The Things I'll Miss

Before we put our house on the market, i wanted to document the things i will miss about it.  I went through it to take pictures of things i always liked about it.  I think it's helped me process...it's not so much the house i'll miss as much as the stories that are housed within it. 

The Nursery:



This room has the distinction of being the first room Moose and i designed together. We were eager to carve out a space for a baby after we were married, and decided we wanted to inspire our child with the gifts of the sea: lighthouses, sand dunes, waves, sea critters. We found the border at a local paint store and chose colours from it, painting the walls a sand colour and the ceiling the colour of the sky. We decorated with sea shells and sand dollars from trips to Oregon and lots of sea themed gifts were received when Cookie was born. Grandma made curtains and bedspreads.  We collected lighthouses and driftwood to add to the space. And books. Lots of books. Eventually, this was Cookie's big kid room, complete with big girl twin bed and a little kitchen so she had a little studio apartment for her and her stuffies. :)

Our room



This room was my favourite because it was our bedroom under the trees.  Some nights you could lay in bed and moon gaze.  On 4th of July it was great to watch the firework shows linger perched up in bed.  The thing i'll miss the most is the paint.  After my miscarriage, i choose this project as a distraction.  I spent hours and hours focusing on rolling paint on the walls, helping my heart to heal rather than spiraling into the desperate "whys" of it all.  It was my therapy.  Once we were all finished with the house, i couldn't help but take Moose in there for one last kiss goodnight in our first bedroom. :)

Wooden Stairs



I've always been partial to wooden stairs. There's something old fashioned about them.

The Intercom


This is something i wished we would have gotten around to.  When we first moved in you could catch AM radio on it, but soon after it gave up the ghost.  It needed new tubes, or just to be rebuilt with a wireless hub on it would have been great.  I would have loved to have it to talk to each other in such a big house.  And as a way to answer the front door. :) 

The Craft Room



The best thing about this room is the colours...Belgium Chocolate and Lotus Flower.  It's the room design where i learned that for me, ceilings look so much better in a creamy, off-white colour in an area where grey skies rule 9 months out of the year. :)

The Bathroom



This is a heavenly little bathroom full of vintage goodness.  I love, love, love the tile walls and the original cast tub.  I documented the sink's design very well, because i would like to replicate it here in our new space.  The sink is undermounted, and water was retained in the sink space, rather than left pooling around the entire counter.  :)

Period Light Fixtures



Some of these glass light fixtures in the house were great.  I could have brought them all with me, but in the end, i could only bring my favourite.  It's really sad when houses get their originality gutted out of them.  Maybe the buyers will do that, but i hope people are waking up to the history and cultural assets in these old homes.  They are like the wrinkles and freckles and crooked toes that makes us people all different from one another.  This light fixture i will miss the most...with the copper coloured base and neat design in the glass.  Copper always reminds me of my dad...

In the end, all these things are just that...things.  They pale in comparison with the people that i love, the happiness we've found in our new community, the opportunities we have laying ahead of us.  They will only play a small part in my life's story...as part of the place where my new little family began when i became a grown-up.

Living Room Project

The living room fireplace is a gem of a deal...it's huge and double sided, ajoining with the room we had our dining room in.  It's about as big as a ski lodge fire place...but the outside didn't really do anything to emphasize it. 

The worst thing about it was the fact the mantle was made out of concrete slabs that were just affixed to the wall with metal brackets.  One of the panels had been lean ever since i moved in, and i was always afraid of what was going to happen to it or the floor when it eventually broke away.

Now, i would have loved to taken out all the concrete, and remodelled the whole thing.  I had a few ideas while we lived there--like may cut out the walls around it, open up both spaces to each other, and finish the walls in the beautiful peach coloured brick like what was in the dining room.  I also thought maybe it would be best to leave the walls intact and just focus on a very dramatic facade for this side in the living room--something reminiscent of the wooden mantlepieces of the late 1800s/early 1900's with the columns mirrors above a thick mantle, fireplace opening with a tricked out tile surround and a tiled hearth underneath.  There are so many things you could do with this. 

