Springtime Garden Blessings

 

Where do I even begin to express myself how I feel about this time of the year? PARADISE is what comes to mind. What have I ever done to deserve to live in such beauty? All seasons have beauty, but I feel in the springtime, when everything bursts forth in color, is when God REALLY shows His awesome, indescribable ability to CREATE. I’m so grateful for it.

We are blessed to live on a property that is completely private. No one can see us. We have neighbors not too far off, but they can’t see us and we can’t see them. We have acres and acres of land in three directions that aren’t settled. The fourth direction points toward the road, where there are people, of course. To give you an idea of our surroundings, here is a photo I took the other evening when we were out for a walk..

That’s our home maybe a quarter mile off. ( I’m just guessing, not good with distance) If I’d turn around in the spot where I took the picture, I would see more rolling hills with no houses for a good distance. Again, just guessing, probably a few miles.

To think that we are only a few miles from Berlin, and have this much stomping ground is something to be thankful for. Now, just praying it stays that way!

We have been having such beautiful weather so far this spring. The flowering trees and shrubs are blooming to their fullest.

I took so many pictures of my gardens the other day that I collaged some together so I wouldn’t slow down your loading time too much.

I always enjoy other people’s garden tours so I will share these pictures with all you gardeners..

Enjoy the tour..

Pebbles was stalking frogs, as you can see by the guilty look when I said her name.:/

I hope you are all having a lovely spring!

Thanks for vising my blog!

-Mary

Pub Table Set Makeover

 

About a year ago I bought this set and had intentions of redoing it for last year’s vintage fair. I never got it done, so the other day I dug it out of my stash and gave it a makeover, which I’ll share with you here.

The before picture..

Everything was fairly solid with the set, only a few bolts to tighten on the table and a few of the chairs had missing braces on the bottom part, (you can see in the picture) so I cut a few out and pinned them on.

I wanted to do something unique for the table top, something to add a little character, so I opted for grooves, making it look like a plank top. I got hubby to help me a little with running the router, since I haven’t used it much.

We did a random spacing with the grooves and kept them shallow since no one wants to scrape crumbs out of a crack on a table top.

I then proceeded to paint the legs and skirting on the table, and the chairs. I used my trusty old sprayer and gave everything two coats of an off white paint and a coat of polycrylic.

Again, the before..

and the after..

I didn’t refinish the top, I only sanded it and gave it a coat of polycrylic.

Our lawn is slightly sloped, so if the picture looks crooked, that is why. :)

I forgot to mention that I also distressed the edges before applying the polycrylic..

I get a little carried away when taking pictures of my furniture makeovers and end up incorporating flowers into the photo, just to see how it goes together.. okay,that’s a little weird, isn’t it? Oh well, it’s fun. I wish I could get the scent to you too. :)

You will possibly see this set at the fair this year, which is coming up on June 24th!

 

Thanks for visiting, you all!

--Mary

TheWhiteCottageCo News

 

A few months ago I wrote a blogpost introducing you all to my Etsy shop, and now I want to give you some updates on how it’s going and share with you some of the products I’m adding to the shop.

First of all, Etsy is a challenge to get started. I was aware of this when I opened my shop and I set out with a big dose of determination, vowing I would not give up, even if sales would start out slow. With the home decorating products especially, it’s hard to become noticed since there’s so many of that out there.

I’ve watched a lot of testimonies and tutorials on Youtube, just to get advice on how to proceed with opening a shop. My sister has a thriving shop called GreenLeafGardens, so she has helped me out a lot too, which I’m so thankful for!

So far, with opening my shop in mid February, I’ve had so much fun! No, it’s not going crazy with sales, but from what I’ve heard about Etsy, it’s doing okay. My best selling product so far has been this vintage hare table runner..

I’ve also sold a few Easter signs…

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                               The wood I use for these signs has a story behind it. The place where we live, the white cottage, as I like to call it, is my home place. It is where I grew up and have a lot of good memories. One of them being helping my dad finish out our barn. It was basically just an empty pole building that we used for our barn and we added box stalls for the horses. We even framed in a separate tack room, which was a highlight for me, being the horse lover I was. I remember how much fun it was drawing out a print of the layout of the stalls and tack room. I could already picture myself grooming my horses, which were tied in the cross ties in the center aisle, and walking into the tack room to get the saddle and bridle to go for a ride.

Anyway, we did make all the stalls with rough sawn wood and it looked like a barn out of a magazine, or so I thought at the time. :) It stayed that way for years. The wood grew darker with age. To make a long story short, we ended up turning the barn into a garage, so all the box stalls were removed. I should mention this wasn’t the easiest feat, since we used all nails to fasten the boards! Evidently that was an era when screws hadn’t quite made their mark yet. So now, we have this stack of nicely darkened wood, just waiting to be turned into something beautiful again. :)

Needless to say, I have plans to add more signs to my shop with this wood. It is a heavy wood, which makes the shipping a bit pricey, but its too perfectly aged to not use it!

The other thing I love creating is paper scrolls. A few years ago, around Christmas time, I was reading someone’s blog and they had a picture of their crafting room, all decorated for Christmas, and hanging on the wall was a big roll of brown craft paper. She had unrolled a portion of it and wrote a Christmas message on it. Thus began my scroll art idea.

  I have also since made some black ones, after finally finding a paper heavy enough to suit my taste. I did find a heavier white paper on a roll also that I want to make some white ones too.

I have a few scrolls hanging throughout the house and love them. You would think paper wouldn’t hold out, but it does! And they are easy to store, should you want to switch it with something else for a while.

 

I make the verses or sayings for these scrolls with my Silhouette Cameo. (the greatest invention ever!)

They take some time and the vinyl is a little pricey, but I love making them! I have a lot of ideas I want to try yet, the only drawback being finding the time to do it. The possibilities are endless!

Another thing I’m excited about that I don’t have any pictures to share yet, is a daily wipe board calendar I’m working on. I know from experience that life goes more smoothly if you write down reminders to keep an orderly schedule. What would be more fun than being able to do that on an attractive, wood framed calendar with little magnets to add charm to some of your days? Keep checking my shop for this!

Spring is my favorite time of year and it’s always so much fun to decorate for the season. I just added this cushion cover to my shop yesterday…

It’s made with my latest favorite, bleached drop cloth fabric. I bought the image and transferred it to the cover. I also added the words “nostrum Nidus”, which is Latin for “our nest”. The cushion pictured resides on our sofa and it does add a nice springish touch to our living room. I am sure it will stay throughout the summer too.

Another springish addition I added to my shop is this galvanized bucket..

I discovered why it said “for decorating purposes only” when it started leaking. :( Next time I would use a liner to hold the water for fresh flowers. It would work perfectly as a planter since you want some drainage for that.

I will try to add updates of my shop every now and then. You can visit TheWhiteCottageCo. by clicking here.

I hope you all have a nice week and thanks for stopping by!

-Mary