My ornie swap with Andrea......

Hi everyone! I just wanted to share with you this adorable ornie I received yesterday from Andrea at Roundabout Primitives. We did an ornie swap and without realizing it we sent each other snowmen ornies! I just love it! It will have a place of honor on my tree this year! Thank you so much Andrea for the wonderful swap! Please be sure to stop by her selling blog to see all the other beautiful pieces she has for sale! Hugs and blessings to everyone!

Why dogs bite people!

Enjoy your day! Hugs

What a sweet surprise!

Just when I thought I had received the last of my birthday gifts, the mail lady delivered a very special package from a very special friend! See that beautiful Give Thanks plaque? Well sweet Kath from The Olde Weeping Cedar sent me this beautiful gift for my birthday! The poem is just beautiful and written by Kath herself. She is a very talented writer, as well as a crafter, and I encourage you to visit her writing blog here to read some of her beautiful and inspirational poems.

It took me only a few seconds to figure out where to place it. Doesn't go beautifully in my dining room? Thank you and blessings to you my dear friend for remembering my birthday and for your kindness and generosity!

My new shelf

Hi everyone. I just wanted to show you the last of my birthday presents from Ray. It's a whale tail shelf. It arrived last night and I am so happy with not only how beautiful it is, but how well made it is too! I bought it from HandsonCreations on eBay. Please stop by and see all of their other gorgeous creations. The sellers are such lovely people and such a pleasure to do business with.

Here's a side view of it. I borrowed some things from other rooms just to fill the shelves temporarily. Now I need some pretty candle sconces for the wall on either side of the shelf and some new things to put in the shelf. I'm off to shopping! As always thank you for stopping by and have a wonderful day! Hugs, Loretta

Prayers for Debbie, Richard, Richie, and Megan

Please take a moment to remember in your prayers today ~Debbie and her husband Richard, son Richie and wife Megan as they mourn the loss of their beloved daughter and sister, Amy. May God comfort them in their time of grief. Blessings, Loretta

Prayers needed for Amy and her famly

Dear friends,
I have from time to time posted about prayer needed for a young woman, Amy, who is suffering from cancer. So many of you were so kind to send her cards and bring a smile to her sweet face. Amy slipped into a coma yesterday afternoon and so now this beautiful family needs our prayers more than ever. Please visit Debbie's site to read more and leave a comment. Debbie has requested we leave a funny story that she can tell Amy. Blessings to all of you. Hugs, Loretta

My Birthday Goodies!

Hi everyone! Well yesterday was my 53rd birthday ~UGH!~ but it was a wonderful one in spite of growing another year older. My sweetie Ray and wonderful son Michael lovingly picked out and surprised me with some beautiful gifts.

This tin cow plant holder was the perfect piece to put the new boxwood greenery in that I recently purchased from Apple Hill. I think it looks great above my kitchen cabinets. Hmmm...now I need something for the other side.

They also bought me this sweet little star peg rack.

Look at this great antique coffee grinder! They did a great job hunting for a few antiques for me!

OH! Don't you just love this lidded crock! I knew the second I saw it where it was going. It went right into the new hutch in the Great Room!

And boy was I surprised to see this gorgeous Thomas Kinkade! I love that it's an autumn scene!


Later in the day I was treated to a delicious prime rib/lobster dinner! Yum! Thank you boys for making my birthday so wonderful! I love you both!

Have a beautiful day! Hugs, Loretta

Furniture makeover!

A few months back I posted a picture of this bookshelf my sister gave me. Well there was a second one just like it sitting up in the attic just collecting dust, and I was always looking for a place or a way I could use it. It had been polyurethaned by my sister and didn't match anything in my house.

Now here's another piece I was never really happy with. See the shaker table on the right with the lamp on it? From the day I bought it it had this terrible crack on the top of it. I thought I could repair it but it just never looked right. Well this piece was moved to almost every room in the house (even the master bathroom!) but it never stayed in one place for long because it was either too big or not big enough for the space. Then I got an idea...........so I grabbed my paintbrush, my trusty sander, and a can of Briwax (thanks Kath) and this is what happened.........

