knitting, creating, and loving life in the Midwest
My husband and I are on a major kick to get some things done around the house.
Here are the plans:
Heh heh.
We are currently halfway through getting our living room gallery done. Then comes our little one’s room. He loves his night light, which makes stars glow softly all over his bedroom ceiling, so we figured we’d take a cue from that.
I’ll share more as plans progress.
It’s been a couple of weeks since I last posted a garden update so I thought I’d do one.
Our blueberries are doing great, I look forward to never finding one because the boys have already eaten them all 😀
Our latest addition are the corn seedlings, we ran out of space at the designated area so we have two “corn hubs” and hopefully will enjoy yummy buttered corn later this summer!
There are hundreds of tiny pinhead-sized grapes, they’re the Concord variety.
Orange tree from our friends:
The pea and bean vines are doing their climbing thing, my oldest loves to eat them right off the vine.
First time growing potatoes so I can’t wait for these babies to be ready to harvest!
Looks like we’ll have pumpkins for Halloween – and soup!
My yellow roses are blooming daily, just love them.
I hope our squash is as good to us this year as it’s been the past two years.
We have enjoyed a few strawberries, juicy and sweet – yum!
My lavender is also doing well, I made sachets for Christmas gifts last year. I am very happy with my garden and very thankful for all my husband’s hard work! Hope you enjoyed the little update!
I’ve had a crush on Cate Blanchett since Elizabeth came out. I thought she was brilliant and she has yet to disappoint me with her acting. She has been in some shitty movies but she is always the highlight. With some overrated (in my opinion) actresses – yes, I mean you, Julia Roberts – you always get the same character. Julia is always Julia in whatever movie she is. And when she is not, she fails miserably at NOT being Julia.
Cate, however, disappears in her roles. She transforms from one role to another (again, is my opinion) and has only gotten more gorgeous and talented with the years.
One of my favorite websites recently featured a spread she did for T magazine and I just fell in love with this photo:
Really, a moment of simplicity, but I love how striking she looks nonetheless. And I want her haircut.
We recently got new nightstands – we decided on the Expedit from IKEA in the walnut finish and have been really happy with them. Our boys inherited our old nightstands. I’ve been on a turquoise kick and I was very happy to receive my LOVE print from Made by Girl this week. I love the pop of color on our neutral walls:
My little corner is full of things I love: yellow roses from the plant my husband got me, pics of him and our boys, and wrought iron/fleur de lis decor. I also got some pillowcases in chocolate brown/turquoise to use as accents, since most of our bedding is in neutral colors. The vase is not as dark blue as it looks in the photo, it is (you guessed it) turquoise and it is from IKEA.
Have a wonderful weekend, everyone!
When I was little, growing up in Lima, a favorite destination for a weekend treat was Palachinke, a pancake place that served huge, thin pancakes. I always asked for banana pancakes and was never able to finish.
Flash forward to last week, when Mom was staying with me and we headed up to IKEA – we had breakfast there and I enjoyed their thin pancakes:
I learned from a quick Google search that “palacinke” (as well as various derivations of the word) is the Eastern European name for these crepes.
As you can imagine, I am determined to make these at home because going to IKEA for breakfast every day is just not feasible. Tempting, but not feasible. I did get a jar of lingonberry jam because it was so delicious!
I’m always on the search for art depicting my favorite city in the world – Paris. Today I’m sharing these lovely works by artists that let us enjoy their art without spending beaucoup bucks.
This is one of four postcards in a set, made by TINYKITN. You could mail them, sure, but they would look so pretty framed in a grid, don’t you think? I would love something like this for a wall in my bedroom.
Now this one would belong in my kitchen/dining room – as would any of talented Lucille‘s other prints – not only do you get charming illustrations but many of them include a recipe as well. Gorgeous AND dangerous art!
I love how bright and cheerful Lynsey Hunter’s cards and prints are – she also has prints of different cars that I love.
Don’t you just want to sit on that chair and look out the window? Kitty on your lap, dog at your feet, what a great way to spend an afternoon. Shell Sherree‘s illustrations make me want to step into her art for a few hours.
Bon, c’est tout, mes amies, that’s all for now, my friends, I hope you have enjoyed these beautiful pieces of art with me!
I went through the masses of books my husband and I have about a year ago, our bookcases looked pretty good. For a while.