And while i would have loved to finish this project, there was no way we could budget it, especially with our intent to sell. 

So we asked for a rebuilt mantle to at least make the area safe.  Unfortunately, it's not as big as it needs to be to keep the design's scale looking right, but at least it is safe.  But these days, it's all time is money with contractors...and you really have to put your foot down with them.  Which we did...but for a project that was much more important that i will show you later. :)

 

I can't get over how much it looks like a dance hall in there now. :)  The house really did have a ton of space that i wish i had a fraction of now.  But truly, i couldn't see it for all the stuff that was "in" the house, because of lack of good functional storage.  That wall around the fireplace should be flanked with bookcases and cabinets.  It should hold things like magazines, books, toys, phone books, a craft basket or two.  All the things that just laid on the beautiful wood floors before.  There is a lesson to be learned here.  And it can be implimented at my new little house. :)

Almost Ready for Market

We've been spending our free time up at the old house again--for the final push before market.  I am excited to show you some of the projects we have been working on.  This house is almost unrecognizible to the one we moved into as newlyweds.   Over the 12 years Moose and i lived there, the carpet was replaced, and removed again to reveal hardwoods, the aluminum windows were replaced with wood, all the beige kitchen appliances were eventually replaced with black and stainless steel models when they kicked the bucket, dated and unfunctional 1960's light fixtures were replaced.  Tons of experiments in paint color and decorating were conducted and much was learned here.  The exterior was repainted when we did the windows.  The yard was a blank slate of grass when we moved in, and we enjoyed shopping for trees and plants we added for interest and food.
Lots more things to memorialize, the contractor is done with his sprucing up projects, and now grime detail is in full swing, but i'll start with this first project.

She just got her exterior all spit-shined this past week.



The front garden has been completely detailed.  Wishing we had done this when we lived there. So much more room to plant now for the new owner's to be--the grass was hand dug out by a yard crew of men in one afternoon.  If it was mine, i would got through and plant the entire thing with herbs, more berry bushes, and lots of perennials flowers.



They tore through the sod in the rockeries.  I did this once the first summer i lived at the place.  What a job!  Most likely it will grow back in a couple months, with the warm weather and sunshine, but it looks nicer now than ever.




With housing inventories plummeting in the Seattle region, we are hoping these projects we've spent the last year tackling make for a quick sale, at full price. We shall see.....

more on new projects tomorrow

A Wicked Oz-some Birthday

Last weekend was Cookie Monster's Wizard of Oz Spa Birthday Tea Party.

(whew! that's a mouthful!)

Thankfully, the group of girls we had over are totally Oz-some and sweet

and had a super time together.

Always looking for ways to cut the waste of these parties, a few ideas came to mind.

We decorated our dining room with these classic and reusable decorations:

a golden garland for the Yellow Brick Road and

and these little spiral doo-hickies that resembled tornadoes.

We also pulled out a few Thanksgiving decorations like a scarecrow and a pumpkin for a little flare.


The tea was the best part of the party.  Listening to the girls sitting and chatting, while taking turns serving each other melted my heart and brought a big goofy smile to my face.

Around here, we enjoy our teas.  Each year, when we celebrate our family's special events at a locally owned tea house, we pick up an item or two to add to our tea service at home.  So our small stirring spoons, serving ware, and tiered stand came in handy for our party. 

Since we keep our gatherings intimate, we only needed four place settings at our table.  I decided to gather dinnerware from the thrift stores, not only because it was more economical when i caught a 50% of dishes at Goodwill, but also it would cut down on waste (we're just donating the items back to the thrift now that we're done with them.)  More importantly, it made the party a bit more special--it's always exciting to use grown up plates and glasses when you're a kid, eh?

