The Train Doesn't Stop Here Anymore

Beautiful Antique French Velvet..........thing

2011-12-12T14:39:00.000-06:00

Is there anyone out there who can tell me what this is?

I bought it a French container auction many years ago and I've never known what it is for exactly. The center is padded as though to be used as a pincushion but it's very large, over 15 inches tall. It's velvet covering a hard frame and trimmed with ormulu and wax flowers. When I was in an antique mall twenty years ago there was a French dealer who often had these but I can't remember what they were called.

I've kept it on my vanity to hold jewelry pins but now I want to put it in my Etsy shop but I don't know what it is. I have looked and looked on the internet using every keyword I could think of and I can't find another one. Does anyone out there have any ideas?

Thanksgiving Greetings

2011-11-22T14:45:00.000-06:00

I thought I would share some old Thanksgiving postcards with you for the holidays. When I was in the antique business about 10 years ago someone came in the store one day wanting to sell three old old albums filled with postcards. They weren't cheap but I had to have them. I fell in love with the intricate designs and the variety and could never bear to sell any of them. Hope you enjoy them too!

The Night the Lights Went Out in Alabama

2011-05-01T23:28:00.000-05:00

All of Alabama had heard earlier in the week that bad storms were possible on Wednesday. We were watching TV all afternoon to see where they were, where they were headed. We were watching as it hit Tuscaloosa, then watched as the TV camera captured a live shot of the monster tornado, a mile wide , hitting Birmingham. We're thirty miles north east of Birmingham. And then the lights went out and the sirens sounded and we took cover.

We were blessed in that our neighborhood was spared. I mean there were not even any leaves blown off our trees. All of our family members are safe. We were so lucky that I feel guilty. We had no power for three days but that's not even worth mentioning. Some people in our community still don't have power; some don't have water. A half a mile away houses were blown off their foundations. Twenty miles away in any direction there is utter and total devastation. The scope of this disaster is beyond belief. The monster storm that hit Tuscaloosa and Birmingham stayed on the ground all the way into Georgia. Three tornados hit Cullman, a mid sized city twenty miles north of here. That whole county has no power and no water. Neither does the county north of there where a power plant took a direct hit. All over north Alabama small towns and communities are gone, just gone. One town has 80 percent of it's population unaccounted for. People from these places are coming into the store in our little town to find food and water and gas. I have heard so many horror stories that I am emotionally drained.

The help and support from people has been phenomenal. Anyone who has a chainsaw has been out clearing roads. Churches are gathering clothes and supplies and getting them where they're needed immediately. A restaurant in our little town is giving free food to everyone until the power is back on. I know it can't be enough, so many people have lost everything, but we're doing the best we can to take care of our neighbors.

Count your blessings. Pray for us.

The Cottage Next Door and My Great Idea

2011-04-18T13:00:00.005-05:00

This post turned out kind of long if you want to skip down to my idea that's OK.

Whenever you move you always worry a little about what your neighbors are going to be like. It's especially true in the country where you find nice houses next to not so nice houses next to rundown trailer/meth labs.

This is the little house that was next door, very very close, to our house. We never saw the owner when we looked at our house, but it was always neat and tidy so we weren't worried. Boy, were we wrong.

This was Joe's house. Joe was in his mid sixties but he looked like he was 80. He didn't work, he just sat on the porch and drank and smoked and coughed that deep smoker's cough all day. He called emergency services regularly when he was drunk and after the first couple of times we didn't even look out the window when we heard the sirens. All the drinking and smoking had given him a low raspy voice and Joe was a talker. The same stories over and over. We started sneaking in the back door to avoid him. He never really caused us any trouble he was just annoying and always there. Drinking and smoking and talking.

Joe drove an old Caddy, the kind with fins. The tag was three years old and he always took the back roads when he drove to avoid the sheriff. One day his drinking caught up with him, he had an accident, someone died, and he went to jail. So he was gone from our lives but some innocent person had to pay.

Joe was renting the house and after he was gone the owner sold it to us for a song. We donned coveralls and masks and rubber gloves and set about cleaning it out. We ripped up orange shag carpet, tore down cheap fruitwood paneling and pulled down the suspended ceiling. We threw everything away, including the stove and refridgerator (we recycled everything we could). The smell was awful. But underneath were the old board walls with their original paint, that gorgeous blue-green color you see on many things from the turn of the century. I fell in love with the board walls and with this tiny hundred year old house. I painted the walls and floor to bring in some light but I left the ceiling; you can see a tiny corner of it in the photo above.

This is just a spot I set up so I could get a photo of this group of pictures I'm selling on Etsy. They're 1896 Louis Prang. But let's have a little honesty here; the room really looks like this.

At first we had a little antique shop here and it was really cute but I wasn't blogging five years ago and I never thought to take any pictures. That lasted about a year. Having your own shop is not nearly as much fun as having a booth in a mall. Then I wanted to have my studio here but the light is only good for a few hours in the morning. Now we use it for storage and a place to paint things.

My Great Idea
I've taken a long time to get to how this little house inspired one of the best ideas I've ever had. As I said, I loved the way the board walls looked in this little house. It came to me that we could take down the paneling in our house, saw it into 6" strips and nail it up crosswise, back side out, and it would look like boards. (You need access to a table saw for this.)

Hubby was skeptical but we tried it and it worked! We didn't fill any nail holes; they just make it look more authentic. So the material was free and it was easy to put up. Especially if you have a nail gun. We ran short of paneling so we bought 4 x 8 sheets of luan plywood at $10 each and sawed them into boards to make up the difference. Still cheap, and we love this look.

The first time I took the picture you could see dust on the shelf so I dusted the furniture and took another picture but I forgot to dust under it. So my floor is dusty. I'm not doing it again.

Oh, and I always liked this photo JD took of the back and photoshopped to look like a painting.

Linking to -
Very Merry Vintage Style Share the Love Wednesday
No Minimalist Here Open House
My Romantic Home Show and Tell Friday

The Easy Way Out - Hanging Drapes

2011-04-14T15:20:00.025-05:00

The first time we looked at this place we fell in love with these old industrial type windows that open with a chain. So loft-like. Sure, drapes were going to be a challenge because the windows tilt inward but we thought we could figure something out.

The living room has two windows on three sides for a total of six and the light is beautiful but the sun gets pretty intense in the afternoon. We finally splurged on some fairly expensive rods that swing open from the middle allowing the drapes to fold out of the way so the windows can open. That was before we tried to hang the first picture on the wall. What we thought were plaster walls turned out to be cement. Cement troweled over rock. When we realized it took approximately 27 minutes to drill one hole in the wall (yes we had a special drill and bit) and we had 8 holes to drill for each window.....we both bailed on that project.

So here's what I came up with. I just stapled some plain cream colored fabric (OK, they're sheets) to the crown molding.(I also started hanging pictures from the molding, I think that one may be a little low)

I really like the way they look and the room needed the height.

I always meant to go back and add something decorative over the staples but you really can't see them unless you get really close so I never got around to it. They're the same color as the walls so they just blend into the background anyway. Yes, I know when I need to wash them I'll have to do it all over again but it only takes about five minutes per window to put them up.

So that's my true confession for today. I am a mature grown woman and I am still using sheets as drapes and declining to put up curtain rods.

Mary may be my most favorite find ever. She has glass eyes that look real.

Linking to-
No Minimalist Here Open House Party
Very Merry Vintage Style
My Romantic HomeShow and Tell Friday
French Country CottageFeathered Nest Friday
Funky Junk SNS#77

He said She said

2011-04-08T20:42:00.004-05:00

We've accumulated a lot of furniture and things over the years, being in the antique and junk business.

Here's what He likes. Real antiques. A continental look.

Here's what she likes. Painted shabby furniture and china with bluebirds and roses and funky chalkware lamps. A little bit of lace. An old farmhouse. Your grandmother's house. Maybe your great grandmother's house.

So decorating around here involves A LOT of compromise. On both our parts. So we don't do a lot of it. Our living room has looked pretty much like this for about four years now.

It's nice enough but something about it seems boring to me. So I changed out the table in the middle of the room and persuaded himself that lots of people have stacks of suitcases in their living room so it's ok.

I think I like it better but now that dark screen above the sofa has got to go. Something about the room still doesn't look right. I think we need a couple of big upholstered chairs to fill up some space, the room is too big.

But first I have to go see if I can find something else to go above the sofa. I know we have some old windows lying around.....

Linked to My Romantic Home show & tell Friday
French Country Cottage feathered nest Friday
Funky Junk Interiors Saturday Night Special
No Minimalist Here: Open House

Things Are Not Always What They Seem

2011-04-04T05:00:00.006-05:00

I don't get to go thrifting very often as I live in the middle of nowhere and the good stores are too far away. But when I'm in town and have time I always make the rounds. I don't find much because as everyone knows you have to go regularly to get lucky. But look what I found for a couple of dollars Friday.....don't laugh.

