Thursday, August 29, 2013

A Winner!



The winner of the mason jar towels by Mary Lake Thompson is Pinky at http://designsbypinky.blogspot.com/.

Congratulations to her and thank you everyone for visiting my blog.  You provide me with great inspiration and encouragement.

Winning ladies I must confess I've called in reinforcements to get your towels to the post office.  Mr. B will be taking them this holiday weekend.  Between working full time and going to school at night I did not anticipate an extra trip to the post office would be so difficult, but these two weeks it has been.

Thanks for everyone's patience~I am so happy to continue to give away these great towels and will have more giveaways after my trip this weekend.

Jennifer

Summer Southern Shopping Tour Begins!

Miss B and I are heading out
for a girls trip down South this Labor Day weekend.
Here is the itinerary~ I will be 
taking pics along the way
to share upon our return.

Friday, August 30
Drive to Charleston via Knoxville Tennessee
Shopping in Knoxville

Saturday, August 31
Tour vacation homes
Shopping in Mount Pleasant

Sunday, September 1
Beach day
Shopping in historic Charleston

Monday, September 2
Drive to Atlanta from Charleston
Shopping in Atlanta

Tuesday, September 3
Drive to Louisville via Nashville
Shopping in Nashville

Stores in Knoxville
Bliss
Mast Gen. store
The happy envelope
Glass bizarre

Stores in Mt Pleasant 
The coastal cupboard
Palmeadow moon

Stores in Atlanta
White rabbit cottage
Casabella
Cest Moi
Boxwoods

Stores in Nashville
Vintage Cake

Thursday, August 22, 2013

A Winner!

The winner to the bird towel giveaway is . . .



Congratulations to Phyllis!  Thanks to everyone that visited and left a comment &/or follows me, I appreciate them all and I'm having a lot of fun giving away these great products I know you will enjoy :)  I'm not a Mary Lake Thompson sales person or anything, these are just some extras from the shop I closed to go back to college and complete my degree.  

Farmers Market Celebration

Today I'm celebrating the 10th anniversary of our
local farmers market with a farmers market theme
table setting out on the porch.
Let's celebrate with a giveaway of a
set of two Mary Lake Thompson flour sack towels as
seen below featuring all the
bounty of your garden or local farmers market.
I was fortunate to be a part of the
formation of the farmers market,
and it makes me so happy to see
that they are still going strong after
10 years time!


For this setting I used vegetables from
our cousin's garden. I nestled grape tomatoes
into the sherbet glasses of
this four piece vintage set
of Indiana Glass in the King's Crown pattern.

I was so delighted to obtain these as a service for 8 recently!
A straw placemat, green majolica charger and blue and green
plaid plate are layered up in style.
My sweet friend "this littler piggy", welcomes you to the table.
On either side of him I placed a bouquet assortment
in large mason jars, which match the mason
jar flour sack towels.

I also used these vintage embroidered
orange napkins placed in
asparagus bundle napkin rings.
With all this juicy vegies we will need extra napkins!
Peppers, potatoes, tomatoes fill a ceramic basket
for the center of the table.

I used my bee flatware, which was inspired by the little
bee on the flour sack towels.



A long shot of the table shows the red accent
table on the background, which
ties nicely to the reds in the peppers, tomatoes and flowers.

If you are interested in entering the giveaway for this week's towels,
please leave a comment. 
For an additional entry, please follow me and then
let me know in a comment.
I will be drawing the winner of the nest guest towels tonight,
and will post the name tomorrow.
I'm Joining:

Friday, August 16, 2013

White Summer & Winners!

I have been spending my late summer evenings with the White Rose family.
You know the War of the Roses-not
the Kathleen Turner movie, but the one
you studied in school between
the Tudors and the Lancasters?
 I have been a great fan of Ms. Philippa Gregory's work
since I first read The Other Boleyn Girl
and her newest gift is 
The White Princess
which chronicles Elizabeth of York and Henry of Lancaster's
marriage which united the two houses.
 I am also watching "The White Queen" on Starz,
which began last Saturday night.
This miniseries is the combination of three
of Gregory's books:
The White Queen
The Red Queen
The Kingmakers Daughter
If you enjoyed the movie "Elizabeth" or the 
series "The Tudors" I think you will enjoy this series.
My winners from the Bee Breakfast on the Porch are:
Tote bag for Kitty at  http://kittyskozykitchen.blogspot.com/
&
Flour Sack Towels for Christine at  http://christineshomeandtraveladventures.blogspot.com/

