It’s been another successful week when it comes to making our home more beautiful and filled with useful things. In fact, Stefan was actually super productive during his short vacation last week and worked on a project that we’ve been talking about doing for the last couple of years.

Out where we live, you’re not supposed to throw your electrical equipment into the regular trash. I’m sure people do, but I’ve been giving a lot of consideration to what ends up in landfills. So when I can I either try to recycle it in its designated place (even if that means saving things up for a while until I go somewhere that I can drop them off, like batteries and light bulbs) or finding someone who can use the stuff. We just happen to have a service here which will come and pick up all of your electrical trash. I’m not 100% what they do with the stuff; but my guess is that they either try to refurbish and repair the stuff so it can be sold. Or they strip it down for useful metals and sell the rest for scrap.

At any rate, we have a real surplus of useless electrical stuff around here and this was the second time we took advantage of this free service. This time around, it was time to purge some old computer monitors and other random pieces of outdated and otherwise useless computer parts. Somehow, things related to PC’s just build up around our house. We’ve had those monitors in our attic since we moved in…6 years ago! Thankfully my husband is “strong like ox” and brought them downstairs. Really glad to have those out of here finally!

But what was way more impressive was one of the long awaited projects that we completed. When we bought our house, we expanded into a side building so that we could have an eat-in kitchen and made the remaining part of the building into mudroom and laundry room. So far, we’ve managed to get about 1/3 of the way done with projects in there so that we have plenty of storage, some extra counter space and just a generally finished look to the room.

In the morning, this is what the laundry side of the room looked like. Things were constantly getting piled up on top of the washer & dryer, and having a fryer on your drink fridge is kinda tacky. But it’s better than having it in our kitchen. The cabinets above are part of our first kitchen in Germany (which you buy and move with you) and they have proved useful time and time again.

So as you can see, it was a kinda functional space, but just lacking a finished look. And we’d been talking about putting a counter in there, but I had no idea just how huge of a difference it would make…

The pictures totally don’t do it justice. But there is just a much more finished feel to the room now. Thanks many times over to my husband who did the majority of the work here. I was just the spotter. And he totally pulled this off without looking up a thing online or consulting any manuals. That’s how far he’s evolved when it comes to home projects. Oh yes, a good banker can do anything! (That’s a phrase that flies around our house often in German since his dad has said it for years — and he’s also a banker who can do anything.)

The counter is actually one that we bought at least a year ago for another project, but then realized it wasn’t going to be useful for that after all. So it’s just been sitting in our barn for a while. It’s extra deep and just absolutely fabulous when it comes to having a bit more space to rest pies for Thanksgiving or set other stuff down. And the ultimate goal is now to get a matching counter that we can cut apart and use to create a side blinder, which will also give some support to that side of the counter top. I honestly think it’s going to look fantastic. And we applied a light stain that seals the wood and makes it antimicrobial and food safe. So that’s pretty rad IMO!

Now we just have one corner left to tackle in this room, but we have our ideas in place. I’m actually a little scared to show you this picture because it’s kinda crazy in here — but I also know (from experience) that once we start moving stuff around in here, the clutter goes fast. One of our major issues is just that we lack enough storage space in here.

When we built those really tall shelves, it was an immense help. And the original plan was to put up more of those shelves on the left wall. But behind those doors, where the piping comes down, is a fuse box to our barn and guest house. So we either had to build around that (while still making it accessible) or otherwise find a new plan. In the end, we realized that we could build more counter space for putting our hobby supplies and some shelves above the work space as well as plenty of shelves below too, which would make the ultimate area in practicality. Because at the moment, what you see here is a few things that go out to the barn, 3 big containers of homemade wine that need to be bottled, some of my photo equipment and a bunch of other randomness. So at this stage, we are checking to see what we have left from the failed shelf and will probably try to use some pieces from that as we put together the new counter area. Don’t ask exactly when that will take place, though!

And as you can see in the photo, above that door, which is my pantry, I want one additional shelf to put some light things on (good thing I’m tall) and some hooks over on another wall for our shopping bags…and then this room can be marked as complete!

Since it’s a room we pass into and through numerous times a day, having this become a more finished space is really important. I don’t know if you’ve ever noticed it, but if you have a room that carries many burdens for you, it sort of looms over you and drags you down throughout the day whenever you go into it. But when you make that room complete and happy inside, that energy transfers to you every time you look in the room. And if there is a problem zone in the room, you are just drawn to it a whole lot more since the chaos seems so out of place and you just want to get it resolved. Or at least that’s what happens around here 😉

What sort of projects do you have going on in your home right now?

Check out what others are doing to make their homes more intentional at Pancakes & French Fries.