My Summer Mantel

Summer officially begins this coming Wednesday evening. (in the Northern Hemisphere) These last few days of Spring have been mighty toasty, in the 90’s here which is abnormally hot for this area.



I am not complaining, I do love the heat but I know many do not feel the same. 

My garden is flourishing as it changes from the Spring blooms to the flowers of summer.  I treasure hunt each evening walking amongst the abundance of flora to find red ripe strawberries snuggled at their feet.

 

I have let the strawberries roam at will and now I have tons of sweet fresh berries waiting for me to find them.  It forces me to walk slowly and look intently, thus I find other sprouting plants that are reseeding themselves, either to my delight or dismay.  Those causing grief are yanked out immediately before they gain a toehold.

The weekend was whirlwind filled with activities but I did fit in the decorating of my Summer Mantel. 

I use my potting bench that we built that resides on our back deck.  It is in full view from the living room.



I kept it light and simple.  A minimum of fuss and clutter.  Soft colors, focusing on the summer roses.



A close up of the Seashells sign painted on reclaimed lumber complete with nail holes. 




I have a few succulents tucked into a hyper tufa pot I made a couple weeks ago.  I was practicing, I want to make some much larger tubs and I wanted to give the technique a try on smaller items first. 

I love them and I will be sure to share the making of my larger tubs.  I just need to build the form.
 


This one is still empty so you can get an idea of what they look like. The mix took on the shape of the mold, the ridges add interest.



I will be back to bore you with more garden photos during this coming week.  I have a ton.

A New Desk for Me

We have been cleaning out the garage and whittling down on extra stuff around here.  We may hold a garage sale July 4th weekend to help us get rid of some of it. 

In our clearing foray my husband dug this out of the piles and stacks..



It is a lap desk.  I had painted it long ago to sell and a friend bought it for her daughter who was not well and spent a lot of time in bed.  I think she used it as a laptop table thus the little marks on top that was from a non slip pad.

The top is adjustable to different angles.  My husband thought I should put it in our yard sale but I am thinking this would make a great desk for me when I am blogging in bed. 



I will just clean it up for now, and get a non slip pad of my own and see how I like using it to blog in my pj’s in my comfy bed.  I may repaint it again but I am not sure yet. 



Speaking on ‘painting’, I have had a lot of interest in my Nest painting I posted a couple days ago.  Nest Post




For those that want to know I have it listed on my website. click here to go there now or click on photo of the Nest painting.
I have another painting in the works on my fabulous painting worktable now.  Another one that has been floating around in my head. 

I have a couple rooster ones I would like to do as well. 
I am ready to take a break and go sit in my garden.  A fantastic spring day at 84 degrees.  You can’t beat that so I am going out to enjoy my garden a bit now. 

My Iris are Finishing up

My garden is still pumping out blooms like crazy, it has been a stellar Spring.  The garden must’ve like the mild winter we enjoyed.

I love this one, it reminds me of the 50/50 ice cream bars I enjoyed as a kid.



My Tess English rose is providing the spark of red and climbing the arbor with relish.



My new Eden rose, it is a little bruised around the petals but these are the first blooms on her and she is a beauty.  I need to learn to paint roses like this. I will have to take this into the studio and work from it.



And a new first for me.  I am co-hosting a blog hop.  I hope I pull it off correctly.  I think it will be fun to see new blogs or at least new to me. 

So here we go…


Thursdays Favorite Things Hop is where you can link your favorite post to share with old and new followers, or write a post about your favorite things!
Here are the rules, yes there are rules. But just a few:

• You must follow Katherines Corner. Through Email, Linky Followers, Bloglovin, Google Plus, Twitter or Facebook and my blog ­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­Backwoods Cottage (If you’re a new follower, please let us know before you start hopping. )
• No adult content blogs.
• Blogs ONLY please.
• Follow as many other blogs in the list as you can. Just click and go. Please leave a comment when you visit

Now hop on and share your favorites. If you’d like to post this blog hop on your page please just grab the linky code. Or if you would like to be a co-host please contact Katherine
*participants who link up will be sent weekly reminders of this wonderful hop*
Please grab the hop button to share with others, you can copy and paste the image with a link to KatherinesCorner.com OR grab the code from Katherines Corner it's on her right sidebar.
It’s always nice to have the hop button on your post. But it IS NOT mandatory.
 



 

yes, I know, I am always late to my own party...
Enjoy.

Nest painting subway art

Just a quick check in.  I have been painting all hours trying to fulfill orders amongst other busy work.

This Nest painting I fit in while painting on the custom sign orders.  It has been floating around in my head for a bit now and decided it was time to paint it.



Some of my designs, once painted, end up on the scrap heap as the reality does not meet the image in my brain but this one has made the grade. 



The creamy streaked crackled background sets off both the wording and the nest.



I wanted the definition to look straight from the dictionary.

Now to add it to my website. 

A couple other signs that have kept me busy…

love the bright colors



painting the bluebird on this one was new for me, I rather enjoyed it.



You need to see it closer up, the upper photo does not do it justice.



And a custom name sign I did on Saturday.  Does it seem to be listing to the right….hmmm



Okay, I gotta run…see you soon!