I know. It's awful. And big. Like a blowup party doll from Little House on the Prairie. But look what she has on underneath.

A perfectly preserved crinoline slip from the fifties!

Here it is freshly laundered and laid out to dry. If I were young I would so wear this with a little cotton sundress. But I'm not so off it goes to my Etsy shop.

This sold the next day. It's going to Finland.

I also bought some other things but they were all boring household things. Except for the white dishes which are going to be interesting when I have enough of them.

Lace and Linens on Etsy

2011-04-01T16:45:00.000-05:00

I've got suitcases full of lace and linens to sell on Etsy and here's my starting point.

The first group is six pieces of crochet trim, each about a yard long, except for one which is over four yards long. You can see more at my shop, Red Lilly Vintage.

I've been looking for a chance to use this mannequin as a prop. Don't you love her haughty face? She's a miniature mannequin that once modeled a miniature girdle. She's in bad shape, both legs are gone and one arm is missing which is why she's always draped. I found her in a closet at an estate sale; I paid a quarter for her.

More crochet, wider pieces, 17" to 40" long, all in beautiful condition.

I put this groups together thinking of spring crafts. There's some embroidery and six pieces of crochet trim. My favorite is the piece with pink roses. It was saved from an old pillowcase. I just know there's something wonderful to be made with it.

A Woman With Excess Baggage

2011-03-30T13:36:00.005-05:00

Inspired by a post at Beatrice Banks last week about finding vintage suitcases, I wanted to show my collection. This is about half of them. I could never resist buying one if the price was right. I once bought one at an estate sale for a couple of dollars and hidden in the side pocket were two sterling silver evening/compact bags from the twenties. Suitcases make such good storage, easy to move around, and have been stacked as a side table, used to fill the empty space under a long sofa table, and used as part of an arrangement on top of an armoire. But this post isn't about decorating with suitcases, I wanted to show you what's in them.

The little one on top is full of lace, lace and more lace. Handmade lace, crochet lace, lace collars, lace cuffs, old cluny lace, vintage Valenciennes lace,; pieces yards long and pieces only a few inches. All of it old, pieces I collected over the years because I thought I might use it (I used to sew for my girls)or just because it was beautiful and I enjoyed looking at all the different patterns.
The next one is storing some vintage things I've already put on Etsy.

Then I have three that are full of crochet and embroidered doilies and table runners, vintage fabric and evidently at some time in the past I bought a box of embroidered hankies and there's tea towels and pillowcases and oh yes, here's a crocheted bedspread I forgot I had.

I had plans for things I would do with this stuff but I have more projects than one person could complete in a lifetime.

I'm going to be putting all this for sale in my Etsy store.

Because there's so much I'm going to make groups of several pieces. I'm going to start with the lace. I should have some of it listed by this weekend so check my Etsy store, Red Lilly Vintage for some super buys.

I'm linking this post to White Wednesday at Faded Charm
and Share the Love Wednesday at Very Merry Vintage Style

Sign of the Times

2011-03-23T13:02:00.006-05:00

A couple of years ago when we went to the county fair we were captivated by this fabulous piece of folk art. Although it was the size of a billboard, we wanted it. J.D. took this wonderful photo of it.

"The Rat" copyright Duncan McKinnon

He made big copies of the photo but I got the bright idea to recreate The Rat as a sign. I drew the outline and cut it out of a salvaged piece of old plywood. It's pretty big and we thought it would be an amusing piece. Turns out it scares little kids.

I know it's kind of weird but we think it's funny. The sad thing is, we got distracted and never did go in and see The Rat. The next year it wasn't there so I guess we'll always wonder. Was it really green? Did it drink gallons of water daily? And why is that scary?

Linked to Very Merry Vintage Style Share the Love Wednesday
Funky Junk Interiors:SNS #74

Wordless Wednesday

2011-03-23T08:18:00.000-05:00

Clothes That Don't Fit Anybody Anymore, #2

2011-03-18T19:29:00.002-05:00

Back in September 2009 I wrote about cleaning out my mother's house after her passing and my frustration with her inability to throw anything away. I actually found a box of clothes in the the garage labeled "clothes that don't fit anybody anymore". Now I've seen the reality show "Hoarders" and it was a revelation to me. To have a name for this.....condition. Mama was a hoarder and she couldn't help it. Just to know how many people there are out there dealing with this has made me feel better.

Now it's almost two years later and I am still trying to get the house cleaned out. Some other family members continued to live in the house because they had nowhere to go. Turned out they were hoarders too. I finally got everyone out in September last year then I broke my wrist and was unable to do anything, now the weather is nice and I'm back at it helped by my wonderful daughter without whom I couldn't do it. Hoping to get the house up for sale (finally) in a month or so.

This whole thing has made me take a long, hard look at myself. I mean I collect things too. But how much is too much and when do you cross the line between collector and hoarder. Do you not realize what's happening? When I was a child Mama was an immaculate housekeeper. At the end you couldn't walk through her house. So I've been destashing and selling tons of interesting little stuff on Etsy and taking tons of ordinary stuff to the thrift store to be recycled. I feel the need for an uncluttered life.

Here's something I found today when we were cleaning.

It's my grandmother's purse. And it's stuffed with ephemera of ordinary life in the 1930s - receipts and driver's licenses and wage statements and here's where Grandpa bought a mule in 1936 for $240 which seems like a lot of money in the thirties seeing as he paid $75 for his car. It's trivial and fascinating at the same time. And now as the eldest I am the keeper of the purse.

Wordless Wednesday

2011-03-16T06:19:00.003-05:00

From The Train Doesn't Stop Here Anymore

Makeover

2011-03-15T09:00:00.007-05:00

I found this at the thrift store the other day. For $35!

This is what it looked like before. Not attractive and the hardware was all broken and the back was missing. But it was solid wood and best of all, the drawers all worked smoothly. I love antique furniture and that's all I have but sometimes you just want something functional, especially if you use it constantly. I really had my baby grandson in mind when I bought it because he was fast outgrowing his white nursery furniture but his mom (my daughter) didn't like it. I thought it was too masculine for a white finish so I painted it black and distressed it. I got the cast iron bin pulls at hobby lobby on sale, I think it was $12 for all of them. Now she wants it.

Linked to
Shabby Nest Frugal Friday

Memo Board

2011-03-13T09:00:00.012-05:00

When I saw these name tag holders in the office supply department at Walmart I knew I could do something neat with them, I just didn't know what. They were only a couple of dollars for a bag of six. So this is what I came up with. I stapled a piece of hardware cloth to the back of a shabby frame, snapped the clips on, and had an interesting bulletin board for almost nothing.

I like it because the clips are strong enough to hold relatively heavy things securely.

linked to
Funky Junk Interiors
Romantic Home
Naturally Me Creations

My New Old Plaster Walls

2011-03-12T10:47:00.003-06:00

I've been plastering the walls downstairs and it's turned out really well. The walls were paneling, the kind that comes in 4 x 8 sheets and has grooves that supposedly simulate planks, not real paneling. I taped all the joints because cracks will form if you don't then used sheetrock mud, the kind that comes in a huge bucket, to fill the grooves. I troweled over this with more mud stippling it with a rag as I went to get the effect I wanted. Very time consuming but a cheap way to change an ugly wall.

I've hated this ceiling since the day I saw it and I finally took the plunge and took it down. I knew it wasn't a drop ceiling attached to a flimsy metal frame so it was a huge undertaking to get it down. The tiles were nailed to 1 x 3 pine boards that were nailed across the rafters. I spent days and days on top of a ladder with a crowbar.

Here's the huge beam I uncovered that runs the length of the house.

Everyone should have flourescent lights in the ceiling. Energy efficient.

The rafters turned out to be dirty so I spent more days on a ladder with a scrub brush. This picture is before they were cleaned. I wanted them exposed but now I can't decide if I want to clear coat them or paint them white.

No after picture yet because it's not in order yet, but soon. This is only about a third of the space I have to do anyway. At least I got started!

linked to
No Minimalist Here Open House Party
Show and Tell Friday at My Romantic Home

Water Under The Bridge

2011-03-11T16:26:00.001-06:00

Summer 2010, Swimming in the Mulberry River

It's been a long time, it's been a hard year. Happier days have to be ahead of us.

So I've given the blog a new look and will try again.

Happy Easter

2010-04-04T08:35:00.000-05:00

Just thought I would put this picture of my cousins and me up in remembrance of Easters past. That's me on the far right. Not sure what I was thinking or why I was making that face.

