It’s the fourth Tuesday of the month and it’s Pinterest Challenge time, my friends!! This month Cindy of County Road 407 has chosen a beautiful tablescape decor from a dear friend whom we lost a couple of years ago now, Michelle from The Painted Hinge. I am honoring her memory, too, as we also honor our fellow servicemen and women this month on Memorial Day…
If you are just coming over from Laura at Everyday Edits, welcome! I don’t really have an entryway as you are immediately into my family and living rooms upon entering our home, so…
I chose to focus on the sideboard idea with my tablescape for this month’s challenge.
I love this photograph of Michelle’s antique sideboard decorated with a garden theme. All the ceramic pots with fresh basil, cilantro and a bunch planted with violas and pansies! Adorable!!
Some pots are also filled just with sphagnum moss. So love the card file creating little planting pockets!
I also love the neutral color palette.
Here is another closer look at her tablescape ~ so many things to catch your eye!!!
***
What I pulled for my decor interpretation
Well, let’s look at what I don’t have: no vintage scale, no wire strawberry baskets, nor a card catalog file (though it’d be a great addition, especially now that I work in a school library!).
I do have books and little things for risers. I chose some wood rounds and a small concrete pilaster for my tableau.
I also chose the one little drawer that I do have as a holder for seed packets. This drawer was accidentally left out of a small desk we sold and which used to be in my daughter’s bedroom. It fit perfectly between the two trundle beds she had in her room at the first house we owned in California.
We replaced that vintage desk with a larger more contemporary one as she grew into a teenager.
For my table, I began with a large tobacco basket, then began layering with all the things I’d see out in my garden.
I love a neutral color pallet, tooThe teacups are what I’d take out to the garden, lol! 😉
My passion, my style
On the left side of this tablescape, I’ve set up my maiden statuette with a little French mask and those two teacups. She wears pearls because pearls are something I enjoy wearing.
Adding wood elements like the inspiration piece
When we were first married and lived aboard Camp Pendleton, California, I found this long coffee table at the base thriftshop where I worked. I sanded it all down and had new legs put on it turning it into a sofa table. It is a Danish maple piece from the 1940’s which had a horrible finish on it before, but now that it has this light stain on it and has been waxed much over the last 30+ years, it is a favorite piece of furniture of mine!
It’s so nice having this large wood piece already as it brings a lot to the table (forgive the pun!). 😉
Having the small wood drawer plus the painted wood tobacco basket also add their own rustic wooden touches.
I planted up two pink begonias in the glazed pot so this becomes my greenery.
The tiny bits of blue in the flowers of the chintzware teacup add the final nod to the upcoming patriotic holiday. 🙂
***Please forgive the mess in the background. I am still working on creating a slipcover for that green plaid wingchair. I changed my mind mid-project which is why it isn’t finished. An upcoming post! 😉
And that is my small tablescape, friends! Simple, elegant, me… Thank you so much for visiting today and I hope you will consider subscribing. I don’t pitch myself very often but I guess I should do that a little more. 😉
Summer is almost here, friends!! Let’s take a look at the table Carol from Bluesky at Home has created for you! I know it’s going to be good. <3
Everyone’s links are below for you to come back to as needed.
No features from me this week! Last weekend was all about cleaning up the yard, clearing piles of leftover oak leaves and nuts (which have been in big piles for a couple of weeks), and laundry… ugh! Hubby was up in the attic looking to block where the evil rats had been getting into over winter. He vacuumed (while wearing protective gear) in the attic cleaning up “that yucky stuff.” Looking better! 🙂
Elizabeth from Pinecones & Acorns shared this wonderful recipe for Dulce de Leche Brownies… I love recipes with dulce de leche and this looks just delicious!!!
Thank You so much to everyone who linked up this past week. A special thank you to everyone for always promoting Share Your Style on your blog and on your social media channels! I do see it when I stop by and I appreciate the love. 💜
If you’d like to follow my Share Your Style board on Pinterest I’d appreciate it, thank you! I do post all of the featured posts from each week’s SYS there plus usually other photos from those posts to my boards.💜 Thanks so much!!! If you are new to French Ethereal, I hope you will think about subscribing to my blog.
