Saving a Few Bucks with a Barstool Facelift

Remember when I said we had a few things left to do in the kitchen?  One of these things was to find "good lookin' bar stools".  Not easy.  No wait, I shouldn't say that.  It's easy to find good lookin' bar stools... if you have an unlimited amount of money to spend.  I set a max of $100 a piece, but I still wasn't happy about spending that much.  Even that budget was difficult to stick to though.  I scoured Craigslist just about every other day, but could never find anything that would work.  We finally found some barstools we really liked at IKEA.  We were relieved to find something, but they were still 100 bucks a pop.  It must not have been meant to be, because when we reached the warehouse one of the employees told us they had 10 in stock, but they couldn't find them.  So we were out of luck and came home with no barstools.  Boo.

But wait... this story has a happy ending!  Just like fate, a couple weeks later I happened across an ad on Craigslist for 4 restaurant-quality bar stools at $170 for all 4.  So we checked them out, offered $150 (which they accepted), and came home with the new additions!

For the record: I chose not to play "Blood Brothers", as tempting as it was.

This is what they looked like originally.  Nice, solid barstools, but the upholstery left much to be desired.

The next day I took a trip to Hancock Fabrics, where I bought some foam padding and a great linen fabric for 1/2 off (like I said, fate).  The foam was a little pricey, so the total for the reupholstery materials ended up being about $45.  I already had all the tools I needed at home.  Here's what I used...

After removing the seats from the barstools, the first (and worst) step was removing the old fabric.  I've reupholstered other chairs before where I didn't need to remove the padding and was able to place the new fabric over the old.  These weren't that easy.  Unfortunately.  The padding on these babies was uneven and pretty much flattened out, so it had to go.  I used the flathead and pliers to get all the staples out.

I was even lucky enough to remove two layers on some of them.  Joy.

All the staples.  Ugggghhh!

Sooo, this is why the padding wasn't working.  I don't even know what all this is (or was).  Half of it was disintegrated.  Ew.

Once I scraped all the disgustingness off the wood seats, I traced and cut around them on the foam.  I did each one a little differently, but came to the conclusion that cutting the foam just slightly larger than the wood turned out the best.  Be sure not to cut it too large though, or it can look a little bumpy after the fabric is wrapped over it.

Next for the fabric.  The best way to get everything nice and smooth is to pull one edge tight, staple it, then do the same with the opposite side.  Then do the same for the other 2 sides (so I had at least 1-2 staples on all 4 sides).  After that I finished off each side and perfected the corners.  Check out the picture below to see how I got the corners smooth.

After all was said and done, the barstools with makeover cost us 50 bucks a piece... half the cost of the cheapest new barstools we found that we liked.  Which means more money for us to spend on other projects :)

Let's check out the official before and after.

Before...

...and after...

More kitchen updates are coming soon!

Go-to Foil-Pouch Salmon and Garlic Roasted Broccoli

Get ready for salmon euphoria.  Yep, it's a real thing.  I came up with this recipe a couple of weeks ago, and I doubt I'll ever use another salmon recipe again.  I found the marinade here, but I made a lot of changes to the recipe it came with.  The main thing I needed with a solid salmon recipe is a foil pouch method.  I am all about the foil pouch.  It's by far the easiest way to cook anything, and it makes fish suuuuper moist and wonderful.  Behold... my new go-to salmon recipe... til death do us part.


Simple, Super-Tasty Foil-Pouch Salmon
Feeds 4 adults... or 2 hungry folks who love leftovers :)

Ingredients:

2 lbs fresh salmon (cut into 4 pieces- about 1/2 lb each)
2 T garlic lemon seasoning to taste**
1/3 cup brown sugar
1/3 cup water
1/3 cup soy sauce
1/4 cup canola oil

**I just so happened to have this seasoning on hand- made up of garlic, lemon, salt, and pepper.  If you can't find this at the store or just want to use what you have, you can sub garlic powder and lemon pepper instead, with a tiny sprinkling of salt.

Directions:

1. Sprinkle on a healthy layer of garlic lemon seasoning to each piece of salmon. 
2. In a medium bowl, combine the brown sugar, water, soy sauce, and oil.  Stir well.  Once the sugar seems to be melted into the mixture, add all 4 pieces of salmon (you could also put the salmon in a gallon-size zip-top bag with the marinade if you want).
3. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and stick in the fridge while you prepare the rest of the meal.  Give it at least 15 minutes to marinate, but up to 2 hours if you want a really powerful flavor.  
4. Heat the grill to medium-high.
5. Set out a piece of foil big enough to make a pouch around the fish- mine was about 18" x 18".  Fold up all 4 sides to make a little salmon-sized pool.  Place a piece of salmon in the middle, then spoon in about 1/4 cup of the marinade (now you see where the pool comes in).  Bring the foil edges in to the center and pinch/roll them together to form a pouch (see photo below). 
6. You can skip this next step if you're bold (or have awesomely strong aluminum foil), but I recommend tearing off another piece of foil to make a little hammock for each foil pouch... Yep, our salmon gets pools and hammocks!  The extra layer keeps any drippings that may escape the pouch from going down into the grill.  Totally optional though.
7. Toss these babies on the grill!  Maybe don't toss them.  Lay them gently.  Close the lid and cook for about 20 minutes- less if you're using thin or small pieces of salmon.
8. Serve... with this yummy broccoli recipe I've added below :)

So I feel kind of bad for making this broccoli recipe the afterthought of the salmon.  It's quite good, but broccoli always has a hard time following an act like salmon.  I usually just steam it for simplicity, but I'll definitely start using this recipe more often.  Especially since the hubby loves it- woop woop!  

