My hanging gerranium

Just planted this guy and it will fill out nicely.

I think there is something special about flowers hanging right outside your window - they are up at sight level and easy to enjoy.

Tea bags for roses

I read where tea is good for roses. So I threw my used tea bags in a container in the freezer and waited for spring to plant my rosebush. I'm using them, still in the bag, as a top mulching. We'll see how it works and I'll report back later in the summer about this technique.

Curb-shopped area rug

Can you believe that someone just threw this out? It's perfectly good and I'm setting it out on the driveway to wash it with a hose and some shampoo. It's under a tree and the sun is setting, so I don't worry about the hot sun on it.


I'd say it's about a 5x8' rug. Love the deep red color!

I saved it from a landfill and I'll use it for a long time. That's living life on a shoestring! Love it!

Potting up some plants...

This is the best side of the house for planting because of the southern exposure. (The brick patio and the stone-walled garden were made from recycled material gotten from another Freecycle member.)


This is my first attempt at food growing. I have tomatoes and peppers here and a zucchini in the back yard. Planted some marigolds because I heard that they keep some insect pests away because of their aroma.


I've potted some sweet basil, boxwood basil, thyme, rosemary and cilantro. Oh, and a pot of a sweet potato vine. In the back is a coleus that I will either plant in the ground or in a bigger pot.


Cleaned and refilled the hummingbird feeder. And I'm getting my first rose on the Knockout Rose bush that I planted last week. The metal headboard that the greenery is climbing on and the birdbath were both from Freecyle.



Another Knockout Rose bush planted in the front yard. This is going to look so sweet in front of the picket fence section.


Got this nice potting table on the curb a couple weeks ago. The wagon wheel was a gift from sister KK and the folding door in the background was a curbside find.


Now I need some plants for my shady porch. I'll check in with Freecycle to see if any generous friends with give some to me....

Before and After linen cabinet

For those of you who can't stand wood furniture being painted - look away now! You've been warned....... ;-)

Got a 14" deep cabinet from Craigslist that had a dark brown stain. This isn't a valuable piece, no dovetailing or important wood. As this is to sit in the hallway, the dark color just didn't work. It's ok as is....but I wanted something more rustic.

So I painted it gray and antiqued it with dark stain. The glass had to go because the door needs to shimmy into place and the glass would keep the door too straight to close. Bummer. I took off the top decorative thingy and have saved it for another project down the road.


I stapled on a thick fabric scrap that I already had. I actually like fabric rather than glass because of the warmth and tone of fabric - and more decorating possibilities.


Then I stood back and lived with this for about a day and decided that it was still too dark for the hallway and besides, the wonderful carved details were lost in that darkness.


So I started adding some blue and cream paint and more stain on top of that......


Ahh, now the details are showing up. See the little balls of cream on blue shells? All nicely carved. The staining helps show the depth.


I added the wooden flower because it seemed to need a little something there. I smoothed out the stain with a little more paint to even out the panels.


What a change in personality! This will give me more linen storage, right outside the hall bathroom, which has a gray and white toile decor. Sorry for the low lighting - I had to stand in the bathroom to get the full picture.




A great spot above to display my small collection of vintage Blue Willow Plates.


And what a nice coincidence that I had a plant container with blue vines, just like the fabric!

This is one of my favorite statuettes - a small boy and his dog is so sweet. Set on vintage books.


Nice gams....


I'm linking up to Between Naps on the Porch's Met Monday. Click on the butterfly to see more "Before and After" posts from creative bloggers:

Blueberry peach cobbler recipe

This is very tasty, with lots of syrup on the bottom to spoon over the scoop of ice cream!

Ingredients:

* 2 cups self rising flour
* 2 cups milk
* 2 cups sugar
* 1 stick of melted butter
* 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
* 1 large can of sliced peaches in syrup, undrained, about 28 to 32 ounces
* Some blueberries - 1-2 cups, either fresh or frozen

Preparation:
Preheat oven to 350°. Put melted butter in 13 x 9 pan. In a mixing bowl, combine flour, sugar, milk, vanilla extract; stir until blended. Pour batter into pan and top with the peaches. Cover with foil (so the juice doesn't make a mess) then uncover after 15 minutes to brown. Bake at 350° for a total of 30-60 minutes, depending on the size of the pan.

Before and After pillow

Got this pillow off Craigslist for $5 because I wanted to personalize it for my daughter's new, pinky bedroom. I was attracted to the black ribbon and sequins adornment. This is the Before:

And this is the after. I tea-stained it, sewed on pink heart-shaped buttons and added embroidered, iron-on lettering and a jeweled crown.

Looks fab on her pinky chair and she loves to see her nickname on it.
I'm linking up to Between Naps on the Porch's Met Monday. Click on the butterfly to see more "Before and After" posts from creative bloggers:

Down-filled chairs.......

What is it with me and my love for buying Craigslist chairs? Dunno, but it's a cheap enough hobby.

Lookie here what I got today - 2 fine chairs that a family was selling so they could move to Florida. The first one was for $30 and is down-filled. Great upholstery and carved wooden legs.





The other chair was $13 and is a soft pink with mahogany arms and legs. It fits in great with DD's new pink bedroom:



I did sell my deacon's bench to make room for the pink chair - but with that money, I got 2 great chairs.

Now where did I put them?......

A solution to one of my organizational problems comes in the form of cookie boxes. Yes, I had to eat the contents in order to use the containers. Such a sacrifice.

The boxes were cut down to size and DD decoupaged them with her wonderful scrapbook papers and stickers.

Velcro was applied to the backs:

And then the boxes were attached to (in this case) my computer.

Well, what have we here? There are my reading glasses!

Sometimes they will sit on the outside of the box:

And sometimes they will be tucked away inside. I have several pairs of reading glasses, but they were always lost - now I have a place for each of them and it didn't cost me a cent. Thats.........

A new life for an old wastecan...

I remembered that I had this old, yet cool waste can that had been passed over at the local thrift store, but I knew it had potential. Yes, that icky fake gold metal again. It came in two pieces.

But look what a beauty it turned out to be! Classic black and white and I think it looks like it could have come from one of those fancy-schmancy high-priced catalogs. At least, I tell it so, poor thing has got feelings, ya know?

I did take some pics of it gracing the bathroom....but posting a pic of my toilet seemed so......indelicate. ;-)