Good evening, friends! I used some comp time today and left work an hour early heading to my mother-in-law’s home to check on it while she is away. As I came out into the backyard to water, immediately I caught the scent of two large roses perfuming the entire garden …
After I finished watering all of her backyard plants (and seeing that I need to help her with a ton of prickly weed removal), I came back out with her heavy duty scissors and snipped as many stems of these soft blush roses as I could.
Previous owners planted this heavenly scented rose and its twin on the opposite side of the garden. Funny, Gramma “plays ball” with a 2-year-old boy who lives on the other side of the fence when she is home. I found a good 12 balls of many sizes and types in amongst the roses and crepe myrtle along this shared back fence!
I tossed them all back over. 😉
After a quick run through the grocery store, I came home and promptly recut all the rose stems and created this lovely arrangement. Creamy white Iceberg roses from my garden filled in the gaps…
Then it was time for tea!
I brewed a cup of Constant Comment and set two lemon Girl Scout cookies on a plate. Nothing fancy! Just a paper napkin, the tea and those cookies.
I love that the cookies have upbeat sayings on them to boost girls’ self esteem nowadays!! They made me smile. 😉
Two of our newer rose bushes in their pots, getting ready for their first blooms…
As I cleared away the dishes, I took a few shots just with my iPhone 12 Pro. It takes quality photographs and I didn’t have to mess with the lighting, which my Canon was being finicky this evening (the overblown whites in some photos, lol!).
But it was a lovely 72 degree evening, perfect for a few minutes enjoying the back gardens as the sun was going down…
A few early iris are blooming, too! Just noticed this beauty as I was snapping away… I gave them all a good feeding yesterday.
Welcome everyone to this week’s Share Your Style #381! A little bunny fun to brighten our Easter month as we check out this week’s featured posts… 😉
I am Barbara Chapman and I’d love it if you’d follow me here on my blog and on any of my other social media sites, too. Thank you!💜
Claire Justine shared this beautiful tribute for all mothers as we approach the holiday soon ~ Homemade Mother’s Day Treat Ideas. Delicious!!
Penny from Penny’s Treasures shared her sweet entryway all decked out in spring decor ~ Simple Easter Entry & 1st Spring Blooms. Soooo pretty!!! (Love pinks…)
And doing a fun double-header, here is Penny’s massive storage solution for How I Store My Spring & Easter Decor. I am totally impressed!! Question: How many bunnies do you think she has??? Love ’em all!!! 😉
CoCo from The Crowned Goat wows with this festive feast of florals in her post ~ Cottage Inspired Spring Porch Tour. Look at those hydrangeas!!!
Thank You so much to everyone who linked up this past week. A special thank you to everyone for always promoting Share Your Style on your blog and on your social media channels! I do see it when I stop by and I appreciate the love. 💜
If you’d like to follow my Share Your Style board on Pinterest I’d appreciate it, thank you! I do post all of the featured posts from each week’s SYS there plus usually other photos from those posts to my boards.💜 Thanks so much!!! If you are new to French Ethereal, I hope you will think about subscribing to my blog.
Hoppy 4th Tuesday, dear friends! Our friend Cindy of County Road 407 has challenged us to create a Spring Lantern for this month’s Pinterest Challenge, and boy do we have cuteness inspiration ideas on overload for you…
Welcome, everyone! If you are coming over from Carol at Bluesky at Home for the first time, an extra big welcome!! For anyone who has never been to one of our Pinterest Challenges, Cindy finds a photograph for us to recreate in our own way, and we run with the idea.
Ann from On Sutton Place has created our inspiration tablescape this time. She has used a couple of white lanterns filled with coconut fiber bunnies, some easter grass, and a sweet pitcher of pussywillows. I personally love all the white!
