Hello, gorgeous!
I am fascinated by this hydrangea. I’ve been watching each blossom evolve from an off-white to tinges of pink to a deeper purple to a faded lavender. It really puts on a show.
It’s doing well in its current location, which was supposed to be on the outside of the dog corral but, due to winter and our worries about Scout, is now inside the mini dog corral – next to the remembrance rose. There’s a little fence around both plants, basically to keep Scout out of there, and it seems to be working.
Let’s pause for a moment to utter a thank you. The humidity broke overnight. We couldn’t be happier. The windows are open, the front door is open, Don’s making breakfast, Scout is snoozing in the living room.
I might even be able to function today.
The living room wall sans dollhouse. Lest I be accused of staging a photo, look closely at the desk. Yes, that’s my duster.
The Maxfield Parrish has been moved to this new position and we love it here. It’s much easier to see and it’s not hidden in a darkish corner like…
the dollhouse is. It’s not all that dark, but it’s very difficult to photograph the outside with the light from the window to its left.
But I like it here in the den because I can see it from my good old blogging chair. That’s a good and a bad thing. I can see it, but that also means I think about it a lot, which means I’m constantly dreaming of new accessories. Which means I have to pull the reins in on my “I want” list.
Moving the desk was a good thing but the whole situation arose out of a need to keep the dollhouse safe when Scout bumped into the dollhouse table. So we still had to move the pottery that was on the desk or it might have suffered the same potential crash-to-the-floor fate.
The two smaller McCoy vases are now on the bookshelves.
The large vase has moved to the sideboard.
I promise I am not going to become a blogger that informs you about every item I move from one place to another in the cottage. Lord, no. Just the bigger changes. Since I had written about Scout’s problems and the need to relocate the dollhouse, I thought I’d share the end results with you.
Frankly, I don’t move things around all that often – when it happens, it’s usually out of necessity.
Although I may write a triumphant post when I finally move all the crap off the kitchen table.
Happy Wednesday.
Claudia, I love how you keep it real. I have to clean my crap off the counter! Have a great day, Doris
I wouldn’t want anyone to think this place is picture perfect, Doris! Far from it
Yes, I too love how you keep it real Claudia…good luck with the kitchen table. If you do manage to do that, would you let me know how? LOL Our table is a disaster…and the rest of the house is beginning to bug me as well. Time to de-clutter and really clean. Thank God our humidity has broken as well or I wouldn’t even be thinking of cleaning.
You and me both, Vera. The humidity stops me from doing just about anything!
Marvelous photo of the hydrangea at the top! They are wonderful to draw and paint as they are so detailed. Your post has spurred me to action! We had contractors in yesterday and all the furniture in one room had to be shifted and covered in drop sheets.
Your post mentioned lighting the dollhouse for photos. I took a few moderately successful photos of my dollhouse using my daughter’s new Android as it is actually better than our little “holiday snaps” digital camera.
(I still prefer my old Nikon that uses film.) I used an overhead light and then a “spot” light inside. Do you have any tips? Your dollhouse photos are always wonderful!
Good question, Barbara! May I save this up for a Q &A post? It will be coming soon, I promise. I’m still figuring it all out by the way, and for every good shot I get, there are about 10 that don’t work!
“Edit ruthlessly” is my mantra for every aspect of my life, including photos.
Looking forward to future posts on the “how tos”! :)
I need to edit ruthlessly in my craft closet and just about every closet, for that matter!
“Although I may write a triumphant post when I finally move all the crap off the kitchen table.”
Thanks for the morning laugh, Claudia!
You’re very welcome, Sylvia!
I’m thinking that Caroline’s second floor balcony looks a bit empty with only the planter…ummm, just saying… It’s good to move things once in a while. That gives some fresh perspective and reminds you of the things you have. My dad used to move whole rooms almost twice a year….he’d switch around the two bedrooms and living room. We kids (my brothers and I) thought it was quite fun helping him haul couches and mattresses up and down the hallway. I guess the experience stayed with me because my first roommate in college and I used to switch our dorm room around when we got tired of studying, at least every couple of months, and at 2 am!
Oh, I used to do that, too – especially with my bedroom when I was growing up. However, our real cottage can only be set up a certain way – we’ve learned that the hard way!
I’ve thought about adding more to the second floor balcony but there is no way for Caroline to get out there, save through a window! Of course, there’s no real way for her to get on the rooftop either!
I’m thinking more potted plants eventually. But they’re pricey, so it’ll have to wait.