Ta da! I love it now! It has a home in my Great Room in a hard to fill corner. I love having more shelves to fill up
and I can't wait to decorate it for Christmas.
Thanks for stopping by and have a great weekend everyone! Big hugs to all! Loretta

We got some!

Hello everyone! It's been a cold and rainy day here in NY. By mid day we started to see this..........

Yup, that's right snow! (you may have to enlarge the picture to see it)

As you can see there was little accumulation but it sure felt like winter here! They're calling for the same weather through Sunday! UGH! Hope it's sunny and warm by you! Hugs, Loretta

Our trip to New Paltz

Hi everyone! Hope you all had a wonderful fall weekend full of sunshine and blue skies. The weather up here was just perfect for a trip to our favorite farm, the Wallkill View Farm in New Paltz in Ulster County NY. I think everyone had the same idea as us because the village was just bustling with people.

Here we are crossing the Wallkill River. This river runs north through New Paltz, into the Roundout Creek, and then empties into the Hudson River.

Along the way we enjoyed some beautiful fall foliage here and there but we were a little disappointed because the colors weren't as vibrant as in years past. I think the unusually cool and rainy weather we had this spring and summer caused many of the leaves to fall before they turned color.

Here is our first view of the beautiful Shawangunk Ridge. The ridge is the northern edge of a long ridge within the Appalachian Mountains that begins in Virginia where it is called North Mountain, continues through Pennsylvania where it is called Blue Mountain, becomes known as the Kittatinny Mountains after it crosses the Delaware Water Gap into New Jersey, and becomes the Shawangunks at the New York border.

The views of the Shawangunks are abundant as we travel along Route 208 to New Paltz.

The village of New Paltz, which is approximately 80 miles north of New York City, was founded in 1678 by French Huguenots. The tiny village stretches a total of 1.8 sq. mi.

As we make our way to the village we pass miles and miles of beautiful apple orchards.

Most of the apples have been picked by now but you can see all of the apples that fell leaving plenty of food for the abundant wildlife nearby.

Also along the way we passed numerous small farms and huge fields of ripe pumpkins.

Here's another pumpkin field with a great view of the ridge in the background.

In the center of the village you'll find the State University of New York, New Paltz. The college was founded in 1828 as the School for Teaching Classics. In 1885 The New Paltz Normal and Training School was established there as a school to prepare teachers for the public school systems in New York State. In the 1980's it was called the State University of NY College of Arts and Science, New Paltz. It has been called the State University of New York, New Paltz since 1994.




This is the famous Clock Tower atop the van den Berg Learning Center. This tower replaced the original clock tower that was destroyed by fire in 1990.






Here we are in the quaint little village of New Paltz. The streets are lined with wonderful little coffee shops, tiny restuarants, clothing shops, bookstores, organic health food shops
etc. The village was full of college students enjoying their weekend off from classes.

As you can see the endless parade of cars through this village is continuous this time of year.






Not even a parking space to pull over so I could take some pictures.




Here we are at the farm. They have hayrides, a corn maze, apple and pumpkin picking and lots of other fun thing for the kids. We've even gone through the haunted house a few times.






The pumpkins are stacked on bales of hay formed into a tunnel for the kids to run through.








Someone told me there was a pumpkin shortage this year. You'd never know it looking at the numerous farm stands all over New Paltz. Pumpkins as far as the eye can see! One thing they didn't have this year were the different colored pumpkins like the white and tan ones I usually buy. I did find a really unusual pumpkin. You'll see it below in one of the last pictures.







My wonderful sweetie and handsome son gave me their ok to publish their picture. Check out the teeny tiny pumpkins they're holding.





Here's me standing next to my very tall and handsome son. Why is it men don't like to smile when their picture is being taken?

