Oodles and oodles

Progress report

 
There comes a point in every project when one begins to question not just the wisdom of the particular undertaking but one's sanity in general. Such was the case with the makeover of the little Hoosier.

 
To refresh your memory, here's how it looked before, with a warped and sagging door, a bowed front, damaged veneer on the sides, icky paint and really ugly hardware.

 
And here's how it looks now. I could just hug it, it's so cute. And if you bear with me a second, I'll give you a better view of that green paint. First, we need to look out the kitchen window,

 
and get very excited by the presence of a rare visitor, a pileated woodpecker. They are huge - the size of a crow - with spectacular markings. We've seen them at the edges of the yard, but it's a real treat to see them close to the house.

 
Here he is peeking around the side of the cedar tree.

 
Showing off his tree-clinging skills.

 
And just generally looking good. I had been admiring the fox next door only a little bit before the woodpecker showed up. It's a regular nature preserve here some days.

 
Back inside, and the dining room is just about done. Done enough to fix up the Hoosier a little bit anyway. But there's not too much fixing up yet, because now it's on to the kitchen!  

The latest in knits

 
I thought you could take a break today from pictures of my unfinished dining room and enjoy some fashion photos. The first thing you need to know about dressing up in 1923 is: Always carry a parasol.

 
Or carry a book. I wouldn't have minded living in an era in which a book served as a fashion accessory. Instead of being bookish, I'd be stylish.

 
These fashions are from a book of knitting patterns that I'm selling on eBay this week. Because it's unlikely I'll ever knit myself a sweater. Much less a skirt. Much less a pleated skirt.

 
See what I mean about the parasol? Even little girls carry them. As for the romper suit: I think my son should feel fortunate that his mother didn't know how to knit all that well. That's one less indignity he had to suffer.

 

 

Color scheming

 
So here's where I'm at on Day 5 - the walls primed, two coats of paint on the trim and the ceiling painted. At this point I could easily be talked into a whitewashed country look.

I was completely unclear in my last post about my wallpapering skills. Indeed, I wallpapered pretty much every surface except the floors when we moved in, but I don't want wallpaper any more. Now I just get to peel it off, room by room. I'll get to use my mad painting skills instead.

Not that I have a color picked out for this room yet. Some shade of green. Not too dark. Not too yellow. Not too gray. I also find myself wanting to pick out a shade whose name I like. Benjamin Moore has some nicely named greens: Spring Meadow, Veranda View, Pine Brook. I'm leaning toward Cornstalk, however, and that's not a bad name, living out here in the country and all. Even though the color I associate with cornstalks is gold and not green.

Today I'm starting on the Hoosier. It's been sanded and washed down, all ready to go.

 
Since the dining room is torn up anyway, I brought in from the shed a piece of furniture I bought last year to make over. Meet the $8 mini-Hoosier.

 
There's a reason it was $8. I think it must have been stored in standing water. It needs a little more than cosmetic work, but I think I've got a plan.   

The wallpaper gene

 
My great-grandparents survived the Great Depression by becoming paperhangers. Nanny taught my mother how to hang wallpaper, and my mother taught me. I am genetically predisposed to hang wallpaper. I have wallpapered rooms of every kind in both of the houses that I've owned and even, in a fit of madness last winter, the inside of a closet.

All of our bedrooms had wallpaper at one point or another, but they've since been painted. Now I'm working my way downstairs. Last week I started on the dining room.

 
Yes, the blue-striped dining-room wallpaper that has figured in so many photos over the years is gone. It took me two full days to peel it off, inch by inch. Turns out it was not strippable, which meant that instead of coming down in nice, satisfying sheets, it came off in tiny confetti-sized pieces.

 
I'll explain the photos of the barns in our neighborhood in a moment.

 
I hope you can see the cows out back - by the trees along the left. I love cows. Just adore them. Pet-wise, though, I think they command a greater commitment than I'm able to offer. So instead, I admire the neighbors' cows.

