NOVEMBER!!! REALLY!!!

I have NO idea what happened to Oct!!  I can't believe it is already Nov!!!

Between time flying by and not being able to get into the blogspot site I am WAY behind:)

SO the room is coming along!  Here are some pictures.

HERE IS WHERE WE HAVE BROKEN THROUGH INTO THE NEW OFFICE

THE BEGINNING !

ANOTHER VIEW

THE VEIW INTO THE HOUSE.  NOW THIS IS WHERE THE POCKET DOORS ARE.

THE POCKET DOORS !!

FROM THE OUTSIDE

It sticks out more that we thought, but hopefully when the siding is added it won't look quite so huge!
The weather is great and it is easy to work right now!  Today they put on the tin roof.  I am happy with the color!

THIS IS THE VIEW FROM THE UPSTAIRS ROOM.

I AM LIKING THIS ROOF:)  I HAVE ALWAYS LOVED THEM.  THIS ISN'T RUSTED BUT IT IS STILL TIN!!!










I will be back SOON for a little tutorial on glazing!

I sure hope that y'all are having comfortable weather so that you can go out an play!  I love to look for leaves and berries for now and Christmas.  Yesterday we went looking for bittersweet!! The patch that I got some from last year is GONE!!!  Now NO bittersweet, yet that is:)

I hope your week is great and you have a chance to take a nice walk outside and breath the fall air!!!

THE FRONT DOOR BLUES.....

We seem to be working on our house all the time!  This year we are adding an office  for my husband.  It is off the Tavern room and will have 2 openings into the new room.  We will have pocket doors so that when he has meetings he can close it off from the rest of the house.  Now with a new section being built, the old section needs a little TLC.  So we decided to put in a new front door.  We decided on replacing the door and sidelight,  that we have now with a set of double doors with glass at the top for more light. We have been thinking about this for awhile now so we decided to go ahead with it!  We are hoping to find a set of reproduction doors and the search has started!  And I don't think it is going to be too easy to find!!

This is the door now.  It is metal and over the years became scratched and dented. I wanted to wait until I could find the best door:)  So to hid the bad areas with some graining and combing. 

This is a close up of the door.  This works great for other areas too such as kitchen cabinets!

I added the missing knob after this picture:)

These are the pantry doors.  This really hides alot of dings:)  I think next year we will improve the kitchen and I am thinking about various tones of white.  I love the white and sort of brownish color of old ironstone.  We'll see:)

The best part of this whole addition is that I get to have the bedroom back that is now the office!!  I can't wait!  I am thinking about color for the walls and what type of aging I will do.  Stay tuned:)

Today was a beautiful fall day!!  The leaves have started falling and I just love to hear them!! So I spent part of the day painting the porch doors!  I will take a picture to show the whole finished porch!! Just in time to sit with hot tea and look over some of the magazines that are in a stack waiting to be opened!!

Well tomorrow I am off to an actual store to look for shoes to wear to our daughter's wedding!  Since it is in a park I need something easy to walk in:) YUK I hate to go into retail stores:)  If it is not an antique store or a thrift store, I just DON'T think it is fun :0)

Wish me luck and take some time to listen to the leaves falling !!

BEAUTIFUL ~ BUSY FALL !

I think that all the seasons are my "favorites"!! But there is something a little tranquil about fall.  I love going through the old magazines and planning Thanksgiving and Christmas!!  This year however, we are planning a new room on the house and a Wedding!!!  Yep our daughter is getting married in a beautiful park overlooking the Hudson river!  She always wanted a fall wedding and here it is!!!  I can't wait to see the decorations our other daughter will be doing for the tables!  I know it will all be great!!  

SOOO about that room!  Well my husband desperately needed an office so we decided to bite the bullet and build one!  Hopefully when the room is finished we can talk about some AGING,  since I wanted this to be an informative blog:)  I seem to be the only aging so far:) 

This will be an outside door for his meetings, so that the visitors don't have to go through the house and face 2 big, but sweet, baking dogs!!

Hoping this tree will survive!

the inside.

This room will be off the "tavern" room, so now that room will be a little dark SO we may add windows to that room, NOW the front door looks terrible!! SO looking for new door, which leads to the inside of the porch!  We will be adding ceiling fans to that!!  I am a Southern Girl after all so I need to porch sit on both the front and back!!  Not sure when I will have TIME for all that sittin but at least it will be there!! In the cool weather,  a hot flash gives me the excuse to sit outside:)

The part I like the most will be the tin roof! Pictures will be coming as soon as it is on:)

The problem here is ~~ Do we decorate the office like the Tavern Room or give it its own personality?  We will enter the office from the house through the Tavern Room!  Where the windows are now, will be openings with pocket doors.  Not the best design but hopefully it will work.  I am guessing we will
 NEVER be able to sell this house!  It will surely be DIFFERENT:) 

I hope everyone has a great Fall day!!

