I got the new Pottery Barn catalog. I love to look at their accessories. Here’s my favorite thing in this month’s catalog:
I looked around for what I had and found a small vase, and I added…well…sticks! They are all I had. It needs some other things in it to make it look fuller, but it’s a start.
Here it is again…okay…it looks a little skeletal. When I’m at Hobby Lobby, I’ll get something to fill it out.
And then from a distance. It’s on the mantle. I wish it were bigger. Maybe it’ll grow!! Or grow on me!
Here’s another vase on the sofa table…
And some late summer flowers in the kitchen….
I actually cleaned the house today…just so my vases and sticks will look their best.
Bad stuff…have you ever seen that bumper sticker that reads “Go head…I’m low on estrogen and I’ve got a gun!” Believe me, if you see it, BEWARE.
Yesterday I was driving down what we Mendota folks call “802” (State Route 802) and others call “The Mendota Road.” I came upon a blue truck with a man and two females pulled off along side the road running parallel to the river. Running down the road a bit were two young dogs.
I just smelled a stink–people drop their unwanted pets in the country. I can imagine the conversation “oh there’s fresh water…wildlife…some farmer…oh the dogs can take care of themselves… and so forth.” Really pisses me off. In the words of my father, “anyone who drops off an animal needs to have a trip to the top of Clinch Mountain, be stripped naked, and let them find their way down.”
Back to my story….I slowed down, wrote down the tag number and made sure they knew I was writing down the tag number. I then asked if the dogs belonged to them. They said yes, and then I asked if they were dropping the dogs off. They said no, and I replied, “you better not…because I’ve got your tag number.” And then I zipped away in my little white Prius. Like Deputy Dog. After I was back on the road, I got a little worried that I’d get chased. But not too worried.
But today, something really nice happened. Good stuff. Mike and I went to Abingdon, and we decided to go to lunch at the Harvest Table in Meadowview. We’d put one of our birdhouse tables in the retail shop when the store first opened, and after all these years of it not selling, we thought we’d pick it up. It’s a table just like the one to the left of the bed in the picture below…
Anyway, no one could find the table. Everyone looked and looked for it. Steven Hopp, the owner, remembered the table. All of the employees recalled the table, but no one could find it! Thought it was upstairs..this room..that room..but still no table. Then, it was determined that “Molly” would know what had happened, and she did! It turns out the table had sold to a person who collects bird houses, and it had sold in December; but no one could reach us. So instead of picking up the table, we came home with a check for $166. The table sold for $250, and the store got one third of the price.
Two things happened in the last day or two that made me feel good.
The first thing is that Gerald, with me helping, opened the hives to see how much honey was inside, how the bees were doing and to treat for mites — varroa destructor is an external parasitic mite. Little bloodsuckers. I hate them. We’ve never treated our bees in the past, as we’d hoped that the hive would be healthy enough to sustain, but after losing all of our bees, we’re not taking any chances.
We got a nice surprise when opening up the hives..”Argh” Gerald said as he picked up the heavy super. It was heavy with honey. A good thing.
See the super (box of frames) in the upper part of the picture below? We installed that on top of the hive so the bees have more space for their honey. These bees will have plenty to eat and no mites. Hope!! Last year we were told that the fall honey flow was not a good one. We’re hoping this doesn’t repeat. At any rate, I’ll continue feeding these bees through October to ensure there is adequate food for them in the winter. We want to give them every opportunity to survive and succeed during the winter months.
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So at least for now, we’re beekeepers again. Mike took this picture of Gerald and me before he high tailed it away from the bee enclosure. He’s afraid of bees. Lots of people are. I don’t blame them. One stung me last week for the first time in 18 months. It hurt for about 36 hours.
My second good thing involved mostly work with quick results. Concurrent with our bee activities, I scrubbed the white vinyl fence around our backyard. Many of us dream of a little yellow house with a white picket fence. I did anyway. No one told me about the mildew. See the green on the “pickets”?
More green in this next picture…it was actually worse in many places. This isn’t as bad as some years.
I took a Windex bottle that was made for attaching a hose and spraying windows. However, instead of window cleaner, I put a half bleach/half water solution in the bottle and sprayed the fence. And I rubbed on it with a sponge in the really dirty spots. It doesn’t seen to harm the plants.
Here’s how it looked after this process…
Woohoo…I think that painted fencing is prettier than vinyl fencing, but when it comes to keeping them up, the vinyl wins. Just some elbow grease and bleach, and it looks very nice.
