Cleaning Day!!!

This weekend I have scheduled time to clean, cook and do laundry! I put my first load of laundry in the dryer before I left for work this morning and even took the time to read Sunday's paper..... I've had a couple weeks that were really busy and the house just was not a priority. This weekend that changes and I am looking forward to restoring order to the house. The plan is to spend the afternoon on Friday cleaning. I do not function well in a house that is cluttered with piles of paper or even dishes in the sink or on the counter. I like everything put away before starting a new project.

Also, I want to find time to stitch and I've got to silence the voice that keeps playing in my mind telling me I have to finish the "work" part of my life before I can "play". You would think by now that "voice" would have been silenced but apparently not.....

So, off I go with my cleaning supplies...

Current projects

I’m taking an online class to learn silk ribbon embroidery, so for the next 6 weeks I’ll be working on projects.  I completed an easy one this week, next week’s looks like a challenge…. 

The white block is for a round robin that I’m involved in.  Each month for the next 4 months I’ll be working on a different block and then I send it on to the next person.  I was the first one to work on this block.  I’ll be sending it off later this week.

Beaver Fair Week

I live quite close to the Beaver Fair so all this week there will be lots of activity around my house.  Yesterday I decided I better add a bit of fall to my front porch so that all the people walking by think that I am somewhat on the ball and have decorated for fall. 

I had some orange colored lights that I wanted to put around the door and I’m sure I had a garland of some sort around the lights last year but I couldn’t find it and I broke two of the bulbs on the string of lights and if ya break one, none of them light so instead of enjoying the Penn State game, I went to Michael’s and purchased the necessary items to give a somewhat fallish flair to my front porch.  

The orange lights may be a bit over the top.  I turned them on last night and I definitely think it is not close enough to Halloween to actually plug them in.  But if I keep the porch lights on, it may not be quite so glaringly orange…  Yeah, I’m going with that.

Treasurers!!!

Last week when my sister was here we went to an antique show and flea market. There were all kinds of interesting things there. I bought a few and Lindy bought a few and some we just enjoyed looking at and walked on by. I’m at the point in my life where I have to remind myself that if I don’t have a place to put it, it is best to leave it. I sure would have loved to have the very old shabby white doll bed, but I have no grandchildren so really….what was I going to do with that!  Don't ya just love it?

I attached a photo of some of the things I purchased…. A couple old Bobbsey Twins books with colors that excite me….I love to stack old books, a lovely pitcher with roses on it, (I don’t really have a place to put it, right now it is on my mantle) it was pretty enough that I’m sure I’ll find a place for it. I like old metal flower frogs so I added one of those to the collection (I guess three makes a collection, right?). When I took this photo last week I had forgoten to put the shabby picture frame I purchased with the rest of the stuff that I bought. It was made from the trim of an old house. I don’t have anything in it yet but I’m looking for just the right photo to complete it.

Pantry Progress

I have been dligently working in the pantry for two days now and I'm finally finished with it.  I took everything out of it and cleaned it well and removed a lot of items that were either expired or were in the pantry because it is a "catch all".  I have cleaned and organized a couple other cupboards today as well.   I wish I had stock in the Sterilite Corporation... I invested in quite a few containers to get myself organizzed.  Here is the before and after photos.

New Mixer

  I bought this lovely KitchenAid Mixer last week to make some cupcakes, my old mixer I have had for all the 25 years of my marriage. So for no other reason than the old mixer was (gasp) avocado green, I needed a new one.  Trouble is, it is bigger than the old mixer and doesn't fit into the space that the old mixer fit so....I have decided that this weekend (and possibly into my holiday on Monday) I will be reorganizing and cleaning the kitchen and even the dreaded pantry!  I will find a place for the new mixer and even get the old one ready for a yard sale that we have decided will take place the first weekend in October.  I'm sure I will be able to find a lot of treasures that will be yard sale worthy as I go through the cupboards and drawers. 

The pantry, if I do muster the energy to clean it out and reorganize it, will be a post of its own...stay tuned!

Visit with my Sister

This weekend my sister came home from CT for a visit.  Friday night I made dinner and we had a picnic with her family and my mother and my husband and I.   Lindy's oldest son has two boys who are both under 3 years of age, they are a lot of fun. 

Saturday my sister Lindy and her daughter Meg and I enjoyed an antique show.  The weather was perfect and the vendors had a lot of good stuff.  I'll show what I got later this week. 

Today we decided to go to the Snyder County Historic Museum.  It is a museum with local history and was rather enjoyable.  Lindy has to read everything so it takes her a lot longer than it takes me, but she did point out a lot of things I would have missed.  We did learn quite a few things that we didn't know about our local history. 

We finished off our day trip at the local winery and purchased a couple wines that we liked.

I had a very nice weekend but unfortunately I ate all weekend and didn't count one calorie!  I'll be back on the wagon tomorrow, for sure.

Todays photos are from the museum, Lindy and Meg looking at the Civil war display and the gallows that were used back in the early 1900's.

Cupcakes

My sister posted some of her recent craft projects and asked me what I am working on.  I haven't done anything creative in quite awhile, unless you count Thursday night's cupcakes!!!   I needed to make cupcakes for a church event and decided to try something somewhat creative with the cupcakes!  I divided the batter and colored it and  came up with these!   The kids liked them.

Evan's 1st Birthday

Today I spent a relaxing afternoon at a birthday party for my great nephew, Evan who happily turned 1.  The party was outside and the weather was great, not to hot or to cool.... My nephew and his wife have a group of friends who all have children....there were 15 lively kids who enjoyed all the water toys and "stuff" that two small children have.   Here is a sampling of some of the kids playing on the sliding board.

There was also a kiddie pool that squirted water, a big ball that was some kind of fountain, a water table, swing set, assorted balls and riding toys, something for everyone...  All these children were very entertaining and they got along great! 

Here is a photo of Evan enjoying the gift I gave him.

Happy Birthday Evan, I hope you have many, many more!!!

Creative Afternoon

On my list of things to do today was to do something creative.  I've been working a lot and not taking time to be creative, no stitching or scrapbooking or anything fun like that....  so today I put it on my list and decided to use some of the larkspur that I dried a couple weeks ago.  

Before I started my wreath I spent about an hour cleaning up my work space...I can create so much better when the clutter is put away, so spending the hour cleaning and putting away the accumulated junk in my work room was worth the effort.

First I poked around in the basement and found a wreath base

 step 2: I wove some larkspur into the base 

step 3: I hot glued some preserved hydrangea to the inside of the base to hide the ends of the larkspur and to  help to keep the larkspur anchored.    

step 4:  I went to the garden and picked some sea lavender and finished it off with a bit of that.

Finally added a ribbon.