Goodies from some sweet prim friends!

I’ve had some fun things come in the mail lately!  Woo Hoo!  First, I ordered this lovely crow from Pam over at Olde Homestead Primitives.  She has some smaller ones that can be made into ornies or bowl fillers that I'm gonna have to get too.  They are so cute!  (Ugh! Can't wait to paint that wall within the next few weeks!).  Thank you Pam!

Then I won this awesome Liberty plate from Kat over at Cozy Country Home Fixins.  She is the sweetest thing!  She sent a cute little note with it that I’m going to tape to the back of the plate so I’ll never forget where it came from.  It makes me real excited about my primitive patriotic living room that I will be starting on this fall.  I wish I didn’t have to wait so long to get started on re-doing that room but it’s been fun buying (and winning!!) prim things for it.  Thank you Kat!

Lastly, I received this adorable Easter bunny from Lucy over at The Farmers Attic.   She sent it to me because I was her 100th follower.  It was a week later before I realized that I won something!  I was so shocked!  Isn't it just the cutest thing?!

Also in the box from Lucy was this sweet little cupcake pin cushion.  My four yr old was holding it and pulled on a button.  I thought he broke it off then I realized that it was a pin with a button on the end!  How clever is that?!  Very cute and what better place for it to be displayed than my sewing half-bath!

  

Then she threw in some little advertising extras which I love:  a pen, magnet business card and business card with a note on the back.  I love receiving little notes with my goodies.  I stuck it under the rabbit’s apron.  I just love having little notes somewhere on my goodies.  Does anyone else do this sort of thing??  I may not forget too soon where it came from, but I want to always remember the sweet person that poured their heart into their creations.  Lucy also sent me a neat little pocket testament of the book of John.  Thank you Lucy!

Moving on to more fun things…  I never have any luck at our Good will stores.  The prices are so high when there is something neat.  I’ve just about given up on them.  I still go every once in awhile.  But I discovered this junky old thrift store.  There are no prices.  You gather up all you want, take it to the counter and they give you a price on it all.  You can either accept it or deny it.  It’s actually kinda fun!  So I unloaded all this junk on the counter and he told me 10 bucks.  I said “That’s doable.”  Hehe!

Some of it I have already painted.  I am going to Missouri to visit some family this weekend and planning on hitting some antique stores.  There are some that sell Briwax there.  I can't find it anywhere around me.  So I'm gonna load up on a couple of colors.  My nieces use it on everything and LOVE it!  You can apply it with steel wool.  It sands, antiques, and seals your projects all in one step instead of having to do multiple steps and it's very durable!  Awesome!  I can't wait to use it.  Has anyone used it or tried it?

  Not sure what I'm going to do with all those plaques along the bottom of the picture.  I might paint on them or cut out some wallpaper border to decoupage.

While I'm on the subject of promoting products, I just discovered another incredible product for wood!  Our home has solid oak all over the place.  One of these days I'll show you what I mean.  It's beautiful but... lots of work to take care of it when you have three kids bouncing around your home.  This product is made right here in Oklahoma, not too far from where we live.

I'm ever so thankful that Rich helps out by doing laundry but when he washed jeans, he would throw them over the door to dry.  I started noticing that it was weathering the door pretty badly.

 

Here's a closer look.  EEK!

I lightly applied "The Victorian House" with steel wool.  Only wiping it, not rubbing the steel wool into the wood.  Wipe it off with paper towels until the towels are clean.  Look at the final result.  Amazing!!

I wish my pictures were better so you could see how incredible it really is.

I wish for you all a beautiful Easter surrounded by family and friends.  I pray that you will join me in celebrating the risen King, the reason we celebrate this delightful holiday.  Thank you for joining me on this day and have a blessed week!

Spring Break

Wow!  Where does the time go?!?  We are in-between sports right now so there should be time somewhere but I’ve seemed to have lost it!  It seems like March was just beginning.  I was so excited for spring to start and here it is already April and Easter right around the corner.  What happened to the Passion Week plans I was making for my family?  Here it is… Passion Week half over and we haven’t done a thing!  I need to spend some time with God showing me how to be a better time manager because obviously I’m way off!