I slapped our marigolds from our JSB Horticulture Class in the dirt early in the spring…I almost gave these away. I’m glad I didn’t because they look so cheerful.
So..there’s some Rudbeckia my sister, Pat, gave me a few years back, some marigolds and a Cala Lilly my sister, Nancy, gave me. My sister garden. All kind of wild looking.
I’m going to work tomorrow and then be back at my Little Bathroom Project with the “Eternity” paint that is taking me an eternity to finish. I’ve still got the commode wrapped up like a giant tomato in red Saran Wrap.
If you read my blog last night, I told you that my bathroom would be painted a “lovely blue gray” color called Eternity. Well, it is going to be an eternity before I get this monster painted.
I started with the commode. Mike mentioned taking it out, and I assured him it was not necessary as I’d read on the internet to simply wrap the commode in Saran Wrap and paint behind it. Of course that is true because I saw it on the internet. Here’s my wrapped commode. Fashionably wearing red.
To wrap this little sucker I had to do gymnastics. I’ve never hugged a commode like I hugged this one as I scooted and pulled Saran wrap around it. If someone had entered my bathroom at just the right time, they would have seen me lying on my back with my head wedged between the wall and the commode painting with rollers, artist brushes and foam craft brushes. Anything I could find. And I can tell you…it just doesn’t seem right to be staring up at a commode. It’s weird.
But amazingly, the Saran Wrap deal worked. I’m that lovely gray blue, too, but the commode remained white and the wall was painted behind it. Probably not very well, but it’s painted.
This is going to take much longer than I thought. It will be days. Luckily, I learned I can wrap my paintbrush in Saran Wrap and place it in the refrigerator to keep it from drying out. Guess where I learned that?
As I’d mentioned before, we’re changing out the mirror, the light, the spigot, the paint and the hardware on the cabinets on our little bathroom. Since that post happened, I’ve bought a light fixture and spigot, returned the light fixture and spigot, and now I’ve got another new one. Moving along…So, you probably think it’s done, right?
Other than shopping for lights/fixtures, I’ve got very little done. I read how to take down the mirror which is glued up, and the first step was to tape the mirror so that when it comes down, it doesn’t shatter. It’s taped in this picture, so that was progress, right?
Wrong. I changed my mind. I’m not taking the mirror down now. See the piece of wood that is on the left side of the mirror in the picture below? Mike is going to build a frame, which will be painted black, and we’ll mount it on top of the mirror. This decision was made when the words “drywall repair” started haunting me. If we pull the mirror down, we’ll be patching drywall.
After I took this picture, I had to remove all that stupid tape I put up. Thankfully, the mirror finish did not come off. And tomorrow, unless something unexpected happens, the room will transform into a lovely blue gray called “Eternity” by Benjamin Moore. Look how much lighter this wall will be when all the paint is up!
I felt so smug when Mike and I took a piece of plywood, painted it with chalkboard paint and trimmed it with yardsticks as a reminder board for our Garage Organization Project (see post here with the reminder board at the bottom.) We hung our masterpiece right by Mike’s truck, and it is a perfect spot. I felt so smart….had anyone else ever thought of something so good? You know the answer.
Reality surfaced when I visited Hometalk and searched on “Ruler” and “Yardstick”!! Yardsticks and rulers may be the next Mason jar when it comes to repurposing. There’s so many things you can do with them, and they’re CHEAP. Like about 50 cents each! I started clipping for potential projects. The folks at Hometalk are letting me show off my clipboard entitled “Repurposed Ruler and Yardstick Projects.” I’m so excited. Mendota, Virginia meets Hometalk. Here it is!! You can just click on it to go to Hometalk and read more about the projects.
If you’re new to Hometalk, please take a peek. It’s a great place to share ideas, ask questions, look at pictures, etc. It’s like a very good magazine that goes on forever, and it’s easy to save the good ideas you find by “clipping” them! I’m an insomniac so Hometalk is a good place to hang out when there’s no one else in the world awake. I clipped my own project, too, because I wanted to show it off. Sorry.
Just so you know….let’s not confuse yardsticks and rulers with measuring tape. No! No! No! Measuring tapes are the opposite of yardsticks, and I hate them. They measure stupid things…like hips and waists. Let’s not talk about them.
Thank you for reading RiverCliff Cottage. Your visiting here makes my day.