Anyway, I say this at considerable risk, but I've been kind of enjoying the winter. The weather has been exhilarating, and the landscapes have been breathtaking. White snow, gray skies, green pines, red barns - just the colors I want in my house.

 
So the great downstairs home renovation has begun, inspired by the farms in my neighborhood and, no doubt, a serious case of cabin fever. I expect that I'll be in home renovation mode the next few days weeks months, emerging every few days, paint covered and weary, to report in.

 
Here we are on Day 3: the wallpaper is off. The color scheme at the moment is beige. If I liked beige more, I could save myself a whole lot of trouble.

 

Just a bowl of ...

 
I don't like to be the one to raise the alarm, but many of you have been so caught up in the Valentines Day whirl that you probably have not planned adequately for the next big holiday: Yes, Presidents Day is Monday. Have you decorated? Shopped? Gotten your cards out in the mail?

 
Cherries are a traditional Presidents Day motif. When I was in elementary school, back when Lincoln's Birthday and Washington's Birthday were celebrated separately, but neither with an official holiday, we made construction-paper stovepipe hats in honor of Lincoln and something cherry-tree related in honor of Washington. I don't think kids learn about Washington confessing to chopping down a cherry tree any more, and it's sad to see that little bit of folklore slip away. On the other hand, my daughter got a really good grade on her living-history portrayal of Andrew Jackson in her AP US History class, so I probably shouldn't worry that she doesn't know a bit of historical trivia that's probably not even true.

 
Since cherries are one of my favorite motifs, though, I'll do my best to keep tradition alive. The towel on the left is vintage, and the towel on the right is one I made, adapting the cherry design. The little corner of patchwork on top is a little mat that was a gift from Amy, who ...

 
used an adorable cherry print fabric on the back.

 
A few weeks ago, I foolishly promised to share some directions from this book for making decorative objects from gumdrops. As is the case in so many ventures in my life, this proved less interesting than I expected. While I had no intention of recreating The Father of Our Country in sugar-coated candies, I did think I could manage to make a gumdrop cherry tree like the one in the lower left corner.

 
And, in fact, I did. To do this, you need, obviously, gumdrops, as well as cinnamon candies, lollipop sticks, a sharp knife and a rolling pin. Flatten the green gumdrops with the rolling pin. Use the tip of the knife to make a little hollow for the cinnamon-candy cherries (they'll stick better that way), and press the cherries into place. Pop in the lollipop stick, and then pop it into the base.

 
I wish I could make it sound more complicated, but it's not. I recommend using the traditional sugary gumdrops and not the spice drops. The spice drops look the same, but they are delicious and might not last long enough to reach the craft stage.

 
While you've got the gumdrops and the rolling pin out, wondering how a life that began with so much promise ended up with making odd crafts out of candy, you might as well go whole-hog and make a gumdrop cherry decoration. Spearmint gumdrop leaves, flattened red gumdrops, a little piece of white gumdrop for highlight and some licorice Twizzlers. I bet you can figure it out from there.

Love birds

 
It's been a long winter, and the birds are more than deserving of a valentine. Instead of chocolate hearts, they're getting ones with sunflower seeds.

 
And peanut butter and fruit.

These are really easy to make, or I would not be making them. (The recipe is below.) It's not necessary to use vintage heart-shaped Jell-O molds to make them. Unless you want to take cute pictures for your blog for Valentines Day.

 
The chickadees arrived almost as soon as the hearts did.

 
The nuthatches were not too far behind.

 
Love those little birds.

(This recipe is adapted from the excellent book "A Complete Guide to Bird Feeding" by John V. Dennis. In addition to a tasty bird treat, it also provides an excellent way to dispose of bacon grease. The proportions don't matter a whole lot, but basically, into melted bacon grease stir an equal amount of cornmeal and half that amount of peanut butter. (for example: 1 cup of bacon grease, 1 cup of cornmeal, 1/2 cup of peanut butter. But honestly, it doesn't much matter.) Add some bird treats like nuts and seeds and berries. Let the mixture firm up in the refrigerator or freezer, then serve.)