Thursday, August 15, 2013

Empty Nest Giveway

We took our son to Purdue this past weekend to move
in as a Freshman, which makes
my husband and I empty nesters, hence the table set for 2.
 In honor of that status I did a tablescape
reflecting a bird and nest theme.
I was inspired by all the brown & white
tables I saw recently at Kathleen's
Let There be White Challenge
 
 I used my Japanese Dripware set with
pale blue, white and brown paisley chargers.
 Popular blue mason jars are filled with white roses
and an iron baby bird bath holds a candle.
 For my napkins I layered cream with brown & white
polka dots and a "nest" ceramic napkin ring.
Cream flatware and a set of tablerunners finish the table.
 Aqua tumblers from Target join the coffee cup & saucer.
 I placed a vintage white & blue napkin
under the coffee cups to protect the table.
 For fun I put these iron bird letter holders
in the center of each plate for all of
those letters we will be receiving from college -not!
 Here is a closer detail of the lunch napkin with scallop edge
which echoes the scallop along the dripware edge.
 Salt and pepper shakers Mr. B brought home
from Washingon State are a nice match to the charger.
One end has a pair of birds and the other eggs in a nest.
 This vintage dripware set came with a small plate
not a saucer but really to small for a salad plate
so I used them under the flower arrangements.
 I am already missing Ben it sure is quiet around the house!
Being in school full time & working full time
has helped fill the void~not much time to dwell!
Here is the giveaway for this week's tablescape.
I set of two Mary Lake Thompson
Flour Sack Towels with birds and dogwood.
To enter please leave a comment here by August 22nd.
I'm joining Kathleen at Let's Dish
and Susan at Between Naps on the Porch
 

Monday, August 12, 2013

Summer Southern Shopping Tour

I have really enjoyed my sea shell full of tea cups this summer on my buffet 

See more of that post here
http://beeutifulbydesign.blogspot.com/2013/07/summer-buffet.html

Don't forget Wednesday is the last day to enter the drawing for the 
Bee tote bag or 2 flour sack towels by leaving a comment here
http://beeutifulbydesign.blogspot.com/2013/07/bee-breakfast-on-porch.html


Please give me your store suggestions for the following cities:
Knoxville
Asheville
Charleston
Atlanta
Nashville
By leaving a comment and You will be entered into the drawing too!

I'm joining Susan at metamorphosis Monday
http://betweennapsontheporch.net/adding-some-color-and-whimsy-to-the-garden/

Monday, August 5, 2013

Black and White Porch

Today I'm sharing the update of our back porch, 
which runs the length of our house with access
from the dining room and the master bedroom.
 Here it is "before" in desperate need of painting
and new flooring.  
The existing floor was tan indoor/outdoor carpet.
We talked about wrapping it with siding, but decided
to have it painted along with
the rest of the outside of the house last summer.

 The flooring was a difficult decision.
No carpet for sure!  Tile? Wood? 
 I love the black and white check floors, and thought the outdoor "room" 
could support such a bold floor, plus it was a good 
place to experiment without having to look at it everyday
if it was a terrible decision (believe me I've made some of those!)
 Here's the process we (meaning my husband) followed:
After the porch was painted we laid new plywood flooring
Then we painted the entire floor white
Next we taped off squares (you can see above) with Frog tape
Filled in the squares with black enamel paint
And let it all dry really well.
 Here's the finished product. You can see Miss Madison was the
first one out on the porch LOL!
 Here it is furnished again with our rockers and table.
 Down by the master bedroom we have the rockers 
where we sit and visit lots of evenings.
 Here is the floor by the wicker rockers, which I repainted black
from the white they were to match the floor.
 I hung a battery operated chandelier over the dining table.
 We repainted the rod iron table and chairs white
and my sweet mother in law made the cushions for 
both the dining and wicker chairs.
I used Waverly outdoor fabric.
This picture is from this past week.  The others are from one year ago.
I wanted you to be able to see how it's "wearing".
Sometimes I see projects and think "that looks great now, 
wonder how it will look in a few months"
Since it is an outdoor porch, even though it is protected by the overhang,
it gets wet when it storms, dirty from bugs, etc.
The floor does look less crisp than when we first finished it,
but I like that look of a little worn, so I am happy.
If you wanted perfection forever, you could put a coat of poly to seal
but I didn't want my white squares to tinge yellow, so we skipped that step.
*Don't forget to visit Bee Breakfast at
http://beeutifulbydesign.blogspot.com/2013/07/bee-breakfast-on-porch.html
for a chance to enter my giveaways!*

I'm joining:
Inspire me Tuesday at http://www.astrollthrulife.net/
Tutorial Tips and Tidbits at http://www.stonegableblog.com/