no framed mirror yet...

but, .... I did find this perfect choice for my new prints from Susan. Well, I think it is anyway. I hope you can see the hints of antique coppery/brass (perhaps it's actually bronze) on all the raised areas and edges and also on the inside of the frame making it like a narrow insert of a secondary mat. It picks up some of the unusual, beautiful colours of the ice chunk and also on the flowers of the other two. And,.. look at how lovely it looks next to my old (almost vintage) lamp! The thing is ancient... a purchase when I first had an apartment of my own and began buying some decent furniture.... waaaay back in the days of working in the plywood plant..... It used to be a bright brass finish, but over the years it has developed more of a coppery/bronze patina... I love it. Hard to believe how many moves this lamp has gone through and somehow survived intact. It is porcelain or clay of some sort .... so not exactly chip proof... but, so far so good. And, it won't be leaving this house... we have spent too much time and effort on our renovations to ever leave here.






































the perfect corner in the craft room for my "iceberg", where I can enjoy it whenever I'm playing with stuff in there. The lamp has been in very corner of every room of every apartment and house I have lived in; it's been used in bedrooms, living rooms and dining areas... stored in basements and/or storage units during short moves or college stints; even used for more light on painting projects ... that thing has really been around... ..... if only it could speak... then, again, maybe not@! yikes!. That set of storage drawers is what keeps my room pretty organized. What a great find that was at Ikea! And forget having a look inside the drawers... hahahhah...I didn't say they were tidy!
















::update: ...this is hilarious...I just noticed how things on the opposite side of the room also have some of the same tones.... unwittingly I am pulling it all together.... how do you like my little faux vintage lamp I found for $50 about 7 years ago? the glass is lovely and heavy; the leaves and base are metal.. very dark, not quite black, (same as the wood furniture)... with some coppery/brass streaking on it...

Before and now....

what was left once we got the old drywall and fluorescent tube lights off the ceiling... ... right back to joists... then we did some wiring for pot lights... and placed a suspended tile ceiling.














drywall off and back to cement walls and studs... re-working the plumbing and also some ducting for the dryer..











ready to go to work... here is the dream plan.... tweaked so I have everything exactly where I want it.











first order of business... build SOLID boxes for the machines to stand on to get the doors to the right height ...and also to withstand the spin cycle of (if you can believe it) 6,000 rpms. To buy pedestal bases at the appliance store... $599 each for the particular size of these appliances. Aackkkkk!! What?? They are referred to as European size..whatever that is.. and are twice as much as the $299 pedestals for American made washers and dryers for some strange reason. Probably because they don't supply as many.... forget it......we are not paying that!! we built one a lot cheaper. These things weighed a ton and are solid frames with built in drawer housings ...











new venting for the dryer along the top; machines in position... glad I didn't have to lift them! Thank you Mr. Darcy....











first cupboards installed.











New ceiling...lighting...doors all built, sanded and painted. The colour is a soft sage-y green, the walls are a different green ... called Carriage House Green... ... but greens seem difficult to capture on any photo... the light one seems to look barely off white and the wall looks more taupe in pics..but not in real life... now.... waiting for the counter top and then we can measure up for the last two doors to hide the plumbing and electrical outlets.. oooh..it'll be so tidy then...











I was originally thinking on a medium dark framed mirror over the sink on the opposite side of the room...but...a designer friend suggested perhaps I might want to try a silver framed mirror to continue with the brushed nickel knobs and won't compete with the counter top... Yeh...that could work..... so far I've only seen two.... still have a few places to look.... but, I am slow at getting my day organized sometimes and who wants to be out and about in the hub bub every day anyway...I love my home..... and the peaceful aura of it.














I'm going to get an interesting little rug too.... lovely greens with a few interesting colours tossed in for good measure. That's also on my list while I'm out there "hunting".

Guess who's coming to dinner? ....

My dear friend and diva, Madelaine, that's who. She heard about "the dinner" and absolutely had to be there, "dahling".... even if she didn't receive a personal invitation.














..she's been dieting for weeks and so, of course, is hoping there will be cake....











... and..... cake......











She is a 2.5 inch button covered in pale shell pink satin crepe fabric. (crepe side out) Her face is done with watercolour pencils. The hat is faux fur, but the black mink trim is real. A neighbour knows I do dolls; had a coat altered, and one day showed up at my door with a little bag of black mink scraps... very handy for small projects.

The little peacock feather is a gift from Marie Antoinette.... .. truly... .. dolls by Marie ... she raises peacocks. Even has a white one. She gets beautiful white feathers for her angel wings from him... I also have some .... so I have to make at least one angel for Christmas this year.














The blues and greens on the other feathers are just amazing to me....

Why not try your hand a making a face of some sort?.... If you would like to play along at Embrace the Face.... click and have a look at the site.

I almost thought about doing ET for this one...but decided on Madeleine because I had several doll pins on the go.....