There was color everywhere with the beautiful fall mums and flowers.





Racks of dried Indian Corn and bushels of pumpkins and colorful gourds greet you as you enter the old barn building.

Lots of fresh produce, gifts, and canned goods line the walls.

Homemade jams, jellies, dressings, nut butters, and flavored vinegars to choose from. We bought some fresh strawberry and red raspberry preserves, and basil-garlic vinegar.

On the far side of the barn is a bakery with a wonderful old stone fireplace where you can sit and enjoy a cup of their fresh brewed coffee and one of their many baked goods at the tables they have set up in front of the fireplace. Unfortunately I wasn't able to get a picture of it because there were so many people standing in front of it. Oh my gosh ladies! How'd you like that old step back hutch in your kitchen!!!!

After buying and eating everything we wanted at the farm we decided to take a closer look at the ridge. It was about a 10 minute drive from the farm through the beautiful Mohonk Reserves.






We're getting closer. The elevation is so high that your ears begin to pop as you drive the long winding road to the top of the ridge.






The Shawangunk Ridge is considered one of the best rock climbing ridges in the United States. I don't know about you but this picture gives me the willies!










Here's a couple of pictures of the wonderful view of the Roundout Valley. We were standing just beneath one of the huge rock formations along the ridge.









What wonderful cloud formations and gorgeous blue skies!

Here are some of the beautiful pumpkins, gourds, and flowers we brought home with us.
Don't you just love the big tan warty pumpkin ! I saw it in a display at the farm and we asked if it was for sale. A group of women at the register were ohhhhhhing and ahhhhhhing over it! Sorry ladies this one's mine! :)


And of course a trip to the farm wouldn't be complete without apple cider doughnuts. Yum. Normally there aren't many left by the time we get home but this year I'm on a diet ;)





Thank you for visiting. Hope you enjoyed our tour of New Paltz!

Fantastic ornie swap and our annual fall farm trip!

Hi everyone! Andrea from Roundabout Primitives is doing a one on one ornie swap with anyone who would like to participate. I'm doing a swap with her and I believe she has 6 ornies left. Check out her selling blog here to see the wonderful ornies and prims she makes.

Well today my boys and I are off to the farm to get our pumpkins, apples, cider doughnuts, candy apples etc. The weather is just perfect today. There's a frost this morning so the temps will be cool and crisp and the sun will be shining. This will be the 38th year Ray and I are making this trip and Michael's 20th time. I was a mere 15 yrs. old when we stumbled upon this farm while on our way to Lake Minniwaska to go hiking. The farm is in Ulster County NY in a quaint little college town called New Paltz. I hope to be bringing back some nice pics of the foliage, farm and the town. Until then, everyone have a wonderful fall day! Hugs to all! Loretta

My wonderful swap goodies!

Hi everyone! I just wanted to share with you my wonderful new swap goodies I received from Pam. The second I saw this gorgeous Christmas Basket Gathering on her site I knew I had to have it. Please stop by her site to see more of her beautiful offerings. She also has her goods featured here.

Look at all these great treasures, all made by Pam herself!

I am still in awe of how beautifully stitched this little Santa is. I had to put on 2 pair of glasses just to make out the individual stitches!!!!

Look at this sweet pinkeep! It has 2 little tiny jingle bells pinned to it. Again her stitching is just amazing.

This wonderful blackened Santa is dusted with sweet smelling spices and smells as great as it looks!

And of course no swap with Pam would be complete without one of her amazing baskets. This shaker basket is just gorgeous and I am so happy with my goodies!

And of course, being the sweet friend that she is, she included this adorable little prim witch! She sits among my fall decorations in my kitchen hutch!



Pam, thank you for this wonderful swap. I hope you love your goodies as much as I do mine! I feel so lucky to have these wonderful new prims to add to my Christmas decor!

Blessings to all! Hugs, Loretta

Amazing!

