Monday, August 9, 2010

MONDAY'S RANDOM RAMBLINGS

Happy Monday All!!!
Hope everyone had a wonderful weekend.
Ours was nice.
Absolutely nothing special or spectacular.
Just a nice, productive couple days.


I really appreciated some of your advice on my last post regarding my monstrous
"to-do" list. It all really is just simple, right? Prioritize your jobs and make a list. Well, unfortunately for me, I've never been a good list-making-prioritizing type.
I want it all done yesterday!
Kinda hard when I'm just one person ;o)

Taking advantage of the break in the heat, I took my blogging friend, Kathy's advice, and hit the gardens full steam this weekend. I spent a total of 4-5 hours each day Saturday and Sunday weeding, trimming, dead-heading, edging . . .

You can probably get the picture. The gardens and beds were in pretty bad shape. After enduring, oh, I dunno, 37 heat waves this summer
- and we're starting day one of the next today! -
I just didn't get out there like a good gardner and care for my rooted babies. But I certainly made up for it this weekend.

While I was weeding and cleaning up the vege/cutting garden yesterday, this little beauty

was busy fluttering around all the newly blooming Tithonia (Mexican Sunflower) I planted from seed. He was bizzy, bizzy, bizzy.

The photos below I took this morning when I went out to turn on the sprinkler in the garden. The fog was heavy and it created a quiet peacefulness, almost like when it snows.




As any of you who have grown tomatoes knows, it's always feast or famine. For some crazy reason, I planted 24 tomato plants - several different varieties. I picked 1-1/2 five gallon buckets of tomatoes.
I took tomatoes to the neighbors next door,
tomatoes to my brother and SIL who live behind us,
Hubby took a big bag of tomatoes to work
and I still have 1/2 a five gallon bucket left.
We're gonna be eating a lot of pico de gallo and bruschetta this week!

I'm also going to share just a few pics from my craft room mini-makeover. I've been so inspired going through all the pics from
I'm still not through the list. Got 'bout 100 more to go!


A good friend had purchased a bunch of boxes of multicolor paper-lantern (only these are not paper - much nicer nylon!) type party lights. She realized they weren't going to work for her the way she wanted, so she was going to drop them at GW. I told I'd take them off her hands gladly paying, but being the nice friend she is ;o) she wouldn't hear of that!

I got to thinking how cool, fun and unexpected it would be to hang a string in my room. But the multi-color thing just wasn't going to work. Being the genius that I am hehe!!! I switched out the shades for a pattern that would match the color scheme in the room - being mostly bright green, hot pink and red. And just to jazz it up a bit, and hide the ugly wire, I used a red boa from one of our crazy Bunco nights.
Thanks, Gladys! ;o)



Now, that ribbon holder/shelf you see up there has been sitting in it's box, unassembled on the floor in this room since January. I finally put it together, hung it on the wall, filled both dowels with just a snippet of my massive collection of ribbon spools, and hated how it looked. Too junky . . . or too unplanned junky, KWIM??? But it does make a cute shelf, and I have ordered a few more spools of that yummy tulle ribbon that should be here any day, and they'll look pretty on the dowel rods - I hope.


The snaps below are examples of a more planned,
or an organized junkiness! :o)






Maybe you remember a past post where I talked about using some of these found metal boxes, containers, etc., here in the craft room.

I managed to integrate a few of them pretty well. I decided to use the old tool/tackle box to, well . . . hold "tools". Scissors, punches, twine, tape runners, glue sticks, tweezers, etc. Pretty clever, eh?



The box/drawer thingy below is housing all kinds of scrapbooking/paper crafts embellishments I'm hoping to use soon on future projects.



This next group of photos are just some random shots from around the room.


My small collection of vintage cameras up there.




A custom-made cabinet (built around a salvaged window shutter) houses a small amount of my quilt fabrics.

Mmm . . . fabulous fabric . . .


And lastly, today was a fun mail day!
Lookey what came!

If you haven't perused through Paula's magazine, it's really good. You can certainly feel her personality in every article and recipe.

I think I'm on year 8 or 9 of the Southern Living Christmas Book. It comes as an automatic shipment, and it's always a nice taste of the Holidays right smack in the middle of summer.

Oh, and isn't this little quilt a cutey?

I made that one years ago when I was sooo fortunate to have been able to work in an absolute premier quilt/fabric store right here in our little town.

It's created from early Debbie Mumm fabrics and pattern.

I love how the background fabric has the bees buzzing along leaving little "bee trails" with the phrase "busy as bee". Too stinkin' cute!


I had to share this adorable card of ribbon I purchased at the Scrapbook/Paper Crafting convention a few weeks ago. Isn't it darling? It's frayed ribbon "flowers" on tulle ribbon strips. I'm definitely going to have get me some more of this.

Pheewww . . . hope I didn't totally overload y'all with pics and words today! I just had too much to share.


Thanks for visiting!
Leave a comment so I can get to know you.

8 comments:

Kerin said...

Hi Ya Carla!
I am sooo glad that you did share!! I have all my creative stuff put away for the move, and it was fun to see all of your stuff!! I do love that new frayed flower ribbon.....ubber cool!
All your gardens are beautiful. I love cosmos! They are so simple, but adorable.
Thanks again for sharing!

Kim @ Savvy Southern Style said...

Your garden pics are just gorgeous. That is a lot of tomatoes. We have three plants and are just now picking them. Your craft room is so nice and it is so organized.

Kathy @ Creative Home Expressions said...

Good for you, Carla! It is so gorgeous, too! What a great pic of the butterfly on your Mexican sunflower. Are they easy to grow from seed? I've wanted to try them myself, but don't usually have good luck with seeds. Love your valance in your creative space {cute touch with the lights} and organized chaos is okay by me when it looks that pretty! I've been getting lots of jars together to hold stuff. The only problem is that I don't know if I'll have enough shelf space for it!

Paula ~ castleandcottagesigns said...

Hi Carla! I can so relate to your to-do list! I'm feeling this way so much lately that I'm starting to just tell myself to stop asking too much of life..s-l-o-w down Paula!! It's helping alittle:)
Love your craft room redo...just love making attractive storage spaces/peices! I'm working on my new studio little by little this summer and hope to share some photos soon!
Keep cool...the heat is back!

M.L. @ The House of Whimsy said...

So happy I made it over here today, Carla!!! What a treat for the eyes. Your garden is gorgeous! Your Studio is amazing...Way Cute!!! I loved the boa and lantern lights. What a great touch.
I hear you on those pesky "to-do" lists. They never end. : )
Have a good week,
Mary Lou

marie said...

Your craft room makeover is divine! Love, love, love the boa lights!! Gives me an idea for a little extra lighting in my (still being worked on) craft room!!
The tackle box for your tools is fun and your shelves full of jars, etc look great!
All your hard work in your gardens certainly paid off ~ they look beautiful! I wish I lived a bit nearer ~ I'd love to help you out with those tomatos! I tried one plant this year and got four tomatos. A gardener I am not!

marie said...

Hey Carla - it's me again. I shared about your very cute boa lights on my blog today ~ hope that's okay!
I think they are so neat!

deb said...

carla!!!!!

i dont know if you see old posts that get commented on....but have to tell you our gardens are sooooo similar....see some of my recent posts....
lol....

we have such similar tastes....very cool.

dj

ps...... i have so many pics of butterflies on my tithonia....looks just like yours. i havent posted them, but i could have sworn looking at yours..it was like lookin at mine.

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