Roasted Garlic Broccoli

Ingredients:

3 heads broccoli, chopped into florets (this is just what comes in a bunch at the grocery stores around here)
2 T olive oil
2 tsp salt
1 tsp pepper
2 cloves garlic, minced

Directions:

1. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees.
2. Toss the broccoli into a medium bowl.  Drizzle in the olive oil, salt, pepper, and minced garlic.  Stir to make sure all the broccoli is coated.
3. Add a layer of parchment paper to a baking sheet (preferably one with little edges to keep the broccoli from escaping in the oven).  Spread the broccoli evenly onto the baking sheet.
4. Bake for about 15 minutes, until the broccoli is just starting to get a little darker around the edges.
5. Serve... with the fabulous salmon you just pulled off the grill!

One Rug, Two Rug, Old Rug, New Rug

Like I said way back when, it's been a goal of ours to take things slow with the house re(-modeling, -decorating, -painting, etc.).  Well okay, maybe not slow, but just steady enough to control my spur-of-the-moment decision making habits.  I found out with our previous house that anything I bought just because I just needed "something" and was in a hurry, I ended up disliking later.  Or loathing entirely.  So far I've been good about taking my time, weighing my options, and searching around (a lot) before buying.  Except once.

We bought a rug at Lowe's for the living room because we really wanted one and it seemed like it would work.  It took about an hour to make the decision.  That's not enough time for me.  And of course, I've been scouring home decorating websites ever since to find something I liked better.  Don't get me wrong, I like the rug, just not in the living room.

After a couple months of searching, I found exactly what I was looking for on Joss & Main.  If you haven't heard of this website, you should check it out.  Every day there are new sales on designer home goods.  I got a pretty good deal on this one.

Here's the living room with the new rug.  You'll also notice our new tv stand.  It's actually an antique I found on Craigslist for just over $100.  I searched forever for the perfect piece (unlike the rug!).

The new white decorative pillows are from our IKEA trip :)

Not sure what to do about those cords on either side of the TV... hmm...

So where did the nice quickly-decided-on Lowe's rug go?  I decided to swap it out with the rug in the office, since it was much bigger and seemed to fit the space better.  Then the red rug from the office moved into the foyer.  Yea, there's been a lot of rug-swapping around these parts.  What do you think?  Good move?

Lazy Sunday Football Chili... Humane Style

In case you haven't noticed, it's pretty much fall now.  Apart from losing the stifling heat, busting out the boots, and sucking down as many pumpkin spice lattes as possible, it's also the season for Sunday football.  And I don't know about you, but "Sunday football" is entirely interchangeable with "day-long eating and couch potato-ing".  I tell you no lies.  So on days like that, my favorite stomach-stuffer is chili.  I've been using this chili recipe for years (mostly because it's sooo easy), and after we went meat-free I substituted soy crumbles for ground turkey.  I know what you're thinking... but no one will ever be able to tell it's not ground beef.  Seriously!  I made took this recipe to work last week, and no one knew... muahahaha!

Another great thing about my meatless chili?  150 calories per cup.  Not too shabby, eh?  It's also packed with protein (0.9 gm/cup) and lacking in fattiness (11.6 gm/cup).  It's healthy enough to convince me at the end of the day that I'm not quite as big of a bum as I look.  And did I mention that soy crumbles are cheaper than ground turkey and ground beef?

So here she is... (originally nabbed from The Slow Cooker Bible)


Easy Meat-free Slow Cooker Chili


Ingredients:

1 package soy crumbles (usually found refrigerated in the "health food" section at the grocery)
1/2 white onion, diced (if I cook the onion in a skillet beforehand, I use the whole thing)
1 15oz can kidney beans, drained and rinsed
1 15oz can chickpeas, drained and rinsed
1 15oz can black beans, drained and rinsed (I used Great Northern beans this time, because that's what I had on hand)
1 28oz can diced tomatoes, undrained
1 8oz can tomato sauce
2 T chili powder


Directions:

1. Dump everything in the crockpot and stir to combine.  Set on high heat for 4-5 hrs.  
2. Serve.
3. Yep, seriously.  That's it.  Feel free to bum around during that 4-5 hrs while your slow-cooker works for you :)

Meet my ghetto-fabulous slow cooker.  Perhaps it's time to invest in a new one?