Then . . . you know how it goes. More books get shoved in, kids put their toys on the shelves, tall shelves get used as spots to put stuff the kids can’t get to, and this is what you get:
Pretty disgraceful, huh?
I’d been meaning to get to the bookshelves for a while, and then this post from the lovely Michaela Noelle was the final impetus I needed to get going. After a long process of weeding out some books and packing them up for storage in the garage, this was the result:
Still a lot of books but my husband and I are avid readers.
Here is one of the Fantasy shelves, with appropriately fantastic gargoyle in the middle: 
Our Gardening books look lovely with pretty yellow ranunculus!
Two handcrafted home accents my husband got at a craft fair accent our – what else – Home shelf:
I’m pretty happy with the results – which meant four grocery bags full of books got put away in the garage. And some random items that somehow (ahem) got thrown on the bookshelves, like bouncing balls, marbles, the case for a handheld game, etc. found new homes.
Now I only have the kids’ bookshelves to deal with. Oy.
Click on the pic for the full-sized printable:
I saw this great questionnaire at Lissalaneous Thoughts and thought I’d give it a try:
A. Age: 29. Okay, 39. Until November. I need to start Forties’ Therapy.
B. Bed size: Queen. Someday King or Cal King but not any time soon.
C. Chore you dislike: Cleaning floors – be it bathrooms or kitchen. Hate it.
D. Dogs: In our future, we have two cats for now.
E. Essential start to your day: Cup of nice hot tea for our chilly mornings.
F. Favorite color: Burgundy.
G. Gold or silver: Gold. Yellow gold.
H. Height: 5’1″
I. Instruments you play(ed): None, but I was a Soprano in my younger years.
J. Job title: Queen Bitch of the Universe. She Who Must Be Obeyed.
K. Kids: Aidan (6) and Alexander (4).
L. Live for ______: My family.
M. Most embarrassing moment: Got an hour? Falling in the cafeteria, running out of gas, not rinsing conditioner out of my hair, etc.
N. Nicknames: Clod. Sooner or later, everyone calls me Clod. They say it’s Claud, but I know better.
O. Overnight hospital stays: Two c-sections and a hysterectomy.
P. Pet peeves: Bullshit. Or rather, bullshitters. People who hate their lives and won’t do anything to change them.
Q. Quote from a movie: “Which one of you bitches is my mother?” from Lace. Not a movie, but one of the trashiest 80s miniseries ever.
R. Roses: I’m making this up because the R is missing from this quiz. My favorite are yellow, although deep red also make me happy.
S. Siblings: Too many, all half-sibs. Two from mom, four from dad, they have half-sibs and THEY have half-sibs, and honestly, anyone could come up to me and say they’re related to me and I wouldn’t be able to say they weren’t.
T. Time you wake up: Between 5:00 and 6:00 am. On my own. I’m a morning person.
U. University attended: San Francisco State University.
V. Vegetables: Um, yes? I eat some, I grow some.
W. What makes you run late: The boys, usually.
X. X-rays you’ve had: Teeth, back, shoulder.
Y. Yummy food you make: That is up to whoever is eating it, but I WAS told I make a good lasagna.
Z. Zoo animal favorites: Butterflies 😀
I’ve been feeling like lightening up my home with some spring-y blues and greens. A couple of trips to Michaels and IKEA helped in that endeavor.
These candles got glammed up with some flowers – $2.99 for six at Michaels – and ribbon.
The center one is on one of my yellow ramekins from World Market.
We’ve had this lovely glass vase since our wedding – we used it for cards with good wishes our guests wrote. After, it languished in the master bathroom for almost eight years. Then I saw this on the PB website.
I got a fake plant (because our dining room is so dark it wouldn’t be fair to a poor real plant) and I love how it looks, flanked by my beloved Fleur-de-Lis candlesticks.
With the help of one of my new BFFs, Valspar’s Everglad Glen spray paint, I brought a frame into the spring season.
This is one of my all-time favorite pics of my boys together.
Last week I was super inspired by Kimba’s Map Decor link party and did this:
The lantern is from IKEA (I also have one in light green) and the tray was paint sprayed with another new favorite, Valspar’s Exotic Sea. I love the combination of the bold turquoise with the muted map print and the white lantern.
So that’s my mini Spring-a-looza tour – I am currently working on a long project that involves lots and lots – and lots – of fabric. Stay tuned!
Casa de Berry 