Kitchen Improvement!

The new year has been off to a slow start as various viruses and germs have plagued us.  But we made a big step forward yesterday by finally upgrading a troubling situation in the kitchen: we now have a normal-sized table.  Why do I say normal-sized?  Well, we previously had a little kid table (where Lucy often eats while we cook), but we've been wanting a more serious table to add to the workspace, allow some eating in the kitchen, and to generally improve the lack of counter/workspace.

I'm particularly happy about the table, because it has leaves that slip underneath, so it is quite the space-saver.  Here's the way we have it now:

And here it is with one leaf extended:

(there's another leaf on the side that's against the wall.)

As you can see, we also got a new chair.  Lucy is just delighted with it all, and we're wishing we'd bought two of the chairs.  They're nice in that they are higher than regular dining chairs so they let her sit up higher without using a booster (which she dislikes).  Lucy also likes that this is over the radiator, which means that when she sits there, she's nice and toasty, which is not usually the case in our kitchen.  I'm hoping that the table-above-radiator doesn't cause a problem.  It's not actually touching the radiator, and I guess I hope that maybe it will perhaps help keep the heat down lower in the room, rather than letting it rise up where it doesn't really help us. We'll see if my tenuous grasp of the laws of thermodynamics hold up to this real life test.

Both of the above are from IKEA, of course.  We're very happy.  So yes, that means I had to assemble that table myself, thankyouverymuch.  The chair came in one piece, thankfully.  Thank you, you Swedish geniuses of design.

Oh, that lamp?  It used to be in the front room, on top of the old old desk.  [Before that, way way way before that, it was in my bedroom when I was a kid.]  We barely used it in the front room, so we were glad to find a good spot for it. This brightens up that corner until we can get something else.  And actually, we rather like it there.

Yes, I guess there are a lot of clashing greens there.

We need to paint.  We also need:
--to remove the hideous border (implied in the painting process)
--a cabinet for the nook beside the stove
--somewhere to put our oven mitts (they were once in a basket under that shelf that's now above the table)
--a new radio/music solution for the kitchen (I'm working on that)
--and surely other stuff, but that's what I have in mind for now.  Stay tuned.  In theory, these are the goals for the Kitchen, 2013.  Wish me luck.