Pink and Purple Vintage

This week I want to show you another of my vintage table cloths.  This one is pink and purple with  gold ribbon.   It almost looks East Indian in inspiration with the purple and gold urns.

 

Lovely details in the cotton.

I set the table for a ladies afternoon of cards.   I used my Mother-in-law’s Johnson Bros. “British Castle” dishes for tea.   The scones were a recipe that Carolyn of Aiken House and Gardens had shared some time ago.   I added dried cherries to mine.  

These were easy to make and were very tasty with a little strawberry jam.  I will make these again often.

Thanks for stopping by the Sandbox today.   Please visit My Romantic Home for Show and Tell Friday.   Have a great weekend.   We are expecting some snow.   Valerie

Faded Roses for Touch up Tuesday

Using Photoshop to touch up photos and add lovely textures and edits to them is a new venture for me.   I recently took Kim Klassen’s Skinny Mini Class and was so amazed at the things you could use the program for.  Who knew???   I am by no means proficient at this but it is addictive to play with the new found buttons.

I started with this photo of faded Fairy Rose blooms.

I added Betty Jo’s Peach Cobbler texture.  Thanks Betty Jo.

I push a few buttons and voila.   This is my offering for Touch Up Tuesday at PaperHeart Camera.    Have a great day.   Valerie

A Change of Season for Mosaic Monday

 

This weekend I did my outside greenery arrangement that sits in an urn just outside the door.  For me it signals that change of season from autumn to winter and especially gets me thinking about the decorating for Christmas.  At one time I put the tree up on the first of December but in the last few years I take my time.   For me I have to rearrange the furniture and decide what items need to be moved to the basement.  Then I have to crawl under the basement stairs and haul all the ornaments out.   My house looks like a tornado came through for about a week while I actually get to work and then take the empty containers back down the basement.    It does look pretty when it is all done and then I slowly warm up to the season.  

I am joining Mary for Mosaic Monday at DearLittleRedHouse.   Hope to see you there.    Have a great week.   Valerie

Happy Thanksgiving to all our blogger friends in the US.  

White Christmas Cactus

The white Christmas Cactus or Schlumbergera is beginning to bloom.   It has just a hint of pink in the petals.  I am joining Maia for Flower Macro Saturday   at Flower Macro Saturday.   Valerie

A Linen of Vintage

My decorating style has always leaned to the country side. I have a need to feel cozy and secure and nothing says that to me but all things of nature.  I used to practice what I now call the cluttered country with lots of knick knacks but I have pared way back over the years.  Gone are the stenciled walls and wallpaper border  of cows with everything cow everywhere.   I have asthma.  I can’t even go into the barn but I can appreciate the animals from afar.  

The other day I was tidying up the dressers where I keep all my tablecloths and as I was bringing them out and refolding I realized I have a small collection of vintage tablecloths.   They predate me and I am vintage.  The table cloths are small so not big enough to place on the table for large dinners.  All are made of cotton and have pretty patterns and colours.   I figure I can bore you with them for a few weeks.  

The first one I really like.  I have seen the pattern used in all things country and on many quilts.  I call it a Fruit Basket design. 

Perhaps the initial use of these cloths was for the kitchen or perhaps a card table. Ladies often used to host card parties in the afternoons.   My Mom was a shark at canasta and know it is still fashionable to hold bridge games in the afternoon.  Card tables were smallish and this cloth would fit it.   I’m Romanizing it I know.

I love the colours of yellow and brown.  It makes it so suitable for this time of the year.  I love the fruit in the basket with tulips, leaves, grapes and acorns.

    

The other evening I attended the Annual General Meeting and Banquet of my Horticulture Society.  The theme was “In a Country Garden”   One of the ladies has a handy husband who fashioned these sweet little wheelbarrows out of scrap lumber and bits and bobs.  There were seven of them in all.  One for each table.   All of the wheelbarrows was painted a different colour.   Seven members took a wheelbarrow home and did their own arrangement in them.   I will share the others with you in another days post.  There was a dried  or fresh arrangements in a couple, an herb garden in one and this one was at my table.   It has a summer squash, hot peppers, raddichio, endive and mushrooms in it.  As my chair had the colour sticker on the bottom of it I got to take it home.   The candle sticks were turned by my husband some years ago. 

I hope you enjoyed this look at my vintage linens.   Drop by My Romantic Home for Show and Tell Friday.   Have a great day and a wonderful weekend.  Valerie

Happiness is….for Mosaic Monday

There are times lately that I cannot think of anything to post on.    My garden is put to bed.  Anytime soon we will find snow on the ground and I will want to burrow in the house.    The last couple of weeks I have been clumping around in a not in the least fashionable contraption to heal the broken bones in my foot.    Yes, I did break some bones stumbling out of the parking garage in Toronto on our way to a Wedding reception.   I lived in denial for over a week and even went to the gym on a sore foot.   I broke down and had an x-ray and at first they thought it was okay but on a second look found I had broken three of my five toes and chipped a bone on the top.    Why am I whining  you ask?  Well misery likes company.   What can I say.  