Macy, The Store Cat

2010-03-11T19:18:00.001-06:00

This is JD and Macy, the hardware store cat. Macy prefers men and likes to ride around on their shoulders while they shop. Today he chose JD and perched on him while he shopped, purring loudly in his ear the whole time.

All together now, awwwww

Water, Water Everywhere. Really. Everywhere

2010-03-10T20:37:00.001-06:00

We've had a lot of rain. A lot of it is in my downstairs.

I had so much I needed to do today but we spent most of the day fighting the water pouring in the back wall. JD manned the shop vac while I started digging trenches in the back yard to divert the flood. Our back yard looks like a rice paddy but we got it stopped. The thing is, this happened once before, last year, and we knew it would happen again if the rain was heavy enough. We talked about what to do to prevent it, then promptly forgot about it .....until today when it happened again. We are kicking ourselves.

One thing I wanted to do today was take photos for my Etsy store. I just set it up a couple of weeks ago and I just learned how to use the closeup function on my camera and I need pictures. I will say more about it when I have a little more in there to look at.

Taxes. I needed to work on my taxes. And update my blogs. Oh well, tomorrow is another day.

Bangor Cave

2010-02-28T19:23:00.000-06:00

Not much going on at the 'ol homestead here so I came across this picture and I thought I would write about that.

Those of you who live in Blount County probably know all about Bangor Cave. Briefly, it was a glamorous nightclub in the thirties. It was said no expense was spared in converting the cave into a exciting nightspot hidden away in the woods around Blount Springs. People took the train up from Birmingham to drink and dance, and for the chosen few, gamble in the back room. An orchestra pit carved out of an enormous boulder could seat 30 musicians and vocalists. Can you imagine? Would that not be fun? So of course the governor decreed it should be closed down. Ostensibly because of the gambling but probably it was just too much fun.

You can visit the cave today and see the rock bar and stairs, imagine what it must have been like, but it's a little creepy. Last time we were there, a couple of years ago, someone had lit a lot of candles and placed them all through it. When we were almost to the other end, could just see the light from the back opening you won't believe was we saw. A tent. Someone was camping in the cave.

Only they weren't. It was dead silent. No one was there. We all (there were 4 of us) froze, not knowing what to do, fully expecting to find a dead body and omygod the killer is still in here. Finally one of the guys walked the 100 feet to the tent. It was a new tent, the box was there. There was an unopened package of steaks which was starting to smell like something dead. There were clothes, pajamas. Pajamas! Whoever was there left in a hurry, didn't take anything with them.

I don't have an ending for this story. Just a story about someone spending the night in a cave and something scared the bejeezus out of them and they got out as fast as they could and never came back. It pretty much scared the bejeezus out of us too.

Here's a picture of the cave entrance today. It's for sale if you're interested.

Out of the Fog

2010-01-31T20:51:00.000-06:00

It was a beautiful day at the park Saturday. Really beautiful. It was cold and dreary out but we decided to go by Pallisades Park. When we got to the top of the mountain it was shrouded in fog, thick fog, and we were the only ones there. Went for a long walk on a trail through the woods which went on and on. I had no idea the park was that big. Such a nice surprise. Just when you think you know everything.....you think you don't want to get out because the weather's so cold and it's overcast and then you do and in many ways it was nicer than a sunny day. Good day.

Woman With a Red Dress on

2010-01-08T07:51:00.005-06:00

I've been having some back trouble lately and I finally allowed myself the luxury of lying down in the afternoon about an hour before time to start dinner with a heating pad , a cup of tea, and Netflix . Through the magic of Netflix instant I discovered The Tudors. This series was on showtime starting in 2007, and continuing in 2010. Not having cable TV I had never heard of it. I do love a historical drama and I have watched many many but I have never seen such lavish sets and costuming. Oh the costumes! The jewels! The Castle! See the red dress in the picture? I literally gasped aloud when she came out in this dress. There was also a cream one dripping with pearls that she wore to her coronation (this is Ann Boleyn by the way) that was gasp worthy. I don't think I've ever enjoyed a series quite so much. At least seasons one and two; I'm not enjoying season three as much; too much politics and fighting, not enough dresses.

Oh yeah, there's a lot of sex and nudity too.

My back is all better, thanks.

A Castle for Barbie

2010-01-05T17:19:00.012-06:00

Ok, so it's been a long long time since I've been here. First I was insanely busy getting ready for art shows, then I was depressed because the shows weren't good; then I was busy for the holidays, then I was depressed because....well because it's the holidays. So I'm gonna try to do better in the new year. Thanks to all the people (2) who wrote to ask what in the world was wrong with me.

So here's what I was busy with for the holidays.

Finished - 2 days before Christmas

In Progress

My daughter and I built this for our granddaughter/great granddaughter Emily, who is four and obsessed with Barbies and princesses. It was the most fun I have had in a long time. I love a project you can really obsess about. I think obsessiveness runs in the family. JD didn't have any projects going on so we were able to use his shop and small pieces of left over wood and moulding for all the trim.

Here's Belle about to go in the front door.

Here's ...I forget who this is....in the entrance hall.

Yes, that is purple cut velvet on the walls. It's a Castle. My daughter made the parquet floor in the entrance from 2" pieces of mahogany scraps. The parquet floor in the living room came from an old headboard.

And finally, here's Belle in one of the bedrooms.

It looks small for a bedroom in a castle, but Barbie is a big girl and we made the house as big as possible and still fit in the house and that's as big as the room could be. Actually it didn't quite fit in the house. It went through the front door but we had to take the bedroom door off and cut off a piece of the stop molding to get it in the room it was being hidden in until Christmas. It's about the size of a piano. We may have overdone it. The top is waist high. I said when she's older she can use it as a bar, or a kitchen island.

Here's a couple of pictures I was gonna use but I never got around to writing a post.

Elk in the Smoky Mountains, Cataloochee Valley.

It was mating season (October) and they were everywhere. Magnificent animals. I had a lot more to say about our camping trip but it's too late now.

Tiny House in Mooresville, Alabama.

We had been up to Amish country in Tennessee and stopped by Mooresville on the way back. I don't have any pictures from Amish country because they don't want you to take their picture. Did you know there's a big Amish community in Eldridge Tennessee? I didn't until my sister told me about it a few months ago.

That brings me up to date. There must have been more stuff going on than that but that's all I can remember. Here's to the New Year and more stuff.

Art in the City

2009-09-13T15:45:00.005-05:00

The rain didn't keep the crowds away from Artwalk in downtown Birmingham Friday night and it's always a fun event. People love to come downtown if you just give them a reason. I didn't set up this year but JD did and I was there and free to walk around and see all the artwork for a change. The thing about doing shows is you never get to see anything else, except in a just passing by kind of way. It's so nice to be able to visit with the other artists. I have to mention my friend and fellow artistGina Cochran; she's started a blog - art and autism - about her son, and if you or someone you know is facing that problem I'd highly recommend it. She's an excellent writer.

Next Sunday I have a show at Deerwood Lake in Shelby County, then we're going to North Carolina for a few days, then we have three shows in a row; Bluff Park in Birmingham, Mecca in Carrollton, Georgia, and finally Kentuck in Northport. With all that's been going on this year I am seriously short on work so I'm going to be very very busy. Times like this I tend to panic and develop serious creative blockage. It doesn't help that is raining and dark all the time either. Light, I need light.

Back to the easel.

Clothes That Don't Fit Anybody Anymore

2009-09-05T11:52:00.003-05:00

Mama couldn't throw anything away.

She passed away in July and now my sister and I have all this....stuff to go through. Why? Why would someone keep a box of old socks? Or a box of plastic lids? Or boxes and boxes of magazines from the seventies? Broken knicknacks, broken furniture, broken appliances, all the leftovers of forty years in this house.

Now she's gone and all I feel is anger. The truth about my mother is she was a strong willed, domineering woman. And out of her grandchildren and great grandchildren she picked favorites and actively disliked others. For no reason. And the one she disliked the most stayed with her when she was bedridden and tenderly fed her and changed her every day. Her favorites took advantage of her all their lives. My sister and I told her they were taking advantage of her but she wouldn't listen. When she died all her money and valuables were gone and all that's left is a rundown house and all this broken stuff. We had to borrow money to bury her. I'm so angry, angry with her and angry with myself that I didn't do more to stop what she was doing.

It's a terrible thing when a grandparent plays favorites in such an obvious way. So much bitterness and hurt feelings tore the family apart.

I hesitate to post this, don't say bad things about the dead and all that, but I needed to say it so now I did.

Gray Rat Snake

2009-08-30T17:00:00.002-05:00

Saturday I came in the gate to go in the downstairs back door and this is what was waiting for me, stretched out in front of the back door.

