Happy Valentines Day

It seems the only time I post any more is on a holiday. I had so much fun decorating for Valentines Day, I wanted to take pictures and post so I have them for inspiration next year. My table decorations were inspired by my longtime good friend Suzanne.
You've read about her many times here. She is the retired owner of my favorite quilt store Strawberry Patches. She moved to Kansas last summer and I miss her more than I can say. We have been friends since college. She dated and married a high school friend of my Mr. SS's. We married these friends the same year, had our baby boys about the same time, cooked, sewed and shopped together. She has been my inspiration for most of my adult life in more ways than decorating and sewing. Her love and zest for life, her determination, courage, and strength have always been a shining light.  I could go on, but let's get on to Valentines Day. Love you, Suzanne.

This is a glance at my hutch. There are a few Valentine's specific decorations, but mostly just everything I could find red and white in my cupboards.

The three tiered stand is new and I found it at Home Goods. I love it because it looks like tart pans and fits my country farmhouse, cottage style. Again, most everything here came from my cupboards.

Here's another view.

Suzanne had posted her 3 tiered stand and cookie jar on face book and I totally copied. Who knew it would take so long to place each cookie in this jar. It won't take nearly as long for them to come out. 

All together.

I even tried to make the back of the stand look good.

See the scrabble X O. They were given to my by a good friend Ruth.

A little dark, but this decoration sits on top of the stand and was made at friend Sandi's house last year. She is sitting on a favorite thing of mine, a wooden spool.

I wanted to add pictures of a Valentine's pillow I did, but I'm having technical issues with this dinosaur of a laptop accepting pictures off my new phone.  I get a new phone so I can take pictures again and now can't get them on an old computer.  

On to happy days. We celebrated Mr.SS's birthday with all but one of the grands on Super Bowl Sunday, as we always do. The one missing is our college boy, Kyle who now lives in Oregon. The young man with the dog is our Drew's new friend, Evan and our new friend too. My son's old 1958 red pickup was not only seats on the tailgate for football watching but my favorite photo prop.

Hoping to post next about our weeks of camping. Mr. SS has been on a job in Ventura since before Christmas and we have endured many rainy days in a campground, but you know how I love my little blue trailer.

                                               

Sleepover for 10

It's been two years since I have had all 10 of my grand kids for a sleepover, so after checking with the Moms, I sent out a group text to the ones that have cell phones and invited them to stay Sunday night after the Easter dinner at my son's house. I really didn't know if the 21, and 19 yr. old would still want to come to a sleepover, but they did and we had so much fun. I only have one extra bed, so we had kids all over the house in sleeping bags.

The girls watching Princess movies.

Madi, Drew, Lexi, Kobi, Camy, Brooke, and Emmy

The boys played games.

Kyle, Cade and Jack

After a big breakfast, they played outside. After bribing them with being able to do a goofy picture, I got them to stand still long enough for this one.

Then...lets have some fun!!

After a big lunch, the Moms picked some up and the two older ones drove home to Tehachapi.

Whew!! Mamaw needed a nap! But who knows if I'll ever get them all at one time again. Emmy is 6 now, so along with the others, I think she will remember this time. (Says Mamaw with tears in her eyes)

I forgot my camera (phone) on Easter so I stole these from Mr. SS's phone.

This is our traditional place to take Easter pictures every year in my son's back yard.

Our dinner table for 26 set up under the tree house.Bouquets of roses are from our garden. You can't see them but there are twinkle lights strung

all over which, when the sun goes down, remind me of the TV show "Parenthood".

                                             

Happy Easter

Tonight as I am getting ready for bed after a day spent cooking desserts and salads for tomorrow's Easter dinner at my youngest son's house, I'm feeling a little teary. Everything is ready for tomorrow. Food is cooked, I cooked and cleaned up from a big Lasagna dinner for my friend MariEllen from So Ca. and my BIL from Nevada. I've laid out church clothes.

But I  haven't taken time to think about what tomorrow is besides a family gathering. It's Easter, Resurrection Day. My prayer tonight is to take time from my busyness  to be thankful for what Jesus did for me and to realize the miracle of him rising from the grave.

I don't usually get so sentimental on my blog, but that's just me tonight.

Okay...on to my blog post. This cute little lop eared bunny came from my DIL, Stefani's shop in Tehachapi.

It's a wonderful shop full of treasures, furniture she has re purposed, jewelry, accessories, and loads of home and garden decor. It's called Bliss Interiors and it is a lovely shop. If you get a chance to stop by, you will love it. She is on face book too, so look her up. 

I had a real treat earlier this week when one of my other DIL's, Lialani brought Cade and Kobi over. While Lia did my pedicure (oh what a treat that is), the kids washed my windows inside and out. They had never washed windows before and after listening to me tell them how I like them done, they did a fantastic job. Look at that smile. They also helped me clean up the patio and get it decorated and spruced up for the weekend company.

Kobi wanted a bouquet of roses for her room. We have the most beautiful roses this year. They are huge and smell so good. 

That lavender one is all our favorite. It has the best fragrance of all.

Today, Lexi and Mr. SS cut roses for all the center pieces for the tables tomorrow.  I'll get a better picture tomorrow. We had tons of Narcissus this year that didn't bloom much last year and later they added some to the bouquets.

Mr. SS found this bunny at Home Goods. At first I didn't care for it too much because it doesn't have a face, but it is solid wood and Mr. SS thought we should have it...mmm...that man and his love for wood.

