A Perfect Day To Take A Break

Time to take a break from whatever you are doing.   At least it’s time for me to take a break.  Hope you can join me 

 It is a beautiful day here in North Carolina, perfect for sitting  on our front porch.  So I just made a pot of tea to take outside and I picked some zinnias.  Did I show you how big the zinnias are in my garden?

 The plant is almost 3 feet in diameter and it is part of the garden right beside our back door.  Every time I leave or come home I am greeted by all this color.  I am thrilled to have flowers blooming because the deer eat almost everything else!

 Just in case you weren’t able to join me I have a book to read.  I love books by Maeve Binchey.  She writes a good story and I love how she develops the characters.  I’m always looking for suggestions of books to read, so if you have a suggestion please leave me a comment.  I am also reading The Power of a Half Hour by Tommy Barnett, which  is also a good book  about how  how valuable only half an hour can be.

Did I tell you about the great bargain I got in wicker furniture? I spray painted it black and put it on our deck.

 It looks nice but it’s not waterproof so has to be covered when it rains and it’s constantly covered with pine needles that keep falling. I don’t have anywhere else to put it so I’ll probably end up putting it on Craig’s List.  If you live in the Charlotte area and could pick it up, you can have it all  for $45.

 Well I hope that you are enjoying your day.  I really need to get back to work now.  Hope you’ll come back and visit again soon.
Rhondi xo

Good Monday morning.  Quilts and plates are two of my favorite things.  Blue and white quilts and plates are my VERY FAVORITE things!

I finally finished this blue and white 12 patch quilt that I started back in the fall. It is such a simple classic pattern. You may know that I love to use men’s shirts and other old pieces of fabric in my quilts and this is one that has a lot.  They have a softness to them that new fabric doesn’t have.

I love the look of a quilt just sort of thrown over a bed like this. I wish you could feel it.  It’s so soft.

 When I began this blue and white quilt, my plan was to make a tablecloth.

Maybe there are a few too many checks going on in this room.

Or on the sofa to cozy it up in the winter.

It would be great on our bed.

Also picked up a set of 8 dinner plates and 2 bread and butter plates at GW the other day.   Hard for me to resist a blue plate for only 49cents, actually 37 cents with the senior discount!

 I plan to use them for meals but for a little while I put them in the coffee table and they make a nice contrast against the black background.

                 Blue and white quilts and plates, that’s what I love.  Oh and of course I love a cup of tea.

I’ve got a pot of tea all ready hoping you might stop by today!

                                                                      Rhondi xo

Our Front Porch

I haven’t written a post in a long time and I’ve missed you. It’s a pleasant morning, not too hot yet.  I just poured myself a cup of tea and am going to take a break and sit on our front porch.  We haven’t sat there much this summer because of the mosquitoes but maybe they are having their morning nap.  Do mosquitoes sleep??  I love our front porch, just 2 rocking chairs a little wicker table and some ferns.

     We also have a little pond which is more annoying than soothing because we bought a pump that was too        powerful for the size, so sometimes I just turn it off.

                                                       Do you remember where I live?  Here it is.

 Next to the door there is a planter with two ferns that I had from last summer and I managed to keep them alive inside all winter.  They weren’t looking too healthy when they first got out here but now they are thriving.  I love ferns and the deer don’t eat them.

Do you have time to join me for a little chat?  I’ve got a new teapot and surprise…it’s not blue and white!

Do you want to see my latest bargains? I got these 2 vases recently, thrift shop and yard sale finds, $1 for the striped and $2 for the other one.

I was thinking I could make it look a little cozier out here, so I brought out a cushion for the rocker.  It looks pretty but not comfortable at all.

  When I started this little blog almost 7 years ago, I hoped it would be a place where people could come and relax,  a place where you might get encouraged a little or get an idea of something you could do in your own home.  I hoped it would be a place where you could leave feeling refreshed, like you’d had a cup of tea and a chat with a good friend.

The blogging world has changed so much since then.  But I still think there is a room for someone like me just to hang out with my friends and talk about whatever is on my mind.  I have really missed chatting with you and plan to be here more often.  So I hope you’ll come back again.

                                                                           Rhondi xo

Do any of you remember any of my summer porch parties?    Here is one from 2009.  Lots of people joined in that day!

Pink Lemonade and Pink Saturday

Every Saturday for at least 6 years Beverly at How Sweet The Sound has hosted Pink Saturday.and I decided to join in today.  I have been enjoying  the flowers in my garden, and these pink zinnias inspired me to get out my acrylic tubes of paint.

So I looked through my rose colored glasses and started this painting.    It would be logical that I would want to paint zinnias, but I felt inspired to paint some imaginary flowers that are sort of  like peonies.  I’m very much the amateur, having fun playing with colors and PINK is definitely a fun one to play with.