I HAVE NEVER MEET A GOURD I DIDN'T LIKE!!!!!

I have been cleaning out my "fall cupboard" and I can't believe how many gourds I have collected over the years!!!  I can't seem to pass up  a cute gourd!!!  They have dried really great and I will try to find time to paint some and maybe sell some on the Picture Trail site.  If I can part with them!  This year I am NOT buying more!!  Well, I will try not to!

Fall is in the air Finally!!!  I even think some of the leaves are starting to change.   I don't remember that happening so early before.  That means it is Apple Time.   Applesauce is on the menu this weekend.  The northwest part of VA is a great place for good ole fresh apples.   Also time to get on over to Starbucks for their caramel apple cider!  Thank goodness for the drive through, I can paint and take a break without having to change out of my work clothes!   This is sometimes a problem, since I often feel the "NEED" for more breaks than usual!

SO take an apple break this weekend and treat yourself to that great caramel apple cider!

YES Virginia there is a Mother Nature!!!!!

Last week is a week that I will always remember!!  I am sure that I am not alone when I say WHAAAAT?

An earthquake in VA ?????  When I first felt the tremor, I just thought TREMOR!  THEN shaking, crashing and loud noise!!!  I realized that it was at least a category 4 quake.  While we were in the high desert of CA we felt those several times since we were on the San Andreas Fault.  The house really didn't shake and we didn't lose anything to crashing:)  The pots and pans hanging on the  pot rack did rattle a little and that was about it!

  THIS house swayed and stuff crashed in random places.  By the time I decided what to do, it was over, even though it seemed like an hr or more:)  I couldn't believe the power, too bad we can't harness that!!! Our poor dog Charlie is still nervous,  Rowdy was like "Whatever"!!! 

 We were lucky to have minimal losses.  Some antique mirrors fell off the mantle in the bedroom and one of them smashed to pieces the other one was not hurt at all the third one, my favorite with a reverse painting on the top, suffered a clean break so I think I can repair it!  Almost all of the little sheep were just laying down on their shelves just as if they new what to do :)

  NOTE TO SELF next time HANG the mirrors, don't just lean them against the wall!!

The hurricane was scary too and for several nights I left the tv on all night to mask the sounds so that Charlie could settle down some. I have never left the tv on all night, but I think it helped some. With the hurricane behind us and the yard cleared of the fallen limbs and branches, we were on the road to recovery! 

Monday was a great day, but Tuesday was terrible.  

 Around 2:00 in the afternoon Charlie had a horrible seizure!  It scared me to death!  I called the vet and  he said to bring him in when he was over the seizure and calming down.   I threw him in the truck and took off.  Luckily the vet is close by.  The Dr was not sure what caused his seizure, but gave me some anxiety meds for him.  I gave one pill to my poor little boy and I do think it helped. He was a little better and slept all that night.   He seems to be a little better now!  I am watching him like a hawk!!  

My husband was in beautiful Wisconsin through all of Mother Nature's tirade!!! 

This little "Mother Nature Show" has really thrown me off as far as fall decorating and plans go! Hopefully by next week I will have some things to share! 

For now I have some scherenscnitte to share!

Little Girl with Her Bird, painted background in a combed frame

Brother and Sister, painted background with combed frame

 

Brother and Sister Parade, painted background, aged frame.

Little Flower Girl, painted background, paint embellished frame.

For more information or to purchase please go to www.picturetrail.com/tansyanniestudio

I hope you all have a safe and peaceful Labor day weekend!

SOMETHINGS IN THE AIR!!

Yep there surely is something in the air this morning!!!

It is actually cool on the porch  and  I can hear the rustle of the leaves.  Is it my imagination or could it be a little hint of fall?  Maybe I am just yearning for fall!

  Not sure why I would since I hardly had time for that lazy summer day! You know the one when we can just lie on the beach or on the lake in a boat and just feel nature!!!   My favorite thing in the summers were the long days which gave us time to do several things in one day! Like read and listen to the birds or go for a swim!! I miss those days and being in the beautiful North GA Mountains!!!

  I also miss the sound of our children playing and laughing and the Christmas movies when it was to hot to be outside!  I would love to go back there for even just one day! PLUS I was really skinny then:)

Well, we can't go back so its time to move forward!!!

  I am a little restless and feel the need to change the whole house around!  I moved the tavern room furniture around every which way and I ended up with it just the way it was!!  Even though the room is fairly large it is square with the fireplace in the center of the outside wall so I am somewhat limited in  furniture placement.

