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All Is Not Calm


My friend and I had a good laugh the other day. She stopped by my house because she left something in my car earlier. (Leaving things in my car is one of her habits.) When she arrived I handed her a Christmas card, which she opened right on the spot.

The card said, "All is calm. All is bright."

That's when we laughed because, friends, have you ever gone into Christmas thinking, "If I had to select one word to capture this season, it would be calm. All is calm. All of it."

I mean, I love singing Silent Night by candlelight each year at Christmas Eve service, but the lyrics trip me up. There's no way the original Christmas was calm, either.

These days, some of the lack of calmness is by our own doing, of course. The season brings a certain intensity. There are presents to wrap, cookies to bake, family to visit, friends to remember, and events to attend. If you're a parent, there are school parties where your children agreed to contribute popcorn or a fruit tray without telling you. These same children get embroiled in one, maybe two, Secret Santa gift exchanges with a group of their friends, and they'll let you know they need to buy a gift the night before.

Beyond that, some of the lack of calmness is circumstantial. In my line of work, everything amps up at the end — students desperately work to finish the semester by completing final assignments and professors desperately work to finish the semester by evaluating those final assignments and submitting final grades. In contrast, in my husband's realm of work (college football) everyone is desperately working to not finish, to keep progressing, to keep winning. Given the new playoff system, it's technically possible for teams to play seventeen games by the time the season is done. Exciting? Yes. Exhausting? Also yes.

I'm also fighting a stupid head cold, which is neither here nor there, but I thought I'd mention it.

All is not calm. It's never going to be perfectly calm — not at Christmas, not in life in general. In light of this, I'm grateful Christmas celebrates Emmanuel, God with us. Jesus walked this very earth, entered this very mess, wrote himself into this very story with the good news that he is the Prince of Peace and the King of Kings. He's with us.

My circumstances don't need to be calm for me to rejoice. I can find peace in the midst of it all — the final grading, the extended football season, even the stupid head cold — because God is with me.

All is not calm, but that's okay. I'm not alone. God is with me.

New Life for an Old Corner Cupboard

Twelve DIYs of Christmas
Day 12: New Life for an Old Corner Cupboard

For the final project of the Twelve DIYs of Christmas, you need to see this picture. It's a corner cupboard that I found on Facebook Marketplace. At $40, It looked mildly promising. I zoomed into the picture to inspect it more closely and noticed some good details. One, it was real wood. Two, it had interesting hardware on the fourth shelf down. Three, it appeared tall.


That was it. Those were the three merits I could find, besides that it also seemed to come with a dry erase marker. Still, those merits are enough. If it's real wood, it could be refinished. If it has interesting hardware, that hardware could be spray painted. If it's tall, it would fill the corner in my dining room perfectly. 

I asked for the measurements, and upon confirming it would fit, I committed to the purchase. I don't buy through Facebook Marketplace often, and the times I've done so have been hyper-local. At an hour and a half away, this purchase was more of an adventure.

Friends, the whole experience — from start to finish — was wonderful. First off, it was the perfect fall day for a drive: blue skies, vibrant trees, windy country roads, old barns, and beautiful scenery. With each mile, my soul relaxed and spirits lifted. So much beauty! The drive was a gift from the Lord. 




The seller was kind and encouraging. (Hi Karen!) She reminded me to enjoy my children and my busy house, as her own were now grown and gone. A few weeks later when I sent her photos of the completed project, she first joked that she wanted the cupboard back, then closed her message by saying, "Feel free to come visit anytime and bring the family."

My heart. Like I said, the whole experience was wonderful.

Here's the process of refinishing: I removed the hardware, broke out my hand sander, and sanded for hours. Days. Eons. It felt like a significant amount of sanding. With six shelves, this cabinet had a lot of surface area.


Once the sanding removed most of the original dark stain, I used an unconventional technique to lighten the wood even more: oven cleaner. Google told me this works. Who am I to argue with the Internet?

Apparently, the degreaser in oven cleaner successfully removes wood tannins, which are responsible for orange/red undertones. Since oven cleaner also is designed to stick on a surface, you simply spray it on the wood, let is sit and permeate the wood for 30 minutes, rinse it off with water, then let the wood dry in the sun, which both lightens the wood and prevents any water damage by drying the piece quickly.


Was this process filled with doubt and fumes? Yes and yes. Ample doubt. Ample fumes. But I trusted the process, and I wore a mask.

