The Kids Next Door: Pantry Raid

For some time, all of our dry goods have been on wire ikea shelf in the little nook right outside out kitchen/next to the door of our walk-in attic. Because we use our back door more often than our front, it irritated me to see the cluttered shelf every time I walked in. Plus, once we started canning and storing our awesome organic home-canned goodness jars there, I wasn't a fan of how much light was shining in from the back door on to our pantry. To solve the problem, I put up a shower rod with a heavy burlap curtain from Target. It was an ok solution.

Here's the pantry nook (you might see where this is headed).

However, my sweet husband and I are not morning people. In our daily morning grog, grab for cereal, we were constantly leaving the dang curtain open, so I'd come home in the evening and would be staring at our mess of cereal boxes and pasta again. Here's a nice look at what was on the messy shelf.

Andrew and I had originally planned to build a butler's pantry in the space. We planned to buy cabinets similar to our kitchen cabinets, and we were completely giddy when we found out that we could go to the Habitat Restore and get a slab of granite for a counter. I pinned a ton of butler's pantries on Pinterest and was drooling over the wine-bar pantry that my inlaws put in to their new kitchen we we visited on the 4th. But what I started to realize is that all the ideas I loved had glass-front cabinets, and that just wasn't going to be in our budget, which we had set at about $500. To get the look I was dreaming of, it was going to take more work than we're really capable of doing, and it was going to take more money than we wanted to spend.

I started looking at other options. On Amazon, I found several 5 and 6ft kitchen pantry cabinets that looked good. But they were $400-$600 and the reviews were so-so. And I'm frankly done with furniture that we have to build. I keep on saying to Andrew that now we're in our 30s, we can't be spending our time putting together furniture that is made for a 1st college apartment.

So on to Craigslist. We made our first Craigslist purchase a few months ago, and even though we had some serious buyers' remorse initially, it's worked out well. This time, I discovered the antiques listing (cue angels singing).

I searched "cabinet" and "wardrobe." Most items were huge (oh how I wish the nook had been big enough for a Hoosier cabinet), or "primitive" (is this code for "painted junk?" Just not my style, I guess..) or waterfall style (mid 1930s). Then I saw an oddly tall cabinet (listed at 7ft) that looked pretty narrow (our nook is 33 1/2 inches wide by 19 deep). It was listed as oak, and it had beautifully clean lines.

However, it had been listed for 30 days and was about 45 minutes away. We texted the seller and she said someone was coming to look at it the next day. With my fingers crossed, I said that we'd be willing to pay full asking price (I know, I know! I need to give away my Queen Haggler title). The people passed on the cabinet and we made arrangements to go see it after work.

It wasn't in the greatest shape, really. It wasn't all that sturdy and the wood looked dried and ashy. It was also barely 6ft tall, not 7 as advertised. I swooned. Andrew thought I was nuts. I was loading it in the car before we'd even discussed payment.

The seller explained that this cabinet came from her mother's Queen Anne style home, so it's circa the age of our bungalow. Her mother had kept linens in it. I said something about the oak being perfect for our home and she said that she was so glad we weren't going to paint it - that it was clear that the other prospective buyers had been planning to paint the piece, and she'd had to part with several items knowing that was the plan of the buyer.

Nothing makes me go full-on Sarah McLachlan sad like the idea of someone painting 100-year old furniture. Seriously.

Once we got it in the house, Andrew practically stomped off. He felt that we'd been taken for a ride. I went to work with some wax/lemon oil that our favorite antiques dealer had given us.

And this is what happened:

Gorgeous, right? I dragged Andrew back and he was pretty happy with the transformation.

We've since taken the wheels off (okay, Andrew did that without my help) so it's a little sturdier. The seller threw in some wire baskets, so for the time being our food is stored inside and we can get away with waiting some time to figure out (and consult one of our master woodworker friends) how to make shelves.

Which gave me time to come up with today's project - a shelf above the cabinet for my cookbooks.

Here we go! I stained these while still in my PJs this morning.