Even if you are not a religious person, you can't look at these pictures and not be in awe of how this man, Dutch Creationist Johan Huibers, built this amazing floating structure today, using modern tools and his own hands, and then think of Noah and how he did it thousands of years ago using no electricity, and primitive hand tools.





The massive central door in the side of Noah's Ark was opened to the first crowd of curious townsfolk to behold it's wonder. The ark is 150 cubits long, 30 cubits high, and 20 cubits wide. That's two-thirds the length of a football field and as high as a three story building.



Life sized models of giraffes, elephants, lions, crocodiles, zebras, bison, and other animals greet visitors as they arrive in the main hold.

A contractor by trade, Huibers built the ark of cedar and pine. He did the work mostly with his own hands, using modern tools, with the occasional help of his son Roy.

The uncovered top deck, which was not quite ready in time for the opening, will feature a petting zoo with lambs, chickens, goats and a camel.

There will also be a space near the keel for a 50 seat film theatre where kids can go to watch a video about Noah's Ark.

Construction of this amazing structure began in May 2005. Huibers, a Christian man, said he hopes the project will renew interest in Christianity in the Netherlands, where church attendance has dropped dramatically in the last 50 years.

Even when I am old and gray, do not forsake me, O God, till I declare your power to the next generation, your might to all who are to come. Psalm 71:18


I want to thank my friend Wendy for sending me this wonderful email.

Hugs to all! Loretta

Autumn Musings

I love stepping outside on a cool crisp Autumn morning to find my porch decorated with freshly fallen leaves.

Before & After

Hi everyone! Hope you all had a wonderful weekend. The weather here today was cloudy and rainy but it was just perfect for puttin' up wallpaper. Here's a pic of John working hard to make my dining room beautiful. I can't say enough about John. First of all he's one of the nicest guys you'd ever want to meet. Last Sunday he even bought us bagels for breakfast! And ladies, he leaves your house as clean as it was before he came. Actually cleaner! He even dusted the tops of my doorways for me!!!!! But really if you want your wallpaper done to perfection, he's the guy to call.



I thought the best way to present this post was a before and after. The change is just amazing.
The pictures do not do it justice. I always felt the dining room looked cold and uninviting with plain white walls, and nothing I put in there helped in warming it up. Until........................

Here's the before............

and the after!

Before..........

after.

Well I hope you enjoyed the tour of my dining room. I want to take a moment here to thank my sweetie for letting me do all this wonderful decorating. It was so much fun planning, and then seeing my dream become reality. Hmmmmmmmmm..........my master bath could use some wallpaper too. In fact I think I heard Ray telling John "We'll be seeing you again real soon" or something like that. You know what that means girls! Whoo Hoo!

Hugs, Loretta

A request from Donna

Donna aka ddogood left a comment for me asking if I would post a picture of the outside of my house. Here you go Donna. Thank you for your sweet comments! And thank you to everyone who left comments about the wallpaper. I am humbled by all of your kind words!!! I just heard from John and the dining room paper is going up on Sunday, so expect more pics as soon as I get everything back into place. Have a beautiful weekend! Hugs

Wallpaper pictures!

Well the hallway paper is finally up and although I haven't gotten all of my stuff back up on the walls yet, I wanted to post a few pictures just to show you how it looks. I just love it! John Dillon our wallpaper guy did a fantastic job as usual! He'll be back next weekend to do the dining room!

I chose this pattern because I wanted it to look as close to a stenciled design as possible without having to do the work. The colors in it are a colonial green and barn red. For a cohesive look we will be using the same paper in the dining room.

This paper adds so much warmth and character to what was a very plain and boring area. Now I don't feel the need to have so much stuff up on the walls.

If anyone is interested, this wallpaper pattern is from the Raymond Waites New American Country collection.

