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We’re definitely out of the closet!

May 10, 2013 By 25 Comments

C and I are having a bit a spring clean round here and part of that is taking everything out of our closets, storing away winter clothes and freshening up the summer clothes.

So while we were finishing up the organising I complained to C that I haven’t posted in a few days, the photo challenges are Artificial light, and patterns, and didn’t know what to post. She said, “look”.

So I give you:
Our clean and organised closets, with tons of interesting patterns and overhead lights.

This is my closet.
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And this is C’s. The pink dress is for a Saturday wedding she’s going to.
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I love Sarah Jessica Parker’s saying, “I like to see where my money is; hanging in my closet.” But our stuff is only about 10% really expensive designer had-to-haves, 25% vintage, 25% pret a porter, and the rest is an assortment of travel finds, imports, hand-me-ups, (C’s case hand-me-downs), and one or two pieces of wearable art which we probably will never wear but is fun to have.

Now to go take away that huge charity bag in the hallway.

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Sushi lunch with dragons for tea cup Tuesday

April 30, 2013 By 16 Comments

Today was one of those days, one which hasn’t happened in…like…forever, where there is actually nothing I had to do. There are always plenty of things I want to do but, just today, there was nothing I HAD to do.

The sun was shining in the living room and I thought that what I’d really like to do is sketch, photograph, have lunch with C and check up on all you, my favorite tea cup Tuesday gals, and beyond.

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I grabbed my water dragons for inspiration and sketched some little garden flowers on more music paper and then it was lunch time.

I love my water dragons. They are Victorian, probably from a water fountain in some old manor house in the Cotswolds, and cast from bronze. They were my Christmas prezzy from R last year. (Honestly, he finds the best prezzies) The mom’s a bit battle scarred and a piece of her horn is missing, but she has her tail wrapped firmly around her baby dragon, who is looking adoringly into her face.

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What better for lunch with dragons than sushi! Isn’t that the absolutely perfect lunch so you can keep sketching while eating?

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I made us some tea but C’s tummy still wasn’t 100% after her boat trip this weekend, and she chose to have a Ginger Ale instead. I love that I brought my children up without pop, except as a special treat for upset stomachs or restaurant meals.

I love that they only choose a Sprite or Ginger Ale and don’t drink Coke/Pepsi or anything like that at all.

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But never mind that, after lunch we had our tea.

I’ve inherited five slightly out of control clumps of Euphorbia Wuflenii in this garden and they have been spreading at an alarming rate. I mercilessly chopped back several stems and singed the ends and stuck them into two ironstone containers, one on each of the side tables. The tea cups I chose are Royal Cauldon ironstone and have a beautiful lacy, bumpy, flowery self pattern.

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For afters we had some mixed dried fruit and some Turkish delight. (Who can resist fresh Turkish delight, and the powdered sugar means no sticky hands!)

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So we were sitting in the sunshine, enjoying our tea and I kept hearing a sound like a soft clicking or maybe a pinging. I thought maybe the heating was on and the vents were cooling or something like that, and then I looked down beside my chair. I had moved the creamer and tea pot to the tray on the floor out of the way of my camera and forgot about them there.

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Yup, you guessed it…that scrubby cat’s nose is just small enough to wedge inside the creamer and lap up the milk.
(And that was our very expensive lactose free milk too.)

Oh Morgan, what are you like? :)

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Linking to Teri and now want to find and look at Kimberly’s ArtJoyStuff, with Martha and thinking I really should Spring clean instead of dossing around today, with Sandi and loving her fresh, green carnations, and Bernideen and thinking, hmmm, a tea time mystery, what fun to read!

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Random thoughts on Friday

April 26, 2013 By 41 Comments

This morning I woke up at 3am! And the worst thing about it is I was awake. I mean properly awake. I took a melatonin in hopes of falling back asleep before I actually had to get up at 6:30, and fell into a sort of half sleep, half dozing state and the alarm woke me up from a most horrific dream. (And I’m thinking, “what the hell…for this I don’t drink caffeine?!?”) :(

What is it about bad dreams? What do you believe? I sort of think that it’s my subconscious trying to work out some situation I’m having problems with in real life, but if that’s true, what is my grandmother, now gone for millions of years, doing in my dream…and aliens in my house…and why won’t my cell phone work on their planet? Ok, well, maybe I understand that last one.

So my brain’s not all that sharp today, I mean, insomnia and all those aliens hiding in cupboards eating all my apple jelly…so here’s a bunch of random thoughts from my fuzzy brain:

1. To my mind, there’s very little in this world that can come close to the wonderfulness of crisp, white, air-dried cotton sheets. Can anyone think of anything better? (well, apart from the obvious: sharing those crisp, white, air-dried cotton sheets with your love later that evening)

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2. The previous owners plunked this lovely, rustic bird box on the top of the pole holding the drying line. A little chickadee family has nested there last year and has staked the box out again this year. It’s a perfect place for them because it’s a good 20ft off the ground and nothing much can get up there. The only problem is that the line vibrates the pole and the box, and the chickadees come storming out giving me the middle claw on their way to the neighbour’s huge copper beech, where they shout at me. So then I feel bad about using the line.

