friends — Page 20

A Bird in the Bedroom

March 23, 2015 at 9:08 am by Claudia

Spring, as you know, is taking its sweet time hitting these parts. There’s still snow on the ground, though less and less each day. The birds that overwinter here are in evidence and I swear I’ve heard a little song here and there. But I’ve yet to see a robin or any of the other birds who start to appear around this time of year.

So when I saw the sweetest bird pillow in the Etsy shop of my dear friend, Judy Clark, I had to get it.

It arrived on Saturday. Judy, being Judy, included some Easter goodies, as well.

3-23 judy's pillow

Isn’t it beautiful? As Don said when he saw it: “Flowers and birds. That fits in here.” (I do realize that I have to keep a tight rein on all things flowery. There’s a lot of it around the cottage.)

I walked around the house trying to figure out where it should go. The bedroom won out.

3-23 judy's pillow 3

I’m not one to shy away from pattern. As long as the patterns have a color in common, I go for it. I love color. I love pattern. I love eclectic.

I am still in love with our newish bed. It’s heavenly.

But I digress. The pillow looks just right on the bed. It needed to be with the two larger pillows. They work together.

3-23 judy's pillow 2

Judy, I hope you like it there. Your work is beautiful, as always. Thank you.

In case you’re interested, the quilt at the foot of the bed was made by yours truly. Most, but not all, of the fabric is from the Kaffe Fassett line, as was the pattern, which is based on the classic snowball block. This quilt was on our other bed, which had a full sized mattress. Since the new bed is a California King, this quilt is used for naps and it also travels with me when I’m on the road.

The gold coverlet is from Garnet Hill. No, I will not be making a California King sized quilt.

I got the pillow on the left from Home Goods.

The one on the right has a cover made out of vintage fabric.

The dust ruffle is from Overstock.

I’m off to start taking photos of egg cups.

Happy Monday.

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A Day Trip and a Remembrance

December 30, 2014 at 8:45 am by Claudia

Yesterday morning, Don called out to me, telling me to go out on the porch and look at the sky. This is what I saw:

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It’s as if someone took a giant piece of chalk and streaked it through the sky. I love the X.

Later, we decided to take a drive to a little town across the Hudson from us called Millbrook. We used to go there quite often when we lived on that side of the river, but we haven’t been there in quite a while. There are a couple of charming antique stores there (we’re on a mission to collect mismatched, but sturdy, chairs for the kitchen table.) We didn’t find any chairs, but we dined at this incredible diner.

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It’s the Millbrook Diner, which has been around since 1929. Jimmy Cagney, who had property nearby, used to stop in there for a bite to eat. It is unbelievably cool, the real deal. Don, who loves nothing more than eating at a diner, was in heaven.

12-30 diner

Here he throws his arm heavenward in thanks for his eating experience.

He ate a lot.

And we also stopped at a local bookstore.

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I can’t resist a bookstore, especially an independent bookstore. As is the usual with us, we ended up chatting for quite a while with the staff, who were incredibly helpful and fun. I saw Mary Oliver’s latest volume of poetry, Blue Horses. After I had read yet another in a series of poems out loud to Don, he grabbed the book and bought it for me. So I bought one for him: Of All The Gin Joints: Stumbling Through Hollywood History.

Even-steven.

Today, we’re heading out to another favorite antique shop. The search continues.

By the way, be sure to stop by my post about Living Small to read some tips I’ve shared and to learn more about the new show Tiny House Nation on the FYI network.

And now, I want to stop and take a moment to honor a longtime reader of this blog who died very suddenly on Christmas day. Rizzi, that was her nickname, her full name was Madeline LeClair, wrote the blog Gifts From the Sea. She lived with her daughter and son-in-law and their two daughters in New Jersey. Rizzi used to comment on this blog frequently and I visited her blog, as well. She stopped blogging about a year ago. Recently, she had been suffering from bronchitis and complications from that illness took her life.

