Flea + flowers = joy

I made it back to New York and I could hardly wait to visit my favorite flea market for the first time this year, a huge old building out in the middle of absolutely nowhere.

It's a really fun place to wander around, and the prices are pretty good.

I found a blue and white milk glass basket (that I didn't need at all), but I loved it and knew it was going to be my new favorite vase for summer.  I couldn't wait to fill it with roses.  Here it is:

Isn't it lovely? 😍

It was dirty.  It was unmarked by a maker.  It was $18.  When I went to pay for it, the lady checking me out asked, "Are you buying it because you think it's Fenton?"

"I don't think so," I told her.  (She had apparently already seen it and knew it was unmarked.  Fenton pieces are usually marked, but not always.)  "I'm buying it because I love it," I said.  "Do you think it's Fenton?"

"I don't think so because of the way the handle is attached" was her reply.  "I don't think so.  But it could be."

Of course, this made me want to research.  And I did find someone selling this same basket online, calling it a Fenton piece.  But I also saw it posted online as simply a "milk glass basket."  So Fenton it probably isn't.  But no matter, I love it!

I got it all cleaned up and filled it with roses from the grocery store.

Absolutely beautiful!

There were enough roses for more than one container, so I pulled out this blue glass (candleholder?) I had bought at Goodwill for a few dollars.

More blue glass 💗

Under $10 and so pretty!

And finally, one more.  I bought a ginger plant at Lowes; I had never seen one before, and it had such interesting flowers.  The flowers on the plant are tall, two of them flopped over so I thought I'd cut them and put them in a vase too - a little blue goblet from Goodwill.  I like how they look.  Simple.

😍

My brother-in-law stopped by last night and he noticed (and complimented) my flowers.  A man.  A man noticed my flowers!  See, I told you they look good!

A guest-ready master bedroom

I haven't posted in a little while, because after madly rushing to get The House of Goodwill complete (or maybe I should say "guest ready" - as we've still got a few details to complete in the future), my family and I returned home, unpacked, then repacked to spend some time in New York for the summer.

I'm going to continue posting "finished" pics of the house, though as I mentioned, there are still some things left undone, like pictures that need to be hung on walls, etc.

So here we go, here is the master bedroom, before and after:

This is how the bedroom looked when we bought the house:

dark walnut 1970's molding and dark gray walls.

The bedroom only has one window, which does not receive direct sunlight, so it felt very, very dark.

Another view, taken from the bathroom and closet entrance.

Here the bed is against the wall with the window.

We later moved it to the back wall in this picture.

It's a little easier to see how dark it was when you see it compared to the new light lavender paint.

Here's the after.

The total cost of everything here is under $500.

(Including the king-size bed, mattresses, rug - everything.)

My son and I found the bed and bed frame on the side of the road while we were walking the dog.  

It's a beautiful bed!  And the cost?  Free!

These paint-by-number lake scenes and vintage chalkware swans are a few of my favorite finds.
I purchased everything on the wall separately; the total cost of everything was around $50.

Here is the oak chest I paid $60 for and whitewashed.

The lamp was a few dollars at a thrift store.

Here is the master bathroom before, with more dark molding.
The cabinet under the sink was dark walnut-stained too.
(The room with the toilet and shower had obviously been redone at some point in the recent past, in beautiful green and white tile, with white-painted molding.)

Here is the bathroom after.

(The curtains, rug and bed linens and towels are the only new items in the room.)

It feels so much brighter now!

My husband had to remove the light fixture at one point, and when he took it off the wall, it removed a bit of paint from the wall.  I didn't have touch up paint, so I painted a stripe over the mirror the same color as the vanity to camouflage the missing paint.  It worked, you can't tell where the original paint peeled off.  (It also gave it a nice color-blocked effect.) 🙂

I totally LOVE these vintage '70's towel racks. 😍

This purple vanity came out beautifully.

It's a nice, rich shade of purple.

I love this bedroom!  I love the cheerful colors, and it's about as bright as a one-window bedroom can get.

The shower, which is completely covered in green and white tile, with white grout, is beautiful, BUT...after trying to clean the white grout with three different cleaning methods, I still couldn't get it looking fresh.  I am definitely not sold on showers and bathroom floors tiled with white grout.  So that's something I've got to figure out for the future.

To be honest, my regular, old, not fancy shower at the home/house is much easier to clean.  Tile is beautiful, but the grout is high maintenance.  If I figure out an easy way to get it clean, I'll let you know.

More pics to come!

From out to in

Ok, so one of my major life goals for the past few years has been to create a cutting garden at home, big enough so I can regularly cut flowers from my yard for vases indoors, but still have enough flowers left outside to enjoy outdoors.  It will definitely take some time to establish this, but I'm working on it.

It's so nice to be able to cut something beautiful from your own yard, instead of having to buy it at the store.  (The floral shops are for the winter months.)

I've been trying to plant more perennials each year.  Here are a few things that have bloomed for me lately:

I think lily trees are my new favorite plant.

I planted this lily tree maybe three years ago...it's now taller than my 6' fence!

It has about fifteen flower buds this year.

Here's one of the lilies in a vintage green vase I found.

The flowers are huge!

Just one looks lovely by itself.

And they smell wonderful!

I asked my husband not to buy me flowers for our anniversary this year, because we were going out of town three days later, and I couldn't bring myself to have to throw them away.

So he brought me a single red rose, just so I'd "have something."

I went out in the yard to see if I could find something to add to it; I used one purple gladiolus and cut one stem of purple balloon flowers.

But don't they look so beautiful all together?

Just three flower stems, but wow!

Another beautiful vintage vase from an antique shop.

I love this one because the back of it is tall (it's hard to tell behind the flowers), so it helps support tall flowers that might want to flop over, like the gladiolus.

Here is a jar of white hydrangeas, by night (all lit up) and by day.

This shrub came with the house I bought, and I never thought to cut any flowers till last year.

They look so simple and beautiful...I couldn't wait to cut more this summer.

This blue and white combination is perfect!

The glass jar is from an antique shop, of course.

The shrub is actually on a rental property; I was able to dig up an offshoot with some roots.

I'm going to see if I can get the baby to grow at my own house.

There is a heat wave/drought in Tennessee right now; I'm afraid I'm going to lose a few of my plants.  Perhaps the most frustrating aspect of gardening is suddenly losing a plant you've nurtured forever due to weather (or disease, or some other unknown problem). 

It's another reason I try to divide my plants and plant them wherever I happen to be...gardening can get expensive, but dividing and sharing help.  

I just found a big perennial sale yesterday, so I added a couple new plants to the collection.  Pictures to come, of course!