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3. So to make them, and me, feel better I filled up the bird bath with fresh water and the bird feeder with seed.

4. I don’t really care who gets the seed though. Squirrels are just as welcome as are the crows and the rosy house finches, and the chickadees. It’s a first come first served policy round here. I know there are a lot of birders, (and my neighbours), out there who will argue that I should do my best to keep the squirrels out of the bird feeder, but I like the squirrels. I think they’re funny and love how they climb right inside the feeder and have their own personal banquet and, besides, everyone has to make a living somehow in this world.

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5. All my neighbours are swearing about and digging up extra bluebell bulbs with a vengeance. I don’t get that either. I’m saving them from the lane construction site and from my neighbours compost piles, and transplanting them all over the place. You know, I have a city garden and I just picked this large bunch of bluebells and it didn’t even make a dent in the flower beds. Besides, they don’t really last long, I think they’re over with by June for sure, and I want to enjoy them as much as possible.

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So I’m thinking that with my wonderful fresh sheets and the bluebells and my windows open to the night air, I just might get a good night’s sleep.

Linking up with my new friend Nancy from A Rural Journal and to Claudia from Mocking bird hill cottage and wishing everyone an early bedtime, and a peaceful, long and deep sleep. :)

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First lunch al fresco…with sunshine!

April 25, 2013 By 10 Comments

This week Chloe and I were optimistic about the weather and braved lunch out at the big rustic table. As she was still studying for her finals, C’s readings came for lunch too. Actually, lunch is a great time for us to discuss concepts and ideologies C is having problems understanding.

Finals days require brain food and I made us some crab stuffed salmon, for the omega 3’s,
fresh spinach leaves drizzled with the best balsamic vinegar, for iron and magnesium,
and a couple of artichokes because it’s such a joy to eat with our fingers.

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This was such a good idea that now we want more meals outside. Come on sun! :) Have you had meals outside already this year? I hear it snowed in Ontario yesterday. Honestly!?!

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From Saturday evening…how did that happen?

April 20, 2013 By 19 Comments

Holy smokes it’s been one of those weeks where I have so many plans and feeling on top of it all,
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and suddenly the week just flies by!
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It’s been a week of work like crazy plus a slight problem with my vision which has kept me away form serious camera work. I’ve been having trouble focusing my left eye, and it seems that, when I do focus it, the right eye goes blurry. Don’t worry, it’s temporary and getting better and my optometrist is on top of it.
But for now I’ve not been out to take any brilliant shots and so have to tell you this story instead and bore you with my iPhone shots.
Morgan…that scrubby little cat…decided to not use her litter box and use the downstairs terracotta tiles instead.
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This is her knowing that I know and she knows I’m angry with her. She’s giving me the “do you feel lucky…well…do you?” look. I’m actually the only one in the family who can discipline her without losing an eye. (and I’m desperately trying not to laugh at her serious little mushy face)
This phase only last until she blinks.
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Then she slinks away and gives me the wide eyed, “wasn’t me, honest, I’m innocent!” look.
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When she keeps getting the “I know you did it stare”, she looks around for a way out and…
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tries it on with the, “it was Milo! He’s the bad cat!” look.
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And after a while I forgive her and she flakes out in the sunshine.
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Also, there was very little art this week. I did manage to sketch this little dragonfly. Dreaming of summer I suppose. I liked this little music paper of Tchaikovsky’s Romeo and Juliet. I loved the pattern of the notes it reminded me of a dragonfly with the calm quiet, one little twitch and then off in a frenetic flight.
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Tea cup Tuesday, not sure what to say.

April 16, 2013 By 31 Comments

This morning dawned bright and sunny. I made my tea in the kitchen and stayed for a while and watched as the sunshine found its way thru the hedge, reflected off the golden gong and onto my wall of post cards.

Then I went upstairs, to be alone in my studio to gather my thoughts and write my morning pages.
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I opened the skylight fully to the cool breeze and the peaceful morning and listened as my neighbours said their hellos in my quiet little neighbourhood.

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I sat at my writing desk, full of photographs of my loves and took out my journal and sat staring at a blank page for several minutes.

I guess the thing that’s on my mind the most is the Boston tragedy yesterday and how Chloe texted me the two words, “Boston Marathon”, and for a minute I thought she meant she’d like to run it. Then I turned on my pc and checked out the CBC headlines. So, while not wanting to add fuel to the media feeding frenzy and not wanting you, my dear friends to have doom and gloom form me, I must say that what’s on my mind the most is that there are people, children, who did not live to see the sun shine today and it makes me desperately sad.