Thank you to everyone for all of your words of encouragement throughout this project. Hope you all had a great weekend! Hugs, Loretta

A pleasant surprise

The wallpaper's going in today, a whole week early. The wallpaper guy should be here in about a half hour! YAY! I'll have some pictures for you soon. Have a great weekend! Hugs

Also please go here to Debbie's site to read about Amy and how many wonderful people sent her cards. Please, if you haven't had a chance to send a card yet please do so now, and if you've already sent a card, thank you so much. Amy's time here may be short and to bring such happiness to this sweet girl is all that matters now. Amy Ragan 1213 Hite Blvd. Enid Oklahoma 73701.

Been working on a few things.......

Hi everyone! I've been busy these last few days working on some snowmen and a few other things. Snowmen are my first love and they are the reason I started my blog in the first place. If you go way back to the beginning of my blog you'll see that it was a way to showcase my snowmen for all of my family members that don't live near me. Then one day I got a comment from someone, and the rest is history!

This is a mirror/shelf that I won on ebay. It was only $8.00 or so and had a very ugly stained finish, but I knew it had potential. I removed the mirror and cleaned it up, painted it midnight blue, then sanded and stained it. I love the way it turned out. I don't have many things in blue in my house so I'm trying to work some into the scheme.

Here's the whole gang! I made some of these for customers and some for family and friends. Some have a more grungy look and others are just white. Each one has it's own little personality and I just love them all. LOOK there's even a snowcat! The snowman ornies and hobby horse are for my tree.

Here's a closer look at the hobby horse. He has a little jingle bell at the nape of his neck.

This is a prim nativity that I'm making for a friend. I am looking for the perfect wood box to make a creche with. I will cover it in moss, add a few palm trees and maybe a few stones. There will be a rusty star above the manger and the angel will be on top too. If I have enough time I hope to add a few more sheep and possibly a donkey.

And here is my wallpaper! All 48 rolls of it. Looks like my wallpaper guy has his work cut out for him! He starts a week from Friday. YAY!

Just a reminder. Please don't forget to send Amy a card. Even if you don't know her or her mom, it doesn't matter. You card will mean the world to her! Please do this for Amy! See my previous post for her address.

Blessings to all of my sweet friends!

Bittersweet, mums and other things

After reading Linda's post about her going out to harvest some bittersweet for herself, of course I ran right out to get some more for myself. Please be sure to read my special request at the end of this post. It's so very important!

This time I added some to my stair railing in the great room. I also added some silk leaf garland to fill in the gaps.

Then I put a little here.......

and a little there.

I also bought some mums and I just love the color of these. The girl at the nursery called these grapefruit color. They may be my new favorite color mum.

I also planted my rust colored mums in the front of the house. Actually I had someone else plant them because I know there are snakes in those rocks. One day I was pulling weeds, and when I looked down at my foot there was a snake draped over my sneaker! I'm not really afraid of snakes but I was so startled that......well let's just say the neighbors got a show that day! :)

I planted burgundy mums in the pots near my arbor. As you can see my flower garden in the back along the fence has seen better days. Everything will be cut down in a few weeks.

Here's a closer look at the burgundy mums.

Now I have a question for all of you wonderful gardeners out there. This is my yellow trumpet vine. It has finally reached the top of my arbor but not one flower bloomed. I was so looking forward to seeing these flowers and was so disappointed when nothing happened. If any of you have a trumpet vine, I was wondering if I should cut this back for the winter or leave it be.



I have a very special request for all of you. Debbie from There's an Angel on My Front Porch is asking as many people as possible to send her daughter Amy, who is seriously ill with cancer, an uplifting card. Amy sooo enjoys getting cards from us and has gotten as many as 12 in one day. Let's try and break that record and send her as many cards as we can! I would love to see Debbie open her mailbox and have a flood of cards pour out. If you would please post this on your blogs and let's sit back and see those cards start pouring in!!!! Also, very important, please remember to put a simple smiley face on the envelope!!!!!!!! Here's Amy's address Amy Ragan
1213 Hite Blvd. Enid, Oklahoma 73701 Please, please make this a priority and get a card in the mail for Amy today or tomorrow! It doesn't have to be a fancy card, just something to brighten her day. We would all want that faced with Amy's circumstances. God bless all of you! Hugs, Loretta

Painting's done!