Spring break came and went so quickly, we barely had time to enjoy it.  It was the middle of March.  My original plans were for a major de-cluttering, organizing, and cleaning in each of the three kids’ bedrooms.  I briefly mentioned to my mom back in the winter that maybe we could take a trip to Illinois to visit family over spring break.  I hadn’t been up there in awhile.  Well, as you can guess… mom’s plans over-ride my own.  So with three kids in tow, I head to Missouri Saturday for a big family get-together.  My parents just got back from their winter stay in Mexico.  Every year, they host a big pizza party so they can see everyone again.  As always, I had a delightful time catching up with everyone because I hadn’t seen them since Christmas.  I love this picture of Robbie with his little cousin Abbie.  She was born with a cleft lip.  Poor little thing has been through more surgeries in her four years of life than most adults will ever go through in their life time.  She is a sweet, beautiful thing and such a fighter too!  There is little evidence now of her cleft lip.

Sunday morning, we head out with Mom for Peoria, IL.  That is where all her family lives.  Along the way, we found this wind turbine farm.  It was awesome for us to see.  I finally realize what those long things are that we see semi’s carrying.  Haha!  We had to go down a few country side roads to get these pictures, but I LOVE country side roads!

While in Princeville, we came across this memorial for veterans of the town.  My Granddad and all my uncles served in the Navy and all were Seabees.  I discovered that my great-uncle, my granddad, and my uncle all served in World War II.  Two of my uncles served in Viet Nam.  My great-grandfather and great-uncle served in the Civil War.  Those that are still alive have never talked about wars so I had no idea.  I felt such pride when I read through the names.  I wish I could hear their stories of courage.

We didn’t do much sight-seeing on this trip.  It was all about visiting family and of course lots of food is always involved when my family gets together.  A little shopping with my aunts was thrown in also.  We all had a great time, even the kids.

We headed back home on Wednesday and stopped in St. Louis to see the arch. 

You don’t realize the massiveness of this unique monument until you stand beside it.

The water was up slightly at the riverfront.  Lol!  This is a Lewis & Clark statue.

It was nice to get out and stretch for awhile and break up the long trip home.

Since this was sort of a last minute trip decision, Rich had to stay home and work.  I was so thankful to have my older two kids to help out with the young one.  Ryan and Robbie have a wonderful relationship and I’m so thankful for it!  You wouldn’t have thought it would turn out this way because Ryan wanted nothing at all to do with Robbie when he was born.  Nothing!  Now, I have to practically tear them apart when they’re wrestling and playing.  So this picture is very dear to me.  Also, the little Mickey Mouse that Robbie is holding Ryan won for him in one of those little machines at a restaurant.  Robbie never laid it down for a second the whole time on the trip.  He kept thanking Ryan for winning it for him.  It was so cute!

We had a wonderful time on our trip.  I know the kids enjoyed this way more than cleaning their rooms.  It was a very long 12 hours from Princeville, IL to Bruner, MO to Catoosa, OK.  That’s when I really missed Rich the most!  My mom doesn’t like to drive so it was me all the way.  My back and bottom were so sore.  Ha!  What surprised me the most was how well behaved the kids were all the way home.  I did more complaining than they did.  I had to have more pee breaks than them.  I’m still bewildered about it!

I'm grateful for time that God allows me to spend with my family and I'm grateful for a family that I desire to spend time with!

Happy Spring!

Thank you, dear sweet friends for your kind comments on my posts.  Family is so very important to me-- those that are here now and those that have gone on.