How did I begin my Spring Lantern?
I began by sorting through my box of spring decor, of course! I looked at everything and pulled some things out and put others back.
I went to Hobby Lobby looking for an new lantern but they weren’t on sale, and I just didn’t want to spend a lot. So, I pulled out the lantern I used in a previous Pinterest Challenge to use again. 🙂
I didn’t come home with a new lantern from the store; however, I DID come home with these cute flower-strewn Easter eggs, some fun paper carrots, and a new vintage-looking sign!
Love ’em!!!
So, I set down this grey tobacco basket and began tucking in shredded green grass, then I added a tree cut as a base for my lantern, and picked a bunny and the whole lot of Easter Eggs to put inside the lantern…
That’s when a story popped into my head:
The Story ~ BunBun’s Jam
BunBun, our sweet little girl, busied herself bringing in Easter eggs to fill her glass lantern garden greenhouse. She worked diligently and swiftly prepping for the year’s early morning Easter delivery of eggs to good little girls and boys of the town.
She was so busy bringing in all of these freshly painted eggs, tucking them here and there inside that lantern greenhouse, she didn’t think about how she was going to get herself back out the door again once those eggs were all indoors…
All of a sudden, BunBun realized that she was stuck! Poor little bunny…
What was she going to do? She’d really gotten herself in a pickle this time.
Meanwhile, her friends were busy outside…
Ducky and Princess Chicky-Poo were busy with spring gardening. They were planting more carrot seeds, seeing that the fall-planted ones had grown so well (and they were still picking those delicious carrots to eat!).
The rabbits were busy setting out spinach starts, a few chive seeds, as well as some daisy and Texas bluebonnet seeds for future picking! The rabbits especially love purple flowers for their dining table bouquets!!!
Looking up and hearing BunBun’s muffled voice and seeing her tap-tapping on the glass, they quickly realized her predicament. The group thought swiftly and hatched a plan. They would lift one corner of the glass lantern so their friend could slip underneath without disturbing the carefully placed eggs.
“Okay, on three!” shouted Ducky to the others. “One, two, three!!!” Everyone grunted a bit while paws and palmate feet slowly lifted the lantern side skyward.
As the glass house was tilted up, BunBun slid down and underneath. She was free! Cheers arose from this gaggle of friends! Everyone hugged BunBun, and she hugged and thanked each friend in turn.
They celebrated BunBun’s release with a cream tea and, of course,…
a slice of carrot cake. :)’
*****
Thanks for stopping by, friends! If you haven’t subscribed to FE, I’d love it if you do. We swing back up to Cindy at County Road 407 next and I know you will love her lantern idea!! And please stop by all of our friends and check out what everyone has created for you.
Welcome to this week’s Share Your Style #379, dear friends! I’m so happy you are here!! As I write this to you, I am listening to a worship service my son played guitar with this past weekend. He plays there at his church in South Dakota most weeks. My heart is full! I hope you are blessed this week, too… 💜
This link party is for home decor, DIY, crafts, recipes and the like, but you are more than welcome to share any of your family-friendly posts with us all. Please feel free to share this post too and join my small but loyal band of friends. I appreciate you! I appreciate your subscribing, also. As always, I am glad that you are here…💜
I am Barbara Chapman and I’d love it if you’d follow me here on my blog and on any of my other social media sites, too. Thank you!💜
No new posts from me this past week. I worked on painting in our kitchen and spent a lovely part of Sunday afternoon out in the garden! Such a blessing to work the soil, get a few things planted in the back flowerbeds and others into small pots to grow on, for later planting.
Yesterday evening, I was able to take some ranunculus corms and get them planted for pre-sprouting in a small recycled lettuce tray. As they grow into little plants I hope to get these 24 little plants tucked into flower pots around the garden!
We have a bunch of fun ideas for you to recreate in your own homes as spring cleaning and DIYing gets going!
