Monday, March 30, 2015
Easter is Near
Hello, how are you? Do you remember growing up and observing Easter with your family? As children, we always got new dresses and matching headbands. We all had GREAT BIG HEADS so the headbands hurt like the devil but we had to wear them on Easter. I think the big heads came from my father’s side of the family because I have a cousin on that side that has the big head too! In fact he was called jughead when we were kids. What interesting things I share about my family! Haha! That was the only time we wore them. I would always get such a headache from it and it would leave marks.
Mama did a great job of coordinating our outfits. There are old photos showing we didn’t have the same dress but the same shade repeated in our dresses and my brother’s clothes. Then of course we took photos after church standing in front of the azaleas if they were blooming.
Ham is an Easter favorite. Oh and plenty of deviled eggs! We always did the egg dyeing and ate tons of them.
Living in the Deep South we know we will have Spring before Easter but the thing is we may have things blooming but we always have a freeze before Easter so we try to harness our excitement and not do any planting until after Easter.
I remember our first Easter after we got married. I wanted to make up a pretty table but we were pinching pennies. Fortunately we did have azaleas blooming in the area and I gathered a few and they were all we needed. It was a small table and didn’t need much. No little children in our home anymore but I still like to decorate for Easter, even if it is simple. I think I still have a little of my inner child that enjoys the decorating and of course the goodies. Do you decorate?
The wisteria is showing off! There’s lots of bees buzzing all over it.
I was planning on cutting some wisteria and doing a pretty table with it but there’s too many bees this year! I know they usually don’t sting but they intimidated me.
There’s two different fabrics on the table. They both have roses blooming.
There are also butterflies!
My cardinal’s nest is happy to be back outside.
Jan
Thursday, March 26, 2015
Decorating With White
White certainly is popular in home decorating and has been for some time now. I do think it is a pretty backdrop for other patterns and colors to show much prettier.
Many books out there showing how to repurpose Grandma’s curtains with a neutral sofa and walls.
I do think if you have a room with plenty of natural light a white is pretty.
This book showing creamy white walls with white sofas and very light rug. The curtains are a floral as was the other photo. This room has very high ceilings. I wonder why the curtains weren’t brought up to the ceiling. Perhaps it's because the ceilings are already so tall that having the curtains mounted at the windows beings down the ceiling a bit to make it feel a little more cozy. Throws with color and pattern would look pretty on the back of the sofas along with pillows that have rich colors. Otherwise it can look a little cold and blah.
I really enjoy the white on the sofas in the Spring/Summer that lasts so long in the south. But my dogs don’t understand. They can only get on a sofa if I have a throw on there for them. They think I have one huge one on there for them!
A lot of solid decorating out there. I have tried to decorate with solid on my sofas before and it drove me crazy. It needed pattern to me!
There’s so many looks for the dining table and chairs now. There is a lot of mixing painted pieces with wood. I do seriously like this table but the chairs appear a little too short to me.
Many dining rooms are much less formal now.
Some rooms being shown have so very little color.
Lack of color is so depressing to me. It’s as if we are living in black and white! If it pleases you then that’s great. Color is just too important to me!
Jan
Tuesday, March 24, 2015
Party Line
Hey! How are ya’ll? This is a photo of our little town in the thirties. I don’t know who the photographer was but it looks like it was taken in the 1930’s. Amazingly it still looks a lot like this. All the men wore hats then, see them on the left. My grandfather always wore a hat.
Now that I am a little older I know what a treasure these old photos are. I always search the photos for a glimpse of a loved one who isn’t here anymore. What a gift it would be to find a photo you didn’t know existed of them. A little piece of them still here. Almost a hand from heaven for you to hold for just a minute.
I remember walking to town as a young girl just about every Saturday morning. Off to get my braces tightened. The waiting room was full of us. We sat in absolute silence and never made eye contact. A room full of tweens, not quite teenagers but not cute little children either. Fearing embarrassing ourselves and scared of what torture we would endure in the next room. The orthodonist liked to socialize while working on my mouth and brag about what an amazing job he did for me. He would have visitors come by while he was working on my teeth and pull out my impression that showed what my teeth looked like before I got the braces. Then he would begin with his commentary that started with a ‘Whew boy! She was just a mess and just look at her now!’ Umm…yes, every Saturday morning I endured this. My mouth was throbbing before I stepped out the door and walking all the way back home seemed to be too big of an effort. Luckily for me, my mama worked at the drugstore downtown. So I would lay on the floor behind a display and discover all sorts of things that were sold in a drug store in the 1970’s. It would be a while before I truly understood some of the things sold In that store.