My kids were on spring break last week.  So we took off to Missouri to pick up my mom and headed to Illinois to visit my Mom's side of the family.  We had a great time and even did some shopping.  But since Rich stayed home to work, I didn't get to enjoy shopping much with three kids with me.  They got some new clothes, but the prim pickins' had to wait!  On our way home, we stopped at the Arch in St. Louis.  We didn't have time to go up inside it because I was driving straight through to get home.  12 hours on the road in one day is not fun.  My shoulders, lower back and bottom were so sore by the time I got home!  My mom doesn't like to drive but that was okay, it was so nice to have her with us on our trip.  I was so surprised at how well my kids behaved with NO complaining!  I was so proud of them!  Even little 4 yr. old Robbie was a great boy all the way home.  Thank You Lord!!

At the end of the week we headed out to Ft. Smith, AR to visit some friends.  My trusty iphone took us to this quaint little place when I put “travel info center” into the map search.

It was a beautiful house inside and out.  We went through a tour of the whole house.

As we were leaving, Rich thanked me for taking us to a brothel!  Oh my word!  I had no idea!  We found this out during the tour, but it would have been awkward to just leave so we got to hear about the building's past.  Their brochure even proudly proclaims on the front in big letters, “Our brothel still takes care of visitors!”  Wow!

We had a most enjoyable time spending the week visiting family and friends.  We are surely blessed! 

On March 20th, the first day of spring, we headed out in snow to AR.  It was so odd considering we were at 74 degrees the DAY before!  It is crazy how this Oklahoma weather changes so quickly.  Goodness!

The snow is gone and the sweet little snowman my daughter built has finally melted away.  My daffodils popped back up after the snow had them lying on the ground.  It is finally spring!  It was so nice to finally open the windows and air out our home!  I wanted to share my spring decorations with you.  I don’t decorate for “Easter”.  It’s only been within the past couple of years that I actually started collecting birds, rabbits, and eggs with a prim look to them.   I didn’t want my kids thinking we celebrate Easter because the Easter bunny brings us goodies so I never played up the Easter bunny.  I wanted them to know the real reason.  Then one day it hit me.  ‘Girl, your child has heard about the risen Savior since they were in your womb.  Alongside Sunday school, you have taught them about our Loving Father.  They know that Jesus Christ’s birth is why we celebrate Christmas and they know that Jesus Christ’s resurrection is why we celebrate Easter.  So why are you being so silly??’  I realized it’s okay to have rabbits, sheep, birds, and eggs in my home to celebrate the beginning of spring.  Whew!  What a relief that was to me because every year I always saw beautiful eggs and lovely prim rabbits I wanted to buy but didn’t feel it was right.  Here is my little collection…

These little eggs were way too pastel for me so I antiqued them.  I wanted to sand them down too but they kept popping out of my hands as I was staining them.  I will probably antique them some more.

This sweet little rabbit was painted by me in ’91.  Mom used to do ceramics complete with a kiln and all kinds of molds.  I’m not too fond of the glossy finish but I don’t want to change it now.

These are blurry pictures but I love the vintage postcards I bought last year at the flea market.

Just a little vintage tray I liked.  I didn’t want to cover up the design so I put my pewter candle stick in the corner.

My holiday tree decorated for spring.

A couple of rabbits on top of my hutch that resemble chalkware.  Wish I could afford the real thing!

A little vignette that I threw together at the end of my kitchen counter.  What I love about this is the little ceramic basket and the little goodies inside it.  These pieces were painted and fired by Rich’s grandma and all were made in the late 60’s and early 70’s.  The grass in the basket is even from that time.

Lastly, my favorite rabbits of all.  Yet, I’m so disappointed that I can’t find any vintage paper grass to put around the bottom of them.  I don’t want to use Spanish moss and raffia is too stiff.  Hmm… I wonder if I should tea dye some cheesecloth to use there.  Or… maybe even dye some cheesecloth with green coloring??

Well, that's all.  Thank you for visiting my little blog.  I so enjoy our “chats”!  Happy spring to you all!  I pray you have sunshine to warm your days and make them brighter~

My sewing half-bath

Yes girls, it was hard to decide whether to leave the spools in the lamp or take them out.  I knew I wanted the spools to go in my half-bath that is on the main level of our home.  But it is a tiny room and not much space for a lamp.  I laugh because I know some of you have tried this before... it's so hard to get pictures of a little bathroom!  Sorry for the lighting and the blurriness.  I did the best I could.

