I recently created 12 different vases for a Women’s event at my church…I took inexpensive glass canning jars, lightly sanded them with fine grit sandpaper, painted them with a cheap enamel paint for glass, baked the jars, lightly sanded the raised words after baking (WIDE MOUTH MASON) embellished with burlap twine, ribbon, antique hymnal paper, antique buttons and burlap flowers. Tied a scripture tag I made around the tops with more burlap twine. Put wet floral foam in them and then added white, and cream and blush flowers. They were gorgeous and really creative. Just what I needed!

This is a fragrant rose bush that we started off of a stem we took from a beautiful, large vineyard estate in Glen Ellen, California.  We cut a small stem below a 5-leaf bracket, dipped the stem in a starter solution, put the stem in dirt, out of the sun and watered and nurtured it until it sprouted several new leaves. As it grew we moved it into the sun and pruned it back in the winter just like any rose bush. After the second year we transplanted it and it is a four foot bush now. Took about three years to get it that large and we have since started two more bushes off of the original rose bush. When the blooms are spent they turn the color of faded red wine dried in the bottom of a clear glass…

I love these created cotton stems, made with cotton and leaves-not the real thing, but look like they could be. I put them in this antique silver pitcher that I bought at a barn sale. I folded up the wired stems on some of the stems to give different heights and to help the stems from moving around…with a cool old rustic box and bird-all three are setting in an antique tray on top of two graduated chests.

Antique chests-Great display and great storage…

Visited the Korbel Winery this weekend, built in 1882. What a beautiful place to take visitors from out of the area. The landscaping is gorgeous, the old buildings are beautiful, the history of the winery and Korbel family is fascinating and the champagne and wine are delicious. Talk about Rustic Chic! If you are visiting the Russian River Valley it needs to be a stop.

I love this idea for shade gardening. We have lots of trees on our property and this grouping (found at Korbel) tucked into a shady corner would be beautiful and would not take alot of water. Great design can be about grouping items together…and the rustic brick is the perfect backdrop.

The view of the ridge…Forestville, California

My husband and I bought a home built in 1978 seven months ago in Forestville, California. We are working on the remodel-steady and slowly. All new updated electrical, all new LED lighting fixtures in every room, gorgeous new flooring, one new  bathroom (two more to go), new Low-E glass dual pane windows (on one level-one more level left), art studio remodel, all new low flow toilets, shower heads, faucets, new man cave workshop, new storage shed, total basement clean out, new insulated ceiling in the master bedroom, new ceiling fans, and lots of small updated details, like new hardware on the doors, floor registers and wall plates…And did I forget to mention the gallons of three different shades of gray paint? Behr, their top of the line, at $42 a gallon from Home Depot-use it with Purdy rollers and brushes and it will cover anything in one coat! But my favorite thing of all are our new rustic granite counter tops-called Black Gold from Brazil…Here is what our counters looked like before and here is what they looked like being installed.

We have decided to keep the solid red oak kitchen cabinets, but we are in the process of updating them, with things like slow close inside hinges, replacing a large, hard to get into cabinet with two big pull-out drawers, adding a cabinet above the refrigerator, turning four solid wood cabinet doors into glass insert doors. When the cabinets are done being refurbished, we are going to paint or stain them. So many great tutorials on the internet on painting or staining kitchen cabinets.  This one by Rustoleum is filled with details in prep you might not think of and is for painting: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EOHslKNrVx

And this tutorial by General Finishes is for Gel Staining: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rChDcbhU_uE

It’s all about grouping together what you love…

We took an antique desk with peeling veneer on top, pried it all off, sanded, filled, sanded, painted, distressed and waxed it to a dull glow…it is on its way to Summer Cottage Antiques in the morning…