And, people, it worked. It really worked. The wood was stripped perfectly, the undertones were lightened, and after one final fine-grit sanding, the entire piece was smooth and ready to seal with liming wax.


The corner cupboard is now stationed in my dining room. The loveliest aspect is that when I look at it, I remember the journey. I recall the beautiful drive, the warm connection with the kind seller, and the adventure of traveling somewhere unexpected on a perfect fall day.

Here's the finished cupboard decorated for Christmas. I've collected the decor on the shelves, including the garland, from thrift store or garage sales over the years.




The decorative hardware, which originally had receded into the background of the darker wood, pops more now that it's spray painted matte black.



This old corner cupboard has been given new life, and we'll enjoy it for many, many years to come. Thank you for joining me during these Twelve DIYs of Christmas! This series has been great fun for me to reflect on my projects from the past year, and I hope you've enjoyed it as much as I have.

DIY Diamond Stripe Canvas Art

Twelve DIYs of Christmas
Day 11: DIY Diamond Stripe Canvas Art

Every so often, a DIY project goes sideways. This happened when I thought I'd do something "fun" to relax at the end of a particularly stressful day by creating a piece of graphic artwork. I convinced myself that crafting would be fun. "You'll enjoy this. It'll be relaxing," I told myself. 

But, you see, this project was not fun. I was not enjoying myself. It was not relaxing. I was tired, my head hurt, and I was trying to replicate this graphic print, which had found online and thought was neat:


I had painter's tape, and a measuring tape, and a paintbrush, and a paint roller. For reasons I no longer remember, I also had a small container of joint compound, a hammer, a pair of scissors, and a hair pick. A hair pick.

Don't trouble your brain to figure out why I selected these materials. Don't try to process how these disparate items belong together because I, the creator of this project, still don't understand where I originally was headed.


I took a picture of myself to send to my friend, "This is me HAVING FUN doing a craft project. Good times, good times."


Right after I sent that picture, I gave up for the time being. If it's not working, it's not working. That's okay. When I came back to the project the next time, I was less tired and the whole process came together easily. All the steps that had seemed stupidly complicated (like measuring and thinking and drawing lines — everything really), was much easier while well-rested.

I'm so glad that I stuck with it because I love how it turned out. Do you think it captures the essence of the original print?


It's just lines and dots, which I painted on a frame that I bought at Goodwill. Once I was successful at getting the basic layout in place by forming the diamonds with painters tape, it was easy progress. Even more, I'm proud of the piece because I made it myself.



DIYs, for the most part, should be rewarding. When it's not, that's okay. Take a break. Walk away. Hit pause. If you're up to it, you always can come back another day, and perhaps you'll find, just like I did, that you really are having a good time.


May your DIYs be merry and bright
Keep visiting for all Twelve DIYs of Christmas.

Sneaky Storage Solutions: Metal Cart to Hidden Litter Box

Twelve DIYs of Christmas
Day 10 : Sneaky Storage Solutions: Cart to Litter Box

I love my two cats, Chip and Peanut. They add joy to our lives and fun to our home. Of course, one thing I don't love is having litter boxes, but it's a necessary part of cat ownership. Through this DIY, I found a way to make a litter box more contained and attractive. Enter, this wheely cart.


Once again, this was a free side-of-the-road find, and once again, with small touch-ups, it because a functional piece of furniture. After cleaning it off, I painted the edges with a matte black spray paint, which really improved the original finish. Then, I painted the top deep navy and cut a spare piece of wood (also painted navy) to serve as a privacy screen to the front of the cart. 


The wooden front blocks the view to the litter box, yet the open side makes it easy to access and empty the box. Since the entry is low the the ground, it's easy for our cats to enter and exit. There's even enough room inside that I installed a small hook to hang a mini hand broom, which helps with cleanup of any stray litter. 


Never let "what currently is" (an scratched gold metal cart) deter you from envisioning "what could be" (an attractive litter box hideaway). This cart, which was destined for a landfill, turned out to be an efficient solution to mask something that's traditionally an eyesore. 

Chip and Peanut approve, too.


"The litter box? It's a 10/10."  — Chip


"If I had thumbs, I'd give it two thumbs up." — Peanut


May your DIYs be merry and bright!
Keep visiting for all Twelve DIYs of Christmas.

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