It was huge, about 4 feet long and I don't know my snakes that well and seeing dark blotches on it I thought it could be a copperhead. I screamed for JD who also thought it could be a copperhead. So I stood at the top of the retaining wall to watch it while he went in and checked the internet. We determined that it had round pupils and was thus not a poisonous snake and was in fact a gray rat snake. So we decided to live and let live and just watched it crawl back under the dog house where it has probably been living all year and is probably hatching babies right now. The fact is we have a LOT of mice and rats around here. Our two cats do a wonderful job of catching them but I guess they could always use some help. One of my chores every morning is to go out and shovel the dead rodents off the steps and out of the yard. Always several mice and sometimes rats, rats the size of squirrels. I think they're catching them in the bushes across the street; they couldn't possibly be living in the yard.

That was really gross, who admits to having rats?

The thing about the snake though; I THINK HE WAS TRYING TO GET IN THE HOUSE. Rat snakes will do that. They're often found in the rafters of barns and my sister found an enormous black one in her kitchen cabinets one day. They ended up tearing the cabinets out to get to him.

So he's still out there and now I am very very cautious when I open the back door.

Notes From the Front Yard

2009-08-06T15:27:00.001-05:00

photo from Editor B, Flickr

I wasn't fast enough to get my own photo but I saw one of these yesterday in a flower container in the yard. I thought it was an earthworm until I saw its head. I went inside and googled it and found out it is a hammerhead worm, a type of planerian. It doesn't eat plants but one variety does eat earthworms and is capable of decimating an earthworm population. The one I saw was about 4 inches long but they can grow up to 10 inches. Thought to originate in Malaysia they are now spreading around the world, probably in imported potted plants. If you see one don't kill it by chopping it up; every piece will turn into another worm. Here's more information on Dave's Garden; you can see in the forum that 2009 is the first year they are reported in Alabama.

And here's one of the few plants that is happy in my yard - an evergreen wisteria I planted last year. It's not really evergreen in this zone but it did come back. This wisteria is not invasive at all and easily contained.

Emogene O'Mary 1926 - 2009

2009-07-24T16:49:00.004-05:00

Mama was a strong willed woman. Jesus came to take her back in April when she was in the hospital but she said no. Really. That Friday when I saw her in the emergency room she looked like death. Later she would say that she saw Jesus, and she saw Jamie (her favorite who died three years ago) but she didn't want to go. But last week she said that she wanted to see Jesus, and Jamie, and go fishing, and early Monday morning she passed away quietly in her sleep.

It was an infection that sent her to the emergency room in April; that infection brought on terrible and complete dementia that took away her mind and cut her off from reality forever. They cured the infection but her mind was completely gone. They sent her home where hospice and family cared for her until the end. She talked nonstop 24 hours a day to people who weren't there. She ate well. She didn't suffer.

I can't believe she's gone.

Why?

2009-07-16T21:13:00.003-05:00

Someone stole our garden hose night before last. It was attached to a spigot at the shop, about 50 feet from the house, as it has been for six years, and now it's gone. Why? Why would someone steal an old worn out hose? It was full of holes patched with duct tape. Nothing else seems to be missing. In fact, and this is the real mystery and we can not figure this out, the culprits seem to have left something of theirs. I don't know what you call it but it's like a block and tackle,some pulleys and lots of heavy chains, that you might hook in the ceiling of your garage and use to lift an engine out of a car. It says on it that it has a two ton capacity. It would lift a whole car if you wanted to. It's an expensive, heavy thing and we can come up with no theories as to why someone would leave it in our yard. And take our hose.

So I guess we came out ahead if we can sell this pulley and chain thingy and get a decent hose but I really would like to know what was going on in this person's mind to do that.

Another Hiccup

2009-07-07T20:51:00.002-05:00

I haven't even gotten up to writing about a couple of bad things that happened so far this year and then last week, last Tuesday my gallbladder attacked me and I went to the emergency room and they took it out and I came home Friday and here it is Tuesday a week later and I feel like crap. It doesn't hurt that much now, I'm just mad. I just so angry that I got sick when I had so much to do. Not to mention the cost but I don't want to talk about that right now. I'm not even supposed to drive for another week. I'm the one that never gets sick. I'm the one with the cast iron stomach who can eat anything. Not anymore. And Gallbladder. What a disgusting word. I don't even like to say it.

I don't have a picture to go with this post. I'm not sure what it would be.......maybe a bowl of jello as that's the most exciting thing I can eat right now.

Looking on the bright side, I am hoping to lose some weight real quickly since I'm really not able to eat for a while.

"Local Woman Enjoying Mid-Life Crisis"

2009-06-25T17:54:00.003-05:00

My daughter over at Who Knows What just got a red convertible and we took off yesterday with the top down, slathered in spf 55 sunscreen. We were going to Blountsville to find the daylilly farm which sells daylillies and fried pies and had a big ad in the local paper. "Go to Blountsville and follow the signs" it said. We never saw the first sign and no one in town had ever heard of it. It's OK though, the lady at the antique store said she had all kinds of daylillies and would bring me a big box full next weekend for five dollars. Don't you love small towns?

We bought some things at the grocery store and had a picnic in the park. The table was under a big tree and a soft breeze was blowing and it was really pleasant. We were so amazed at being able to sit outside in late June when it's in the nineties that we couldn't stop talking about it. Every few minutes, one of us would say incredulously, "Gee, this is really pleasant."

We came home a different way and everything is so beautiful and lush this year because of all the rain we had earlier in the year. It was a really good day.

As you know from my last post, we had a yard sale last weekend. Not such a hot idea. No, really it was a hot idea, as it was 97 in the shade that weekend. I don't think anybody wanted to leave their house. We live near a main road and I've never seen it so dead. I mean there was no traffic. It was almost eerie. We kept wondering if it was some holiday we'd forgotten about. It was torture to sit there and we all swore we would never ever do this again. So naturally we're going to do it again. Only we're moving it to Who Knows What's house because she lives in the Oneonta metro area and they have a newspaper we can advertise in but we are waiting until the weather is better.

Even though it seemed like a big failure while we were doing it, at the end of the day we had enough to get the Netflix box and a wireless router to watch movies instantly so it wasn't a totally wasted day.

I need a convertible.

Boss Says Let 'em Go

2009-06-18T20:55:00.002-05:00

We're having a yard sale Friday and Saturday. I haven't had one in ten years so it's kind of a big deal to me. I've always had a hard time letting go of stuff. One thing I learned from my Mom & Dad is never throw anything away, you might need it some day. The other thing I learned is Food is Love, but that's another story.

Anyway, the time has come that I realize I will never need a green & orange quilt or a cow cookie jar or a box of crocheted doilies so time to clean house.

We used to be in the antique business. By antique business I mean we rented booths in different antique malls. We made pretty good money at it. Let me tell you being an antique dealer is the best job in the world. The mall handles the business, you spend all your time going to garage sales and estate sales and auctions. It's so much fun, like a treasure hunt all the time. It's addictive, like gambling, and bidding at an auction is such a rush. Little country auctions are the best because the regulars get to know each other and it's like a party with your friends every Saturday night. Anywhere you travel you look for out of the way shops and flea markets and this is your work. When we first started twenty years ago it was so easy to find things you could make a profit on but more and more people started doing it and competition drove wholesale prices up and then China started copying any kind of antique or collectible you could think of and it got hard to make enough to pay the rent. I miss it terribly.

So we don't do it anymore but we still have a lot of stuff, good and bad. The bad is the result of a lot of box lots bought at auction, like the green and orange quilt. I didn't want you to think I deliberatly picked that out. Unless you like green and orange in which case come and get it. $2.00. Third Street by the Railroad Tracks.

Rain

2009-05-17T09:44:00.002-05:00

Where do I begin? It's been a rough couple of months. We're OK but close family members are not. Between trying to work a temporary job I took and driving back and forth to the hospital in Birmingham, I haven't felt like writing. In fact I practically lived in my van for a couple of weeks coming home only to sleep and change clothes. I don't want to go into everything right now but I may in the future so my entries may be kind of morose for a while. I really would like to get back to normal and write about the weather (it's raining) and what's growing in the yard and how the decorating the house is coming along.
I've missed my blogger friends and I hope I can re-connect and feel good again.

JD's beloved mother, Eleanor, passed away May 3rd, 2009, at the age of 93. She was a wonderful lady and will be sorely missed.

The Joys of Remodeling

2009-03-12T14:52:00.006-05:00

The big news around here is that we did have the electrical work done and now we have outlets and a switch for the bathroom light in the bathroom! I keep showing this switch and the outlets in the living room to people but oddly enough no one seems as impressed as we are. The electrical work was done by Geno's Electrical in Oneonta and they were great, very conscientious and so nice, and I would highly recommend them if you need anything in that area.