 

It's good to be feline

 
Not sure how the Hoosier looked the last time I took a photo, but it got a new look today.

 
Patch just discovered that a farm basket is the perfect size for a cat.

 
And the perfect place for a little nap. 

Playthings and distractions

 
If I do say so myself, I've been doing an admirable job of moving stuff out of my house. I've been listing things on eBay and Etsy, stocking the antique mall case, making donations at the thrift store and swearing off sales (such as they are) until spring. (Unless they sound really, really good.) I can almost begin to see progress. But when it came to this box of spools and bobbins, I wavered.

 
It just seemed like they wanted to be played with. Made into something. Like a coat rack, with spools for pegs.

 
Or a toy wagon. All it needs is a pull string with a wooden bead on the end.

 
Or a table for dolls. It looks a little bare.

 
There, that's better. Just needed a vase.

 
I found these little wooden blocks a few weeks ago. I'll probably sell them at some point, but for now, they're nurturing my inner Anglophile. Must be the crown block. Although 'hare' and 'fawn' seem somehow British, too. I'm stifling the urge to use the word 'whilst' and spelling 'favorite' as 'favourite.'

Having a fox next door makes me feel very British, too, although it's well known that the red fox is the most widely distributed carnivore in the world. (I've been reading up on them on the Department of Environmental Conservation web site; can you tell?)

 
I'm getting even less done than usual because I'm constantly looking out the window to see if the fox is out. This morning when I looked, I was surprised to see that either we were living next door to a rare eight-legged fox ...

 

or that two foxes were living next door! Oh, yes! This is quite exciting, because this looks to me like a happy fox couple. And since they seem so very settled in, I can only think that kits are in their (and our) future.

 

 

Just a few leftovers

 
When we last talked about my case at the antique mall, I was about to fill it with stuff I did not want any more. This was my radical business plan for January: skip the beautiful displays and give those knick-knacks and what-nots one more chance before they went to the thrift store.

So when I returned to the antique mall last week to restock and pick up my January check, I had low expectations. I hoped that I would cover my rent, and that I would have least gotten rid of a few of the bigger things. When I got there, I found a booth practically empty and a check larger than I hoped. It was like getting paid to have junk hauled away! I packed one small box with some uninteresting leftovers and dropped it off at the thrift store. I brought home with me the tray full of blue in the photo - it wasn't part of the junk-reduction effort. The pastels, though, weren't working with my mostly red scheme for February.

Should I be vulgar and use actual dollar figures for the month? In the interest of sharing information, I will.

 
By filling a case with items priced mostly from $1 to $5, I sold 43 pieces, most of which were yard-sale mistakes and box-lot extras. My total sales for the month were $203, and out of that came $3 for credit card transactions and $52 for rent, leaving me $148. (This circus mug, by the way, was a box-lot extra, but I think it's just waiting for the right home. Even though I can't stand clowns, this one at least doesn't look like he's an escaped convict in disguise.)

 
Anyway - I wouldn't want to fill a case with junk every month, because it's not very satisfying. I like leaving with the sense that I have the most beautiful case in the mall. And $150 isn't all that great, considering the time and effort that goes into the enterprise, not to mention the cost of the inventory itself. (Which in this case was minimal, but that's not always the case.) So as a business model I don't think it works - but as a once-a-year way to unload stuff that's making me crazy, it's fine.
 
 
Even though I swore I wouldn't bring these trays back home with me, I did.

 
I must have bought 20 of them at a sale a couple of summers ago. They're so pretty. And I've sold a bunch of them. But when you start out with 20, you've got a long ways to go. I thought at $3 each they'd sell, but they didn't. I'll see how
I feel about them in a few months.

 
Here's a photo of my new neighbor. I'm absolutely obsessed with getting a better photo of Mr. or Mrs. Fox. I can see him/her out the living room window every day, sunning himself/herself on the ridge behind my neighbor's house. I've even set up little fox blinds in my yard so I can sneak up and get a close-up. So far I've discovered only one thing: It's really, really hard to outwit a fox.