When my cousin called from South Carolina and said they were coming up…I thought “what are they going to do? It’s raining nonstop here, and it could be so boring.” “Boring is good,” Alisa said. And then, they arrived, and to keep everyone on their toes, I called Alisa (correct name) “Alisha” (incorrect name) and mixed up Caroline and Rebecca all weekend long. They were so gracious not to say anything. Oh…and I never bothered to clean the house and didn’t get groceries this week, but it all worked out!! Hey…they’re family!! Here they are…oh…and that is Andy. My grandmother, Eva Sproles, is his great grandmother–that is how we are all related. We are “first cousins, once removed.”
I should not have worried about being bored. Andy was easy to entertain. He likes to hunt and fish, and we live on the river. Plus — we gave him and Oth (my sweet nephew in-a-way) an assignment — rid us of the skunks that are entering the bee enclosures. Twenty-four hours later we are down four skunks. You are looking at the Skunk Dynasty. “Stinky, Stinky,Stinky.”
And what did the girls and I do? We payed our tribute to A. P. Carter and the Carter Family by taking pictures of the store (now a museum) and the Carter cabin. Here’s a couple of the pictures..
And since these three are serious quilters, we visited Tennessee Quilts in Jonesboro and Short Sheets in Bristol. I’m inserting about ten pictures that are a feast for your eyes. These ladies and these pictures have made me zealous in my desire not just to learn to quilt but to have one done by Christmas. Think I can do it? Yes!
Are you loving it? Who cares about the upcoming Bristol Race? It’s not “Gentlemen…start your engines.” It’s “Ladies…grab your scissors (actually rotary cutters). Here’s my “Fat Quarters.”
Learning all kinds of new quilt slang…these are “jellyrolls”!!
And the Carter Family tribute that we started on Saturday morning as we took pictures? Serendipity stepped in and we continued on Sunday morning at Mt. Vernon Church. Oscar Harris, Dale Jett, Laura Cash and Daryl Jayne gave us great music — Carter Family style! We shovedpushedjumped stepped in and had our picture taken…Daryl is missing as he’s behind the camera!!
PS! Alisa and I have something in common! She is a blogger, too! I would appreciate it you’d visit her site some day and say hello. She’s a teacher, and she’s the kind that everyone wants their third grader to have as their teacher. Here’s the link:
http://alisalamb.blogspot.com/
Hope you have a great week. Please be sure and visit again during the week. Hometalk has been nice enough to feature one of my “Clipboards.”
I mentioned in a post a few weeks ago that I was reading “Flight Behavior” by Barbara Kingsolver. The author enjoys pulling readers into the relationships in the book…to allow us (the readers) to see things from other folks’ perspectives. However, the final pages are the ones that have lingered with me. In this book, which I hope I don’t spoil for anyone, the monarch butterflies…the King Billies...are wintering in East Tennessee vs. Mexico. There are many factors as to why…the changing climate, availability of milkweed, etc., but it’s not a good thing. It seems to be an impossible situation.
However, there is an inkling of hope as a few of the monarchs survive the winter in spite of all of the perils. We don’t know their final outcome, but we are given hope that they may be evolving and adapting to the new “now.”
And even though it’s not “time” to put out fall decor if you’re a person who follows that type of thing (I am), these guys are tired of lying around on the ground. They are “done” and I’m adapting.
Not just one…but a bunch! A “gang” or a “gaggle”!
If you follow Pinterest, Southern Living and all the other places that feature pretty autumn pictures NEXT month, you know that I’m early in placing these pretty gourds in my foyer. What else is there to do???
This continues to be a year of change for us…our family is changing, my transition to not working is occurring, and our “dear girls” Gracie and Luckie are getting so old that they will not be with us much longer. Not all these changes are welcome or wanted, but we’re like the King Billies, we’ll adapt.
Thank you for reading RiverCliff Cottage. I hope all your changes are good ones!!
Hi! If I have misspelled words in this post, it’s my stupid laptop. The keyboard is not working right. It is under warranty but what a lot of trouble!
Mike and I are going to be working on our house again during the next 6-9 months. We’re getting the hardwood redone, redoing the kitchen counters, and fixing up this and that. I’m still working part-time for a few more weeks but I’ve already started one of the projects. Our “powder room” is dated, and we are starting there. By the way, when did “half bath” become “powder room?”
Here’s the room tonight…
I’m changing the light, the mirror, the spigot and the paint…maybe some of the cabinet hardware. I still enjoy Lisa Snead’s painting…but I can’t keep it and change the paint. Here’s a glimpse of her work…
Here ‘s the brassy spigot…I had wondered about painting it, but I just went ahead and bought new.
Tomorrow we’re removing the mirror which is glued to the wall. Guess who gave me instructions on this? My True Love…