Well, friends, let’s see what features we have this week…
And here are this week’s featured posts…
Lori from Dining Delight shares her lucky gold find in this post ~ St. Patrick’s Day Table for Two. Love the overflowing pots of gold and the little shamrock napkin rings!!!
Newcomer Iris who goes by Moumous, from her blog La Moumous, shared this fun fashion post on 15 Must-Have Wardrobe Staples in 2023. I personally love a nice shirt and jeans ~ timeless!! Isn’t that handbag so sleek? Perfect for spring. Welcome, Moumous!!
Debbie over at Debbie-Dabble Blog shared her friend and neighbor Ann-Marie’s Winter Home Tour 2023. Fun seeing all the vintage decor! Thanks for sharing with us!!!
MaryJo from Master “Pieces” of My Life brings us a little Cajun inspiration with a Fat Tuesday post ~ Masquerade Mask Mardi Gras Table. Love the colors and the gorgeous masks for favors!
Oh my, I LOVE this armoire how it turned out! Check out this post from Tara at Stilettos & Shiplap ~ From Facebook Marketplace to French Beauty. Lovely and perfect on this wall!
If you didn’t get to hop over to Wendy’s at WM Design House last week, do check out her totally crafty (and fun!) post ~ Spring Decor at It’s Best – Sharing Over 20+ Ideas for Crafting. Love this spring wreath and all of her crafting ideas!!
Thank You so much to everyone who linked up this past week. A special thank you to everyone for always promoting Share Your Style on your blog and on your social media channels! I do see it when I stop by and I appreciate the love. 💜
If you’d like to follow my Share Your Style board on Pinterest I’d appreciate it, thank you! I do post all of the featured posts from each week’s SYS there plus usually other photos from those posts to my boards.💜 Thanks so much!!! If you are new to French Ethereal, I hope you will think about subscribing to my blog.
Welcome to this week’s Share Your Style #377, dear friends!! Oh my goodness! There are so many ideas for sharing with family & friends for Valentine’s Day… Let’s take a look!
This link party is for home decor, DIY, crafts, recipes and the like, but you are more than welcome to share any of your family-friendly posts with us all. Please feel free to share this post too and join my small but loyal band of friends. I appreciate you! I appreciate your subscribing, also. As always, I am glad that you are here…💜
I am Barbara Chapman and I’d love it if you’d follow me here on my blog and on any of my other social media sites, too. Thank you!💜
As I finish up painting in our dining room, I wanted to thank all of you who shared your thoughts on how I should paint the lower wall and picture moulding below our chair rail. In the end, after going back and looking at pics from Versailles, I decided I really did love the Comet Dust grey wall color, so I carried it down below and used off-the-shelf Valspar Ultra-White on the mouldings. It’s looking good!
Since then, I’ve been dealing with sick dog… Lots of mopping in the kitchen and laundry room, carpet cleaning & laundry. He has had multiple baths, too. I think the extreme fluctuation in temps didn’t do him any good since he has to go outside to use the restroom. Plus I was painting indoors, where he is close to during the day… So, maybe that whole combination was the issue. He seems better now but I’ve held off finishing painting until later in the week, and only in small amounts. 🙂
So let’s look at this week’s features! I hope you will stop by and visit a few people while you are here. Everyone works soooo hard! 💜
Have a great week!
Here’s what I shared this past week atFrench Ethereal…
An Inspiration Challenge ~ Styling a Vintage Valentine’s Cloche ~ This is a link party if you’d like to come aboard and add ONLY CLOCHE posts with VALENTINE’S DAY DECOR IN THE CLOCHE. I’ve had to removed several posts which didn’t read the link up through. Thanks!!! 💜
And here are this week’s featured posts…
Karin from Karin’s Cottage shared a blast-to-the-past with her post ~ How Do You Style Velvet Pants? Yep, I had a whole pantsuit outfit. 😉
Lynne of Thrifting Wonderland has us sighing over her entryway in Two Flower Vignettes. Love the sweet petals dripped along the table runner!
