Progress....

Joe took out the windows and I will drop them off at the window guy's on Monday. The putty is just falling out of them...and one was broken. There are four windows in this room. This took a while because they were pretty stuck...he has it scraped down to bare wood in the window frame. I'll be so glad to be rid of the old cracked paint.
Our hardware is pretty charming but most of the latches no longer work. We'll have to see if we can get them working.
I love these hinges. Looks like hugs and kisses to me.
And here's the inside.

We're Redoing Daughter's Room

I don't have a real before. The wood wasn't painted and is pine...and was filled with holes from years of hardware hanging. The walls were painted Pepto Bismol pink. There are hardwood floors, but the floor in this room was so stained from someone's pet that we put in carpet. This is how we decorated it for our daughter when she was about 4. I love the woodwork painted white and I think it is appropiate since the wood is just pine and it fits the simple folk type of house this is. The room was pretty, but these days it's just plain tired and chipped and in need of attention. These are old pics. It's been a nice room for all these years but now our daughter is 16 now and ready for a change anyway. She wants bright, bright colors and since I can easily repaint later we are going to indulge her.

Stay tuned...today we are scraping, filling, sanding............

Stewing

Some people love to cook. They love to chop, stir, and get a bang out of creating with food. I'm not one of those people. But I love having those people for friends! I do love to eat and I have a family that loves to eat so I've learned to cook. One of my favorite things to make and eat is soups and stews. This one is so easy and soooo good.

2 lbs stew meat
1 onion chopped
2 stalks celery chopped
2 potatoes chopped
6 carrots chopped
2 tsp. salt
1 Tbsp. Sugar
2 Tbsp. Minute tapioca
1/2 cup tomato juice

Put it all in a covered pan and cook in a 250 degree oven for 5 hours.

That's it. Easy as pie...no easier. I usually add a couple more potatoes and another 1/2 cup of tomato juice because everyone here likes seconds.

About that Porch....

So, I finally found all the pics and took a few today...brrrr...cold out on the porch today!

Here's our house before we did the back "porch." As you can see a driveway leads to it...it was some kind of little carport. I'm not sure what we're going to do with that drive....

A little closer before. It had a hodge podge of windows...some missing...it was just a mess.
Here it is after. As you can see we do not have central air yet, so you get the pretty window air conditioners. We used the Screen Tight system and we bought it at Lowes. In fact all the supplies except the concrete and paint came from Lowes.
I can't believe I'm even showing this. This whole area was always stacked up with stuff to keep it out of the weather and it was awful looking...unfortunately we use this door all the time. It was dark and ugly and didn't have screens or glass in some of the windows, so it basically became an ugly storage shed...that you walked through to go inside :(
After. Soooo much better. It's actually one of our favorite rooms now. Water used to run in from outside because this floor was lower than the concrete outside...we added a several more inches of dyed concrete and now it's nice and dry!

Before:

After. We finished off the walls in siding matching our exterior siding. The ceiling is covered in beadboard:

Before (someone was even braver with color than I!):

After:

Before, coming in from the garage and patio:

After (in the cold...please excuse our kindling piled up there!):

Here's a shot of the ceiling just because I really like how it came out. Joe installed fixtures he salvaged from an old factory..green enamel. The trap door leads to a little storage space above the porch. We are going to replace that old seventies door with one salvaged from a victorian home near here.

All the work was done by my husband, Uncle Bob, my dad, Joe's dad and Joe's friend Tom. And then my mom and sisters and I painted. They spent a lot of hours helping us and we are eternally grateful!

Pretty Package

I mailed off an etsy sale and this is what the package looked like. The bookmark is made from the wool (felted, or fulled) from the skirt in the stack from the post below. And some vintage trim and button. Even the bead in the center of the button came from an old necklace. I'm giving the bookmark as a thank you for the sale...but I may make more to sell.

I didn't forget the porch pics...I found almost all the ones I need. The state of my photo collection is sadly unorganized. Most of my photos are actual paper prints since we just went digital recently. And let's just say I really need to spend a ton of time scrapbooking. And make it very simple so I can get a lot of years done fast!

Bag Sale!

Our local charity shop is clearing out the winter stuff...fill a bag for a dollar! I got some wool sweaters, wool skirts and jumpers, and corduroy. All for $2! Yea! Now to wash it all within an inch of it's life...hope it all felts nicely. Might not be able to find wool as easily now that everyone is getting ready for spring. I picked up the corduroy to try and make a hobo bag for the rest of the winter. They are jumpers and already have neat reinforced pockets that will make a nice front for the bag.

I'm searching for some before pics so I can do a post about renovating our back porch. Hopefully I can find them and get it together sometime tomorrow.

Happy Valentine's Day!!

Had a little fun last night making valentines. And everyone got chocolate...Colleen too, but she's already eating hers. I found the perfect postcard for my bicyce loving husband while I was on vacation last year. I saved it for today because of the heart.

Snow Day!

Well, it was for almost everyone. I worked in the card shop downtown. We were one of the few businesses that wasn't closed by noon. You should have seen the poor guys who waited till the last minute treking into town....afraid they will be snowed in tomorrow for Valentine's Day. Very amusing!

My daughter was thrilled to stay home from school today, but my son left to go somewhere in his truck. For some reason, my 19 year old young man does not understand the need to reassure mom and dad that he's safe in this weather. Hopefully we'll hear from him soon.

Joe came home from work early and busted out the snowblower. Thank goodness for that tool! We have nothing compared to New York, but it's a pretty good storm for around here.

"Felt" like sewing

I've been having the best time making things out of the thrifted clothing I felted recently. These are a couple of the pins I made from old wool sweaters and suits. And another little piece of the tattered quilt. As I said before, I love sewing on this fabric. It feels so nice and doesn't ravel. It's been soo cold here lately, and in the evening I've been sitting by the fire watching TV and making these.
I figured out a way to cover the pin hardware too, so that the only part that shows is the pointy bit you need to attach it to a coat or bag. If you are interested I have these on etsy.

True Blue

Look at those lovely blues. I just sent them through the washer and dryer today and they felted up nicely. The GW store was having buy 2 get one free...I also got some reds. This could become very addicting.