Darling Dovecote

Here is what we have been up to…

Auntie R gave Darling this scooter. I love it. It is so cute! I need to learn how to drive it.

I got these cute play hair rollers at Unique for Mila. So cute!

I made two giant batches of strawberry applesauce. The first was 10 lbs of apples and was so good we ate it in 3 days! The second batch was 15lbs of apples (I had more red delicious than grannies for the second batch) and 2 lbs strawberries, plus a squeeze of lemon and some honey. The second batch is not as good. I think too many red delicious made it too watery and so I tried to cook it down a bit. It turned into an almost apple butter. Good, but nothing like the first batch. Oh I made chicken broth with chicken feet. It completely changed the texture of the broth. Very gelatinous!

Mila got her summer sandals. These were too big, I exchanged them for a size smaller. I love these salt water sandals so much I ordered myself the red adult version

These little potted flowers were 3 for $10 at Giant. They were such a treat! I bought the pretty lacey Ikea pots for $2.50 each I think. I bought them with Giant potted flowers in mind. They are a perfect fit!

I made some pretty cards.

I bought these lovely lamps with Sacha at Unique for $6.99 each. I am crazy about them. They need quite a bit of cleaning/fixing, but they are so very pretty…I can’t wait to get them working!

The last month was a bit hard. Mila and Liam both went through nasty stomach viruses and I have been dealing with awful rashes all over by face and neck. I believe I finally figured it out…I have developed a coconut allergy (I haven’t been able to wash my hair in a week). More on that later…I have been so busy…and then today we lost Moonie. But Sacha is here and that is fun…and G and I are walking and that is fun. I have been spending too much time looking on ebay for pink and blue porcelain handled items to take my mind off things. I got a few new pieces to add to my little collection (Mila already broke my vintage cake separator/cutter…I was so disappointed). But it is finally March and Spring is nearly here. All will be well…February always seems like a hard month.

Goodbye to our little Moonie

We had to put Moon down this morning. She was about 17 years old. Our longest lived kitty. She came home from Italy with us. So sad. She had a blood clot a few weeks ago and lost use of her back leg. Although she slowly regained use of her leg, the vet said the next clot would be worse, and it was. Last night I loved her and thought how frail she seemed now and commented on how she hadn’t been outside since the first clot. She was a smart kitty. At 4am I woke to a strange noise. She was flopping about. When I came down she started crying. We didn’t want her to be in pain or scared. Christian had to bring her in to a 24 hour pet hospital. Terribly sad. I know she had a good long life and was healthy right up to the last few weeks. I guess that is the best way to go. When we first got her in Italy she was so small she could sit in the palm of your hand.

Look what I just ebayed!!!!!!

I have been trying to ebay this coat since before Mila came home. I think this coat is from 2009 from Right Bank Babies. I have only ever seen one come up on ebay before and I lost the auction! This time I did the buy it now option. I payed more than I normally would for a coat for Mila but it is new with tags and I still got it for 60% off it’s original price. It is a size 4/5 and it is reversible so I know she will get a ton of use out of it! I love the fabrics/colors together! Don’t you just LOVE it?

PS Here is where I blogged about it before!

Thrifting Saturday

Nora and I had a lot of fun thrifting on Saturday. This is one of my purchases ($6/3 knives) from the Thrift Shop for the Blind in Kensington. They are porcelain handled, brass, fruit(?) knives. They are marked “Bohemia” on the brass. Does that mark mean they are Czech? They are so pretty! I came home and scoured ebay and etsy for similar pieces in blues and pinks. I think this is the start of a new collection for me. I just won my auction for a porcelain handled cake separator ($6.95)! Woo! I will actually use this because I love to make cakes. This is supposed to cut cake without smooshing it.

VINTAGE PORCELAIN HANDLED CAKE KNIFE CAKE BREAKER

Vtg SHEFFIELD England Painted Porcelain Handle Stainless KNIFE Set of 6 w Box

I like these a lot too. But the starting bid is $36. The blue on these is so pretty! I think if I stick to light blue and pinks they will all mix and match well.

Cute-cheap bathroom light idea

Before:

After:

We wanted to do something a little different for the bathroom lights above the sinks and didn’t want to spend a lot. We bought these galvanized steel outdoor light fixtures at Lowes for $25 each. Then we (and by we, I of course mean, my darling husband) sprayed them with paint we already had on hand. I LOVE how they turned out. We thought about doing them white, which would have been very nice and really goes with about any type of style. But in the end, we thought pink would be more fun (and more Cath-Kidston like).

I wanted to style the bathroom all pretty before taking these pics. However, I just realized it wasn’t going to happen at all unless I just photographed them as is. I read Miss Mustard Seed’s blog and she does such a lovely job of styling and taking photos (she has a book deal now where she is writing, styling and photographing her own book!). That is my goal. But for right now, it is truly more than I can manage. This is the reason I haven’t taken photos of the kitchen cabinets yet. They are lovely and just what I wanted! I wanted to style the kitchen counters so I could show them to you with the kitchen cleaned and all prettily styled. But honestly, my kitchen is almost never clean. We have three kids and I usually cook three meals+ a day. So, I am just going to show you my house as is for now. Maybe someday soon I will be able to do more…

Big Blankie Border…finished!