Fall leaves...

... that's the latest over at Inchybyinch .... so, I had some fun incorporating real leaves into my inchy for this week. If you would like to try your hand at making one.. go have a look at the site and the other inchies... any medium can be used.











The back ground is watercolour pencil dampened to make it look like paint. The leaves are spirea and the little flowers are centers of potentilla and a blossom from the stalk of hen and chicks...

My collection of colourful choices was spread all over the table..... all the latest flowers and leaves have now been shaken out of books that have been under weights all over the floor...










.....outside the poplars have dropped most of their leaves and with the gusty winds of today surely all of the huge limbs will soon be naked.










you can hardly see sidewalks in some areas...

Poor young Private Elmo.... he's still valiantly pushing fruits of all kinds...some days I actually try.... but on other days... the poor little guy just gets ignored. I must be pretty hardhearted to ignore a cute little face like that..... bad me...











Ramped up my exercise program and wrenched something in my gut. Won't be doing much today except ... ...taking pictures of my laundry room cupboards and drawers wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee !! Try as I might, though, I am unable to get a picture of the true colour of the beautiful, soft, sage-y green. The knobs are being installed as I type.... the look of brushed nickel,... oh, my lovely laundry room, tra, la la.... ....it probably sounds a bit silly to be that excited about it...but I am. It is also the downstairs bathroom.. it has a toilet beside the sink counter... this week I think I also found a perfect sized mirror for over the sink. Bringing it home next week to try it out....

Peacocks and Peasant Bread

Some days ya love the mailman! Other days... it's just bills.

A few days ago he brought me peacock feathers from a blog buddy who raises some of these beautiful birds. Thank you so much Marie!!










One of the little, green, thumb print sized feathers will be featured on my next Embrace the Face project... which is still in the gluing stage...













For over a week I was just fiddling and playing with bits and pieces ... not getting anywhere really, but in the past few days I finally have things where I want them and a little feather will be front and centre... well, off center really...and a bit higher than center tooo... hahaa... well, you can see it in a day or so. Now, my head is spinning with ideas to use some of the others... just look at those colours!

Productivity in the doll and bear making department seems to be very, uhm..... ... s.l.o.w....
As a matter of fact...it's almost non existent. It seems I've been bitten by the bread baking bug .... and it's just been more fun experimenting with different loaves... I'm blaming it on Lewis and Susan.... yeh...that's it, ...it's all their fault.










Yesterday it was loaves of Peasant Bread, a recipe that Susan talked about on her blog and of course, I just had to try it. Boy, I'm glad I did .. I've made it a few times now... but this time added sun dried tomatoes and sauteed onions to one, and apricots and muesli to the other ... mmmmm.... both are yummy. The amazing thing about this bread? .... absolutely no fat in it... those peasants knew how to eat healthy...

two posts in one day!

Couldn't wait to tell you about the ladies... my pin doll ladies and the real ladies who made them.

Doll Street has a pin doll swap every so often but this is the first time I've participated. Click to see all of the pins. Can't tell you how excited I was to see my own handwriting on the self addressed return label, on my own box the mailman delivered today. The same little box I used to send off my ladies to the "swap meet".

Silly me; must be an old softie...I have no idea why, but tears crept into my eyes and I couldn't even read the cards telling me who had taken the time and thoughtfulness to create each beauty! What an unusual and wonderful thing to be able to exchange a bit of ourselves with total strangers who have done the same for us.














You can't see it from this angle, but "love sings" travels around the side of this little gal.... her face is clay.... the little applique heart is felt.











This face is also clay and her headdress is extensively beaded... what a lot of stitching is involved in each of them. I have a great interest in eyes as anybody seeing my own faces knows... so the eyes on this one really intrigue me.

I will treasure them both and thank you so much Linda Misa and Susie McMahon ... both of my little ladies traveled all the way from Tasmania, Australia to Canada. Don't worry, when it gets to -30C here..I will wrap them in cotton wool!

a toast......

Even Elmo wanted to get in on the private little congraluatory "toasting" we had at dinner the other evening .. ...

...the toasting of the grand opening of a classy new Etsy shop... 29 Black Street. Friend and blog buddy, Susan, delights in taking extraordinary photos of life in small town Nova Scotia. An artist and designer, she will soon be adding more photography as well as collage, illustration and paintings..... it will be worth having a peek just to see the lovely photos.













..... this amazes me.... a beautiful chunk of ice, on a perfect day, in her very own little harbour ...... a photographer's dream date. I did more than peek... I'm definitely having this one sent directly to my desk where I can marvel at it almost daily....

Suncatcher

Hopefully I managed the illusion of sparkle from my crystal hanging amidst the fuschia. This week's challenge is to incorporate "Sun" into our inchies. ...... pat..pat...pat... that's me patting myself on the back. New challenge is issued each Monday. Look how early in the week I am this time, fellow procrastinators ...! Of course, it's only because as soon as I saw the word 'sun', I thought of suncatchers. Dating myself I know....... and, I still like them too..... so there.