The mismatched plates and fancy pants glasses i found for 50 cents a piece.  I found adorable floral cloth napkins that we will be saving for everyday.  Who can't use more cloth napkins, eh?  We used was Cookie's Great Grandmother's silverware.

I found a milk glass vase for $4 that served a tropical fruit salad with style.  They also dined on scones with homemade jam and homemade lemon curd, grapes, and devilled eggs that we served on the 3 tier serving rack lined with thrift plates from my china collection.

A sweet little etched glass dish ($1 at the thrift)  was filled with marshmellows, resembling lumps of sugar for they girls' hot chockie "tea" that we served in this green drangonfly teapot that we already had. 

We had these cute little espresso cups in our china cabinet that we used as "tea" cups.  Thankfully, one of Cookie's friends has family from England, so she showed the everyone how to pour tea properly.

They played some Twister

The main event at our party was making personal care items which doubled as party favours.  We made bath salts and sugar scrub with household items.  Our tricky project was making lip balm.  We sourced the materials from a company online called The Sage.  They had a vegan lip balm base and we ordered a couple different flavourings for the lip balm, which we also used in the salts.  The girls made a lip balm for their moms and themselves, which left half of a jar for us to use in our Christmas gifts this year.

Mixing up some sugar scrub

We made these funky labels for our spa goodies which we packaged in recycled jars.

"Dorothy's Bath Salts...guaranteed to melt your troubles away."

"Toto's Sugar Scrub...makes you wag your tail."

and "Frankly, It's Lip 'Baum'".

Yeah, i know that last one was a stretch, but we just couldn't help ourselves. :)

I also knitted face clothes for the girls from some cotton yarn i had in my stash.

Cookie made labels for the bags from large gift tags stamped with characters from Oz...she decided that if her friends were clever enough, they could reuse them as bookmarks. :)

And just like that, we had a fancy little tea party, building great memories with friends, and without a lot of fuss or items filling up our trash bin!

 

Follain Farm Video

We decided we needed a way to show people our farm, better than a few photos posted on a Facebook time line.

I created this video, my first ever, with lots of technical help from Cookie, and Moose's editorial prowess.  Amazing what can happen with a few good pictures and movie maker software.  UPDATE: and a sweet song download. :)

What do you think?

It's Official :: Our Farmstand is Open for Business

This weekend we decided on a farm name.

 

There were quite a few names contending for the spot. We wanted something catchy. Something unique. We veered off into corny territory but then we made a u-turn. (Because really would anyone buy food from a farm called The Happy Hooligan?)

 

We settled on something Gaelic. Not only to honor our Irish roots, but because of our love for the culture. It is also a name that translates into why we started this adventure in growing our own food.

 

I invite you to meet

 

Follain Farm

 

Click on our new farm name above to learn more about our new farm stand, currently selling eggs. 

 

 

UFC December Challenge :: Make it a Simple Christmas

This month's challenge wasn't too far from what we normally do every year at Christmastime.

I've always felt that in this day and age of people being able to buy anything they want at any time, it is more interesting to receive something that is functional or consumable as a gift.  Especially for those blessed with much already, and at a time of year of when it is easy to become overwhelmed with stuff.  We try to focus on homemade and artisan made, with books or gift certificates being our back up plans.

I especially like to have my child create things for members of our family.  This year she made homemade organic bird treats as described in a previous post.


Bird Suet Wreath :: A Hard to Beat Present for Bird Lovers

We also made a set of napkins for my mom.  Unfortunately, i don't have a picture (maybe you could send one, Mom?) :)  We found a couple different styles of fabric and made napkins that fold into the shape of Christmas trees. 

For my dad, we made a shirt, with the help of my mom and her embroidery machine.  My dad is a freight train geek and a techno music connoisseur, hence the detail we create on the shirt.

For other members of the family, we focused on useful food stuffs.  We have a new store here in Enumclaw called MountainAire Mercantile.  Wonderful place using local and sustainable as their business model!  We found coffee roasted especially for them from a company in Wilkeson, WA and beautiful handmade soaps from a friend to gift my in-laws.  Another store in town that has wonderful gift items is Sweet Necessities--a wide variety of tea, which we gifted, fudge and caramels made by the shop owner, Toby, and chocolates from a chocolatier in Oregon.   

