Are You Kidding ... It Can't Be Wednesday Already???

Oh my ... where has this week gone?  I have been faithfully chipping away at my To Do list, day by day, paying very little attention to what day it actually is.  Since I was last here a few days ago, I have accomplished a LOT.  Settle in and let's get caught up.

Saturday.  

Toured four beautifully decorated houses in downtown Fredericksburg during the annual Christmas Candlelight Tour.

Played hostess in the living room of one of the tour houses in the afternoon.

Spent the evening with our grandsons while our daughter and her husband went to her work Christmas party.

This is how our daughter found me (and Grandson #1) when they got home.

Sunday.

Met a greyhound hauler from Florida to pick up three dogs who were going to an adoption group in Maryland.

Missed the Greyhounds Rock meeting, because the hauler ran into bad weather on his trip north and was running late.  Participated in the meeting via cell phone after I dropped off the dogs.

Hung out with some very fun, very crafty women at The Empty Nest ... making Christmas decorations, eating, and lots of laughing.  Thank you, Janet, for hosting us!!

Monday.

Bug out of the house while the cleaning lady is here, and continue to chip away at the Christmas Shopping List.  Made good progress.

Put lights on second Christmas tree ... this one isn't prelit, darn it.

This is our prelit tree in the family room, with shims under the stand because the floors in this old house are uneven in places.

I still have to put the skirt under it.

Edit and print Christmas Letter.  Letters from some people are nauseating brag fests, but ours isn't.  I tried to eliminate the letter years ago, but this was met with protests from everyone on our Christmas Card list.


Tuesday.

Go to Shumate Auction tag sale.  It was the estate of a seamstress, and I thought I'd find some cool sewing stuff.  I passed on the machines, notions, and fabric (though there was one bolt of Waverly toile that I really, really wanted ... but had no use for.)  I left with a wonderful 6-board antique chest that will live in our guest/grandkid bedroom.

Address and mail Christmas cards and packages.  I only had two packages to wrap and mail, and about 30 Christmas cards.  The cards have glitter on them ... and so do I after handling them.

Make dog stew.  I supplement Ruby's commercial dog food with home-cooked veggie-meat-rice mixture ... cooking a large batch every few weeks and freezing most of it.  With only one dog to feed right now, this batch of stew will last for about 10 weeks.

Wednesday (today).

Finish the last few Christmas decorations and get the boxes and totes out of the entry hall.

Go to the vet to pick up a case of Dorothy's cat food.  (she eats prescription food to help with her tendency to develop urinary crystals.)

Write and mail Christmas cards that I forgot about on Monday.

Do laundry and pack for our trip to New York City this weekend.  This is a bucket-list item for The Husband.  We quit putting it off, and this year we have made time to spend a long weekend seeing the New York Christmas sights and a show with friends.  Ruby is spending the weekend with my parents, so I have to pack her things, too.

One of the other items on Monday's list was to de-shed Ruby, since I noticed that she was starting to blow her undercoat.

Even with all of this seemingly-nonstop activity, preparations for this Christmas are fairly relaxed.  I'm not stressing about shopping or decorating.  For shopping, I made a list and have stuck to it, for the most part.  The Husband did most of the house decorating while I was out doing other things over the weekend, and the place looks really nice.

Family room mantel

  

I love Christmas and all that comes with it!!  I expect that this year may be the best one yet!  (I say this every year.)

How are you doing with your Christmas preparations?

Meeting Myself Coming and Going

This weekend is going to be a wild one, with multiple commitments on both days and very little time to spend at home.  Fortunately, every single thing that we have to do is something fun!

Saturday afternoon, The Husband and I will be hosting at one of the houses in downtown Fredericksburg on the Christmas Candlelight Tour.  Historic Fredericksburg Foundation goes all out every year, and the homes are always beautifully decorated.

photo from the house we worked on 2012 Christmas Tour.

Because we are working the tour in the afternoon, we are taking the tour in the morning so we can see the other houses. 

photo from the house we worked on 2011 Christmas Tour.

