My Kitchen Is The 'Alter Ego' Of The Lounge…

by Jean
(Ohio)

Kitchens have come a long way from being the dark, smoky places that one would want to get out of as quickly as possible!

I tend to think that families had the best times when the hearth was where the food was cooked and people ate and chatted in front of it or even had a bath in a small tub!

I prefer to have my kitchen spacious with a lot of storage space. It is nice to have large windows so that the kitchen is always bright and airy.

In our home the kitchen is always the place where we had lively chats when friends and neighbors drop in. One could even get a bit of help chopping and cutting!

I like my kitchen to be a bright and airy place and so we put it two large windows. Having such large windows has some disadvantages. The windows face full west and the afternoon sun can make the place very hot. And, where we live, certain months of the year are very windy. The wind blows west to east.

It was not difficult to solve these problems. I got a nice roll up bamboo screen which is not only beautiful but very effective too.

Unfortunately, putting in the screen meant that I had to move the nice wooden rack I had for potted plants and craft articles.

We have a nice counter with bar stools, in the kitchen for breakfast or a quick meal. This is where we sit around to chat, when I have to get a meal ready. Instead of the usual Lazy Susan, I have stuff on wall racks, which are attractive. A pole running through the breakfast counter has little circular shelves at three levels. These shelves can be rotated and one can always use them to display plants and other decorative items. The lower most shelf has slots for glasses.

I have mounted on the wall a number of ethnic bamboo articles and wooden molds that are used to make gingerbread cookies. These are real conversation pieces since they come different parts of the country. Basket work is another item I collect and they do very nicely on top of the storage shelves.

For color, I have tiles with herbs and vegetables in printed on them. They serve as coasters and hot pads.

There is always a bowl filled with fruit and a vase with flowers from the garden. Of course there is an attractive, wall mounted book case for my cookbooks!

Thanks to the judiciously planned storage cabinets there never is any clutter on the kitchen counter. The counter is marble topped and is easy to clean. The sink is below one of the big windows and has a beautiful view of the garden.

The kitchen, in our home is a place where we spend a lot of time, sharing the news of the day and just enjoying a joke or two.

My thanks to psd @ flickr for the photo

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