When we moved into this house, the first thing I said was this wallpaper border has to go!  I'm not into floral print at all.  Give me a bouquet of daises and I'll be a happy girl, but I don't do floral in my home.  I painted the walls and decided to keep the border because it resembles an antique border.  Plus, I decided the roses would go well with this room being full of things that belonged to my grandmas, great-grandma and great-aunt.  The soaps in the metal container are hand made with flowers embossed on them.  I received these on Mother's Day when I went to my parent's old country church last year.  They gave each mother a plate of them.  What a nice surprise it was!  The soaps get changed out with the seasons.

If you are an old Home Interior lover, you might recall this picture from many, many years ago.  I believe it is one the first prints I ever bought from them.  I've had a hard time letting go of it over the years.  Some things you just can't let go of, right?  The black metal sewing box belonged to my great-aunt Neta.  The sewing notions you see displayed here were in this box.  The gloves belonged to my mom.  She actually wore these to her prom back in 1953!  If any of my three sisters knew I had these, they would throw a fit.  Hehe!

A close up of the sewing notions I feel so blessed to own now.

One of my favorite pieces in this room is the needle book.

When you open it up, this is what you see inside.  It is almost fully intact!  Only missing a couple of needles.

This old sewing drawer came from my great-grandma's sewing cabinet.  I'm not sure what happened to the rest of the cabinet.  The little lamp with purple flowers was a Christmas present from my grandma many, many years ago.  All of us cousins received one with different flowers.  The old sewing tin was from Neta and was full of old sewing notions also.  Now don't freak out when I say this, but it is dear to my heart.  The dried flowers in the little tin came from flower arrangements that were put on the caskets of my two grandmas, and my great-aunt Neta.  There are dried red roses, yellow roses and daises.  The silver candlesticks are patiently waiting for me to grubby up some candles.  I am slowly gaining a stash of them to grubby.  I would just like to do it all at once and make one big mess instead of lots of big messes.  Know what I mean?

Okay, here is where I put all those spools.  I think Karen might be right; some might be from the 50's.  I'm so thrilled to have so many old ones!

A close-up of the spools.  I even had a couple that said 15 cents!

This shadowbox shelf is on the other wall of the bathroom.  The rabbit angel figurine was a gift from my mother-in-law quite a few years ago.  The jar on the top shelf in the middle was an old coffee jar that I painted the lid green, added homespun and filled with miniature spools and bobbins.  I just love these little minis!

This old falling apart pin cushion belonged to my grandma.  I just love it in all its rustiness!

I saw this at a garage sale years ago and scooped it up in a hurry!  I don't think anyone would have tried to take it from me.  As a matter of fact, my sisters laughed at me for buying such a rusty, dirty piece but I fell in love with it at first glance.  For a moment I thought about finishing it but I decided it better to keep it like it is.  When I look at it, I am taken back to the creator's hands and love of her project.  I wish she could have seen it through to the end.  I'm sure it would have been so lovely in a beautiful frame.

The rest of the pieces in this shadowbox are notions that came from Neta's other tin.  I love old sewing notions and have thought about buying more as I see them but I'm afraid of them getting mixed up with those that belong in my family.  So I am going to take pictures of what notions came from whom.  That way as these things hopefully get passed down to generations, the girls in the family will appreciate the things that once belonged to women that they are related to.  I love old pin cushions and have passed them up in the past.  I recently saw a post from Alma over at Blackbird Designs, one stitch at a time.  I love what I saw and now I'm on a hunt with something new to add to my treasure list!  =]

Well, there is my half-bath.  Thank you for sticking with me through my travel down memory lane.  I really enjoyed sharing pieces of the women of my family with you!  I wish for you a wonderful and sunshiny weekend!