The zinnias also inspired me to make a quick picture using the Waterlogue app, which is so much fun.  Perhaps one day I will be able to paint this myself.

I have an idea…let’s go visit Beverly and see what other pink things are posted for Pink Saturday.    We can pretend we are together visiting the other bloggers while we sip some pink lemonade!

                                                                                  Rhondi xo

Pink Saturday

Happy Pink Saturday.  It’s not actually Saturday yet here, but it’s already Saturday in some parts of the world!!

Beverly at How Sweet The Sound hosts a Pink Saturday party every week.   I think she started it over 6 years ago.  Since I have some pink blooming in my garden I thought it would be fun to snap some pictures for you  and join in today.

These aren’t from my garden.  They were a gift for my birthday.  Our peonies are already finished blooming here in North Carolina.   I love the fragrance of them!

These are growing right outside our kitchen door.  They are a kind of campanula (I think).

We dug up a whole bed full of old shrubs on the other side of our kitchen door and I planted it with perennials.  These pretty little zinnias help fill in the spaces until the perennials have a chance to mature.

One of my favorite old standbys, pink geraniums.  They remind me of my mother.  She loved to do watercolor paintings of  geraniums and always had large pots of pink or coral ones in the summer.

This rosebush grows at the end of our driveway and wants to climb all over the mailbox, so I am constantly cutting it back.

That’s all the pink that is blooming in the garden on this June day.

  I have one more pink flower to show you.  It’s in a painting which I did recently.  I’ve just begun to experiment a little bit with acrylic paints.  It’s not very good but I like the colors!   So that’s my contribution to Pink Saturday.  Thank you to Beverly for hosting it.  I hope you’ll stop by and say hello if you’ve never met her before and maybe visit a few of the other bloggers who have pink things to show you.

 I have been so inconsistent with my blogging.  I wonder if anyone will even read this today…

Rhondi xo

Evolution of a Living Room

Good morning dear friends.  I think of you as friends even though I haven’t met most of you.

As I sat and drank my second cup of tea this morning I was thinking about the changes in our living room over the last couple of years and how my tastes have changed.  I like to call it “the evolution of a living room”.Here is a photo of our living room this morning, as is, no staging, although I did clean up a bit for book club yesterday. We actually use this room a lot.  It is very peaceful with the white walls and white slipcovers.  You can see into the dining room, yellow with white chairs.

Last year I rearranged the furniture so that the sofa was across the opening into the dining room.  I  loved the way it made for a cozier conversation area, but to get to the dining room or kitchen, we either had to squeeze through a narrow opening  or go around through the TV room.  So that only lasted a couple of weeks! That was when I made the brown slipcovers which I hated.  They only lasted a couple of weeks too!

Before that the living and dining rooms were both yellow and the wing chairs were covered in the fabric with the blue and  white plates.  I loved that fabric but the slipcovers eventually got worn out and I had to make new ones.

I tried another arrangement and put the sofa on an angle on the left side of the picture.  I was into a lot of color then.  The dining room was red and the dining room chairs were black and my wicker desk in the corner is also black. I had curtains on the windows, which I stole from the sunroom.

The couch looked very nice then in the corner next to the fireplace.

Another arrangement of furniture.  I was REALLY into color then.  That wicker chair lasted a week before I moved it, way too uncomfortable for a sitting room.  There was a short time when I had a lot of red accents in the living room too, but I couldn’t find the photos.

Every time I do something different with the living room I like it.  I guess I just change it up for the fun of being creative!

ONe time I switched the rooms around and the living room became a dining room.  That was fun for awhile too.

Well my tea is cold and I have some work to do so I better get at it!

Rhondi xo

Book Signing With The Nester

 Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you probably know that Myquillyn Smith, The Nester has written a book.  If you haven’t ordered a copy yet, you will want to.   It is filled with lots of good ideas and lessons from her life as a “nester”.

On Saturday there was a book signing at Bebe Gallini’s, a wonderful home style store near me.

                                       
                                                 She set up a display just like the cover of the book.

She took the time to chat with everyone and made each of us feel special. Did you notice that she is wearing the      shoes that are on the cover?

                                                      I’ve never been on a bookcover before!!

Here are a few photos of Bebe’s.  I want this chair   Love the color of it

                                                          This chair is pretty great too.

        Interesting displays were everywhere.  This bust would look good in my house and so would the tables.

                                                 Lots of color..pink and aqua, very girlie.

                                           The candles inside these containers smelled lovely.

Lots of fun artwork.  This quote is from Winnie The Pooh.

Her sister Emily and her parents were there too and they are just as nice as she is.

It was a fun morning and I’m so glad I live near enough that I was able to go to it.

Hope you have a good week,

Rhondi xo