I am thinking of taking the rug out, I have never really liked it with the sofa fabric!  Not much of a change but something:)  Maybe I will slip cover the chairs.

Oh well, I did sort of get my garden room/studio somewhat organized!

Well at least a little bit:)  I will get better pictures!  These are not so great, but it gives you an idea of the mess:)  I like to do so many different things that I can't settle on just one so I just do everything in that one room:)  I sort of hang out there all day!  When my husband is home we have dinner together and then I wander off to "my room" and he wanders to the tavern room with espn on the TV:) LOL

 

 As much as I hate to leave the porch and talking with y'all I must get going!  Have to be at a meeting at eleven and I haven't even vacuumed up the dog hair yet!

I hope that you are feeling a little bit of fall weather today! 

  And please remember our troops over in those hot places under the worst conditions!  They need our prayers every single day!!!

If you are feeling "a little restless" and moving things around, send us pictures of your changes and we can all be inspired!!

HAVE A HAPPY DAY AND LISTEN FOR THE RUSTLE OF THE LEAVES, FALL WILL BE HERE SOON!

A LITTLE BIT OLD, A LITTLE BIT NEW

Sometimes I think I should have been born in the 1800's!  Then I think about no electricity, no indoor bath or water and no computer!!

Since I don't live in the 1800's I am always trying to find ways to "age" everyday things!  Take my very ugly record book, I can't function without it, it has all the necessary information in it! So the answer for me is to cover it just like the children did in the old days!!  I can just see them sitting by the fire with Mom's rag bag making covers for their school books!

THESE ARE TWO OF MY FAVORITE OLD BOOKS, THE ONE ON THE TOP IS A CHILD'S SCHOOL BOOK.  THE ONE ON THE BOTTOM IS AN OLD RECORD BOOK.

I have sold some on my picturetrail site, here are some examples!

THIS IS MY FAVORITE, I STITCHED FRENCH KNOTS AROUND THE EDGES.

A CLOSEUP OF THE FRENCH KNOTS!

HERE IS THE INSIDE

THE STITCHING!

VERY AGED SMALL ONE, GOOD FOR MY PURSE

THIS ONE IS DOWNRIGHT GRUDGY!!!

THIS ONE COMES IN RED OR THIS BLUE.

All of these are available for purchase.  You decide which fabric you would like and if you want the candlewicking.  The large journals are $18.00 and the small $12.00

For more information go to

www.picturetrail.com/tansyanniestudio

THIS IS MY UGLY RECORD BOOK COVERED!!

This is a picture of my desk, with all of the old and the new!!!

These are a few of my favorite aged everyday things! 

Look around your house and see if there are some things that you use everyday that can be aged!  Its a great way to spend the rest of the HOT summer!! 

Send us your pictures and inspire us!!!

I wish you a cooler and fun week!!

FIRELIES OR IS IT LIGHTNIN BUGS?

Fireflies with their tiny lights

give sparkle to a summer night

When the sun goes down and the stars come out

Their little lights start to dance about

Summer is their time to shine

til the fall moon takes over

Back home they go to build their light

til again they dance on a warm summer's night

SOOO I am not a great poet!!! BUT I love those little flies, we called them lightnin bugs.  We caught them in a jar and kept them in our rooms for a night and let them go the next day, well some were still alive:)

I still love to watch them and have tried and tried to get a picture of the yard with all the lights,  no luck though.

I can't believe that it is already AUGUST!!!!  I am in the process of gathering the fall items for the picture trail site!  Somehow it makes the heat bearable:)

When the children were young we used to watch Christmas movies and make Christmas decorations and gifts in the summer.   We always moved in June or July so they didn't have friends yet, I selfishly was glad to have them alllllll to myself!!  I am still inclined to do the "Summer" Christmas thing but it is not as much fun!

I will be posting some new aging examples soon.   I hope you can use these ideas.  Feel free to send along yours too:)

Well that's about it for today!    I hope you can catch lots lightnin bugs! 

HAVE A GREAT WEEK!!!!!!!!!!!

ANTS AND PLANTS!

I mentioned this on my facebook page but I would like to share it with y'all!!  SOOOOOO a few years ago I noticed that our jasmine trees had ants allllll over them.  As I looked closer I saw scale.  Since they were outside I decided to just let it go until the fall when they come inside.  When I checked it again the ants AND the scale were GONE!!!  I couldn't believe it.  I just thought that it was just some weird event:)   THIS year my favorite myrtle topiary had scale so I took it outside and found some ants, really easy to do this year, and put them onto the plant.   In about a week they had cleaned that plant as well!  Even the stickyness was gone!!! I don't think that  ANTS COULD REALLY MOVE A RUBBER TREE PLANT   but they sure can clean up the scale:)  I have a new respect for those little critters:)

It has been really hot and humid so I haven't finished painting the porch, I have been sitting on it though, not as long as I would like because I feel like I am sitting in a sauna!! When it gets a little less humid I will get back to the porch.  We still need to paint the doors and the shelves.

