Renew My Home: January 2012

Friday, January 20, 2012

A Piano, Reborn

The cabinet that my husband built from a 1916 piano.

Nate gutted the piano, took out the strings, keys, soundboard, and the decorative panel in the front. He removed the structural members in the back. He then built a box cabinet and fitted out the former key area into compartments.

The compartments are perfect for silverware and serving pieces. They are about 2 1/2" high and 14" deep.

The left side of the cabinet has a vintage wire towel rack. This picture also shows the built-in wineglass racks and the lights inside the cupboard.

Nate built a drop-leaf shelf on the right side of the cabinet.
He used a hinge from the top of the original piano.

Under the cabinet, he used the large central decorative panel to create doors for a storage unit.
This part measures about 19" tall, 22" wide, and 13" deep.

To the left, he created an opening for a wine chiller or a small cube frig.

Two mahogany-stained pieces for display and storage: a raised plate rack and a tiered box for wine bottles.

The metal bar (that dampened the strings), removed from the interior

and suspended along the front.

Can be delivered to 50-mile radius of Elk River, MN area.

612 239 4888 (Nate Murphy)

Price reduced!!
Now $2400 (was $3200)

To see our other piano bar, click here.

Tuesday, January 10, 2012

Paring Down

Driftwood from Lake Pepin and Superior's North Shore, piled in a basket and formed into a cross.

These old weathered pieces of wood are free.

But I suppose they cost something.

They came from trees that were as fresh and green as the leaves in the white vases.

Now the wood is dead, but to me it is lovely.

It reminds me that pounding and suffering don't make things disappear.

The essential thing remains.

"If your heart is broken, you'll find God right there; if you're kicked in the gut, he'll help you catch your breath. Disciples so often get into trouble; still, GOD is there every time. He's your bodyguard, shielding every bone; not even a finger gets broken."

Psalm 34: 18-20, The Message

Hush

"Can we say 'Hush' to ourselves? Can we command our thoughts? I believe we can. God has given us the power to close the shutter of our minds upon hurtful, weakening thoughts. He has provided all manner of shutters. A book that swings us off ourselves and into another world is a very good shutter; a song set to music; beauty; the dear love of those who love us. Above all, there is this: look at Calvary. Look steadfastly. Take time to look and all within you will be hushed, for power streams forth from Calvary. We need never know defeat." (Amy Carmichael)

A Prayer (Not by Joel Osteen)

"Take from me, Oh Lord, that self-pity which love of myself so readily produces, and from the frustration of not succeeding in the world as I would naturally desire, for these have no regard for your glory. Rather, create in me a sorrow that is conformable to Your own. Let my pains rather express the happy condition of my conversion and salvation. Let me no longer wish for health or life, but to spend it and end it for You, with You, and in You. I pray neither for health nor sickness, life nor death. Rather I pray that you will dispose of my health, my sickness, my life, and my death, as for Your glory, for my salvation, for the usefulness to Your church and Your saints, among whom I hope to be numbered. You alone know what is expedient for me. You are the Sovereign Master. Do whatever pleases You. Give me or take away from me. Conform my will to Yours, and grant that with a humble and perfect submission, and in holy confidence, I may dispose myself utterly to You. May I receive the orders of Your everlasting provident care. May I equally adore whatever proceeds from You."
-Blaise Pascal

Solitude

by Henri Nouwen

We enter into solitude first of all to meet our Lord and to be with him and him alone.
Our primary task in solitude, therefore, is not to pay attention to the many faces which assail us, but to keep the eyes of our mind and heart on him who is our divine savior.
Only in the context of grace can we face our sin;
only in the place of healing do we dare to show our wounds;
only with a single-minded attention to Christ can we give up our clinging fears and face our own true nature.
As we come to realize that it is not we who live, but Christ who lives in us, that he is our true self, we can slowly let our compulsions melt away and begin to experience the freedom of the children of God.

A Meditation

by Henri Nouwen

To listen is very hard, because it asks of us so much interior stability that we no longer need to prove ourselves by speeches, arguments, statements, or declarations. True listeners no longer have an inner need to make their presence known. They are free to receive, to welcome, to accept. Listening is much more than allowing another to talk while waiting for a chance to respond. Listening is paying full attention to others and welcoming them into our very beings. The beauty of listening is that, those who are listened to start feeling accepted, start taking their words more seriously and discovering their own true selves. Listening is a form of spiritual hospitality by which you invite strangers to become friends, to get to know their inner selves more fully, and even dare to be silent with you.