Blended Hearts Tablescape

When two hearts come together

To live and love in life it is because they have learned the secret....

Of what it takes to maintain.

Often there is fire...

...and passion!

And reminiscing over old times...

...remembering where you have been...

...and where you have yet to go!

But the spiciest relationships know...

It takes two to tango.

Only a beautiful blending of hers...

And his...

can create a love that is theirs.

Two hearts that share ...

can make the perfect setting...

...for many nights to come!

I always enjoy having an excuse to show those I love how much I care.  I've shared three tablescapes for Valentines this year.  The first was a brunch setting for girlfriends, shown here.  Last week I shared a family valentines tablescape, shown here.  I didn't think I'd have time for one this week but knew in my heart I couldn't leave this one out.

  I hope they inspire you to share a special evening with the loved ones in your life, whomever they are!  I promise you won't regret the efforts!

Please be sure and visit Tablescape Thursday for more beautiful settings

Thank you for visiting!  Always!

Wishing you a Happy Valentines Day!

Mary

R is for Retail Therapy

Good Morning Miss Jenny!  I'm heeeeyaaahh!  Did ya miss me the last few weeks? Yes mam, I have been absent quite a bit.  But, I been absent for a very good reason, now mind you.  Seems my cousin Mary has got so much going on again that she is just too busy to bring me to school these days.  She says she will do all she can but it ain't easy.  Mam?  Yes mam, cousin Mary really did say that! 

Yes mam, I do know that is not like her to talk that way, you are so right!  I think I've told you before about how cousin Mary forgets all her etiquette when she gets stressed.  Why yes mam, she is stressed again!  Yup, it's about a job again.  This time she's been offered a job though it ain't all that.  What?  Yes mam, I meant it's not all that.  What?  Yes mam, I mean it's not quite as promising as she had hoped it would be, though it is a sure offer.  Now do you understand?  Then she's got another opportunity that is not a sure bet but could be quite lucrative if she was able to make a go of it, though it's RISKY!    

No Mam!  Risky is not my "R" word, but that's a good one!  I was just getting to that, Miss Jenny, my "R" word is Retail Therapy, because that's what old cousin Mary decided to do today.  She said, it always helps.  She also said, "That's how you know your in the right business when you enjoy retail therapy as much as I do!".  LOL!  Let me show what her therapy session consisted of.

She found this cute little basket at one of her favorite consignment and antique stores.  It was 50% off because it's a Christmas item.  She plans to use it all year round after doing a makeover on it.

She said this little holly leaf is coming off as soon as she can figure out what tool to use to get it off. 

Then she found this here CD holder for 50% off too.  I said, now cousin Mary what you need that for?

She said, look at it this way!  It's got all kinds of possibilities when you look at it like this.  She said, this might come in handy if she feels like chasing her risky adventures.

Later at another antique store she found another booth that was 50% off.  She dug these two small dirty old silver trays out from the bottom shelf and was shocked to pay only $2.00 for one and $1.00 for the other.  That was unusual for this store as it wasn't no thrift store, but was a bonafied antique store.

She saved so much at that store she able to pick up a few luxury items.  She said, she was not familiar with this brand but they smelled so wonderful in the store she wanted to indulge.   As if, retail therapy wasn't indulgent enough?  Geez!

Well, that's all I got Miss Jenny!  Retail Therapy!   It helped cousin Mary a bit but there's still lots of decisions to be made, so I just don't know how often I'll be around.  I do like it here though, and will come as often as I can git here for;

Alphabet Thursday

and

Junking Finds Friday

Have a good day Y'all!

"Little Missy"

The Old House that we Built

Several of you have joined a party showing how your styles have changed from back then to now.  This got me to thinking if I was brave enough to show my old barely any style style. 

 But....then I got to thinking maybe I would just show you my old house.  I am not joining any parties just sharing my love for our old home.

My husband and I built our old house ourselves.  We had a builder, but we used a cost plus contract where we had control over the finances and decisions.  This was the way we wanted it since I myself had drawn up the original house plans.  For years I painstakingly took notes and sizes from home tours about what I would like in my own dream home.  Then one day I sat down and drew up a house plan.  When the dream became a reality we took those plans to an architect and had him draw up the actual blue prints.  There were several things I wish we had done differently but there were soooo many things we did then that I miss now. 

