Brick Wall in the Kitchen? + More Cottage Finds & Colors

For a while now, I've been toying with the idea of having a brick wall in our kitchen and dining area. The wall I'm thinking about is a little partition between the fridge and dining room. I've always felt the wall is a bit weird...that it sticks out like sore thumb. I don't know if it's a load bearing wall or not - it is where the kitchen was added on to by the previous owners. To remove it would look funny, too, because I don't want to see the fridge in the dining area and from the living room. Sooo...I've been thinking, why not just enhance that silly old wall and make it look like a really special and unique feature?

I've mentioned before that I've decided to use painted brick pavers for our backsplash (when we get around to replacing the countertop...which along with the new kitchen sink, faucets, lighting, hardwood floors, bathroom tile, vanities, etc., waits patiently for us in the garage:) ). It's hard to see in this photo, but I propped a couple of the pavers up against the backsplash area in the kitchen. This photo is a few months old... (Click to enlarge). I will be painting the pavers a couple of shades lighter than what they are now, maybe they will have a darker basecoat and I'll distress them by sanding here and there... and they will be aged with a subtle coat of brown antiquing glaze. I would use the exact same technique on the pavers I add to the partial wall beside the fridge. To give an even more substantial feel to the wall, we'll cap off the end of the wall with some nice boxy trimwork that would nearly mimic the beams on the ceiling - vertical beam, if you will. I've always loved the look of aged brick, so I'm really excited about this idea. Maybe that strange little, boring wall has potential afterall?

A few weeks back on one of my many Goodwill excursions, I found a couple of really sweet pillows. They are very well made and I just love the juxtaposition of the contrasting patterns and textures. The red and white checked pillow is made of a heavy cotton and the other is a floral wool needlepoint. I paid $4 total for both of them! I've put them in our gutted bathroom for a little color.

It's so ironic that of all the rooms in the house, our gutted bathroom (there is only a working tub and shower in there now) is *the most* accessorized room- no kidding! Since we're always shuffling stuff around in the rest of the house because of renovation projects and things stay dusty and upside down, the bathroom is the only place where things can stay where I put them. It's a nice "practice area" for decorating. I know we're going to have to live with the bathroom like this for another year, so why not work with what's there:)

Oh, I also found a spot for that little handpainted chest that I wrote about yesterday. I put it in the gutted bathroom beside my little basket of soaps and cloths and flowers. It ties in with the red and pink in the pillows and adds just enough color to what would otherwise be a very dark and scary room, lol.



It's such a funny thing about color...I never dreamed that I would ever like pink...or blue, but I'm finding that more and more I'm loving particular shades of the two. I'm not a pastel kind of person, but I really like the deeply saturated colors like dark pink against red and fresh shades of blue with green. Long ago, I bought my curtain fabric for the dining room and loved it because it had nearly all the colors of my living room painting. I thought that I would stick to decorating only with colors that were in both the painting *and* the plaid fabric, but now I think I'll also branch out to some other colors, too. I've already got a pillow with pink in it! How about a nice blue bedroom with crisp trim, furniture, and linens and fresh green accessories? Or what about a pretty white ironstone pitcher overflowing with periwinkle blue hydrangeas for the kitchen table? Ahhh...the possibilities are endless!