I'm going.  The COG did not feel the need to add drawers, so his closet is unchanged.  I don't have a Before of the inside of my closet - but if you squint at the Before picture of the outside, you can kinda see the inside. 

I still have plans for this cupboard - I'm adding a top to it, so it looks built in.  

I also added a little shelf over the bed - again, these pictures are unframed and will get changed out. They are place holders.  

The bedroom will be getting painted and decorated soon.  All based on this picture of the COGs that I love love love. It's the Ipswich River in winter, and it looks like a painting.  

But that's in the future.  I'm really happy with the few changes I've made already.

Bread Making update

We have been working on our bread making with the new, odd little bread baking thing.  This is our 4th loaf.  It's a lovely shape - the first time we've managed to get one that looks like a normal loaf.  The texture is even better than the three previous loaves, too.  

The difference was that I kneaded it a tiny bit - maybe 10 or 15 times- and shaped it.  Small difference, but results.  

Lewes Prison

We had lunch with a friend yesterday. She has just moved from Brighton to a rather idyllic little house in Lewes with views across the downs.  The bus stop is in front of Lewes Prison, which is this kind of castle-y fortress looking place.

It's mid-Victorian, of course.  The Victorians really the mastered Grim and Foreboding architectural school.  It famously housed prisoners of war from the Crimean War. It held Irish rebels after the Easter Uprising, including Éamon de Valera.  

Most famously of all (to my generation), Mick Jagger spent a night there in a drug bust.  After which the editor of the Times wrote an editorial with the wonderful title, 'Who Breaks A Butterfly On A Wheel,' protesting the police decisions that had been made.  

In 2003 there were riots in the prison protesting the conditions. They sound appalling, not the lovely 'Period Details' one might hope for in a mid-Victorian property.

The picture is captured from the internet, which I feel a bit guilty about. it was credited to David Hill/Daily Mirror.

The reason I used it is because this is the picture I took. It's pretty hilariously terrible. 

Painting

I've been preoccupied with painting the kitchen cupboards. Last time I did the lower cupboards, so this time I'm completing the upper cupboards.  Everything is a mess at the moment.

Some of the cupboard sides and trim is also being painted in situ, so it's not in this picture. And there are cupboard doors you can't see in these pictures.  But you can begin to see what a mess we are in.

The slight disappointment we had is that the carpenter who is going to reinstall the soffit above the cupboards and put up the window blind and various other things is booked until May. So we will have to wait until June to finish the kitchen completely.  Well, for now.   But, if this is the worst disappointment this week, it will be a good week. 

All of the woodwork in the flat needs repainting. I'm thinking that I am going to start by doing the hall in sections.  I'll prep and tape and paint one length or one doorway at a time, so it's not such a mess and still leaves time to do other things.