 We purchased the house we are in now and did not build it.  I know it is where we should be at this point in our lives but there are times that I miss my old house so much.  This post is dedicated to my old dream home.  You were such a beautiful place to live our lives for 7 years.  I cannot believe it is almost 8 years ago now that we left.

This house was built after we inherited land and my FIL developed a small one cul de sac subdivision, with huge lots.  We were involved in building the whole little neighborhood as well as our home.  This gift from my FIL allowed us to build our old house and one we will be forever grateful for even though we no longer live there.  If you want to read more about that you can read an old post I did on my old blog here.  Let's move on,  it's time to take a peek into our past now.

There she is!  This was the dream we created.  I still have those same gnomes by the walkway here at our home now.

I hope you will overlook these photos.  They were all taken some time ago.  I had to scan and crop them all in the computer.

We had over 9 acres here back behind our home.  I really miss that flat yard and good old fashioned brown dirt.  I have red clay now!   This is my youngest son waaaayyy back when. 

This had to have been taken shortly after we moved in because I still had my old redwood furniture given to us when we first married.  As you can see I painted it to try and keep it lasting a bit longer.

This is one of the features I miss the most.  My front steps.  I had these rebuilt twice before the brick masons got it right.  I really wanted to be able to have a place for my annuals.  Yep, that's me enjoying a cold one after working in that brown dirt somewhere.  You can see it on my knees, ha ha!  I loved gardening outside back then.  It was sooo much easier!

Let's take a look inside.

Here was my foyer.  I was in love with mahogany back then.  The floor was a dark red mahogany.  As you can see there is our old foyer table and mirror.  Were going to look to the left of this door now.

This was my formal living room when we first moved in.  It was longer and narrow.  It had 5 floor to ceiling windows, three on the right side and two on the back wall.  There was a built in bar on the left corner that you can barely see here in between the living room and the dining room.

It wasn't long before we accumulated a little more furniture for this room.  Sorry these are the only photos I have.

I always put the tree in this room.   Even though we didn't use this room often I do miss having a formal living room.  Actually, I think I just miss having that one extra space to relax and for people to gather on special occasions.

Let's peek at the dining room.  The color was not quite as blue as the photos show but more green.

Here is the china cabinet that I had built in.  I just loved this thing so much!  It really was quite larger then it looks here because it was very deep.  I miss the wainscoting we had in the dining room and really want to do that here too.  The pocket door shown leads to the kitchen and den.  Let's head in there now.

This was my favorite room of the house!   It was totally open, just like all those wonderful beach house's you rent.  We had so many wonderful parties in this house.  Do you recognize those bar stools?  They are now the legs for the tables on my front porch between the rockers.

To the right we had an area built large enough to accommodate our large claw foot table comfortably.  This was my husbands family kitchen table growing up so that's where we knew it would eventually be.  We spent a lot of time getting this space right to maneuver around the table.

Behind the long kitchen island was our den with the built in bookshelves.  Lots of storage here that I miss too!  I probably would not build them this way now but I sure loved it then.  The french doors on the right led to a deck and the door on the left led to the screen porch and the garage.

Here's the only photo I could find of the screen porch.  Whew!  What a mess!

Let's go back inside and take a look at a few more photos I was able to drudge up of this space.  Please don't laugh at my decor style.  I really did love that royal carpet until it started to buckle then we wondered why we didn't extend the hardwood into this little area when we had it everywhere else downstairs.

You can't see it in this photo but the hardwoods were in the kitchen and the eat in area and stopped right behind this chair.  Yes, I was a good wife back then and allowed the leather lazy boy for my hubby.  Unfortunately our two sons wore it out before we moved.  Love my boys!

Not sure why my oldest looks so sad here.  As you can see I loved plaid even back then and made these drapes myself.

Ah!  That's better, eventually I found the right location for my pictures above the fireplace.

This photo shows the mirror I now have above my fireplace.  When I first got this mirror, it was a frame only and I had the glass made to fit it.  Then I painted it the green you see here.  It wasn't until later that I painted it the white it is now.  I really did like the green!

My Christmas style!  LOL!

Okay what was I thinking with this mantle?  LOL!  I have my wizard of oz dolls displayed.  I also had faux greenery mixed with my live plants.

Here's a few more random shots from the prior years.  I loved my long island that separated the kitchen and den.  It was a great place to put out dishes for get togethers.

My short hair days back when I was skinny too..  Oh, the days!