We painted the walls in the bedroom last weekend. Of course the paint we so carefully picked out was wrong, wrong, wrong. I cried. It was supposed to be khaki but it was more like dark white. Luckily I had some other paint that I mixed with it and it turned out just right and as soon as I put another coat on the woodwork we can start moving stuff back in, probably tonight. I can't believe it might finally be done. I can't believe it took so long to do one room.

I've been feeling a little blue lately so I haven't been writing much. I think Winter has just gone on a little too long. Anyway, I haven't posted in a month so here's a picture to illustrate the posts I was gonna do but didn't. The daffodils bloomed and Spring is here. Yea! We got snow. Yea!

Let There Be Light!

2009-02-12T18:41:00.004-06:00

I'm so excited. We finally got an actual electrician to come out to give us a price on adding some of that new-fangled e-lectricity upstairs! Not only did he come out, he showed up 10 minutes early! He said he would call back tonight with a price AND HE JUST DID! He could be the one!

About our electrical situation-here's what we have upstairs now: 4 outlets, all on the same circuit, and 4 overhead lights including the one in the bathroom, all controlled by one wall switch which is by the back door. That's it. We don't have any outlets in the living room which means if we entertain it's strictly by candlelight which has actually worked out pretty well so that's not all that bad. The refrigerator is downstairs which means I have a work triangle of approximately 74 feet. You know, you move in an old building and you just kinda get used to it's little quirks and hardly notice them anymore until, say, a guest asks where the bathroom light switch is and you reply it's down the hall by the back door.

We bought this place on an "as is" basis and didn't realize there was no electricity in the living room, which is about half the upstairs. There were plugs, turned out they been disconnected or something. They are in the ceiling so maybe that didn't work out as well as whoever put them in thought it would. I'm not sure how you would keep a plug in the socket - duct tape?

About the picture- I love these old kitschy plaster lamps and just thought I'd throw this picture in.

Faking It

2009-02-02T18:36:00.006-06:00

Our house was originally just two big rooms, one upstairs and one down. When it was divided into rooms later they just used paneling, the kind that is one 4 x 8 sheet with grooves. Nothing could look less like real wood. But here's what we doing with it. We're taking the paneling down and sawing it into 6" strips and putting it back up going across the wall, with the back side out, and painting it. It looks just like old board walls that you see in farmhouses.Any nail holes or imperfections just make it look authentic. Here's a picture of the stairwell - you can not tell that it's not old boards.

I just wanted to share this in case there is anyone else out there faced with a lot of ugly paneled walls they'd like to do something with.

We're doing the same in the bedroom. Every year we say we are going to get the house finished by Christmas but so far the living room and bathroom are the only rooms that come close to being finished. But it's a new year so we're trying again. This time for sure. So in January we moved everything out of our bedroom, thinking it would only take about a week, two at the most, to varnish the floor (they've been stripped for about two years now), fix the walls and paint. So we painted the ceiling (painting beadboard is a project), varnished the floors, took the paneling down - and then we both got whatever bug is going around. The mattress is in the living room, the bed and other furniture is scattered around the house and it looks like it will stay that way for a while. I never get sick, why now?

"As I See It"

2009-01-30T11:59:00.005-06:00

JD has just published his first book! JD is a talented photographer who began showing his work at art fairs around the south about a year and a half ago. Most of the images were taken within a ten mile radius of our house here in Blount County. I'm telling you about this not so much to sell the book (although that's always nice) but to say how great is self publishing? I'm sure everyone has heard about the online publishing companies by now and let me tell you the service was great and the finished book quality could not be any better. It's a book of photos and the color was spot on. He used Blurb because he had heard their color was good. If you've got a book in you, I'd highly recommend having it printed so you can hold it in your hands, and share it with friends and family. You can order one, or hundreds; the price per book stays the same. Very reasonable. Think of the possibilities!

The Long Road Home

2009-01-27T15:01:00.003-06:00

I'm going to borrow a line from my daughter over at Who Knows What and say let's just pretend I haven't been absent for over a month. I don't know what happened. But here's what happened last week. Remember last weekend? The weekend it was so very very cold, everywhere? We picked that weekend to visit my daughter in North Carolina. We were going to leave her house Sunday morning, before the snow and cold weather came in, but guess what - we got up Sunday morning and there had been freezing rain Saturday night. And then snow on top of that. The road to their house is a narrow one lane road hanging on the side of the mountain which makes a couple of hairpin turns then goes almost straight up. Sunday it looked like a ski jump. So we weren't able to get out until Thursday afternoon when the temperature got above freezing. And we had put down 80 pounds of de-icer.

Once we accepted the fact that we weren't leaving for a few days, we had a wonderful time. We're from Alabama and snow is a big deal to us. We haven't even seen snow since Winter Storm '93 when Birmingham got an unheard of 16 inches. It's one of my fondest memories even though we had no power for seven days.

The woods and frozen streams and waterfalls in the mountains were beautiful and we walked and walked. We had plenty of groceries and satellite TV, what more could you ask for? I also got to spend extra time with my beautiful one year old grandson. So all in all I could not have planned a better winter vacation. Thank you so much Rob and Melanie for having us. I give your B&B five stars.

Catchup

2008-12-14T20:18:00.004-06:00

I read the other day that 99% of blog posts are about why the author hasn't posted lately so let's don't even go there. I wanted to post, I meant to post; things kept coming up and time slipped away from me - again. So here's my picture of Fall in the country I meant to write about.

What I'm supposed to be doing right now is writing a short biography for promotional material. An artist's biography is really more like a resume in paragraph form. Since I don't have an art degree and haven't won any serious awards I don't have a lot to say. I have won a couple of merit awards, can I call myself an award winning artist or is that stretching it? You try writing something complimentary about yourself when you know people you know are going to read it and know that you wrote it. I need to send it in tomorrow. I feel like I'm in high school and have waited until the last minute to start my essay.

JD just finished the last of several pieces he was building that had to be finished by Christmas so he's feeling de-stressed. Do you know why people have furniture custom made? Because they can't find pieces big enough for their house. All of the pieces he did for this client were over nine feet tall. I have to get some pictures of his work to show you because he does amazing work. The only picture I could find was of this piece we did about 6 years ago. I say we because I did the finishing. The doors are antique French; the piece was built around them and finished to match.
There was an elaborate base and crown and they (there were TWO of them) were the biggest armoires I had ever seen. They were gorgeous but so big that I would burst out laughing when I looked at them. Now, for several years now, everything he builds is this big. Or bigger.

Before I became an artist full time I painted furniture and sold antiques. I was a master of the distressed finish if I do say so myself. Wonder if I can work that into my biography? I need filler.

Lady Bug Lady Bug Fly Away Home

2008-11-07T17:45:00.003-06:00

Or is it Lady Bird, Lady Bird ? Anyway every year at this time we are inundated with Lady Bugs in the house. Yes the curtain is on a shower rod. It's a long story. As I was saying, we have hundreds and hundreds of lady bugs in the house. I should say on the the windows, the ones on the sunny side of the house. How or why they get in I don't know. I mean I can see a few slipping in under the door but you'd think we'd notice if there were hoards of them lining up like ants. They'll crawl around in the window a couple of days then drop lifeless to the windowsill and floor. I used to sweep them up and put them in the trash then my daughter told me that they're hibernating. I didn't believe it but next time I put them in a box and saved them and sure enough next Spring when it started getting warm they started moving. Is that not cool? Unless you think having a box of bugs in your house is creepy.

I'm Back.....Again

2008-10-31T17:43:00.003-05:00

I made a point of saying in my last post that I was going to post more often, then I took off to visit my daughter in North Carolina and I just got back so here I am, late again. As I said in an earlier post, she lives in the Smoky Mountains, so close to the park boundary you can see it from her house. So of course when she has a day off what do we do? Go shopping in Asheville of course. This time it was really fun as it turns out Dilliard's (a big department store in the south) has a regional clearance center here. And it's enormous and crammed full of clothes, good clothes not just the dregs no one wanted. Everything is 70% off with specials that change every Wednesday so that some things are an additional 40% off! They owe you money! She bought a beautiful satin evening dress with beading (for a Halloween costume) for $12. I thought you would like to know.

Speaking of Halloween, I have a ghost story to tell. It's not often you get a new audience to tell one of your old stories to, so here it is.

It happened about 30 years ago. My first husband and I were living in Knoxville in a new house in a new subdivision so I can't explain why this happened there, but it did. One night I awoke suddenly out of a deep sleep with the feeling someone was in the room. I sat up in bed. It was a very dark night but I could see a small figure at the foot of the bed. It was wearing a long white gown. At first I thought it was my six year old daugher and I called her name several times. Then the figure slowly disappeared, dissolved before my eyes. My heart was pounding and I couldn't go back to sleep but I didn't talk about it the next day because I didn't want to scare the children.