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I made my tea almost subconsciously this morning. Put it into this gentle little Aynsley tea pot and grabbed this gentle little Colclough cup. Went outside and gathered a few spring flowers and cut up some strawberries, and then I went to choose a spoon.

And I couldn’t choose one so I brought the whole pile upstairs with me thinking I’ll just make the decision up here.

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And as I sat here at my writing desk staring at the spoons, willing myself to write my morning pages, I realised I was looking at a UN of spoons and I smiled at the thought of how well they all get along in that little silver mint julep cup. How there is no choice as the cup is the only home they have. They sit there and coexist and tarnish together. How I wish all people in the world could live as simply as these little spoons and just coexist and tarnish and grow old together.

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We are not perfect, we are unedited versions making mistakes, needing help, needing love and tolerance and understanding, and a little bit of luck to make a go of it in this world, and the more love and tolerance we can show each other the calmer and richer the world will be for it.

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So I sat here and drank my tea and picked up a drawing pencil instead of my pen. And sketched unconsciously, not thinking about it, and it became a sidewinder, a poisonous coral snake, a king snake winding his way across the desert of my imagination. Not sure what that says about my thoughts today.

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Good luck world with the sidewinder in it. I’m sending you strength and hope and love, and to you my friends I’m sending peaceful gentle thoughts.

Linking up with Terri of Artful Affirmations and letting her lovely tea cups lift my spirits too, and to Martha and praying right along with her, to Sandi at Rose Chintz Cottage and reliving the grand glory of the Titanic, and to Bernideen and thinking hmm, her tea cups almost match my little tea pot this week.

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Rainy day…let it rain we say.

April 12, 2013 By 20 Comments

One thing’s for certain about April. One day it can balmy and warm and I’ll happily plant out little seedlings and the next day a massive windstorm blows in causing me to fear for their safety. Such a windstorm blew thru Vancouver this past Wednesday knocking out power for most of the day and playing havoc with the shallow rooted firs. And the windstorm has blown the clouds around and slammed them into the mountains where they gathered into a blackish-gray mass and it hasn’t stopped raining all day.

It’s ok we say. What do we care when we can play and nap and have tea.
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Come walk around the garden with me

April 8, 2013 By 13 Comments

Morgan’s up for a little walk, she’s not impressed by the glorious ranunculus at the kitchen door, I am, how about you?

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On the back patio I’ve started cleaning out and replanting the blue pots; so far this year in hot pink and red geraniums.

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Most of you know I call C “Clover”. So she loves clover and has chosen to grow this beautiful little plant in its own special blue pot.

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Guess what I found in the very back of the garden, in last year’s forgotten carrot pot. Brand new, sweet and crispy carrots. The pot needed to be emptied and cleaned so the carrots had to be harvested, but what a little treasure we got for tonight’s salad.

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In the back flower garden the muscari have gone a bit crazy. This year I’ve been giving clumps to friends and relatives.

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Milo likes to guard the hole in the hedge where the aggressive orange cat sometimes sneaks thru. Not on his watch!

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Here are the trilliums from the shade garden. I’m not sure how everyone else feels but to me there’s something so romantic and special about them. Such a fragile West Coast plant and so protected that you rarely see it in the wild. Mine did not come from the wild; they came from my late aunt’s garden.

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But the star of my early April garden is the camellia tree. Almost as tall as the house, with flowers the size of side plates, it never gets rusty in the rain, never drops its buds, and blooms its little heart out for me.

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I’m sorry but I do own the most beautiful camellia in the world! Ok, in Vancouver then…ok, in my hood.

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Thanks for coming with me. :) See you tomorrow.

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Where she yarn bombs Binky and Bunny

April 6, 2013 By 8 Comments

Kerstie, Chloe and I went to a church bazar this morning and came up trumps! A whole box of knitted bits for $5.
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When we’re finished yarn bombing the babies we will wrap and knit the bits around the old apple tree in the back corner of the garden and show it some love. :)

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Probably got too much sun today…

March 21, 2013 By 15 Comments

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I really do adore having a 100yr old house that creaks and groans. I’ve been out all day and just now the sun-warmed house is cooling down and popping and snapping its old bones and I have to tell it it’s loved just the perfectly imperfect way it is.

I stole gathered some hellebores from my mother’s garden and put them in a vase with some other little garden snippets and the evening sun lit them up so beautifully that I spent a happy few minutes photographing them. (I would have taken more time but I lost the light.)

Then I put my cheery little arrangement in the living room and the house creaked its appreciation rather loudly.

I’m looking at some of the photos and loosing myself in the beauty of the blossoms. These hellebores absolutely have to be painted immediately…well, maybe tomorrow. It’s evening and Morgan has missed me. She’s terrifically determined to replace the lap top on my lap. I’m stroking her soft fur and wondering how I might be able to spend the rest of my life happily photographing and drawing flowers.

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