Mosaic today is a nice slice of gingerbread cake,  a new pink bloom on the violet, a good read of a fabulous Canadian photographer,  the promise of a new floor in the bathroom that is now installed.  Wahoo, no more 80s flooring.   And the last one is my lovely contraption for my foot.   Find more inspiration at Mary’s place for  Mosaic Monday.    Hope you have a great week.   Valerie

A Blue Hue for Macro Flower Saturday

On the front lawn my husband and I planted a Colorado Blue Spruce 20 years ago.   It is probably 25ft tall now and gets wider each year.  Thankfully we did put it to the side of the lot and not in front of any windows.   It seems to be very happy in its location despite being planted in sandy soil.   I love the blue colour of the stems.   I recommend it as a great specimen tree.

I am joining Maia for Macro Saturday.   Have a great weekend.  Valerie

Lest We Forget

 

My Mom and Dad met while they were stationed in the Royal Canadian Air Force in Newfoundland.  My Dad was a flying officer piloting an airplane called a Canso.  Mom was in the tower.  

Here is my dad with his mother and and his sister back when he was a young puppy.  Looks rather dashing in his uniform doesn’t he?  Although he did not serve overseas he protected this great country of Canada so that we would have a place to grow and thrive in peace.  Remember to bow your heads for two minutes at the stroke of 11am tomorrow and pray for lasting peace for own families.  Valerie

In Flanders Fields by John McCrae

In Flanders fields the poppies blow

Between the crosses row on row

That mark our place: and in the sky

The larks, still bravely singing, fly

Scarce heard amid the guns below

We are the Dead. Short days ago

We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow

Loved and were loved, and now we lie

In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe;

To you from failing hands we throw

The torch; be yours to hold it high

If ye break faith with us who die

We shall not sleep, though poppies grow

In Flanders fields.

Weekend Clean Up for Mosaic Monday

I recently made a presentation on “Putting the Garden to Bed” in which I told the audience that I basically do nothing when I clean up the garden for the winter.   But,  it took me over an hour to tell them that and the presentation was just an overview of what I do.  As a rule I leave pretty much everything to either compost away naturally or feed the birds with the seed-heads left on the plants.  Diseased debris is another issue.   This weekend my husband and I cleaned up the pond, took the pump out and put the bubbler in for the winter.  We noticed that we went from 4 fish to approximately 20 that I counted in it today.  I don’t know where the frogs went but if they are at the bottom I hope they survive to entertain us again next year. 

I took the camera out to capture anything that fit the mood of the day.   I found a seed head of an Echinacea or Coneflower with backlighting, the plumes of Solidago or Goldenrod looking quite ghostly, an annual snapdragon that is valiantly fighting to stay alive in the cool nights, a little garden gnome I painted many years ago and the containers that held the fall Chrysanthemums.  I need to get back out there and finish raking the leaves up to add to the flowerbeds.   I am joining Mary for Mosaic Monday.   I hope to see you there too.    Have a great week.   Valerie 

A Quick Visit to Niagara on the Lake

Last Friday on the way to Buffalo, New York for a little shopping trip my friend Jennifer of A Garden of Threads I took a little side trip to Niagara on the Lake.   We were meeting her future Daughter in Law and her Mother later in the evening so we had the time to stop for a few minutes.   Niagara on the Lake is a beautiful historical town.   I drool over all the homes there.
Niagara on the Lake was founded over 200 years ago on the west side of the Niagara River and now boasts many attractions for visitors such as Fort George, the Shaw Festival, Niagara wineries, Niagara Parks with a Butterfly conservatory, fine hotels and restaurants and charming bed and breakfasts.
Going down the main street we saw this lovely old buggy surrounded by pumpkins and gourds to make a pleasing vignette.  

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At the front door of this little hotel were two black urns, one on either side of the steps to the veranda with little pumpkins arranged in it.   I loved the contrast of the orange and black.  

This fellow was waiting patiently to take a visitor for a tour around town.  The street was deserted that day.   Note his colourful socks.



I just had to play in Photoshop and give the buggy another look.  I used a texture by Kim Klaussen Cafe.    I hope you have a great weekend.   Valerie

The End of the Season

It is now November and the last of the trees are raining leaves.   We have come to the end of the fall season and winter is coming our way.   On a Sunday drive recently I captured a pond surrounded with beautiful fall colour.   I am sharing this view on Watery Wednesday and Outdoor Wednesday.


Have a great day.   Valerie