What a surprise and some blooms too

Good morning everyone. It is Sunday, breezy, and partly cloudy. Another gorgeous day in so. FL. This weather is ‘why’ people move down here, or stay here for the next few months.

Below is the morning sky looking to the west with the moon.

Here is the sun coming up and shining on the clouds. Sorry about the power lines. The 5 lane road is to the right.

Yesterday morning I had a wonderful surprise when I started reading one of the blogs I follow. I had completely forgotten about the drawing she was having.

I found Nicki Lee’s RavioLee Dreams blog through Stitchin Fingers, which I am now a member of. There are so many wonderful stitchers in this group. Anyway, Nicki Lee hand dyes Venetian lace and sells them in lots. She also does beautiful crazy quilting pieces. Here is her Etsy shop link Raviolee Dreams. If any of you do crazy quilting or scrap booking or other projects that can use lovely bits like these, do give her a visit. She just might have what you are looking for.

My surprise was that I won the $30 gift certificate for her hand dyed laces. I was thrilled and yelled I won, and was laughing and almost crying I was so excited. DH had to come see what all the fuss was about. I was thrilled to say the least and he was happy for me.

She is sending them out to me tomorrow. I can hardly wait to see them and then start using them. I will post pics of my sweet little pretty pieces of Venetian lace after I get them.

This was started earlier ~ We decided to go to HD for a sheet of 11/32”x4’x8’ plywood for the caravan’s door, and two 3/4”x4’x8’ sheets of styrofoam, for insulation material. DH is making the door as we didn’t have one for the camper. The original door was a short one. He is using the lock and handle from original door though. He is making a window with panes, that will open out, to let in breezes.

Anyway, we stopped at a yard sale, something we haven’t done in ages. There wasn’t much there, but there was a small, narrow Christmas tree I was interested in, a CD of symphonies and DH was interested in a couple of small hand tools, both American made. We got all for $3. The tree even has little clear lights on it and I’m already thinking of how I want to decorate it. This is smaller than the other small tree we have, plus we have the humongous one. I did the huge one last year and didn’t feel like it this year. This little tree is just right. It’s about 3 1/2’ tall, including the plaster pot that it is in, which I will cover with something or other.

I didn’t have to work yesterday so I played outdoors. I gathered up bricks to use as a border for our little caravan patio. I placed them, but still have to dig out dirt to make them level with the rest of patio. I’ve got to add some rocks into cracks between stones, then DH is going to mix up cement to fill in spaces on top of the rocks.

The rusty cast iron piece between two chairs is an old wringer washing machine base, found of course. I will probably leave it rusty, just clean it up a bit we don’t mind rust.

I brought an ‘old’ cement donkey and cart that someone gave us many years ago when we helped her have a big estate sale before she moved, to beside the caravan. I’ve still got some tweaking to do of this area, it all takes time. I’m not going to leave that greenish pot there, it doesn’t go at all.

Now for some blooms from this morning.

The first two pictures are of Chrysler Imperial. These two blooms were filling the whole area with their wonderful old rose scent.

I looked a little while ago and this bud was fully open.

Pink Pet or Caldwell’s Pink.

Plumbago

I loved the salvia color against the new growth on Chrysler Imperial.

The next two pictures are of South African foxgloves. This was a volunteer.

Next we have a ‘weed’, a native though, called Spanish needles. The seeds are these little long things that stick to you and that’s how they spread. The plants are tough and hard to pull up, and butterflies love them. I try to pull up most of them though, because they are a pain.

I guess that’s it for now. Oh yea, I did buy two bags of potting soil at HD for growing seeds and cuttings in. Hope to work with that this week before heading back to work Thurs-Sat.

Hope you all are having a lovely day and also have a great week.

FlowerLady

It was a gray, rainy day ...

So I decided to go up into the attic for our tree and the decorations. This year I decided to do the 'big' tree. I was inspired because of two bloggers trees that they recently posted about. One is Donna's wonderful funky tree. It can be seen here, at Funky Junk Interiors. And the other tree is by Jeri. Her lovely tree with it's antique jewels can be seen here, at Hopalong Hollow.

After insulating the attic a year or so ago, DH did some rearranging up there and put all the Christmas boxes right near the ladder at the west end of the attic. It's all easy to get to and I enjoyed seeing the boxes and reading what was in them. My excitement for the days' project was revving up. I got the tree trunk in the stand and started putting on the limbs and then saw that the thing was crooked in the stand. It was slipping so wouldn't stand straight, having lost it's piece of cork that we had used before. I started taking bottom branches off, to see if I could remedy the situation with a shim, but that didn't work. I went out to DH's workshop and told him my problem, he came in to take a look, and ended up going back to workshop with tree trunk and stand. He brought it back in a little while later, ready to be inserted in stand and ta da, it's straight and should always be so from now on.

This tree was another one of our 'curbside' finds 2-3 years ago. It was right on the street east of us thrown out still all put together, but without a stand. Of course, FlowerLady had to have this tree because it was gorgeous, and FREE. Since our cottage is small, I got the idea, to leave off some of the branches on the back side so that I could move it closer to the wall and it wouldn't stick out into the room as far. It worked great, I just had to use some of DH's heavy little metal weights from his workshop. They work fine in the stand, on the back side.

The lights were also found curbside in the last year or so, and I was thrilled that they all worked. Once I had the lights on the tree, then the real fun began. Unpacking and hanging the ornaments. It was an all day job, as I walk around the tree seeing where I want to place each ornament. Sometimes I move them, because they could look better over here, or wait maybe over here. Ah yea, that's just right.

Some of these ornaments are really old, passed down from DH's family. Some my late MIL gave us each year until she passed away. She had started the tradition with her kids when they were little. Others we've collected through the years, and some were given to us, plus I was involved in a Christmas ornie swap with some friends for about 5 years in a forum, where we exchanged handmade ornaments.

After decorating all day, around 5 or so I was basically done with the tree, and pooped! Now I just have to hang ornaments where ceiling and wall meet, and set up the creche. That won't be until Sunday though, as I am working at my job today and tomorrow.

Here is a little peak at the tree as taken this morning from my little space. There will be more pictures once I get the rest done, and all the boxes back up into the attic.





The Christmas spirit

~ Love ~

changes hearts and lives.

Pat Boone

Zone 10 ~ s.e. FL