Who was that woman and why did she paint all the foyers with that faux finish?  She sure didn't look very happy up there on that makeshift scaffolding. 

Aww!  Look at my cuties!  I miss this tub somewhat too.  I do have a large jacuzzi tub for two now but it is a pain to clean.  This one was was an extra long jacuzzi tub for one.  You could totally stretch out in it!  Yes, that was a mauve tile floor I put in there, sure wouldn't do that again.

The backside of our house shortly after moving in.

Eventually it became this.  I wanted a pool so bad back then and we could not afford an in ground pool so we bought this one and dropped it in the ground a bit.  It was a 30ft round so it was quite large.  I so miss having a pool and would love one here.  The Mr. says no pool until we can afford an in ground.  I'm with him on that one, but it seems it may never happen.  When we sold this house we had built up decking all around this pool connecting it to the house decking.  With the cost of all the decking we built up to make it more comfortable we could have saved quite a bit for an in ground pool.  Live and learn right. 

 That's what all of this is about, living and learning and growing and changing.  Don't get me wrong we are in a very good place in our lives.  I guess I am feeling so reflective now because as my FIL is nearing the end of his life it is closing the door on our past yet again, but we will always have such good memories.

That's all I'll bore you with for now.  This post really was for me to reflect on where we've been and who we are!  I love looking at old photos of my children and our dreams.  My, how quickly things change.  Thanks for coming along on the trip down memory lane!

I always appreciate your visits!

Mary

It's Dollar Tree Days

I promise you I am not getting any reimbursement for endorsing this store, but I sure do wish I was.  LOL!  I just can't help it, I've been finding all sorts of creative ideas for a buck here lately.  Yes indeedy, I am talking about the big DT..yep, that's the Dollar Tree, ladies.  You just never know what you might find.

This cute little ceramic container.  Very basic, but perfect for smaller floral arrangements.  These would be excellent for topiary bases too.  They even had a multiple assortment of colors.  Very pretty!

I bought two pots, and several of these basic green hydrangeas.  I want to have a pair of these on my mantle soon.  Only I didn't quite buy enough of the green hydrangeas and had to go back for more.  Wouldn't you know the closest DT was down to only 1 more green hydrangea.  I think that will be enough but if not there's plenty more DT's further away.

I also picked up this last purple one.  It will be great for a very small something somewhere!  You can never have too many hydrangea arrangements around IMOP.

Then I got very excited when I saw these.  I only bought two, may regret that but I wanted to try and count up how many more I might need.  They only came in silver and gold but of course you can always spray paint them.  Who doesn't need more of these around.

Here's why I bought the easels.  Only it's still a bit too small for this stack of dishes.

I got these cute little dishes at GW the other day.  They are from cracker barrel.

Do you see the cute writing on the tops?  I got the stack of four for .50 cents.

Now, I usually don't even look at the huge bin of linens at GW, but there was a piece of toile fabric that caught my eye.  I was considering buying it until I realized it was $1.00 for the very small piece so as I was putting it back something way down on the bottom caught my eye. 

I tugged and pulled and out came this gorgeous bed skirt.  It was brand new, crisp and not even ever washed.  I know this because I brought it home and washed it and it was considerable different after washing it.  It really is more of a brighter green then is shown in these pictures.  I couldn't find the size of it to be sure but figured it was either a queen or a king.  But for $2.00 I knew I wanted it.

Yeppers!  That's the brand ladies.  This is no $2.00 bed skirt and to my delight it is a King!  So that means it may go on my bed someday if I change out my bed linens.  Do you know more and more I have been finding comforter sets that don't include the bed skirt.  What is up with that?

I can't remember if I ever showed you this.  I got this from the thrift store several weeks ago.  Isn't this so cute?  It will be packed up for fall soon.  It has ROC made in Taiwan on the bottom.  Not bad for $3.00.

Finally, this is just something I thought was a great find.  No sale, or thrifty deal, but at $6.99 it was just too cute to pass up.  I am looking for a cute bread basket to go here where my crock pot usually sits.

Right now our bread is hiding under this but I do plan to use it for cakes and desserts maybe.  It has a net liner on the inside though so you can use it outdoors.  I could take that off easily enough but for now I kinda like it.  I may use this for outdoor events this summer.

Well that's it!

Come visit the following parties for more great finds

Junking Finds Friday

Nifty Thrifty Tuesday

Thanks for visiting!

Mary