Rizzi’s niece, Ann Marie, is also a reader of this blog and she wrote me to tell me of Rizzi’s death. Both Rizzi and Ann Marie are kind and generous, the sort of people I felt blessed to come to know through this blog. When I started to write about my new dollhouse obsession, Rizzi sent me three unfinished cabinets for the dollhouse. You see them every time I publish photos of the den and the kitchen. The blue hutch in the den was from Rizzi. The shelf unit over the Aga oven in the kitchen was created from one of the unfinished pieces that I took apart and reconfigured.

Those pieces will always be there and they will remind me of a lovely friend who took the time to share her world with us on her blog, and also took the time to stop by mine.

Rest in peace, Rizzi. You will be missed.

Happy Tuesday.

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Monday Morning (For Lack of a Better Title)

December 1, 2014 at 8:51 am by Claudia

Don and I have lost two friends recently. Both of them lived in our area of the Hudson Valley.

Bob, who was about as good as they come, was diagnosed with Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (Lou Gehrig’s Disease) several months ago. It was quite advanced at the time of diagnosis and within a couple of months he was gone. It hit Don especially hard. Bob was always there for us, bringing his chainsaw to help us deal with a fallen tree, checking the brake line on Don’s now-gone car, one winter he helped Don unfreeze a pipe in the basement. Always giving, always kind. We can’t believe he’s gone; here one day and gone the next, much too quickly to take in.

Mery, who was diagnosed with Breast Cancer a few months ago, died on Thanksgiving. Mery owned and ran a café in Saugerties, NY called Café Mezzaluna. Don played there for Sunday Brunch many times, as have most of our musician friends. Mery was a great supporter of musicians, visual artists and writers. There were art exhibits on the wall. Poets read their work. Musicians played their music.

Mery was a force of nature and her spirit was pure and loving. Cheri, Mery’s partner in life, was by Mery’s side during her illness, all the while continuing to cook the delicious meals that came out of Café Mezzaluna’s kitchen. Needless to say, the community is reeling. Cheri is trying to buy the café so that it can continue to be a haven and joyful gathering place for everyone and there’s a fund in place to try to raise the money. If it fails, this wonderful place will be no more.

Cheri decided to open up the restaurant for brunch yesterday, so we drove up to Saugerties. I’m so glad we were there; to hug Cherie, to be a source of support, to mourn, to witness, to celebrate Meri and the business into which she poured her heart.

Bittersweet and very sad, yet beautiful.

We grabbed a few minutes after brunch and visited the wonderful used bookstore that is in Saugerties, Our Bookshop. I wrote about it in August on Just Let Me Finish This Page. I wanted to look at the vintage children’s books. I’m trying to gather some of my personal favorites from childhood. My mom had some lovely books that she read as a girl, then passed on to us to read, and somehow our estranged sister ended up with them. Mom had all the Anne of Green Gables series, all the Louisa May Alcott books, Daddy Long Legs by Jean Webster, and more titles I can’t remember. All from the thirties. All lovely editions.

So I try to buy them when I can.

vintage books

I came home with Anne of the Island by Lucy Maud Montgomery and The Mystery at the Moss-Covered Mansion (A Nancy Drew Mystery) by Carolyn Keene. Don grabbed King Kong. (That’s my signed edition of To Kill a Mockingbird on the left.) There was a newer set of the Nancy Drew books in the shop but I didn’t like the binding or the look of them. The one that I bought yesterday is lovely.

And, on Saturday, some carpeting arrived for the dollhouse.

DH runner 1

Actually, two runners. I got them from a wonderful Etsy seller, Maison de Petite. The runner that she was selling came in a wider width than my narrow stairs could accommodate, so she kindly reduced the size for me. But I underestimated the length, so I’m ordering 3 more – one that will cover the remaining steps and, since I like the look so much, two more for the stairs leading to the bedroom from the den.

Isn’t it beautiful?

DH runners 3

Dollhouses become special worlds, don’t they? No sickness, no sadness, no too-young deaths, no heartbreak. They’re happy, carefree little worlds. I think that’s why so many of us love our little miniature havens.

New post up on Just Let Me Finish This Page.

Happy Monday.

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A Bird in the Bedroom

A Day Trip and a Remembrance

Monday Morning (For Lack of a Better Title)

Lambs Like to Party

A Note

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