Saturday evening, we plan to go out for dinner somewhere to take advantage of the fact that we will both be nicely dressed and looking very Christmas-y, then we will spend the evening at our daughter's house to babysit the grandkids.  Now that I think of it, I should take a change of clothes with me so I can get on the floor and play.

Sunday morning, bright and early, I will meet a hauler to pick up three greyhounds who are on their way from Florida to an adoption group in Maryland.  Transporting dogs like this has always been one of my favorite parts of working with greyhound adoption!

photo from a greyhound haul in 2012.

As soon as I drop off the dogs, we have to turn right around to make it to a meeting for Greyhounds Rock Fredericksburg, our charity that raises money for canine cancer research.  GRF meetings are always full of food and fun.  Our benefit in November was a great success ... this is the meeting where we figure out how much money we can donate to this year's beneficiary, The Mosby Foundation, and we start to plan what we will do in 2014.

Sweet Daniel, who died of lymphoma in May ... he didn't mind wearing those bunny ears.  He was such a good boy!

Sunday afternoon will be full of even MORE friends and fun!  I will be with the crew at The Empty Nest for crafts and girl time (and more food).

Whew!  I'm already tired from writing about this ... can't imagine how it will be after I actually LIVE it.  That's part of what Christmas is around here, though.  It's a season full of time with family and friends, doing good for others, enjoying decorations and great company.  I wouldn't have it any other way.

A Week's Worth of Posts, All At Once

How can it be Saturday already?  Where did the week go?

I spent part of each day in my basement workshop.  Some of the rose cuttings in the north window are starting to show roots!  This is the roadside rose that I rustled last month ... I showed it to you in THIS post.

 

 

Most of my workshop time was spent painting the cabinet doors and drawer fronts from my brother's kitchen.  There are a lot of them, and the finish I want requires that each of them be painted multiple coats of two colors, both front and back, so it's going to take a while.  The top color is a custom mix of Annie Sloan Chalk Paint, that I showed you in THIS post.  This kitchen is going to be so retro and happy!

 

 

 

Mrs. Wren is now sitting on five eggs in her nest in the pot in my greenhouse.   See her tucked WAY down inside there?  It's hard to get a decent photo because the white perlite bag is in the way in every angle but this one.

 

 

 

The new Romantic Homes magazine came out this week, and my friend Janet's shop is featured in a fantastic article, with photos taken by her son!  See that little greenhouse in the corner of her display window?  Yep, I built that.  No mention of this in the article, but that's okay ... I am thrilled that all of the hard work that Janet has put into her shop is being recognized on a national level.  Love you, Janet!

 

 

 

A strong line of storms passed through our area on Thursday.  Whenever things like this are predicted, I always worry about my trees.  Last time we had a big storm, we lost two of the large Oak trees in our front yard.  (See the damage in THIS post)  Fortunately, this storm passed just to our south.  We had rain, but little wind and no damage.

 

 

 

Thursday's sunset, after the storm was gone, was a beautiful one ... as seen from our deck, looking toward Hartwood Winery next door.

 

 

 

Friday dawned with a beautiful blue sky, puffy clouds, and cool, comfortable temperatures.  It was a great day to do something outside.

 

 

 

Normally, this means working in the garden.  This day, though, I decided that it was long past time to clean up my Mustang and get it ready for convertible season.  It was so dirty and dusty after sitting in the garage all winter.

 

 

 

With the car all washed and waxed and polished (and myself and The Husband cleaned up, too), we spent part of yesterday evening at the local Friday night classic car cruise in.  There was a fantastic selection of cars last night ... with the Mustangs making a respectable showing.  That's a 1970 427 Cobra Jet parked beside mine.

 

 

 

To end on a garden and rose related note ... yesterday morning, I saw my first Japanese Beetle of the year.  This seems to be a little bit later than usual ... beetles arrived on June 4 in 2011, and I didn't note the day of their appearance in 2012.  We have had very few beetles for the past three years ... I wonder what this year will be like?

