Spicy Red Spice Racks

I haven't posted any home improvements for a while, mostly because I haven't done very many.  :(  However, I'm pretty proud of my new spice racks. I officially hung them on August 7th and have been using them long enough to declare that a) They are awesome. and b) They have made my countertops much more organized. 

The reason for the spice racks?  Well, I have kind of a lot of spices and extracts.  Not as many as some people, but more than just the basics.  Which means that the nifty vintage Watkins Spices rack that I bought at an estate sale *definitely* didn't hold everything.  The bottles and jars took up some space, but they also tended to meander around on the counter and every time I wanted to clean the counter, it was really annoying to move them all.  Plus, they were perpetually falling over.  

When I started looking for spice racks, they were all fairly expensive and none of them were what I wanted.  I finally found something workable at Ikea, the Bekvam spice racks. At a mere $3.99 each, they are what I will call "super-cheap."  They are also real wood and can easily be customized.  

        

Like all Ikea things, the spice racks come flat-packed and need assembly.  So, I unpacked the pieces and assembled them.  You don't need any tools; a little wrench thing is included in the packaging.  You do, however, have to figure out one of the standard, slightly confusing Ikea drawings, because there aren't any actual words in the directions.  Luckily, though, this is a spice rack and not a huge piece of furniture!  

After I assembled my two spice racks, I spray painted them (with a glossy red Rustoleum).  It took 3 coats to get a nice, even, shiny red.  Yeah, I should probably have sanded them first, but honestly I didn't think about it at the time.  So....oh, well!

After they were completely dry, I hung them up in my kitchen.  The tricky parts were avoiding my electrical outlet, hanging them individually straight, and hanging both in an even line...all while working right underneath my cabinets and standing on a chair because I have short arms.  As you can see, there is a bit of space between them, but I think they turned out just fine!

Almost Instant Hutch Update: Green is the New Orange!

An extremely generous co-worker and friend gave me a hutch several months ago.  I absolutely loved it, and not just because of the low, low price point!  It is beautiful, with two glass shelves, a light, and windowed doors in a top area that is perfect for displaying breakables like my hurricane lanterns and some of my great-grandmother's china.  On bottom there is a solid single-doored area for storage.  It is an old-fashioned and genuinely lovely piece of furniture.

OK, except for one thing: at some point someone painted the original back of the hutch orange.  Really, really orange.  And streaky, because they didn't spring for multiple coats of paint to get it even.

I lived with the orange for a while, thinking I would paint the back when I made some other decisions about painting my cheap living room furniture.

Eventually, I realized that I didn't want to do what the previous owners did.  Just painting over the orange wouldn't bring back the niceness of wood grain, and if I wanted to change it later I would just be adding more coats of paint.

Enter my genius plan: cover the orange with fabric!  I found a great microsuede-like fabric in a dark green that was very similar to the fabric covering my living room chair and ottoman.  I used simple push pins (though I had to hammer them into the hard wood) to attach it, then put the glass shelves back into their original positions.  I think it turned out really nice.  It is colored, but is sort of neautral in that coloring...and I can change it quickly and easily anytime I want to!