An Old Stool Gets A New Home ~ New House Design

As I tidied upstairs this morning, I saw the little old white footstool that serves as the booster step
up into the high rice carved 4-poster bed in our pink guest room,
and I remembered that I did a post about that some time back.
I am resurrecting it, this story of a battered old stool and its life's mission.

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(Repeat post from February 5, 2010)
You see this little old white step stool,
that our dog Dion is so curious about?

It's a newcomer to That Old House, but it's no stranger to hard work.

It was long ago nailed together from pine boards,
and painted a robin's egg blue:

(Can you see the traces of blue under the cracks and chips?)

Then, repainted white, and used and used and used and used . . . and it is not yet used up.

At some point, it was repaired. Underneath you can see that its old leg has a split or big crack,
and that explains the scrap boards nailed outside, for strength and support.
Waste not, want not.
Recycling and going green are not new concepts; they used to be just how people lived.

How did this beat-up old chipped and crazed step stool wind up in my kitchen,

being gently molested by a suspicious spaniel?

Simple. A church friend asked me if I wanted it. Willa had devotedly cared for a very elderly member of our congregation, and when Ellie moved into a care facility and Willa was sorting out her things, she found this stool. "It's worn, and old, not in very good shape, but when I saw it I thought that it belonged at your house," she said. "Do you want it?"

Of course I did. We kind of run a halfway house for the
old and worn and not-in-very-good-shape things of this world.

But this stool has many years of service left.

It's sturdy and strong, and its hard-earned "chippy" patina tells the story of the many times

it has been put to good use, to reach that jar at the back of the shelf, or boost a child to

reach a kitchen faucet for hand-washing, or help someone stretch up to paint the trim over the door.

I like the color of those paint drips, don't you? Sort of a butterscotch.

As for Dion, he has not made up his mind about this newcomer on his turf.
But as long as the newcomer doesn't claim sofa space or cookie treats, he'll come around.

And for myself -- as I develop my own chipped and cracked patina,

I hope I can manage to always find my own mission in life, and be useful.

That's a pretty high calling, being useful, for this step stool and for me.

Willa also said I might want to repaint this old stool.

But I have a feeling she knows I won't.
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And that's my blast from a February past. I hope you like our little footstool, which has not been painted!
Tomorrow, it's back to the beach house for Howard and me; we are aiming to finish
up most (some?) of the projects we started last weekend; wish us luck!
The weather should be warm and sunny -- it may be hard to concentrate on painting
when we've got the water beckoning outside!