It wasn't until six years later that my daughter, then 12, overheard me telling someone about what I saw. She said, "I can't believe you never told me about that! One night when I was about six I saw a man and a woman in a red dress dancing down the hall! I thought it was you and dad at first......I didn't say anything because I didn't think anyone would believe me!"

I was stunned. And I so regret that I didn't do more research to find out what the story was about where the house was built. Was it on the site of an old farmhouse? Perhaps even a family cemetary? All I can say is that I was young and had three small children and didn't know how to research things back then. And we were transfered not long after. So I guess it will always be a mystery. I think about contacting the people who live there now and asking them if they've ever seen anything but I guess I'm afraid they would think I'm nuts. I had my chance to find out something about the other side and I missed it.

What would you have done?

I'm Back!

2008-10-23T14:30:00.012-05:00

I finished my last art festival this weekend. It was Kentuck down in Northport, Alabama, one of the top festivals in the Southeast. It’s such a fun show to do. The focus is on Outsider art so there’s lots of far out stuff to see but the best thing is that the whole atmosphere is so festive and everyone seems so happy. The October weather was perfect, bright and sunny, but cool, a perfect weekend to be out in the park. The entertainment was above average to outstanding, like blues singer Ruthie Foster who had the crowd on their feet dancing and afterwards they rushed in and bought all her Cds in about five minutes.
At least that’s what I heard as I am stuck in my booth all day except for five minute bathroom breaks and never get to see anything except the view above. Not that I’m complaining because sales were good despite the fact that the economy is apparently going down the toilet.

Don’t you love this car? Doesn’t it make you want to go glue random stuff all over yours? What’s really amazing is this is apparently a 20 year old Vega or Pinto or something like that, that still runs.

We cheaped out this year and camped at a state park six miles away instead of paying a bazillion dollars for a cummy motel room because it’s game weekend. (This is Tuscaloosa area – home of the University of Alabama. You may know football is a big deal around here.) Lake Lurleen is beautiful, one of the best maintained parks I’ve seen anywhere. We took our bikes and did a little riding.

This is JD getting some shots of some horses in the beautiful foggy twilight on a road near the park. Afterwards we spent 30 minutes in the dark looking for his glasses because he has a habit of sticking them in the neck of his shirt and they fall out. I can’t believe we found them.

I always feel a little blue after a fun and exciting show is over but I’m coming out of it now and will be posting more regularly so don’t give up on me.

The Dark Side

2008-10-02T19:53:00.004-05:00

We met a new neighbor the other day, who was moving back to the family land after being away a long time. He grew up here, across the road. His father owned the cotton gin that used to stand on the corner. He was telling us about how much things have changed since he moved away many years ago. Then he told us about something that happened when he was a child.

It was in the 1960's and he was five years old. There was a man who lived in "the cove" who still rode his mule to town. He always tied it up at the cotton gin then walked to the store across the tracks. Randy and his brother were playing in the yard when the man came one day, tied up his mule and walked to the store. He appeared to be covered in red paint. They told their father who was waiting for him when he came back. It wasn't paint, it was blood. He had just killed his neighbor with an axe.

Speaking of killer, here's a killer version of The Thrill is Gone. B.B. King with Eric Clapton and Phil Collins on drums. You can turn my music off if you scroll down to the player. Or go to youtube and watch.

Fall at Last

2008-10-01T17:43:00.005-05:00

“All things on earth point home in old October; sailors to sea, travellers to walls and fences, hunters to field and hollow and the long voice of the hounds, the lover to the love he has forsaken” - Thomas Wolfe

This isn't a very October looking picture but long shadows in the afternoon is the only indication that the season is changing around here. I find it hard to write anything without some kind of visual aid and this is the best I could do. It's my street, past our house.

It's so wonderful that Fall is finally here. We so look forward the end of the long hot days of Summer and the sharp clear light of autumn.

We've been super busy around here turning over a new leaf. What does that mean anyhow? Do the leaves just keep turning over? Anyway we're trying to stick to more of a schedule, get more work done, exercise more, eat less, lose weight, yadda yadda yadda.

Nothing is going on around here except work work work. Just wanted to check in and say I'm still here.

Stalking the Elusive Felis Domesticas

2008-09-23T18:32:00.004-05:00

I was going to title this BFF but I couldn't get a picture of Buz and Todd together-they're so cute when they curl up together and lick each other's neck- but Buz is afraid of the camera and runs whenever I get it out while Todd won't keep his face out of the lens. I guess you can tell they're brothers. Does anyone recognize who they're named after? Route 66? Buz and Todd hit the road in a red corvette? My favorite TV show when I was twelve. I'm not sure how you knew it was a red corvette since the show was in black and white, but you knew. It was the definition of cool in 1963.

Buz (the one on the sidewalk - I had to shoot his picture from 30 feet away)is the sweet one and he loves JD. I mean loves him. He always comes running to meet him when he comes home. And I'm the one that feeds them. So the other day JD was waving something around for Todd to chase and he did that thing cats do - play play play then ball up on your hand and bite hard enough to draw blood, and Buz was watching and ran over and knocked the crap out of Todd for biting. Attack cat.

Fly Away

2008-09-11T21:33:00.012-05:00

This picture has nothing to do with this post; I just needed to put something here. JD wasn't home last night so I had a bowl of cereal for dinner and spent the night blogging to my heart's content. Not here obviously. You think this is the only place I have? I've got three other blogs to keep up. Actually four now. Only two are open right now because I'm not far along enough to share the others.

This newest one - well, we leapt (yes, leapt is right, I looked it up) into the 21st century by joining Netflix a couple of months ago. Already we can't remember what we've seen. We were,like, what was that movie we saw last week? The one we liked so much? The one we gave five stars? (It was Amelie. If you haven't seen it go rent it right now. I'll wait. Be sure to watch it in French.) So we got this bright idea to start a blog of reviews of movies we've seen. Mostly for us, so we can remember what we've seen. So JD made this neat header and we've uploaded five pictures from movies. But we've only written one review because designing blogs and picking out pictures is a lot more fun than actually writing something. And music - movie blog must have movie themes playing. So I spent an absurd amount of time looking for movie themes last night. It was wonderful. I heart my computer.

You've probably noticed I have music on this blog. I tried to pick out music that wouldn't be annoying. I love it. I often leave it playing in the background. Listen, playlist is so much fun. You don't have to put it on anything, you can just create an account and listen to it there. You can have more than one list. You can have up to 95 songs on each list. You can find anything there. It's FREE. It's not illegal because you're not downloading anything. Have you looked at my music? Acker Bilk? Who else remembers Acker Bilk? Anyone? Or am I the oldest living person in the blogosphere?

I thought so.

I've Been Busy

2008-09-09T17:07:00.006-05:00

As usual I've waited 'till the last minute so I am working as fast as I can to get ready for shows this fall. I've been matting and framing up a storm. Can you tell? I am knee deep in mat board right now. And now I can't find anything.

Friday and Saturday we both had a show downtown so that's one out of the way. You wouldn't believe what we have to load up to do a show, especially since there's two of us. I mean there's all these heavy display screens that have to be put together when you get there,and folding tables, and boxes and boxes of prints and paintings. When it's outside there's two tents. JD always says he feels like a carny worker; all that's missing is the tilt-a-whirl.

This show was downtown in what they call the loft district because anything that doesn't move has been turned into a loft. I love it. I would so live here if I could afford it. Preferably next to a grocery store. It's been my dream for years to live on the same block as a grocery store. What is wrong with me that I need to go to the grocery store every single day? And the grocery store that used to be two miles away burned down last week so now it's a six mile trip to the nearest store where they do not have anything whole wheat, or decent lettuce. Ever. I think they get it in pre-wilted.

I'm in a bad mood and ranting about the lettuce because I have to drive 20 miles tomorrow to the nearest real grocery store, by which I mean Walmart,and who goes to Walmart and doesn't spend 3 hours so that's most of my day, which means I get nothing done in the studio but hey, we have to eat. Wheat bread and lettuce mostly.

Time Marches On. And On.

2008-09-04T18:17:00.005-05:00

I had a birthday last week but I'm OK now.

Until last Wednesday I hadn't been bothered by a birthday since the year I turned 35. Thirty-Five. I realized I was halfway through my thirties and I cried and cried. I'm from the generation that coined the phrase "Never trust anyone over thirty." Probably most of you don't even remember that but it seemed very profound at the time.

After that I got ok with getting older. You're only as old as you feel, 50 is the new 40, 60 is the new 50, blah blah blah. But this birthday was a milestone and it felt weird. I think of myself as middle aged and I'm not, not any more. I have grandchildren. And two great grandchildren.This picture was taken two years ago. Five generations. We didn't line up right as I should be next to my mother but I'm in the middle. In twenty years I'll be at the end of the line.

