White Wednesday

So as many of you know we are turning Mom's room into a nursery with extra sleeping space for guests and returning Ting's room into a guest room.  Ting's room has the furniture that was there when it was a guest room in the past but Mom's room was completely emptied and all of her furniture moved to her new digs.

Not wanting to spend a lot of money, we decided to repurpose some of the furniture we had stuffed into our garage.  We had a dresser that had been given to us by Frank's cousin, John, and a bookcase that belonged to my parents since before I was born.  Dawn and I used chalk paint and were extremely pleased at how cute they turned out for a nursery.  You can see the transformation here.

We also had a dark brown bunk bed set that I wanted to put into the nursery for when Lil and/or Spence come and stay.  Spence is coming home with me from canoeing on Sunday and staying for 2 weeks!!!  I am giddy with excitement.  Lili is no longer my little bug....she has a job now so won't be able to stay with me this summer.   How did she grow up  so fast??  She is such a lovely young lady, I could not be prouder of her.

I know, I know...I digress....it seems to happen a lot around here.  Back to the bed.  I did not want dark wood in the baby's room.  Dawn and I thought about chalk painting the bed but I thought that would be too babyish and eventually the baby will grow into the regular bed.  So I asked Frank to paint it a glossy white.

He, of course, said no....as he always does whenever I ask him about anything but then he thought about it and said yes....as he always does whenever I ask him for anything.

So here are all the pieces to the bed in the dark wood.

Here is a nifty air gun sprayer that Frank bought when we first moved into this house.  13 years ago.  Still in the box, never been opened, brand new.

Here is Frank using his nifty air gun paint sprayer.  It made short work of it.  Had we not had to allow for drying time it probably would have only taken an hour or two to prime and paint all the pieces.

All the pieces are painted and ready to be assembled....

Now if we could only remember how...hmmmmm.

We got this far into the assembly when we realized we had four extra screws and 4 extra screw holes in the bottom rail with nothing to screw into...So we went out to the garage and found the safety rail for the top bunk, not painted yet.  So we painted that and decided we were too tired an cranky to deal with moving the bottom rail to the top and vice versa.  So we left the safety rail drying and tomorrow is another day.  You will have to wait until then to see the completed project.

We are having BBQ chicken legs, thighs and wings for dinner tonight.  We were originally going to have Vegetable Pasta Salad as a side but I still had some lovely peas from the CSA that I did not use on Monday so I am making Pasta, Pesto and Peas as a side dish instead.

The recipe I am sharing with you was adapted from one found in Barefoot Contessa Parties.  I just love Ina Garten's cookbooks.  I have several, they are well written, easy to understand and prepare and interspersed with little snippets about her life.  You feel like she is right in the room with you.

Ina's recipe was written to serve 12 so that was my first adaptation because there are only 2 of us. The original recipe also called for frozen peas and spinach but I adapted it to use the fresh peas and spinach in my fridge.  Ina also called for mayonnaise in her recipe but I deleted that, mostly because I forgot to add it when I was cooking and it was delicious without it.

It smells yummy and I am starving!!!

Pasta, Pesto and Peas
adapted from Ina Garten, Barefoot Contessa Parties

4 oz. mini farfalle (bow tie) noodles
1 T. extra virgin olive oil
1/4 c. pesto
2 c. baby spinach
Juice from 1/4 of a lemon
2 T. shredded parmesan, romano and asiago cheese blend
4 oz. fresh peas
salt and pepper to taste

Cook the pasta according to package directions.  Add the fresh peas to the pasta during the last 2 or 3 minutes of cooking time.  Drain the pasta and peas and toss in a bowl with the olive oil. Set aside to cool to room temperature.

Puree the pesto, spinach and lemon juice in a bowl of a food processor until desired consistency.

Add the pesto mixture to the pasta and peas along with the cheeses and salt and pepper to taste. Toss well and serve at room temperature.  Print Recipe

Since we were having chicken and since I had already deemed it White Wednesday I opened a bottle of Joel Gott Chardonnay....aaaahhhhhhhhhhh

Dinner is served.  Have a good night all.

I love days like today when we are Thriving at Home.  Stop by and see how other's are thriving.