Yesterday, we had our first snowfall of the season. Didn’t amount to much but made the neighborhood magical this morning. (Note: I’ve been reading too much L.M. Montgomery when I use “magical” in a sentence.)
Front porch. This morning.
Two weeks ago I met this guy wearing leather chaps in 70 degree weather. Two days ago he became a local celebrity when he called OnStar saying he was drunk and didn’t want to drive home.
Yesterday he was driving by the house. Welcome to my neighborhood.
Listen to the OnStar call.
I have a little sewing room that’s off the bedroom; it was one of the main selling features when buying the house. It used to be a separate bedroom up until the late 1970′s when the previous owners (actually two owners ago) cut that bedroom into its present sitting/sewing room and a full bathroom. I can shut off the water to the tub when reaching into the shelves in the sewing room.
The sewing room has two windows facing north and east. Great morning light. Steady natural light throughout the day. It’s toasty in winter and cool in the summer (the AC is in a window closest to an outlet).
Currently the room is very cluttered because I’m working on a project that should be done in the next two weeks. But I will show you my icon wall that’s behind the sewing machine.
My personal icon wall
I suppose they are not “technically” icons but they get me into the right place. Starting on the upper left, clockwise, is Dali’s Christ of St. John. Picked that up from a Saver’s, BTW. Next is Petrus Christus’ The Virgin of the Dry Tree. I LOVE this painting. The red cloak offset by the stark black background, framed by the brown branches. Beautiful. A Christmas present from Hubby. Sigh.
On the bottom are the words “Litany, Martyrs and Canticles.” I got the words, $2 each, from the Round Lake (NY) Antiques Festival. I placed them in a frame already in my possession and used a black t-shirt (soon for the rag pile) as the background. Finally, everyone’s favorite protestant-American image of Jesus. I think I got that from Saver’s, too. It’s in nice shape with a lovely gold frame.
The goal is to fill the wall. I recently spied an image of Theresa of Lisieux and have been thinking the space needs some little flowers.
Downgraded Irene kept the family inside. When the Wee One went down for a nap, Hubby and I started cleaning out a room that will eventually be Wee One’s bed room. While rummaging through a plastic container full of papers, I found a bag of foreign coins and notes.
Glorious.
In the bag are some worthless Egyptian Pound notes, enough Canadian coins to pay for a small cup of Tim Horton’s coffee, and 65 UK Pound notes. A quick online search indicates that I am $103 American dollars richer.
Thank you, Tropical Storm Irene!!!
Posted in Home
Not much happening around the homestead. I’m working on a project that should be finished in a few days and I’ll post pictures when completed.
In the meantime, enjoy a few minutes with the Monkees. One can never go wrong with the Monkees in late summer.
Posted in Home
A few weeks back, I related my adventures sanding and painting a kitchen chair in Me So Crafty IV. I had one other chair to give the same treatment.
My second project was the brown chair on the left.
I paid $5.00 for the chair at the Washington County Antique Fair and Flea Market. Unlike the first chair, the brown paint was like shellac. Even with a sander, the paint would not give up the ghost so easily. After a couple of days, I got down to the bare wood, painted two coats of Cherry Red paint and printed the leaf/branch motif.
Final Product
I crocheted a round seat cover for it but the cover reminds me of a brown turd, so I won’t publish it here.
Posted in crafts, Home, Uncategorized
Tagged crafts, Home, kitchen chairs, painting
For the first time since I received it in 1994, I actually utilized my sewing machine. It speeded up the process of sewing a pair of curtains for the window over the kitchen sink. I’m not going to show the step-by-step process because I did things that one is not supposed to do when sewing curtains because I didn’t use a pattern. I’m not going to show the back of the curtains because they ain’t pretty. They’re not horrible but they ain’t pretty. All I care about is the part I see every time I do the dishes. The neighbors can deal with the messy sewing bits.
Not too bad...from a distance.
I designed the tea pot motif and created a filet crochet edging.
The other day I was sitting on the floor of my circa 1840 parlor with my 17 month old daughter. We were looking at a photo of a family. I was pointing out each figure, “That’s a man, woman, boy, and girl.” I did that a couple of times.
Next, I asked, “Point to the girl.”
My brilliant daughter pointed to the girl in the picture.
Then I asked, “Point to the woman.”
She pointed to the empty foyer next to the parlor.
Oh, crap.
I don’t want to vacuum or wash anymore windows, so what is a girl to do? Get crafty.
I’m in need of two chairs for my kitchen table. Currently we are using our dining room table chairs which are too tall for the kitchen table but they’ve been doing the trick since November. Yesterday I replaced one of the chairs with my old school replacement.
Step 1. Buy a chair at Savers for $5.99.
My $5.99 chair had flaking white paint which I sanded down to the wood.
Step 2. Sand paint down to the wood keeping a rough texture.
Step 3. Spray two coats of Cherry Red indoor/outdoor paint ($2.50) and use black acrylic paint ($4.50) to stamp a branch/leaf motif ($8.00) on the seat. The result:
Looking very farmhouse.
The stamp adds a nice touch and I like the rough look of the paint..
…the neighbor down the street gives you a dozen fresh eggs from her chickens.
Delicious!
Brown Eggs are local eggs and local eggs are FRESH