Beautiful Hydrangea! I miss them as there aren’t any in my neighborhood here. We get so much sun! I know how the moving things around needs to happen at times. I just sold my sofa so I can get the one my Mom bought but doesn’t use. It’s a sleeper sofa so that will be good here when the grands stay the night. Everything in the living room is moved out of the way so one sofa could leave and now I’m waiting for my SIL to move the other sofa in (hopefully today). Then I’m cleaning and rearranging this weekend. We had a big storm last night and it finally cooled off a little bit. Whew. Hope you have a good day with lower humidity!
hugs,
Linda
It sure is nice out there! It will still be warm, but without the humidity, it’s like a whole new world! Good luck with the sofa!
You have me laughing, Claudia…my triumphant post would be my breakfast bar lol! I’ve always loved your piano area…
Aw, thanks, Linda! I think we all have that one place where everything lands.
I love that hydrangea…so beautiful. And a big whoop to the humidity leaving…here’s to fresh air! I had to laugh at your reference to the kitchen table…why is it such a magnet? Course, we spend a good portion of our morning at the kitchen table…so everything, like current reading material, always lands there. I cleaned mine off this past weekend…no small task, and our peninsula….which also is a landing spot. Enjoy your humidity free day! ;)
Ours has all of the mail. All of it, including things Don should have ‘attended to’ a long time ago!
Same here….I put it all in a basket…and put it in his “office”. Risky, I know, but sometimes a gal has to do what a gal has to do! ;)
It is risky. But if I wait for Don to actually pick it up off the table and do something with it, I’ll be waiting a long time!
I have crap on the table and the counter – how did all this stuff end up here with no home? – this weekend’s project if it kills me!!! So glad to hear the humidity has broken- now if we could only return to “normal” Pacific NW temperatures I would be thrilled!!!
I wonder what ‘normal’ is now, Sue? Is it a new normal? I hope not!
I enjoy reading about your changes at the cottage Claudia. I think everyone has a “kitchen table”. A place where things seem to get dropped and forgotten. Have a lovely day…and enjoy the better weather.
Blessings,
Betsy
I’m going to go out and make myself do some weeding, Betsy!
What a beautiful hydrangea. A great photo. And your dollhouse is lovely, elegant and so inviting.
Isn’t it fun to move things around, even if it is by necessity? I haven’t done that for awhile and it might be good for the soul….just to give a new look to things and stimulate the eye a bit.
We are having a little cooler weather for a day or so, too. Welcome relief to feel human once again.
It is fun! So many times in the past, we’ve had to do it for some reason or another and we’ve found that we see the room with fresh eyes.
I’m afraid to check the weather. I don’t want to know if this break is a short one. Not yet!
It’s cooler here humidity wise but it’s still 80 degrees out which does not feel cool to me..The hydrangea is beautiful..
It feels cool to me after the last few days!
LOVE that first picture…it’s a beauty!!!!
My question is…..I hear that people always say, “after a while…..you just get used to the humidity and it doesn’t bother you.” ………BUT!!! you’ve been there a long while and grew up in Michigan…..still it bothers you? OR were you spoiled by living in California? I don’t think I could take it. I spent too many summers visiting my grandparents in Pennsylvania and NOT doing well with it.
Addie
I never hear people say that! Not out here, they don’t! And no one ever said it in the Midwest, either! I’ve never liked it. Never got used to it. Hate it!
lololoolo…you made me laugh!!!! but REALLY I hear people say they get used to it…I wouldn’t!!!!!
Me neither! And I haven’t! xo
We are heading to the upper 80’s and low 90’s for the next 5 or 6 days. ugh. But we have been so lucky so far this season that to complain seems very wrong. My philosophy is that I can drive in 90* weather, and am not worried about slipping and sliding when I walk… so we will take it!!
All the crap, indeed. I thought by doing so much banking and bill paying on-line we were on our way to being a paperless society…haven’t seen those results yet!! Those piles just keep growing.
Yeah, what happened to eliminating paper? I don’t see any difference!
Oh, don’t get me started on the crap on kitchen tables. I clean it off once a week. And by the next week it is in full flower again. How does that happen? And I do so love your doll house.
I don’t know! But it happens here, too. I asked Don today if we could go through everything that’s on there sometime tomorrow. I can guarantee he won’t remember having that conversation!
It all looks just fine. I have display-envy because I could never have little objects on shelves in front of books in earthquake country.