The last couple wonderful gifts we gave this year were for my daughter.  I finished my first pair of hand knitted socks for her just before the holiday.  That was my Christmas miracle this year. :) 

 

The other gift was a beautiful handmade costume from her Irish dance instructor.

 

 

It is made just for 18 inch dolls (i.e. American Girl) and is a spitting image of the costume Cookie wears for her competitions straight down to the ghillies.  Everything is machine embroidered and the craftsmanship is amazing!

Other gifts of books were given.  Books are one of our favourite gifts...knowledge is the best gift in our book.  And another gift is coming for my hubbie from Etsy...a handmade case for his e-reader.
 

Trying to support creative pursuits of others is a Christmas gift in and of itself...being able to share the holidays with people in your community-at-large and reward them for their cleverness with a purchase or two.  It also helps other families have a Merry Christmas, as it gives them a little extra cash in their pocket to make a merry holiday for their loved ones.

 

Happy New Year, Everyone!

 

 

New Year, New Skills

Aside from my newly developed duck doctorin' skills, i've discovered another talent of mine.  And boy oh boy, how addictive it is. 

 

I knit socks!

 

This is my second pair in a month.

Cookie has a pair of pink striped ones.

 

Funny thing about hand knit socks.

 

Cookie requested more new socks as her feet are approaching u-boat proportions, so we checked out the offerings at the shoppes recently.  "Hmmm, i can't find any that are my style, Momma.  Their either too black or too colourful or too girlish."  Then the light bulb lit over her head and her lips curled like the Grinches as she said, "Hey Momma, can we go back to the yarn aisle?  If i can find a few balls of yarn i like, maybe you can just knit me more socks."  We came home with skeins for a purple pair, a lime green pair, and a pair like those pictured above. :)

 

Think it's time for someone to learn how to knit herself, eh?

 

Can't Catch a Break

Happy New Year!  I hope your's has been restful and restorative.  We just returned from Christmas in Idaho and are enjoying just being at home.  Puttering in the garden.  Knitting.  Watching movies.  Staring at blank walls. :)

Unfortunately, it can never be a dull moment around these parts.  We are under attack by some hungry bird lovin' beast.  Two weeks before we left, it killed Cookie's dear chicken, Fro, who was slated to become a show chicken this Spring.  Dooh!  Cookie is so sad because Fro was the only chicken that would let her pick it up.

Today we returned from lunch with family to find we were down a duck.  Moose and i looked everywhere.  Finally, he found her in the frozen pond.  It was Cookie's duck, Racer, and she appeared to be dead.  He took a closer look and saw her move, he dove for her tail feathers, reigned in the bird, and whisk her to the duck shed.  Poor thing was so still, but she wasn't missing more than feathers.  She had a few gashes on her, but the bleeding had stopped.  Mr. Chevious picked a fine time to want to mate, so we had to separate him.  Daffy took care of Racer, trying to nudge her to eat or drink and tried grooming her.  It was sweet.  Cookie thinks she's a nurse in the duck world. :)  We let her settle a bit, then brought her inside for a soak in the tub, try to clean the wounds a bit with an Epsom salt soak.  She wasn't interested in eating, or swimming, but she enjoyed the time in a warm tub it seemed. 

Duck Doctorin'

We dried her off and set her back out under the heat lamp.  We're saying our prayers tonight for her. 
With our temps getting down into the 20's tonight, i am very worried about her.  But in our research, we learned that it stresses the birds more if you isolate them.  And i certainly don't want 3 grown ducks in our bathroom all night. :)

Lesson learned :: Farm animals are NOT pets! :) 

Cookie's solution--"We can't ever adopt anything else that's cute, Momma!" 

Wish it were that easy, don't you?