Vintage Kitchen Cart Roundup

I own one of these funny little shoe repair carts and I  have used it for storage in the kitchen for the most part.   It then, made its way out to the deck, during the summer for serving dinner and finally it was banished to the garage where it has stayed for the last few months,
waiting for me to let it back in the house!
Please let me come back in...I'll be a good cart...I promise

 You can still find these little carts
at antique shows...
they are easy to clean up, easy move around and have a million uses...

because they are so simple

 These happen to be from the White Flower Farm House shop

where the incredibly talented owner Lori, had a few for sale

 This one is in Lori's kitchen and

I think she bleached this rack to brighten the wood...I love it!
But I love everything she does!

 This is an old cupboard made from recycled wood and old doors
that I used in another kitchen

 It is similar to the  look of the carts, with the bleached paneled back and the rustic shelving.

Collected white china looks great in these!
The only thing it is missing are some wheels

Heres a cool looking green one...
you can buy it here

This would be fun to use to dry flowers or herbs
in the garden shed
I saw a similar cart on eBay for $150 dollars...pick up only.... somewhere very far away
very very far...bummer

A really nice big one for sale on 1st dibs

and it seemed reasonably priced too...

what a great item for wine storage 

This is a great looking metal cart from one of my favorite stores:

Juxtaposition Home

A pair of French industrial rolling carts...these are really chunky and I love how the top flips up 

this is an old Apothecary cart...with really cute wheels!

Can't you see white china on this one...or big white towels?!

A wood and metal bindery cart....so great, but a bit pricey...found all of these all on 1st Dibs 

look at this beautiful cart filled with old vintage ironstone, 

from a great blog called Rusty Hinge

Her collected dinnerware is wonderful!

This makes me want to collect transferware...so pretty

 The photo above is from Pinterest and I could not track down where it came from...I know you're out there, talented blogger...and I love your cart!

How about the stack of old books in the wire basket!!!!
Wonderful styling going on here!!!!

 Above stylist Kelly McGuill....find her blog here.

She used this in her bathroom

 Restoration Hardware does a few too

 Ya know...as much as I think they do a good job with designing furniture, my heart always sinks a little, when they knock off something vintage,
which originally cost about $200 dollars
and then they attempt to sell their version
for $2000 dollars

but it's big and it does look nice with this table
but sometimes...

I look at the styling in their catalogs and wonder if anything
is actually NOT a knock off

is anything real and original?

do you ever think that?

Halo Styles has a few nice choices

I like the ladder shelf below and this would fit 

in a smaller area like a bathroom

but how great in the kitchen too!

the two below are from Go Home ltd...the metal one has a great top

no wheels but a really unique shape

and this green guy looks kind of interesting  

here is my little cart...

it holds quite a bit of dish ware 

I added a decorative swag this weekend...a few left over clippings and some fruit from the tangerine trees 

 are these the best little carts?

 a  little item to look for next year maybe?

sending out
 good  and happy
thoughts to all...


Kelley

Holiday Wreath Project: Finished

Finishing this little wreath took a bit more time than I had thought....

but it was a fun project 

 So the next job, once the wreath of grape vines was finished,

 was to decorate it with greens and things I gathered from my garden

I did actually purchased some Reindeer moss too 

for a nice pop of color

I chose greenery that would stay somewhat fresh looking after it dried 

and things with interesting texture

 Using floral wire and floral tape I made  

small bundles to attach to the wreath

I dried some orange slices too...why not?

As you can tell, I'm not sure I did these quite right!

 For the bunches:

Boxwood, Rosemary, California Pepper-berries, Olive branches 

and of course some lavender!

I used some more small grape vine sticks for the picks, 

which blended into the wreath

 The orange slices went onto these floral picks which have pre-strung wire attached,

 so I could easily add them to the larger bundles

Here is the first one finished... but it had way too much tape showing 

so I added moss to the base of each bundle 

to keep it looking really natural

 I really wasn't sure how many of these I would need...

 I just kept arranging and moving things around,  adding more greenery,

until the wreath started to look balanced and full

 The other problem that I had, was determining

 where the actual top of the wreath would be

It just sort of found it's own top 

after most of the greenery was added

 Millie kept me company and I think she may have thought there was a chance 

 a treat or two would  fall on the ground...but she only got a stick to chew on!

 what?  no cookie?

 Here we have the finished wreath, simple and natural

and a bit  

"Charlie Brown"  

out of shape

 last a little ribbon made from old mattress ticking 

and a pair of vintage ice skates

 next project:  the holiday mantle

I wonder how long that will take me?

better get going!

Holiday Wreath Project

 As luck would have it, I needed to prune the grape vines and I need a wreath for the front door...

who said timing is everything right!?

 The grapes get a really heavy prune after the leaves drop and then I tie the and shape the larger growth from last year, so the plants have more structure.  I'm not sure my pruning technique is perfect but I read a few articles about grape pruning and I think I'm pretty close.

 What I was left with was a huge pile of vine clippings...some 12 feet long and really supple 

 I sorted through every thing and picked cuttings that I thought would make for a nice wreath, including ones that have the little dried curly tendrils 

 Having never done this before...I figured it would either turn out great or 

be a Charlie Brown wreath...or most likely something somewhere in the middle

 I chose a really nice beefy vine to start with and tied it off using floral wire.

By the way, is was raining the whole time I worked on this, which actually was sort of fun

 You keep adding and winding and weaving the vines together.  I clipped off the stray ends to keep  it from looking too messy 

The wreath tends to pull and get a bit out of shape as you add more vines,

 so tying the whole thing together at different spots helpes to keep the shape circular

I saved a few smaller really long pieces of vine to criss-cross and wrap around the wreath and to cover up any areas where the wire was showing.

I actually didn't use much wire

 This wreath will have greenery and some dried things too,  but almost everything will be things that I can pick in the garden

In the next post I will finish it off and hang it on the door!

It is not perfectly round but I love the rustic natural look of the vines

and the best part is that it was free!

Cheers!