Watercolour pencils on Bristol Vellum sketchbook paper..

Why don't you try your hand at a teeeensy but fun inchy? It is a bit strange at first glance when you draw or cut out a one inch square, believe me. You immediately think...how can I get anything to look like anything on this?? .....but...once you begin to fiddle with it, place miniature pictures on it.. or sketch on it... all of a sudden it becomes your whole world..... and pretty soon....voila! done! ... you step away from it and wonder again ... how on earth did I manage to make it look like anything on paper that tiny? lol.....

You can see what everybody else has done at INCHYBYINCH.

I have no idea what I will do with my collection of "inchies". However, ...for now I am saving them in a perfectly sized little box that a fellow bear maker and crafter from Poland sent me..










She recycled part of a pretty envelope I had sent to her...

Rain

Well, not here, right now... as a matter of fact we are having amazing sunny days....a bit blustery the past few...but no raindrops. No rainbows either.....

Cloudy and cooler yesterday .... and last night was very cool ... down to -5C...brrrr.... too early for that (it's always too early for that!) and since today would have been a golfing day .... the old guys and I decided it would be silly to be out there in earmuffs or toques and still be cold.

I worked on my "inchy" instead. Rain was the keyword for this week's challenge but, I tossed in a rainbow for good measure....











If you would like to play along and make some inchies.... check us at INCHYBYINCH. They are only one inch by one inch...so don't take up a lot of time ... as a matter of fact for me, the biggest holdup is just planning it in my head. I don't even like to put a pencil on the paper til I have a plan. Maybe it would be better to just doodle a bit and see what happens. Maybe next week I'll give that a try. But..hey...look! I'm early this week and feel good about that.... don't think I'll go overboard on trying to totally change my methodology....










Here's something else I just made.... a great plum loaf, and even though it belongs on my food and recipe blog... I just have to show it off .... it is every bit as yummy as it looks. As a matter of fact, this is one of the tastiest loaves I've made. If you have plums.... mmmmm.... make it..... the recipe calls for Italian plums or prune plums and I finally discovered what those are. They are just the smallish plums that everybody had on little old wizened trees in backyards when we were kids. I think the round plums in the shops would probably taste about the same....but... I did score some of the right type...and oh, is it yummy!

I picked the last two persistent pansies and some other little blossoms as well ..... attempting to enhance the colours of the plums. The girls on the site where I found this recipe have a beautiful dahlia with their loaf.... but the pansies are very pretty too. Scroll down under the recipes for "quick breads" to find this one ..... it's a great site; lots of amazing recipes and their photographs are beautiful.

last day!!

Here I am posting my inchy on the very last day and Fiona at INCHYBYINCH already has the new challenge up a day early this time...hahahhaha......










THIS W ...oops... still had caps lock on after doing the title... lol.... what I meant to type, was.... this past week we were to incorporate some stars into the design ... Some weeks, it seems I have to do way too much thinking before I actually put pen or colour to paper ... then..when I finally get around to it, and the project (whatever it is) takes less time to get the done than anticipated, I am a bit annoyed with myself. Sort of like being back in school... procrastinate til the night before something was due and then... either swot the books or get busy drawing, painting and pasting.... til about 4 a.m........ eerrrgghhh .... probably I will never change.... but every so often I do try to hop off that big, slow, procrastinator's wagon...and walk beside it...going ever so slightly quicker than the wagon wheels ....... but, I am mostly lazy and like to ride along.... just taking it easy.........................












If you would like to play along and perhaps make a little "inchy"... check out the site. It is easy and lots of fun to see what all the ladies come up with for the various weekly challenges.... this coming week.... it will be "rain"..... or anything to do with it..... hmmm.... on goes the thinking cap. And this week...I'm doing it before Sunday rolls around!

Gorgeous fall days....

...hosta leaves beginning to curl up on the edges .... time to cut it back...... . couldn't resist one more pic...














that's me...closest to the pin with this chip on Wednesday with the "old guys"... we all were cheering it on, waiting for it to drop... not quite...










walking down the fairway on the best day of the whole season...I was wearing shorts! Hardly ever happens...'course, you can't see me cuz I was the photographer.... it was +27C !!October 1st. wow.....











The reservoir is a pretty nice looking body of water... runs along the 9th hole at this small course....











like glass.....














looking up instead of concentrating on game strategy... ... oh, well.....










one of my new hen and chicks that I brought home from my sister's early in the summer...it did very well... looks pretty with some pale burgundy taking over from the pale greens...














the neighbours have a huge poplar..... hope they bag some of it this year before it all blows across the street onto my lawn....











ladybirds (or ladybugs)... ... looking for warm home for the winter.... it looks pretty dense in there.... that's good... she will need it when the snow flies.