Now, I have kinda fallen in love with it along with Mr. SS.

Wishing you a blessed Easter Day!!

Happy Valentine's Day

We are in the middle of a three day baseball tournament for grandson Cade in Fontana, but it's still Valentine's Day and I couldn't resist just a quick post.

Before I left home, I snapped a few pictures of the little bit of Valentine decorating I did.

I love red and white, can you tell?

A couple of treasures. The framed picture, my friend Sandi made. Hope you can read it. The heart in the background I got last year from Suzanne at Strawberry Patches at Bernina club.

I made one pillow for my white wicker chair out of some of my favorite Pam Kitty stash of fabric.

Three pillows I made for my friend Sandi a few weeks ago. She still had some Pam Kitty fabric from pillowcases I made a couple of years ago for her., They are so happy!

Wishing you a sweet day, friends and as always:

                                               

Happy Easter

Are you like me and saying to yourself, it can't be Easter already? Wasn't Christmas just last week?

March seems like the fastest month ever. We had a busy month around here. A birthday and a trip to Washington and Oregon took up the first two weeks. Then March was gone and here it is April and Easter.

This Cross is right across the street from my front porch. I took this several weeks ago, but thought it perfect for my Easter post.

The birthday girl, Emmy turned 5 this month. She is our "baby" but is so grown up. When asked what she wanted for her birthday, she told her parents she wanted new baby chicks. If you have been reading my blog for a while, I have often called her the "Chicken Whisperer" because she can catch, hold and cuddle the hens when no one else can. Well, she got 27 new baby chicks for her birthday and yesterday she showed them to me. The all have names and she knows each one of them.

She asked to make her a dress, so of course that's what a good Mamaw would do, right?

When she told me that's what she wanted,  I told her I was really glad she still likes me to make her dresses.

Being the precocious child she is (and 5 going on 15) she said, I said dress not dresses....OK!

I have no trouble getting her to pose, we had a fun morning in the yard and I probably got 20 photos, but I'll stop now. You got the idea.

I took this project to Washington for handwork in the car. I blanket stitched it and the stitches aren't too even, but I got it finished and put together when I got home. It sits on the bench I have in my entry way. 

I really enjoyed making the flowers. Of course I've done lots of yo-yo flowers, but had never done the others before. It's always fun learning a new technique. They would make cute hair bows for my girls...hmmm.

I finished off the back in my favorite way, by over lapping and adding vintage buttons.

The pillow is 38 x 18. I made the insert and literally had a wrestling match on the floor trying to get the pillow inside. Mr.SS thought it hilarious, but didn't offer any help at all.

I did a little Easter decorating using a few favorite things and some vintage linens and tablecloth.

I love my little lambs. I have had them for many years.

This little bobble head rabbit was added this year along with the metal shelf. The rabbit came from the dollar store. Amazing how something so cheap inexpensive can make me so happy. The metal shelf came from HomeGoods and was a pretty good deal too.

Thought since tomorrow is Easter, I would leave you with this picture again.  Wishing you a Happy Easter and a blessed day with church, family and of course lots of good food.

A Little Valentine's Sewing and Decorating

Last year, my friend Sandi bought a panel and the fabrics to make a quilt she wanted to throw over the back of her couch for Valentine's Day. Actually she got enough for 2 of them(one for me too), but I only got hers done for now.

She and some other friends came over and we had a sewing day. I sew, they cut, press, pin and we all laugh a lot and eat a lot.

This was one of the projects we worked on.

The panel is from the Pam Kitty Love collection last year. If you have followed me at all, you know how I love those Pam Kitty fabrics.

The blocks all look like vintage valentines. The back is very romantic, don't you think?

I love sewing the binding on the back by machine and it looks like top stitching on the front. So quick.

I machine quilted around the borders and sewed buttons down the center to tie it off.

My machine quilting skills are limited, but using my walking foot it came out pretty good.

The Pam Kitty border is actually the selvage. But it is so cute we left it on. The other side says Kitty Love, I think.

When I took my Christmas decorations down, I knew I wanted to do something different to my hutch.

There is a story to this hutch.  In our previous house, we had a large white hutch that my son and husband had built and I had a table that sat 10. When we moved into our RV small cottage, we gave them to our son who has a family of 8.

When we recently bought our old  new little cottage, we had no furniture at all. This hutch was our wedding present to our son and his wife. It was just sitting in their garage so they offered it to us. It fits just perfectly in our little dining area as does their first table and chairs. ( I will show you those later, I have big plans that includes a can of paint)

There was a solid door off to the right that Mr. SS removed and we have now removed the glass doors, replaced the wood shelf with glass and added a light.

I thought the back of the hutch was too dark, so I was going to paint it white. Then Mr.SS suggested bead board, but that still wasn't what I  pictured. Then, I decided I wanted to put fabric on it and it took me a while to decide which one. This Pam Kitty (I know, what else) fabric with recipes on it seemed just perfect. It lightens things up and adds some interest. I cut pieces of  heavy poster board to fit and covered it with the fabric. It is just sitting up there, so I can change it any time I want.

I don't have a lot of stuff, but I  found enough red, white and  glass things along with a few Valentine things to fill it up.

Here's a close up of the fabric.

And here it is all finished. Those two top drawers are going to be replaced with wire baskets soon.

I like it so much, I think the red and white will stay even after Valentine's Day. 

Happy Valentine's Day!