 

 

 

There you have it, a whole week's worth of blog posts in one shot!  The weather today is almost a gorgeous as yesterday.  Am I going to work out in the garden like I should?  Nope ... I'm spending today with Deborah, and we are going to hang out and hunt junk all day.

 

Have a great weekend!

 

All That Glitters ...

I've been feeling crafty.  The only one of this past weekend's sales that held any appeal for me was the one at Michael's (craft store).  I have an idea for a really unique decoration for our front porch, and I needed to get the components for some of the ornaments.  I left Michael's with a basket full of clear plastic Christmas balls, and a sixteen papier mache stars ... all half price!

I will show you the balls later, once I'm finished with them.  For now, this is what I did to the stars.

 

 

And here is a step-by-step of how I did it.   Normally, I wouldn't do a tutorial about how to paint and glitter some papier mache stars, assuming that everyone knows how how this is done.  I discovered while helping Janet at her shop last week, though, that there are folks out there who have never used glitter and needed to be shown what to do with it. 

 

It seems like most projects around here involve Chalk Paint in some way.  In this case, I used Old White to put a quick base coat onto my stars.

 

 

 

 

 

After the paint dried (which didn't take any time at all), it was time for glitter.  I used Diamond Dust, which is a clear glass glitter that's available in just about any craft store.  It looks like coarse sugar and was exactly what I needed to make my stars sparkle.

 

 

 

Brush a generous coat of glue (I used Elmer's) onto one side of the star. 

 

 

 

Use a spoon to sprinkle glitter all over the glue.  The excess falls into the pan.  Keep scooping and sprinkling till no more glitter will stick to the star, then gently shake any loose glitter into the pan.  Glass glitter is great because it's heavier than synthetic glitter and it doesn't get all over the place.

 

 

 

All done.

 

 

 

I applied glue and glitter to one side of each of my stars, and I laid them out on the counter to dry.  By the time I did the last star, the first one was dry enough for me to carefully do the reverse side.

 

The transformation from brown papier mache star to sparkly ornament is simple and perfect for what I'm planning.  (No hints ... I don't want to spoil the surprise.)

 

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Sending a special Thank You for those of you who have sent your Kitchen Window photos.  I am so excited to share these next week!  Don't know what I'm talking about?  Click HERE for details.

Drapes in the Dining Room

This post could also be titled "Following My Heart, and Being Myself No Matter What Others May Think".  You see, the journey from a 'lightbulb moment' in a fabric store to beautiful drapes that are perfect for our house was an emotionally difficult one.

In September, I was in Hancock Fabrics and I saw the most perfect potential drapery fabric.  I knew instantly that it would be totally wonderful in our house.  I snapped this photo, and I brought home a couple of their tiny sample swatches.

The little swatches hung on the windows in our dining room and family room, and the colors in the fabric were even more perfect in our house than they were in the fabric store.  I knew that I had found THE ONE!

I visited Janet at her shop a few weeks later, and I saw a roll of MY fabric in her work area.  I told her how much I loved it, and mentioned that I was planning to use it to make drapes in our dining room and family room.  Janet said, "That's the fabric Miss Mustard Seed used for her drapes."

When she said that, I felt like I had been punched in the stomach.  MY fabric was actually someone ELSE'S fabric ... I knew I would feel like a shameful copycat if I used it ... especially since the simple drapes I had in my imagination were very similar to what MMS has.  (I googled them as soon as I got home.) 

It wasn't that I minded that someone else had used the fabric and published it online ... I'd be silly to believe that no one had EVER made drapes like the ones I was imagining.  I got myself pretty deep in a feeling of insecurity, worrying that other people would THINK I was a copycat.  It's totally unlike me to even consider stuff like this ... what was I to do?

It was my friend Kat (dear, sweet Kat) who set me straight.  When I wrote to her about maybe not using the fabric, even though I loved it, she replied, "I say use that fabric and enjoy those drapes.  We can't decorate our houses for the internet, nor should we deny ourselves something we like because someone else has already used it..."

Thank you, Kat!!  Your words of wisdom helped more than you know, and I am very, VERY grateful that I took your advice, and followed my heart.