Kathryn from The Dedicated House shared her Dining Room Paint Refresh. Looks great! 💜 Been there AND still painting ours. 💜
CoCo from The Crowned Goat shared this fun DIY project ~ DIY Valentine’s Mailbox. Adorable!!!
Thank You so much to everyone who linked up this past week. A special thank you to everyone for always promoting Share Your Style on your blog and on your social media channels! I do see it when I stop by and I appreciate the love. 💜
If you’d like to follow my Share Your Style board on Pinterest I’d appreciate it, thank you! I do post all of the featured posts from each week’s SYS there plus usually other photos from those posts to my boards.💜 Thanks so much!!! If you are new to French Ethereal, I hope you will think about subscribing to my blog.
Good evening, everyone! Welcome to this week’s Share Your Style #376. It’s officially February and all things Valentines is on repeat!! Since we have a third day off from school tomorrow, I may actually get a Valentine’s Day post out for you. 🙂
This link party is for home decor, DIY, crafts, recipes and the like, but you are more than welcome to share any of your family-friendly posts with us all. Please feel free to share this post too and join my small but loyal band of friends. I appreciate you! I appreciate your subscribing, also. As always, I am glad that you are here…💜
I am Barbara Chapman and I’d love it if you’d follow me here on my blog and on any of my other social media sites, too. Thank you!💜
My mother-in-law made it safely home from a month in California. She has been for home for about 10 days now and we got together over the weekend. We even went to our favorite thrift shop on Saturday, but didn’t find anything. That same day, I made a crockpot full of turkey meatballs in organic tomato sauce paired with cheese raviolis, plenty of leftovers.. Turned into a wonderful dinner. Yum!!!
We did better at Lowe’s as we scored some wonderful plant starts. I’ll share a post on the the things I found soon, but for now… It is too cold to be out in the shed working on potting up plants! At least for me. 😉
Well, let’s check out this week’s features, shall we?
Here’s what I shared this past week atFrench Ethereal…
Jeanie from The Marmelade Gypsy shared her post ~ And January Goes On! ~ all about what’s been going on up in her neck of the woods in Michigan. Check out the poor deer and what happened to him… A wonderful ending! 💜
Thank You so much to everyone who linked up this past week. A special thank you to everyone for always promoting Share Your Style on your blog and on your social media channels! I do see it when I stop by and I appreciate the love. 💜
If you’d like to follow my Share Your Style board on Pinterest I’d appreciate it, thank you! I do post all of the featured posts from each week’s SYS there plus usually other photos from those posts to my boards.💜 Thanks so much!!! If you are new to French Ethereal, I hope you will think about subscribing to my blog.
Welcome to this week’s Share Your Style #375, dear friends! I’m excited to share all the cool features we have for you this week…
This link party is for home decor, DIY, crafts, recipes and the like, but you are more than welcome to share any of your family-friendly posts with us all. Please feel free to share this post too and join my small but loyal band of friends. I appreciate you! I appreciate your subscribing, also. As always, I am glad that you are here…💜
I am Barbara Chapman and I’d love it if you’d follow me here on my blog and on any of my other social media sites, too. Thank you!💜
Can you believe we are coming to the end of January 2023 already? It was just New Year’s and now we are speeding towards Valentine’s Day! With that, I’ve chosen some wonderful Valentine ideas for you.
So let’s get to this week’s features!
***Quick update on Thursday morning: I fell fast asleep as I was writing this and putting together this week’s SYS features last evening, so… I’m finishing this morning and actually POSTING IT. Lol!
I took half a Benedryl yesterday around 11am because I guess I’m now allergic to Prednisone. Anyway, it knocks me out and so somewhere around 7:30p.m., I was out for the night. I did make it through the school day and the hives never fully erupted, but I still feel itchy…
Anyway, happy to get this Valentine’s-y post out for you! Plus a touch of football, too. <3
Here’s what I shared this past week atFrench Ethereal…
MaryJo of Master”Pieces” of My Life shared a bunch of beautiful tablescapes for inspiration at your own home in this post ~ Setting the Mood for a Valentine’s Day Tablescape. I loved this alfresco setting!
