Sunday, July 31, 2011

Teasing the Cats

I guess I deserve the major gashes and scratches in my arm and hand.
After Jason went down for bed, I let the cats inside again to feed them canned cat food. As they made their way to their food area, they noticed one of Jason's toys on the ground, a little tucked a way. It apparently spooked Kitten, who approached it slowly, cautiously, suspiciously. Elvis noticed Kitten's slow calculated movements, saw the toy, and also began approaching it carefully. I thought it would be funny to scare them by moving the toy quickly in their direction. And I was right. It was hilarious! They both, at the same time, jumped 2 feet in the air and backwards, landing w/ a loud thud and scrambling away! I laughed and laughed and laughed.

Sadly, though, it seems that I've psychologically scarred Kitten even more than she already was.

Kitten ran to the other room (Elvis just went around the corner of the kitchen island and walked it off, I guess), while I got their canned cat food ready. A routine that usually gets both cats excitedly meowing and purring around their food spot. But Kitten wouldn't even come over. So I went and picked her up and brought her over. As we approached the scene of the crime, she was scrambling in my arms, but she absolutely did NOT want me to put her down. Finally I got her to eat her food, and I thought that after that she'd be fine.
As she walked back to the family room, she noticed another of Jason's toys (completely different from the first), and again began approaching it cautiously. So I picked her up, pet her, and tried to get her calm enough so she could see that it wasn't dangerous. She let me get her pretty close to it, so I thought maybe if I set her down on top of the toy, she'd feel like she was pouncing on it and would know that it wasn't alive or anything. Bad idea. She FLIPPED out and clawed me trying to get away. PAIN!! Two deep gouges and a few long scratches, one of which runs down my hand in between two fingers - you know, where that soft web-like skin is. So much pain. And some blood. I immediately washed my wounds w/ soap and applied neosporin and put a bandaid on the deep ones. Fortunately the only one that still hurts is the one on my hand in between my fingers.
CAT ANXIETY: Kitten still has not recovered. That night she was spooked by everything. The next morning when she came inside, she was afraid of the part of garbage bag that was sticking out from under the garbage can lid. Oy! What have I done! My poor anxiety-ridden cat. She already had problems w/ pulling out her fur in huge clumps when she's bothered, and she follows me throughout the neighborhood when I take Jason for a walk, meowing sadly the whole time. (Otherwise, she NEVER meows.) I may have to take her in to a cat psychologist. Do they have those? Or are they just called vets?

Friday, July 22, 2011

DI remake

This is from a few months ago, when I was on a spray-paint-everything-white kick. Found this at the D.I. in a traditional red. Red was my favorite color when I was little, and it's been pretty popular in kitchens, but it's just not my thing. White is now my thing. So this got painted white.
I also wanted a place to put my purse (instead of just on a counter stool), so I attached 3 COMMAND hooks to the back. They face the wrong direction, but it's all good.

p.s. There are also 3 tea light candles as part of the frame. I'll probably never use them, but they just add a touch of interest.


Tuesday, July 5, 2011

Hmph

The green, much to my dismay, wasn't working out. So after several more coats of white and gray and green and white again... trying to make it look right, I decided to start over. No green this time :(. The silestone was so pretty. I wish I could recreate it w/ paint, but it's just not working.

Trying to take off all these layers of paint, without an electric sander, is going to take a lot of time and work, though. (I gave myself a blister last night working on its removal.) So I'm going to move on to the next piece of counterspace - the island - and work on paint removal from the first piece a little at a time.

Even though my original idea didn't work out, I did learn how to get the look I want. Now I'm ready to tackle the other areas w/o having to worry and constantly reassure myself with, 'Just keep going. It'll all turn out and look good in the end. Just keep going.'
Last night's removal efforts

Monday, July 4, 2011

Artwork on my Countertops!

Even though I'm not even close to being finished, I have to post some pictures of my latest project b/c I'm so excited! I'm following the instructions from Pretty Lil' Posies on how to do faux granite countertops using PAINT, found here.
My inspiration:
Sorry for the blurriness. I tried.
My other inspiration came from a piece of Silestone (I think) at Lowes or Home Depot that looked like white granite w/ flecks of glass-like light green. And I love green and white. (Sadly, they don't let you take home samples of silestone, like they do w/ Corian.)

1st Step: sanding
It was really hard to get a good picture of the sanding,
but can you see the streak?
2nd Step: primer
Please forgive the black marks on my stove. I did clean it,
but my pots and pans leave black marks that take
some major elbow grease to get off.
Pulled the stove out to do a test-run on a small space of countertop.
The primer dried pretty fast :). And it only took me about 10 coats to cover up all the ugly forest green! (I don't really know how many times I went over it - it was more than 3 though - but it really did dry fast, nonetheless.)

3rd Step: SEA SPONGE & CRAFT PAINT!
I put the gray down first, 2 different shades.
The craft paints also dried fast, which made me really happy because I was/am so anxious to keep going and finish!
Can you see where the counter and the backsplash come together? The sea sponge doesn't get in that space very well. I suggest using your fingers to fill it in.

Before I added the green, I sponged over the gray with 2 different shades of white. The gray is supposed to be minimal and kind of muted, so I wanted the white to cover up a lot of it. Plus, with just the gray down, it really looked like I just sponged on some gray blobs, instead of looking like the flecks in granite.
Again, sorry for the blurriness.
I snipped off a tiny bit of the sea sponge to do the green with. Then I used my fingers to make streaks here and there. In Kelli's tutorial, she and her mom used an old, kid's paint brush from those watercolor sets. I didn't have one, so I had to improvise. Although, I think her idea would probably look better.
Next Step: go over again with more white. Lots more white, so the green looks more random.