I hope y'all are keeping cool and drinking LOTS of water!! I like to put lemon in mine and it is so refreshing that I don't want anything else.  I DO have my sweet tea at least once a day though!!

OK I am outta here!!  And don't forget to thank a Service Member for his or her service to our great country!!

Oh yeah, here is a little bit of trivia~~~~~ The heat in Afghanistan at this time of the year is about 130 degrees with high humidity!  I try to remind myself of that when I think I can't stand the heat anymore! 

Have a GREAT week!!!!!!!!

About that porch......

Good Morning!!

Whoever said "Time Flies" knew what they were talking about!

 Somehow I have lost about 2 weeks.  So here is what has been going on!   My husband and I ACTUALLY TOOK A VACATION!!!  We hardly ever go away for very long.  We both hate to leave our babies, which are the two dogs y'all see in my pictures all the time:).  BUT we have a wonderful friend who started a pet sitting business a few years ago and she is great so we decided to give her a call and see if she had any openings, she did,  so we toke off!  

Since we settled on Maine for our little get away, I thought I would brave the heat and see the beautiful North East!   It WAS SOOOOO beautiful.  We left on a Wed. and stayed in Saratoga Springs NY, which was a really cute town, then on to a small town in Maine called Auburn.  I loved that little town although it was a little depressed as the mills have all closed, soooo sad.  

This is Auburn!

These are the views from our hotel room, we walked along a little path that went by this river an took tons of pictures!

I loved the water!! it looked so pure!!!!

The next day was  my favorite of all!!  Driving through Maine was the most fun and the scenery was great!  AND GET THIS!!! :D  ALLLLL of the houses were different and most were OLD!!!  I did notice that most of the porches were~~~ you guessed it ~~ BLUE!!!!   They were well maintained and loved!  We took the back roads along the coast and I couldn't believe all the antique stores!  My "antique store radar" was going off every 2 or 3 SECONDS!  We didn't go into even one because our little car that only seats 2 was full already!  But we have decided to go back and take the TRUCK:)

Our destination was way up on the boarder with Canada and it was really cool and beautiful!

It was cloudy when we got there

The wind was blowing designs in the water!!

These are views from the deck of the little cottage we stayed in! 

We didn't want to ever leave:) 

The only thing I found a little strange was that there were no sounds 

AT ALL  during the night.   I missed the frogs croaking and the lightin bugs that are so much a part of our Southern Summers!

We saw beautiful Acadia National Park and spent some time with good friends.  

Our trip came to an end and we headed out to West Point NY and then home to VA!

 As we all know it is great fun to take a vacation, but it is GREAT to get back home:)

As you might have guessed by now,  the porch is still not completely finished! SOOOO back to work soon, probably not today though, its my day to work in the gift shop at the wonderful

Mary Washington House, George Washington's mother's home.

I have gone on tooo long about our trip but I just had to share:)

I hope you have a great day, and if you get the chance, go out and see our beautiful country, it is all out there waiting for your visit!!

A little update!!

I usually like to blog on Mondays but I decided to pass this along today! :)
I wanted to alter something that I said earlier about aging a wall.  I mentioned staining it first, then dry brushing.   You would NOT have to stain first, unless you wanted the aged look sooner, just dry brushing over the bare wood would be fine.  Just let nature do the rest!  It might take a little while, not sure how long!

I am having problems getting the pictures side by side, I will have to work on that, I have lots of wasted
space:)

These are examples of dry brushing.

These are some pictures of the almost finished porch.  I still need to do the doors and the inside of the cabinets.  Still deciding on the color, but I am thinking a light mustardy color.  I like Benjamin Moore's
HC 40 or HC41.  That decision will be made on Mon!  Hope the paint store it open since it is the 4th.

 Charlie loves the porch:)

My Favorite rocking chair:)

I liked the shadows here.

A FEW EXTRA PICTURES!!!

Charlie and Rowdy !  We all stayed on the porch most of the day!



Right after I took this picture Rowdy stole my peanut butter bagel!!
She had trouble getting the peanut butter off the roof of her mouth!!
It was sort of funny watching her, but not to healthy for her!




I HOPE YOU ALL HAVE A SAFE AND HAPPY 4TH OF JULY!
PLEASE REMEMBER OUR TROOPS!


So long until next time!