Lynne from Thrifting Wonderland shares winter whites in her winter cupboard ~ Winter Display in the Hutch. Love all the creamware!!!
Lynne from Thrifting Wonderland also brings us a couple of easy and fun crafts to make for Valentine’s Day. I can see this being so fun with kids!!! Our double feature for this week ~ Two Quick Valentine’s Crafts.
Newcomer Shay from What the Fork shares this easy peasy recipe for Football Rice Krispie Treats! Perfect for this weekend’s big Super Bowl Game!!!
Debbee from Debbee’s Buzz shares her fun post (love all her tablescapes!) featuring 20 Sweet Valentine’s Day Ideas. Love it!!!
Last up for this week we have Meagan from Decorative Inspirations with her sweet post ~ How to Make a Salt Dough Garland. Love it!!!
Thank You so much to everyone who linked up this past week. A special thank you to everyone for always promoting Share Your Style on your blog and on your social media channels! I do see it when I stop by and I appreciate the love. 💜
If you’d like to follow my Share Your Style board on Pinterest I’d appreciate it, thank you! I do post all of the featured posts from each week’s SYS there plus usually other photos from those posts to my boards.💜 Thanks so much!!! If you are new to French Ethereal, I hope you will think about subscribing to my blog.
Merry Christmas, dear friends!!!No Share Your Style this week as I was just too busy prepping for the Arctic freeze on Tuesday and Wednesday, which blew in all over America. I hope you are faring well where you are and keeping warm!
We are enjoying a bit of relaxation with our daughter who drove in from Austin, Texas after work a couple of nights ago. Mr. Ethereal is off this week and next from work, as am I.
Later in this post, I will share our yard and how I used almost every spare brick we have to pin down sheets, blankets and frost blankets from the big box stores to keep our baby garden nice and warm, but…
Right now, I am sharing our table set for Christmas dinner!
* none of this is sponsored, but I thought you might like to know where you can shop for these goodies!
This was especially fun to set!
Just like over Thanksgiving, we actually used this tablescape for our Christmas dinner today for lunch.
I cooked Aunt Nellie’s pot roast with added carrots and red potatoes. YUM! ;)’
Aunt Nellie’s Pot Roast
“Use a rump roast or watermelon roast.” Ours was something else but turned out just fine. 🙂
“Put tenderizer on it, then poke it and rub tenderizer over it.”
I didn’t put on tenderizer (does anyone anymore?? I think it’s a health thing) to this roast (never liked it), but I did poke it all over with the carving set fork and then used an English Rub I picked up in Fort Worth at the Stockyards a couple of years ago. Turned out great with all the herbs and spices!
“Cook in a cast iron skillet, cook dry for 1 hour at 275 deg. F. After an hour, put in water (2 1/2 cups) and turn up the oven to 350 degrees. Cook about 1 1/2 hours more (3 lb. roast).”
I put in about 3 cups of water, or maybe a bit more, and the veggies added their own water so a lot was leftover in the pan to make gravy. 😀 When I added the water, that’s when I added the pre-cut potatoes and carrots. They cooked up absolutely perfectly! Soft but not over soft.
“Drippings should be almost dry (normally with 2 1/2 c. water used) and crusted to the pan so that you make the best gravy! Dark, dark brown gravy.”
This is what I wrote down over 30 year ago, literally… Funny to read it that way.
Our daughter has to leave Christmas afternoon to be ready for work on December 26th, so we had our dinner today. I am soooo thankful she was able to drive up!
