My kitchen is a mystical place, a kind of temple for me. It is a place where the surfaces seem to have significance, where the sounds and odors carry meaning that transfers from the past and bridges to the future.Pearl Bailey
The Susan Branch drawing that accompanies the Pearl Bailey quote.
Isn't it wonderful? I love this kitchen. I want to peek in the drawers and cook on those green tiles. Pretty much as different from the kitchens I see in magazines as is possible. Mine is more like this one. My butcher block counters and lower cupboards are from 1981. I don't expect I'll ever change them. I did get rid of the upper cupboards years ago, and Tom replaced them with open shelves, which I love.
I was just saying yesterday that most of my favorite things are in the kitchen -that new-to-us kitchen table and my aunt Mabel's cupboard I told you about earlier this summer,
the Larkin desk, and the Hoosier.
Together they make the kitchen homey to me.
Nan, I LOVE your kitchen. It gives off a sense of contentment and comfort. I have a Larkin desk very much like yours - it lives in our bedroom but I love how it snugs into that corner of your kitchen.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the Pearl Bailey quote too!
Mary
Thank you so very much for your comment. I love it. Our Larkin desk came from Tom's step-grandmother. It belonged to her husband who won it for selling soap! It has lived many places in our house but it found the right home after the grandchildren were born!
DeleteI love your kitchen -- the open shelving is great ..... We had a Hoosier cabinet in our Oregon home (the past life one) -- our daughter and SIL own it now. I remember Pearl Bailey and love the quote. And the picture, although I like your kitchen better -- it is calmer (if that makes sense).
ReplyDeleteI'm very happy your beloved Hoosier stayed in the family! I'm sure they love it. What a very nice thing to say - 'calmer'
DeleteCharming kitchen, I can feel the warmth and love. I always wanted a hoosier. Love it! Thanks for the kitchen peek and the lovely quote.
ReplyDeleteOh, thank you so much. I bought that Hoosier at a local antique shop years and years ago. I've always said it is the first thing I'd save in a fire!
DeleteWhat a lovely kitchen you have. It's lovely to have a glimpse
ReplyDelete(I find friendly homes lovely to peek at ..perhaps I'm just nosy ..oh dear )
Aren't you so kind to say so. Thank you. I am very nosy- ahem, interested in people's rooms!
DeleteNan, I love your kitchen. Now, go make us something good! :-)
ReplyDeleteThank you, dear Kay!
DeleteI loved the quote and your kitchen is very nice, big and open and friendly.
ReplyDeleteYes, it is nice and big. When we bought the house we knocked down a wall to make it bigger. And then we knocked out another to make a butt'ry. All one room. I do love it. Thank you.
DeleteYour kitchen is perfect. So welcoming. We have open shelving too and a farm sink as in the illustration. Love the quote and love that you use a birthday book. I have a calendar with family birthdays on the side of the fridge. :)
ReplyDeleteWish you were closer so it could welcome you! I've thought of a farm sink. So appealing.
DeleteNan, I love your kitchen, always have, and the new table is so right for it.
ReplyDeleteBut Pearl Bailey is a favorite of mine and I'm thrilled to see an illustration of her kitchen, especially since I really miss the black and white checkerboard floor from my old kitchen. In fact we had enough tiles left from doing that in 2004 that we're considering using them here either in the kitchen or a new bathroom.
And those green tiles are so pretty too. I'm really glad to match Pearl to her kitchen now, I always like to do that!
I'm so sorry if it was confusing. That illustration is from the Susan Branch book, and she matches quotes with her drawings. It isn't Pearl B's kitchen. I had a black and white floor in my childhood cellar. Loved it.
DeleteLove the quote, the book, and especially love your kitchen. What a cozy spot to peruse a cookbook near the stove.
ReplyDeleteThanks!! And yes, it is!
DeleteThe kitchen is my favorite place to be and yours is so warm and homey. That is a fine Hoosier cabinet you have there, I love it.
ReplyDeleteI felt so lucky when I found it years ago in a local antique shop. I love it.
DeleteOur kitchen was very plain when we bought this house. It reflects us now. Every change was made by our own hands--no fancy stuff, just colorful local tiles. Lots of Frida Kahlo paintings, cut from children's paperback books and framed by me. No big money items, no granite countertops. Actually, it looks a lot like some "before" photos of kitchen makeovers, but it pleases us!
ReplyDeleteI always love visiting your home, Nan.
I'm a 'before' kind of person, too! And thanks for what you wrote.
DeleteI have the Hoosier cabinet which started life in my grandparent's VT home--it has been to Wyoming with us and now to Kentucky. I wonder what happened to the Larkin desk--I recall that it had a flowered feedsack curtain over the bottom shelves--
ReplyDeleteHow wonderful that you still have it!!! I've seen Larkin's with picture inserts where my mirror is. I took the flat part off because it is almost in a doorway and it wouldn't have fit with it. Now it is a bookshelf of children's books.
DeleteI've read all three of Susan Branch's autobiographical books and enjoyed the illustrations. Since she is close to my age, I related to many of her experiences. Love Branch's kitchen, as well as yours!
ReplyDeleteI have those books! But haven't read them yet.
DeleteI love your kitchen and have always thought that top cabinets make a kitchen seem heavy, but shelves open it up. The quote is very good, will have to look him up.
ReplyDeleteThank you! More here about Pearl Bailey - http://www.nytimes.com/1990/08/19/obituaries/pearl-bailey-musical-star-and-humorist-is-dead-at-72.html
DeleteI have the same Susan Branch Day Book. ;)
ReplyDeleteI always love seeing pictures of your home, especially the kitchen shots. After all these years, I feel as if I've been there in person. It has such a warm, homey feel to it and if I were decorating/building a kitchen, I would copy yours!
P.S. Another kitchen I admire is Jean & Lionel's in As Time Goes By.