Home Decor

This cake pan has eight small areas that make cakescicles. Insert a small stick in each, and you've got a yummy baked treat, rather than a yummy frozen one.

This cake pan is used to make a checkerboard cake. If you're not familiar, when you cut into it, it has layers of white cake and chocolate cake, mixed in a checkerboard pattern.

To use it, you make two mixes. Then, insert the plastic thing with three rings. Pour white into one ring, chocolate into the next ring, and then white into the final one. Lift the insert out, rinse it, and put it into the next pan. For this one, you want to reverse the order. If you've got white/chocolate/white, you want to do chocolate/white/chocolate. Lift it out, wash it off, and go back to white/chocolate/white. When you assemble the cake after it's baked, you stack them so they alternate. That way, when you cut into the cake, it will all be in the right order.

This cake pan is shaped like a giant cupcake. In fact, I think it would be especially cool to pour muffin mix in, and have an enormous blueberry muffin. Can you imagine the muffin top on that one?!?

This cake pan has three small cake pans that build a three level cake. These are small versions, so be forewarned that if you're looking for something like a wedding cake, this isn't going to work.

What I think would be especially clever with this one is to use it for a wedding cake, but do a small one at each table (or for each person depending on the size). Then, you have a larger one at the bride and groom's table.

This cake pan features a 9 car train design. I've never seen one that's quite as extensive as that. I love the idea, and I know my son would really love this cake. What I think would be cool is to make this, plus a mountain cake with one of those decorative bundt pans. Decorate them both, and really get into the fun.

This three level cart has a lot of space in a very tiny area. Built into it is a door area, a wine rack, a towel holder, and three levels that would be good for plants or decorative items. It's a cute idea, and might work for some people, but I fear that despite all the built-in features, it's just not going to be very useable. You can't make bread dough on the top, and it seems like it's an awkward size to put almost anywhere.

This cart with a wine rack is very useful looking. It features a drawer in front, a wine rack underneath, a towel bar on the side, and shelves below. There's enough space that you can make some food on top. Very useful indeed.

Stylewise, this isn't my favorite. But feature wise, this cart is perfect. It folds up to a space that's only 5 1/2 inches wide. Not much as far as extra features go, but the convenience of not having a huge kitchen cart that takes up a lot of room is well worth it.

This cart is nice, not only because it had drawers and doors, but also because it has some open shelves. There are some opportunities to put plants, decorative items, or some cookbooks on these shelves. And with a spice rack, towel bar, and paper towel holder rounding out the accessories, it is very useful.

The granite top on this cart is probably the least useful thing on this kitchen island. There's a towel bar on the side, and a place to store lots of flat bread boards and flat cookie sheets. There are small drawers that seem almost useless, and small open shelves below it that are about the same size as the drawers. These aren't a big help, but maybe you can figure out something to do with it. There is a large door, which has storage behind it.

This has only one purpose. It dispenses hot water for making tea, soup, cocoa, or anything else that would require boiling water. The water is dispensed at 190 degrees, and can be set to a different temperature. This would radically save time in cooking various items, and is quite an affordable luxury item for your house.

This cereal dispenser is perfect for holding two different types of cereal, and dispensing them when you need it. You simply slide your bowl underneath, turn the handle a few times, and the cereal comes out into your bowl. We have one that is similar, and we got it for my daughter. It's an awful, bright pink Hello Kitty dispenser, but it's one that we knew she would like. Every morning at breakfast time, that's where her cereal comes from. Is it easier than pouring from a box? Not really. Just more fun. lol

I've wanted one of these dispensers for years. They are amazingly handy for keeping certain food items out of the way, but close by when you need them. And it would get a LOT of use in my house. This fall, we bought a 20lb bag of rice. We've been using it at least three times a week since then, and it's almost gone. We've recently started eating a lot of food that uses beans in some way. One day, when we were having tostadas, we realized we didn't have any beans. We decided that we would use some black beans I had in the cabinet, and make our own refried beans. It was such a success that I told my husband we should get a bag of those too. lol

This dispenser is perfect for hard foods, but I will warn you not to use cereals in it. The paddles are too rigid, and they will pulverize any cereal you put in there. Instead, check my next entry.

This kitchen cart is interesting. At first, it looks a lot higher end than it really is. I mean, all the metal makes it looks really upscale. But think about how fun that metal is going to be to clean. Furthermore, the coffeemaker on top really nails it. This is a great piece for a hotel breakfast area. It's not as good for a home.

This wire cart would work well in REALLY upscale modern kitchens. You know, the type that don't have upper cabinets, but there are wire shelves. It's something like you'd expect a professional chef to have at home.

If this does not describe you or your home, I'd avoid it. It's going to look cheap in the wrong kitchen, and it really shouldn't.