In The Garden, Crafting and Tea Time

Happy day dear ones! I hope this finds you all well and happy and busy (in a good way!) getting prepared for Thanksgiving. We have been cleaning the house and prettying things up. This week I will bake a few things ahead of time so I don't have so much to do on Thanksgiving day. My dear husband takes care of roasting the turkey. He ordered an organic turkey and picked it up at the health food store the other day. My son is so excited about that turkey! He loves food!

Above you see our Rose Cottage by the Lake. I am so thankful for our home, so thankful for my family and friends, which includes each of you sweet ladies that visit me here, and so very thankful for the Lord and all He has blessed me with!

It has been so cold the past few days and with this colder weather, the Dark-eyed Junco and White-breasted Nuthatch have returned to our feeders. How delightful it is to fill those feeders with good seed to help provide food for some of the smallest and most lovely of God's beautiful creation, when many bugs are not available for them to eat.



Violas (johnny-jump-ups) and Asylum in a hanging basket. So cheerful!

I forgot to take photos in the organic vegetable garden, but I will soon! I am so pleased that the seeds we have planted are sprouting and growing well. We already have lettuces to eat, as the ones from spring reseeded themselves. We planted more lettuce along with swiss chard, beets, broccoli, brussels sprouts, green onions, arugula, parsley, spinach, peas and carrots. We are still harvesting jalapeno peppers from our garden and have a few bell peppers that are almost ready to harvest, we also have several very green tomatoes. I don't know if they will ripen, so I may bring them in and hang them on the peg rack. The jalapeno peppers were extremely hot. I did not eat any, but my husband and son enjoyed some last night with grass-feed beef, organic lettuce, salsa, black olives, raw cheese and tortillas.



We have plenty of pine needles that have fallen and it makes a wonderful covering and mulch for the flower beds. I have read that pine straw is good for roses, they like the acid it provides. Our dear Rose Cottage is in need of roses!!! I am hoping to order several old roses this winter. I can hardly wait!



The Coneflower (Echinacea) is thriving in this cold weather, it did not endure the summer heat well. I am so thankful to see it is blooming!



Lovely!



The Saliva is thriving too!



So is my sweet son! He seems to grow taller everyday! We are so thankful for this boy!



We have been working on making our library more cozy. Here is a spot I would like to share with you. Remember those cabinets were once hanging on the wall in the sun porch? Well, here they are all painted (thank you dear husband) and filled with our art supplies. I made the curtain panels for the front. I also made the sweet rabbit wall quilt. I used a flannel background and wool for the rabbit and leaves and vintage buttons for the "flowers", then I framed it in fabric. I am going to make some of these for Christmas gifts. They are very fun to make. If you use wool felt, these can be made with all your scraps. I used this pattern, Itty Bitty Button Pictures. I loved it! They are easy to make and the instructions are clear. The designer recommends you frame them, but I decided to make them into little wall "quilts." I forgot to take a close up for you, but now my camera needs the batteries charged so I will take one soon. You can also see where I decided to hang my redwork quilt I found at the antique store.




I have had this wooden box for some time and decided to make a little dollhouse, or should I say a doll room!" I found the wicker chair at the antique store and I used a wood candlestick and paper mache box I had on hand for the table, painting, then gluing the two together. I found a tiny tea set at Hobby Lobby. I made the bird that is hanging up and found the Christmas tree in a lovely Esty shop called Brandywine. She has so many delightful things. I have always been pleased with my orders from her. Now, I just need to make a doll, which I hope to do soon! Oh, the stickers I used for artwork are also from Brandy. I had the little heart shaped wreath for years and hung it with a feather my son found. The trim around the box it the decorative tape my son gave me for my birthday.



Here is the little tea set. I am going to take some old lace and make a tablecloth for it.




A place for extra teacups and saucers.



I also decorated this little glass bottle that my husband bought for me at a yard sale for 50 cents!



I tied some old lace round the neck, and an old key my son gave me out of his collection, and sewed a vintage button onto the lace. Then I glued some pretty scrapbook paper and a vintage paper (also from Brandywine) heart I cut out to the front. This was easy and fun to make and would be lovely Christmas gifts. You could put dried herbs or dried flowers in it as well.



Yesterday my son and I enjoyed tea and cookies together. We had chai tea and I made my son oatmeal cookies from my new Cookies cookbook and made myself cookies using almond flour.



We enjoyed reading the Bible, God's word is so comforting, and having our tea and cookies together, talking and making sweet memories.

I hope you all are having a very lovely day! Thank you for visiting me!


Sing unto the Lord with thanksgiving; sing praise upon the harp unto God. Psalm 147:7