Maybe you could eventually have a small standing lamp near the dollhouse, or a wall-mounted light? Then you could also enjoy it on dark winter days or at night. The window helps…but do you have to worry about sun and light harming the wood or paint of the doll house? I’m having to currently draw a curtain mid-afternoon at this time of year, to protect a vintage wood table I like by the window.
I was just looking at a small 18th century (human!) cottage highlighted in HOUSE BEAUTIFUL. Filled to the brim with stuff and, yes, eclectic, and I might have gone for that ten years ago…what am I saying, I’ve-been-there-done-that look…but now it seems very un-restful to me (like curbing an urge to want to take half of that stuff out of that place!). My husband cleared off a space on our mini-patio to prep for a little rain which came thru over the weekend and my eye keeps going to it…because it’s empty and, confess to say, I like it. It makes the space feel bigger and cleaner. So, I keep telling myself, “Don’t go to Goodwill today” (since I’ll be right across the street in an hour from now). I don’t really NEED anything in terms of framed ‘art’ or decorative plates/cups/bowls; garden statuary or vases or trinkets or anything! I’m old enough now that I’ve spent a lifetime already accumulating all that stuff. And I certainly have no room left for even the smallest piece of furniture in my small house. (Which is why I could only get a dollhouse-mini; but I rationalize this by saying it will be the ‘home’ now for a lot of little stuff, everything contained in the one ‘vessel’…much like a bookcase for books, a china cabinet for china, etc.)
What made me think about all this is looking at your photos; noticing again that although you say your own cottage is smallish, and you’re a collector of things, you don’t look cluttered so, somehow, you’ve found the secret of blending small space with lots of treasured possessions in a workable way. I, too, rarely move things once I’ve got them in the order/arrangement which suits…whereas my mom, at least when I was growing up, was constantly changing the furniture layout. We’d come home and think, ‘She’s at it again!’ but we were also most-always delighted with her changes. She could do amazing things with not too much stuff, frugal lady at heart.
The light that comes through that window is diffused by the big maple tree that is outside the window, so I think it’s okay.
If you saw the spare room, you’d see tons of clutter! And my closets, which are so small and so crammed that I do everything I can to avoid sorting through things. I’ve hardly ever had a large closet and certainly have NEVER had a walk-in closet! That would be such a luxury!
Anyway, I feel like I’m constantly fighting the battle with clutter, whether it’s paperwork, mail or just plain stuff. I try to keep my collections organized and in order and I do work real hard at not cramming ever surface in sight with things. There needs to be some ‘air’ around everything – at least that’s what I think, and it seems to work for me.
I think we all have a room to the rear we don’t show off! And the proverbial kitchen junk drawer.
Yes, keeping the collections organized; really key.
I’ve had walk-in closets, twice. We filled them up quickly. I have a friend who bought a darn-big house…one of the McMansions…20 years ago. She’d always lived with spare furniture and possessions. It was her husband who wanted the bigger house, mostly for location-location (he’s a snob; she isn’t; I love them both). She’d shake her head and say to me, ‘We’ll be living in this cavernous space and hear ourselves echo; we’ll never fill it up in a million years.” Well, she filled it up in about six years without realizing it or thinking about it or even buying a lot of stuff. As humans, a lot of us gather. We keep too much stuff. And we ARE inundated with flyers, mail, newspaper (I still like a newspaper; I don’t read everything online), mags and also just keeping copies of bills and tax forms and everything else. And, yeah, sorting and donating and pitching (especially clothes); if you don’t keep up with it…and I don’t too much of the time.
A lot diff from my parents’ generation, at least earlier in their lives. I think my grandmother actually only had two (nice) dresses other than ‘house’ dresses. My parents rarely added to what they already had…if we got a new piece of furniture, it was a mega event.
Thanks for answering my question yesterday about the mystery/phenomenon of miniature life!
Just the kitchen table? Ha! Try any flat surface! Honey gets a little bit — aggrevated with me for my “nesting” piles!
I love the desk near the piano. I hope Scout adjusts to the new set up.
Beautiful Hydrangeas
Glad the weather has let up !
I have your Scotty bookends! They belonged to my grandmother. Do you know anything about them?
Both of your homes are beautifully decorated! :)
Pour Scout. I’m glad you found a new place for the house. I bet you will do a lot of “house decorating” in your head while sitting in your blogging chair and adoring your doll house.
Hahaha. I notice I said Pour Scout instead of Poor Scout. Oh well. Some days the brain works and some days it doesn’t.
If I blogged everything I moved well…. not a good look on my part! xx