Growing up we visited my grandparents most Sunday afternoons. They lived in the country. Back then if you lived in the country you had a party line. A party line meant that you shared your phone line with other families that lived close to you. I remember needing to call someone and having to keep checking to see if the line was open. There was a lot of entertainment on there if you were so inclined to listen.
My husband grew up with an eight party line which meant they shared the phone line with eight other families if you lived in the country. Then the closer to town you got it went to a smaller number. So eight, then six, four and two. My mister’s mother and aunts would hold a four way conversation with relatives that shared the line.
Found on browndresswithwhitedots.tumblr.com
Pop always wore a hat. He had a hat for going to the country store. He had a hat for church. He had a hat for going to the grocery store once a week. He had a hat for working in the garden. He had a hat for everything. He never went out without a hat. Pop whistled all the time. He was always whistling something. He drove my grandmother everywhere she wanted to go.
My grandmother's house was always spotlessly clean. I loved the way her bathroom smelled. Every time I went in there the smell was clean like soap. That one bar of Dove soap perfumed the tiny bathroom. There was barely room to turn around but it had all that was needed.
My grandfather was a substitute preacher. We called him Pop. Pop knew the Bible very well. He talked about it a lot. Sometimes he and my grandmother would start telling me about this verse and that verse. I pretended to listen but I really was hoping they would talk about something else. They always got so serious about it. I didn’t understand why it had to be so serious. I just daydreamed about other things when they got serious and hoped it wouldn’t last too long. I believed in God and Jesus and I just thought I would learn the rest later when I was really old like them.
Found on timothy-denehy.artistwebsites.com
Her house was always wonderfully clean. It smelled like fresh corn on the stove cooking. I always wanted to cook something with her but she put it off. I really wanted that connection with her. As I have gotten older I understand that not all of us like or want someone under us while we cook. But I did ache for that. That memory of her and me cooking together in her clean kitchen. Time flew away and it never became a memory. But I didn’t realize that until many many years later. I had stopped at a country store and as I walked in the front door the smell brought tears to my eyes. They sold hot lunches and it was no doubt what I smelled. It was my grandmother’s house I smelled in that store. I couldn’t stop crying and yet I couldn’t leave. I was a child again in my grandmother’s house. It was such a sense of longing. Wanting to be back in her kitchen and all those familiar smells. Seeing her and my grandfather. Seeing my mother, seeing my father. It was as if I was almost there but just couldn’t reach it no matter how hard I stood up and got on my tiptoes to reach into the past.
Jan
Monday, March 23, 2015
Peeking At Spring
Early this morning I was in the backyard checking for any flower buds. Instead I found these pretty patterned raindrops left on the iris leaves. They were too pretty to not try and capture.
No rosebuds, yet dazzling beauty from nature this morning.
Wisteria buds shedding their “cocoon” eager to share their beauty.
Tulips reflected in the hazy mirror.
Purple hyacinths that reappeared with Spring’s warmer temps.
We have two coral colored azalea bushes starting to bloom.
Jan
Sunday, March 22, 2015
Suzy Stout
Hey! How are ya’ll? There’s lots of pretty to see today. I first ran across interior designer Suzy Stout’s home many years ago. This is how her home appeared then.
Suzy chose vibrant coral to be used in her entry. She used hits of green that are then repeated in her dining room.
Her pretty dining room with painted green top molding and green and white checkerboard floor.
Beautiful dining room! Such a complete turn around from today’s non descript rooms.
Creamy white walls with floral curtains and rug. There is a blue sofa to keep things from getting too warm visually.
The back of her home then.
Today beautiful wood floors with light green painted walls begin the description of her home. What about those ceilings and beams! The chandelier is beautiful. The images below are from Hooked on Houses.
Beautifully decorated, it is airy and light while being cozy at the same time.
There is no formal dining room so the large entry doubles as a dining room when necessary. That is a limestone floor!
Her white kitchen is painted with white walls now instead of the yellow. Again, look at that ceiling!
Cozy seating by the fireplace. Again the walls wear white now.
The dining area wears white as well now.
Look at those ceilings!
This room appears to have been yellow before being painted green.
Master bedroom with wood floors and fireplace is decorated with beautiful floral curtains and chairs.
For more photos and information, check the listing with Dawn McKenna of Coldwell Banker, Debra’s post at 5th and State, and Liederbach & Graham Architects.
Jan
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