So here is the border I made for my big granny stripe blankie. I am so happy to have this finished and move onto some new projects. Maybe I’ll show more pics of it later. But right now I am just excited to have it finished. We are not using it on the bed but on the couch. It is crazy HUGE. Remember when I started it here?

Here is the old pic before I added the border, but you get the idea. It is huge. I do love it. Next one I will make smaller though so it will be a good couch/throw size. Plus I think I get bored with big projects. I love the planning new projects phase and when you work on the same thing for a year and a half…you miss that phase…a lot. But I did it anyway!

Valentine’s Day craft

Mila did this fun craft with a sweet friend and then I made the boys make some too. I guess they are not finished yet but I’ll show you anyway. I still have to write their names and date around the outside. This outline will make it look more like a heart I think. I might even frame them.

Valentine’s Day was my 15th survival anniversary. It was good. Mila and I had lunch at the co-op and we had my favorite Tara Thai takeout for dinner. Oh and I made molten chocolate baby cakes on the spur of the moment. So yummy. Lovely day for a Tuesday. I am quite thankful I made it this far

Art dresser organized…finally!

I was so inspired by these little heart plastic boxes at Target that I decided to reorganize the art drawers. It was a big job that involved three trips to Target to buy enough of the boxes. It took about a week to complete! That seems outrageously long but we have a ton of really nice art supplies that I had to sort out. I have to say, these boxes are way over priced ($3.99 for the small boxes). But they are so darling. It is so nice to have all of these art supplies properly organized for the first time. They are even labeled. I can’t tell you how happy it makes me. I know. It is weird.

I replaced the knobs on this chest as well. The glass knobs came from Homegoods and were super cheap! I think it cost $8/4 pulls. I noticed that Jo-Ann’s had decent cheap knobs as well.

3 day juice cleanse for my 15th survival anniversary

To celebrate my 15th cancer free anniversary on Valentine’s Day Darling and I are doing a three day juice cleanse. I have been wanting to do a detox since I went off my meds for Lyme/Bartonella. I am pretty excited because the last time Darling and Sacha had to do a 5 day by themselves since at the time I was on medication and I puked after the first juice (when your meds say take with food, they mean it!). I am using The Three Day Cleanse book (from the people who do The Blueprint Cleanse). We are doing a level one cleanse and will be doing 6 juices a day.

Day 1

1. greens with apple

2. grapefruit-strawberry

3. cherry-banana-peach

4. pineapple-raspberry

5. spinach-blueberry-apple-lemon

6. raw chocolate milk

Day 2

1. greens with apple

2. grapefruit-strawberry

3. grape-cucumber-pear

4. spinach-blueberry-apple-lemon

5. strawberry-apple-beet

6. easy cashew milk

Day 3

1. greens with apple

2. spinach-blueberry-apple-lemon

3. pineapple-raspberry

4. cherry-banana-peach

5. grape-cucumber-pear

6. raw chocolate milk

**Here is the grocery list for 2 people for 3 days. Just in case you are wondering!**

spinach 24 cups

kale 18 cups +

cucumber 5 large

beets 2

strawberries 60 oz

golden delicious apples 12

lemons 12

granny smith apples 8

pineapple 4 cups

raspberries 4 cups

bananas 4 cups (frozen)

green grapes 40 oz

pears 4

ginger

coconut oil

raw cashews 3 cups

rice milk 14 cups

cocoa nibs 12 Tbls

frozen cherries 4 cups

frozen peaches 4 cups

We purchased as much as we could from Costco to keep the price down. We had to get a few things from the Co-op and I still need to make a run to Giant for a couple things. We start on Monday!

Yesterday Darling, Mila and I went shopping for new sneakers and workout pants (Off Broadway for the shoes and TJ Maxx for the pants). I am registering for Zumba with G and Darling and I are getting the couch to 5k app that Sacha introduced us to. Also I have my first appointment with a natural MD tomorrow (Dr Rothschild in Mt Airy). I hope it goes well! It feels good to make time for these healthy things even though we have a two year old + nine yr old + thirteen yr old. It is so hard to find any time for things these days.

Giving Diapers Giving Hope

My sister came across this site that provides free cloth diapers to low income families. It is such a great idea that I have to post about it here. The lady who started it was inspired to do so because she was a single mom, recently laid off work and had to move in to her parent’s house with her children. As she was doing the cloth diaper laundry, she thought to herself “Thank goodness I cloth diaper because if I didn’t I wouldn’t even know how I could buy my children diapers!”. After our recent job loss adventures, I couldn’t help but connect with this story. If there is anyway you can send a donation to them, please do!!!!

Darling Dovecote

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Here is what we have been up to…

Goodbye to our little Moonie

Look what I just ebayed!!!!!!

Thrifting Saturday

Cute-cheap bathroom light idea

Big Blankie Border…finished!

Valentine’s Day craft

Art dresser organized…finally!

3 day juice cleanse for my 15th survival anniversary

Giving Diapers Giving Hope

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