That's a scary.

Show and Tell

2008-08-24T17:10:00.005-05:00

I really intended to post at least twice a week when I started this blog but Fall art show season is coming up and since I seem to have been in a fog this whole summer I've been super busy trying to get some new work finished.
Many thanks to all who came to the
reception at Four Seasons Art and Antiques in Homewood Friday night. These are my friends Julian and Cliff (sorry guys, the pic with your faces was out of focus) who are also artists. Here's Julian's beautiful work. I knew Cliff was a set designer but I just found out he also makes these amazing cakes. He made a wedding cake for Diana Ross. Really. He has the story of how that went on his website and you have to read it.

Julian sent me the nicest email the other day after reading this blog. It brightened up my whole day. So, people, if you're thinking something nice about someone, go ahead and tell them. It matters.

It's A Nice Place to Visit.......

2008-08-16T08:19:00.008-05:00

Now that I've been away for a week and have probably lost the few readers I had, it's time to start blogging again. I was visiting my daughter in Bryson City, North Carolina. Bryson City is a picturesque little town on the edge of the Smoky Mountains Park. If you love visiting the Park but find the Tennessee side too crowded, try it from the North Carolina side. This place has it all - mountains, trails, whitewater rivers, scenic roads with little traffic.

As much as I love this place, I wouldn't want to live here. I can say that because I did live here for a couple of years back at the turn of the century. Talk about peace and quiet - too much of a good thing.

I was here in 2000 and took a job as a census worker. It was the scariest thing I have ever done. I am not allowed under penalty of fines and/or prison to say anything about it but I can say that our training included what to do if you come across a survivalist compound and/or are threatened with a gun (back away and leave as fast as possible. Duh.) I have been up more one lane dirt roads in the mountains than I would have ever imagined existed anywhere. You pray you don't meet another car because there's no way to pass each other. Five miles hanging on the side of a mountain and at the top would be a trailer. See that mountain in the distance above? There's probably a trailer on top. I never could figure out how they got up there. Helicopters?

It was scary but I came to love it and couldn't wait to get started each day. Most people turned out to be kind and helpful ( "I wouldn't try and go up there if I was you") and I wished I could make a career out of asking random strangers personal questions.

If you do ever visit here don't miss tubing on Deep Creek in the Smokies. It is the most fun you'll ever have for $2.00 a day, which is what it costs to rent a tube. Also, if you are a treasure hunter or junker don't miss Fred's auction every Friday at 5:00. It's on the main highway at Almond and the official name is Almond Trading Post. It's one of those country auctions where it's mostly junk but anything could turn up. I've bought several pieces of majolica for less than $20, including a sugar bowl with a book value of $250 for $7.50. I also once bought a Rolliflex camera, mint in the box with a book value of $600 for $10. These things don't turn up often but it's a lot of fun and Fred is a hoot. Minimum bid is $2.00. Tell him the frizzy haired lady from Alabama sent you.

Road Trip

2008-08-05T21:50:00.002-05:00

I'm leaving tomorrow for a week long visit to my daughter in the North Carolina mountains. I always get so nervous before a long trip trying to think of everything I need to do before I go and everything I need to take with me. Like they don't have stores anywhere you go. A couple of years ago we were going down to Baton Rouge for an engagement party for my daughter and her fiance that his family was giving. It was a big deal. I had a special new dress and shoes I was going to wear and since the dress was on a hanger instead of the suitcase I was so afraid I was going to forget it. Well we got down there and I had the dress but had left my suitcase by the front door. I had nothing. No shoes, no clean underwear, no makeup, no jewelry, nothing. There was a Walmart next to the motel and in 30 minutes I replaced everything. It wasn't the same but it was better than nothing. So I went to the party in my designer dress and my Walmart shoes.

My other daughter is going with me, thank goodness. It's a long trip by yourself. I've done it many many times and 6 hours is a long trip. It'll be great to get away from this heat down here not to mention see my daughter whom I don't get to see nearly enough and all you people who move far away from home you don't know what you're doing to your mother. The official high today was 96 but my thermometer said it was 106. It's ten o'clock at night now and it's still hot outside.

I've got to go finish packing now. I'm getting more hyped up by the minute and will never get to sleep tonight which is great when you're trying to be on the road by six.

Stay cool.

Walk On The Wild Side

2008-08-03T20:26:00.006-05:00

I want to tell you about what happened here summer before last. It's been two years but I still think about it every time I walk down this road, the road that goes past Ronnie's house and down by the lake.

Ronnie was the first one we heard the story from. He was working in his backyard when he had the feeling he was being watched. His dog was staring into the woods behind the house, the way dogs do when they see something they don't understand. Ronnie stood up and looked, seeing nothing at first. Then it moved and he saw it. It was a tiger.

Now Ronnie always has a good story to tell but if you could have heard him tell this story you would have been convinced too. And something had certainly put a long gash in his dog's shoulder. I was working part time at town hall as the water clerk at that time and about a week later a lady came in to pay her water bill and asked if we had heard about the tiger. Her friend who lived on fifth street (I live on third) had warned her to be careful because she had seen a tiger walking across the yards early one morning. Another week another lady, who lived in a more isolated area away from town, came in and said she thought there was a big cougar (Alabama doesn't officially have cougars either) around because she had seen big cat footprints in the dust on a table in her yard, and something had mauled her dog, which was in the fenced yard.

No one had reported losing a tiger but stories continued throughout the summer. Dogs killed by a big animal. Tracks in the mud around the lake. I personally talked to a LOT of people who had seen something.

Now you can imagine the excitement this caused. But then you'd be wrong because seeing a tiger in the Alabama woods is like reporting a UFO or a bigfoot sighting. Oh our little town was all a buzz but the Sheriff's department was not interested and referred calls to county animal control, who basically said, "What do you want us to do about it?" They referred people to Auburn University which has a department in charge of investigating unusual wildlife sightings. They did say they were aware of the problem and were looking for it. The story never made it to the news.

Where did it come from? The word was that a man who lived on several acres on the edge of town and was known to have some exotic animals, was the one who lost it and didn't report it because he didn't have a permit and would face stiff penalties for illegally possessing a wild animal. What happened? Nothing. The stories stopped when Winter came and as far as anyone knows it was never found. It may have been captured but that never made it to the news either. I certainly quit walking my dog down the road where it had been seen.

I wish I had a better conclusion for this story. But that's the way it goes; loose ends don't always get tied up neatly. An unfinished episode of life in our small town. I only wish I had seen it.

This OCD Life

2008-08-02T18:41:00.007-05:00

If a thing is worth doing, it's worth doing to excess, that's what we always say. I read the other day that checking your email 50 times a day and/or surfing the web repeatedly is officially considered an addiction. We've always called it avoidance activity. (It's hard to work at home.) Another thing I've always done excessively is read the news. But you know what I did today? I took the News folder out of my bookmarks. I never thought I would be one of those people who say "I don't read the news because it's so depressing", but you know what? I'm not reading it anymore. It was the incident in Canada on the bus that did it. If you've read the news lately you know what I'm talking about. If you don't know, do not, I repeat, do not look it up.

JD made the illustration above with Comic Life and a pic he took with his webcam. We sit back to back at our computers where we frequently instant message each other instead of talking. I am not the neat one in this relationship. What I am saying in the cartoon is really hilarious because it's what my character in a video game, which is our second favorite avoidance activity, says every five minutes in her condescending English accent. It's Rainbow Six and this is her way of urging her fellow terrorist hunter to action. I guess you had to be there.

Neil's Garden

2008-07-26T08:51:00.010-05:00

You know it's humid when moisture is condensing on the outside of the window. I just got back from a walk and it's like walking around with a blanket on your head today. But that's not what I was going to write about. This is what our neighbor brought over yesterday from his garden. Vegetables right from the garden are so different from what you buy in the store. Even the squash is good, really good, like something you would choose to eat, not just because you think you should.

Neil has to be the most thoughtful neighbor ever. A few weeks ago a storm was coming and the wind was blowing really hard. The tin roof on our shed out back was coming loose and flapping in the wind so Neil brought his ladder over and screwed the roof down so our stuff wouldn't get wet and didn't even say anything about it until about a week later. He does things like this all the time. He's offered to plow up a place for us to have a garden out back, which I would love, but JD does not want any more work to do in the yard and he doesn't think I will take care of it so that it looks neat enough due to the unfortunate episode with the tomato plants by the fence one year. He may be right but we have differing ideas about how the yard should look. I like things left in their natural form, overgrown if you will, while he likes to prune. He is always wanting to cut limbs off our little trees and trim the shrubbery.