I don't want to bore you all with more pictures of my wainscoting but the painting is all done and I wanted you all to see how it turned out. It was slow going, but I finished it Saturday afternoon. I went out and bought all of the tools to paint, rollers and such, but wound up doing it all with a brush. I didn't like the finish when I used the roller. I'm really happy with the way it turned out. Please excuse the messy paint line above the chair rail. I was using painters tape but every time I went to pull it off it took the paper from the sheet rock with it. So I gave up. Besides it will be covered with wallpaper anyway. Soooo....next comes the wallpaper. I ordered it last night and it should go up in 2 weeks. Yippee!

Here's a few shots of the dining room. What a different look the room has taken on! I'm so glad I did picture frame molding instead of beadboard in there.

Here's a shot of that long narrow hallway I'm always complaining about. Suddenly it doesn't look too bad!
I no longer feel as though I need to have furniture along the walls. I want to thank each and every one of you wonderful friends for being so encouraging to me during the whole process. It was a lot of hard work but your sweet comments helped me to get the job done. Thank you!!!!! Hugs, Loretta

First look.........

Let me start by saying I HURT! Every muscle in my body aches. But I had to do it. I couldn't wait one more day without seeing what everything would look like painted. Now remember that this is only the first coat of paint. I couldn't take any good pics of the dining room because everything is piled in the middle of the room. The baseboard heating vents were not very receptive to being painted as you can tell by the looks of them but a few more coats will get the job done. I have the entire entry hall 1st coated, the entire dining room 1st coated and I'm working on filling in nail holes for the rest of the hallway. Hopefully by tomorrow it will be 1st coated as well. I was so anxious to get started that I painted everything with a brush instead of using a roller. In order to get around all of the molding you need to use a brush. Second coat will be with mini rollers. I'm really happy with the way it's looking. I'll be even more happy when the pain subsides :)

I want to wish everyone a happy September! I want you to know that I am enjoying seeing all of your homes so beautifully decorated for fall. Unfortunately I don't have much time to leave each of you a comment but I wanted you to know I will catch up with you as soon as all the painting is done. Have a beautiful day! Hugs

Less than 24 hours later..........

Will you look at these vines! Less than 24 hours later and they are already gorgeous! I'm sooo happy!

Yippee! I got some!

For 3 years now I've driven past a vine on the side of the road that I was 99% sure was bittersweet. Well today I'm 100% sure thanks to dear Linda at Behind My Red Door! Linda I know it's too early to harvest these little beauties, but I convinced Ray to drive down with me to where the vine is just to take a closer look (there's no place to park as the road is very narrow with a ditch on either side) and I just about squealed with delight when I saw those little pods. Ladies you'd think I found a sack of diamonds just sittin' on the side of the road! Well of course I had to cut me a few branches and thanks to Linda's tutorial I pulled those leaves off easily losing only a berry or two. I can't wait until that vine is ready 'cause I'm going back, this time with clippers and black plastic bags to fill up. Yippee!

Hope you all had a wonderful weekend! The weather today was beautiful, and tomorrow it's gonna be a high of 69 degrees. My kind of weather! I'll send some up your way Linda! Have a restful evening everyone! Hugs, Loretta

Edit: Anyone interested in learning more about bittersweet hop on over to Linda's site at http://behindmyreddoor.blogspot.com and check out her 2 part tutorial (top right sidebar)on harvesting bittersweet, and just enjoy the photos of how she so beautifully uses it throughout her lovely home.

we're getting there

Nail holes need to be filled, and everything below the chair rail will be painted the color of the closet door. Then comes the wallpaper above it. We're getting there!

just a peek.......

The chair rail's up and were working on the wainscoting now!