Great Gramma Gini was gifted tickets by my nephew and sister-in-law to go out to Sacramento, California, to their home for Christmas. She was really happy to go as she misses all of her friends (and family!) there. <3 It would have been fun to sit down with Gramma and Granddaughter together… They keep missing each other!
upper left side of our china hutch
I’m sorry I haven’t posted hardly anything this fall! Part of me just wasn’t feeling like writing, though I have a number of unfinished drafts. It’s tougher with my MIL around all of the time. We were off on our own for 34 years so it has been a big change for me. I am used to seeing family only occasionally and not every weekend. A lot of my free time is taken up there and with work, in general, as you know how it is. We did a number of fundraisers here in the fall, too, with the Odd Fellows (IOOF) and Rebekahs. I cannot tell you just how much having these two weeks off from school means! I can finally rest…
Yoda is struggling to get around, too. He has accidents pretty much everyday, and with his doggie Alzheimers, he gets stuck under everything… I’ve spent many an evening carpet cleaning, and getting him out from behind furniture. He paces and I am constantly picking him up off the tile floor in the kitchen. Rest in the evening is rare until he is taken back to bed in our bedroom.
I tried taking him for a walk about two months ago, as it turned into fall around here in North Texas. He just turned his head and wanted to go back home… Sad for all of us, but he still loves his food and tonight he will have leftover roast mixed in. Usually I put in Little Caesar’s chicken and veggies into his Iams Senior kibble for smaller dogs, but today is feasting day!! Btw, he really enjoyed it!
A new glass Santa found on Black Friday at JC Penney for 1/2 price, I think. Middle right of the hutch.
Here is our china hutch
I know this is a mishmash-kind-of-a-post, but since I’ve hardly shared anything all fall, I wanted to at least share a little of what Christmas I did get put out. I didn’t even get all of the stuff cleared off of it. Real life! 🙂
There’s a fun picture frame waiting for tiny gold nails to nail the hanger on it, then I can hang it in the hallway. Some jelly jars for Gramma as she would like to make some peach jam next year. A little fallish gnome I found at Winco while grocery shopping one day….
That picture frame I picked up at a store with the kids when they were down last Christmas (our son, DIL and grandson from South Dakota), and we had gone shopping down by the racetrack.
Or maybe it was found at the mall in Garland… It was Garland.
We had taken Milo to see the aquarium there in the morning, then had lunch and shopping at the mall there. We went to a second outdoor mall down towards Fort Worth later in the late afternoon, then had dinner out before driving home.
Was a fun time that week before Christmas 2021!
centerpiece of the hutch ~ the angel door!
Here in the hutch, I really only swapped out the plates from fall for the brown winter Johnson Bros. set. I added in the seaside photograph I picked up in Grenoble, France, at the little thrift shop I found while out looking for antique stores the Saturday morning before my niece’s wedding.
La Vierge à l’Enfant avec Catherine et un berger, dite La Vierge au Lapin (detail) ~ Tiziano Vecellio dit Titien (vers 1488/1490 – 1576).
I still need to share that adventure. I need to share more from France, too. On the list! 😉
Meanwhile, out in the garden…
I finally finished planting everything except one small boxwood, so I put it in the shed until it warms up next week. When we knew that the freeze was finally coming in, I spent a good 6 hours on Tuesday raking leaves around all of the tender plants and putting mulch around many of them as I could.
On Wednesday morning, as the cold north winds were swirling in, I was busy tarping plants and putting the leaves back over them as I could. The bricks came in handy to hold things down. 🙂
Hubby has almost finished putting up the insulation along the roofline inside the shed, so I’ll share that in the next post, how that is looking. Even down to 9 degrees F/-12.77 Celsius, it stayed at 40 degrees with the little floor heater churning away.
All that insulation I put up a year ago, plus the wood panels over top, the shed is staying pretty warm and cozy. The plants inside all look good. I water them about once a week as they dry out quicker with the heater on full time. On nice days, I shut it off and open the door wide to let air and light inside.
One of my squirrel buddies! He likes walnuts and pecans but not those filberts.
Well, that’s about it, friends! I think I’ve caught you up other than saying I am enjoying working in the library at school. I could do this until I retire in a few years. 🙂
Here’s a little duck from my walk this afternoon… I posted more up in my Stories on Instagram.