Happy Birthday Max!

Since we really don't know Max's official birthday, we decided that since he needed a new halter we would make it July 24th! Here he is modeling his new halter!

And here is why he needed a new halter! He is a swimming fool! We did not take his old halter off when he got in the pool and it was always wet! He would stay in the pool as long as he could every day.....

This is his favorite toy to fetch in the pool or at least the remaining half of it!

We decided to get a new toy for his birthday as well...

But he remained loyal to his old piece of toy...

We hid the old toy and replaced it with a new red bone, same size, same shape but not as "squishy"... He would play with it but it just was not the same....

So I went back to the store and got 2 more like the original bone- one blue and one green- maybe they will last through the rest of the summer!

What I Have Dragged Home This Week...

Or at least some of it! Last week I was under the weather- I didn't leave the house. So this week I have been itching to get out to the garage sales and thrift stores. Two of my favorite finds are posing on this cute little end table that had a makeover this week. The table is a good solid piece of Bassett furniture. I painted it this week with one of my favorite colors of Annie Sloan chalk paint- Graphite with a touch of dark wax in the distressed areas. One of the plates is the Southern Living at Home Dress Me Up Plate- new in the box. The other is a beautiful Shenango Plate.
This plate is so thin! With a beautiful embossed band and featuring a Naval Battle from the War of 1812. I found it at a yard sale. It was dirty but I could see how pretty it was underneath and it washed up perfectly! Love!
And these big boys took my breath away! I loaded them into my cart with the speed of light-

After I calmed down I saw the babies, too! And 50% off!!! Next came this wrought iron plant stand and all these little goodies. Rook game, Carrriage sillouette prints, a bunch of jello molds and some Restaurantware.

I have not even counted all of these molds!

The lower plate is Shenango- from the King Cole Restaurant- I might have my Hubby try that on ebay. In a few days he will be making a real life change- retirement! He will need to keep busy with our junking business.

Pinterest Crafts

Pinterest is such a great source of inspiration for me! Sometimes I just search for a supply that I have in my stash and I have instant ideas to keep me busy. For instance -chenille....I am a hoarder of old chenille plus the trims that go with it. I take the fringe off the bedspreads and even save the cotton lining on shams and the buttons on duvets. And here is the result:

A pile of pillows ready to go to my booth. Some are presold because every time I put one out there it sells and some people have asked me to sell them one before it gets sold out from under them!

Each one is unique. All recycled or new supplies from yard sales or thrift stores. I use down inserts and they are so fluffy!

I have used many burlap ideas from Pinterest. These are ready for football season- Auburn colors and Aubie of course!

The burlap Aubie is a door hanger and the one in the back is painted on a recycled cork board. Somehow a vintage Aubie glass from the thrift store got in the picture...

After a recent tragedy in Auburn I have seen a lot of Auburn crosses so I tried one in burlap.

This top is another Pinterest project. It is much cuter on but I failed at taking my own picture wearing it! I have sold many pillowcase dresses for kids this year and this is made the same way. Except bigger and this is a top. I have seen some made from recycled T shirts and men's dress shirts. This was a Ann Taylor XL t shirt $1.99. I cut off the neck and sleeves. Made some self bias to edge the armholes and a casing at the neck. The tie is cut from a navy T shirt I had.

I thought this fabric looked Auburnish! The Hubby said "Cute, you look pregnant"....not the look I was going for!

I'll be back soon with some of my fun Thrift Store goodies this week.........

Lazy!

I have been a lazy blogger. Things have not been very exciting around the swamp. The dogs sleep 85% of the day. Max has moved into the big bed at night and is hard to pry him out of the bed in the morning. He will get up for breakfast and if I don't make the bed ASAP he will sneak back under the covers. I was going to wash the sheets this morning so he got back under the sheets and refused to get up!

Even when I tried to pull the sheets out from under him!

I'm going to try to blog a couple of times this week to update a few things- crafting, thrifting ,life changes.....

Spring Cleaning

Technically it is still spring....until June 21st...so I may be late but I am cleaning some areas of my house that have been neglected for a long time. This corner of my bedroom was so cluttered that you could not see the dust and dirt. It had become the dumping ground for mail, magazines and bric-brac. No before picture -too embarassing. So I moved everything out and purged and scrubbed. For a change I moved the suitcases in and moved a piecrust table to the dining room. This led me to finding homes for some of the bric-brac. I gathered all my birds and vintage planters (bird related) to move them to the dining room.

This led me to cleaning off the dining room table, getting out a vintage tablecloth and some plants - that made a home for these birds-

The piecrust table got dusted and most of the birds and planters landed here-

I made myself obey the "less is more" rule and only put 6 things on the table. All of these are yard sale or thrift store treasures. Most of them were supposed to go to our booth and maybe they will.....one day!

One bird, a flamingo, landed in the hall- which meant I had to clean up the hall- I was running out of steam so I just went shopping around the house for some beachy things and rearranged - no big cleaning here- yet!

-Soon I will be looking at this view in Orange Beach!

French Chair Finale

First let's take a look at the chair before:

Red corduroy fabric and 1,000,000 staples! I did not think I would ever get all of the staples out! This was not the first makeover for this chair. I actually liked the tapestry fabric under the corduroy better but- it was gone on the seat and arms. Once the staples were out the work went much faster.....

Now for the GRAND FINALE!!!!




Annie Sloan old white chalk paint and clear wax. Waverly fabric (found at the thrift store) and neutral braid trim.

Ignore the blue painters tape on the back- I had to touch up the paint and forgot to take it off! Glad I saw the picture before I took the chair out to our booth! Yes, as always, after all this work I hate to sell it-

If I can find a pair of them next time -I will keep them!

Slipcovered Chair

So my huband bought 2 chairs. He thought they were great. Really?.........

Really?
Besides this questionable fabric, it was part of a sectional and did not have sides.
On the positive side- it smells ok, has a drawer underneath, and is really comfortable. Plus it was almost free. I've read a lot about drop cloth slipcovers, so off to Lowe's I went. I picked out a medium sized one for about $20. It is the lighter weight dropcloth because I knew I wanted to make cording and was not sure how hard it would be to sew on. I washed the cloth first so it would not shrink.

Then I just jumped in and pinned and cut and recut to fit the chair- inside out first. I had plenty of fabric for mistakes!

I used a small cording to give it a finished look.

I really like the texture of the fabric and the color. I made a gathered skirt so that you can easily get to the drawer under the seat. I covered the front of the drawer with the same fabric. Then I forgot to take more pictures. So here is a "phone shot" of the finished chair sitting in the booth at Angel's.

I really like the finished look- maybe my husband was right about it after all! The next chair is similar - we are thinking of making it more "Man Cave-ish" with a Mossy Oak slipcover!