Without further delay, allow me to introduce ... our new dining room drapes.  (I snapped a few quickly-styled photos for you with my iPad this morning.)

The ceilings on the main level of our house are nine-and-a-half feet high, and these drapes emphasize that height and add definition to the room.  I am over-the-moon delighted with how they look.

Since the drapes are wonderful, I decided to do what I could to pull the rest of the dining room together.  I hung this gallery of The Husband's paintings on the wall above the blue buffet, and I love how it looks ... I need to find something to put on the top of the buffet, tho.

This corner cupboard holds a little flat-screen TV, so I can watch the news while I cook.  The top of the cupboard looked like a good place for a graduated stack containing two of my primitive painted tool boxes and a child's toy trunk.  The wall clock is an 1840's ogee clock from Connecticut, and the antlers are the same ones that I originally hung over the door in our office ... they look way better here in the dining room.

From the moment I hung the first of the two sets of drapes in this room, I knew that I had done the right thing.  These simple drapes, gathered on a rod, hanging from ceiling to floor, are the perfect choice for this room ... I am so happy about this!!  

The moral of this story is .... I followed my heart, and I am delighted with the results.  Kat, my friend, I am ABSOLUTELY enjoying these drapes!

Today in the Workshop

I spent a good part of today in my workshop.  It felt good to have tools in my hands, because it has been quite a while since I had the time or the inclination to build anything. 

What was I working on, you ask?

My friend Janet (of The Empty Nest) used salvaged windows to help decorate the walls of her new shop.  She had some windows left over, and she asked me if I would use them to make a mini greenhouse for her. 

I delivered the greenhouse to Janet at her shop this afternoon, and she squealed and hugged me when she saw it.  I'm really excited to see what she does with it.  Since she's such a chalk paint magician, I have no doubt that it will be beautiful when she's finished. 

 

Virginia Garden Week ... Fredericksburg Tour

Every year during the last week in April, garden clubs throughout Virginia offer tours of beautiful houses and gardens during Virginia Garden Week ... this is the 79th year!  The tour in Fredericksburg, hosted by the Rappahannock Valley Garden Club, is always on Tuesday of Garden Week.  It's almost like a national holiday for me, and I try not to miss it.

I invited my mother and Janet (of The Empty Nest) to come along.  My mother is a seasoned garden tour goer, but Janet had never been before ... and she was very excited that I had invited her.  With the company of two of my favorite people, and wonderful houses to see, you know that we had a GREAT time.

The houses on this year's tour were in the neighborhood surrounding Kenmore, the home of George Washington's sister Betty Lewis.  Most of these homes were built in the late 19th or early 20th century, and they are lovingly preserved as family homes ... a lot our historic home ... though mine is still very much in the 'construction' phase of its preservation.

The mild winter we had this year has made for some strange combinations of plants at peak bloom in most of the gardens.  Usually for Garden Week, we are treated to the usual spring blooming Southern plants, like azaleas, daffodils, tulips, hellebores, etc.  This year, azaleas are in full bloom, and so were most of the roses we saw ... a full two weeks (at least) ahead of normal.

The homes were staged and decorated with beautiful flower arrangements done by the garden club ...  no photography allowed inside the houses, so I can't show you some of the most beautiful of the arrangements.  Here are some that were outdoors.

We saw this display in one of the gardens.  The little card says, "Cookies are for display only, please."  There was only one cookie left, and notice that the top plate is full of crumbs.

My favorite sight of the day, and the first photo I took, was a Lady Banks rose climbing a trellis on this yellow Victorian house.  I love it when I see a rose that is allowed to grow to its full potential ... instead of being subjected to radical pruning and torture in an effort to force it to fit into an ill-chosen spot.

Mom and Janet and I had SUCH a great time!!

There is more garden tour for me today.  I am hostessing at a home on Richmond's Monument Avenue tour this afternoon, and touring a few of the homes and gardens before my shift begins.  I have to hurry now, because I still have to get dressed.  (I love hostessing tours and telling stories!)

Stay tuned for photos of Richmond.