But this is not about us, it's about good neighbors. Thanks Neil. I hope you see this.

When You're Wrong, You're Wrong; Or There's An Elephant In The Room

2008-07-21T19:55:00.005-05:00

Let me begin by saying that we don't have a comfortable chair in the house and there's nothing in the budget for new furniture. So I saw this chair sitting in the driveway at a yard sale this weekend and it was really fat and comfy and the upholstery wasn't terrible and I thought I could slipcover it for that easy care rumpled look (I am not going to say shabby chic because that phrase is so overworked and makes me want to barf) so I bought it. JD went back with me to load it in the truck and I should have known I'd made a mistake when it filled up the truck bed. And he hated it. Then we had to open the double doors to get it in the house. No, I'm not going to leave it in front of the doors. Yes, that is a 50 pound pail of spackling sitting behind it. I need a photo stylist. That green sofa it's next to? that's a huge sofa. We can't even get it up the staircase. But this monster chair dwarfs it. I cannot imagine anything this chair would look right with. It's like a prop from Honey I Shrunk the Kids. It just didn't look that big sitting all by itself in the driveway. Now what do I do? Give it away and cut my losses or throw more money at it and buy material, possibly camouflage, for a slipcover? Can I find a place where it will be all by itself so it doesn't look quite so ridiculous? I do so need a comfortable chair.

Art is Hard

2008-07-15T17:20:00.005-05:00

This is what I would like to do with this painting. I've been working on this @$#%& painting for two weeks off and on, and it just won't come together. What seemed like a daring composition now just seems wrong. Parts of it seem stiff and pasted on. I can't trash it because I've put too much time into it but the more I put into it the worse it gets. I should be working on something else and let this one simmer but here's the thing: I HAVE NO IDEAS. I have 3 shows to do this fall and I have nothing.

I go through this a few times a year and I just have to keep telling myself it will pass and I'll have some ideas and the work will start flowing again. But these blank times are so hard. It's hard to work from home anyway, and I don't even have any little kids around. It's sounds great. No fighting traffic, no commute time, no one to notice if you're late or if you take a two hour lunch - but it takes so much discipline and that I don't have. The two hour lunch turns into three hours and then there's a load of laundry you need to do RIGHT NOW, and the dog really could use a bath and the flowers need to be watered and I need to check my email about 20 times a day because you never know when you're going to get something really important and first thing you know you're working ten to four. With two hours off for lunch. Anybody that has to go to an office every day will probably hate me but, I NEED SOME PLACE TO GO TO EVERY MORNING.
This is where I would like to have my studio. It's next door and it looks like a jail in this picture but it has burglar bars because it used to be a store, one of the first stores in town; the people we bought it from said it was over a hundred years old. It's kind of charming inside; it has the old board walls and a pine floor. I just can't justify the cost of heating and cooling it when we have so much room in the house. Heat I could do without, air conditioning is not optional. Maybe one day.

Freecycle

2008-07-11T19:56:00.003-05:00

I just found out about something really cool. Actually I heard about it some time ago but only last night got around to joining the group. First let me say that JD has a woodworking shop where he builds custom furniture. So we have a lot of wood scraps and bags of sawdust which we have been leaving for the trashman. Ok I confess; we burned the wood scraps (this is the country; you can do that) and feeling oh so guilty. I would have loved to have saved them because I am a packrat and save everything but there was no way. So like I said, last night I joined the local group of Freecycle and today I had three people wanting the wood, and one person wanting the sawdust! Wanting bags of sawdust! I feel so green.

This is such a great idea if you have something insanely heavy like a sofa bed you don't want to move or, say, boxes and boxes of magazines. Which is what I'm going to try to unload next.

Summer Idyll - Mulberry River

2008-07-06T12:49:00.006-05:00

We live very close to two beautiful free flowing rivers - the Mulberry and the Locust Fork. I wish I could say we spend a lot of time here but the truth is we don't. Seems like it's hard to catch the river at just the right time. Either it's so low the water is still and warm as bathwater, or it's at flood stage. I am totally faking the swimming thing here as the water is only about knee deep. That's my dog in the water with me. Bear loves the water. He has a big fluffy tail that is apparently waterproof because he swims and swims and it never looks wet.

I've had Bear for seven years now and he is the first dog I have owned since I was six. Unlike many people in the country, I keep him in a fenced yard. So every morning I take him, on a leash, for a long walk. Apparently this is a novel concept around here as I am known as that lady who walks her dog. I have actually been introduced as "you know, she's the one that walks the dog." He's really fluffy and has dark patches on his tongue as he is part chow. Don't ever say the word "chow" to an insurance man. It is not a plus when you're trying to get homeowner's coverage.

Wild Roses

2008-07-03T17:58:00.004-05:00

This is one of my few gardening successes. I think they've tapped into the septic tank. The first year we were here I dug up a couple of wild roses from the edge of a road and it's a good thing I did because they were sprayed with herbicide the next year and killed. These bloomed the second year but then the next three years they were struck with some kind of killer mildew that caused the buds to fall off, even with diligent spraying. Almost lost the flowers this year but then I tried Neem Oil, which is an organic product but still apparently deadly as it requires a hazmat suit, gloves and goggles to use, and managed to save them. Why is everything so hard? For Pete's Sake they're WILD roses.

Walking the Line

2008-06-28T17:03:00.007-05:00

No, that's not me. I would never walk on the tracks. In fact, until I was about 8 years old I was scared to death of trains. If the car had to stop for a train I would lie down in the back seat and cover my head until it passed. JD took this picture of a photographer friend of his while they were waiting in the tunnel to get a shot of the train coming in. I don't think I would do that either.
Our little town grew up around the train station, which is long gone. But until the late 1960's you could still take the train to Birmingham. People around here could easily get to the city to shop, or visit friends, or go to school at one of the colleges. I think about that a lot because it sure would be nice to have that option now.
The passenger train stopped running and the interstate missed here by five miles and one by one the businesses closed. Most of the old buildings and the cotton gin and the gristmill were torn down. Now there's only one actual business in the city limits. But nobody moved away. Like in a lot of rural areas their families had been here since the area was settled, before Alabama was a state. Since the time Andrew Jackson was fighting the Indians.
So here we are today in this little town that isn't really a town anymore. But in a way it's like Mayberry (without any stores) because everybody knows everybody, or at least knows who they are. And who they're related to (everyone in some way). But people here are kind and friendly and we've never felt like outsiders. So we like it here a lot but I wish it looked more like a town.

The Old Rock Church

2008-06-19T21:47:00.015-05:00

We had always said, "Wouldn't it be great to find an old church or something like that we could make into our house? Something in good condition that just needed mainly painting and decorating? A place where we could have lots of light and open space?" We forgot to add, "and not anywhere near a railroad track."

So, five years ago we saw this place for sale. It was perfect. Except for one thing - across the road is the railroad track. There's an open space there where the train station once stood. The train wouldn't be so bad but there's an intersection and they blow the horn repeatedly and let me tell you up close that horn is LOUD. So we thought about it for about a month then decided we would learn to live with it. Nothing is ever really perfect so since I'm an artist and needed studio space, JD builds custom furniture and needed shop space and the old post office next door came with it, and the price was really right, we bought it.

It was built in the 1920's as the Masonic Lodge. More recently it had been used as a church. Originally it was two big rooms, one upstairs and one downstairs. The Masons met downstairs and the Eastern Star met upstairs.There was no interior staircase, the ladies came in by the back stairs outside. The church added an interior staircase and divided the upstairs into three rooms, and added a bathroom and kitchen area, also upstairs. So we decided the upstairs would be our living area, our downtown loft so to speak, and I would have my studio downstairs, with lots of room left over for - well, just for room. Unfortunately, all my before pictures of the inside were lost in a tragic computer accident but here's the living room today.

All the pine floors were covered with commercial carpet which was glued down, all over. The glue couldn't be sanded off because it was too gummy and we didn't want to sand them with a floor sander anyway and lose all the patina. We wanted them to look old. We experimented with different solvents and found that plain old household ammonia would take the glue off with lots of patient scraping and scrubbing with hot water and a scrub brush. I think it took the better part of a year to clean the floors, working on a small area at a time. Of course all that hot water caused the wood to feel fuzzy so I sanded them by hand. With a sanding block. It really didn't take that long. I think I did it in a day. And afterwards we polyurethaned them and they didn't need stain, and we kept all the flaws and they look great. And OLD

I think that's enough for my first post. I wish I could have started this blog when we first moved here but we could only get dial-up plus I didn't know anything about blogs. I've enjoyed other people's so much I wanted to do one of my own about my life. I've had one about my painting for a few years but I wanted one where I could write about anything. So thanks for finding me and thank you AT&T for finally bringing DSL to our corner of the world.