Summer Garden Review

I will be doing a few posts by myself for the next week or so. Andrea, the Broome side of our blog, has had a busy week and even busier one coming up. Like most of the east coast, Andrea survived an earthquake and a hurricane last week. She was very lucky and they did not lose power. But in the middle of all that she was packing and preparing for a move to a new apartment!! She is leaving her beloved Nolita area behind and moving up town to the Chelsea area. Hopefully they will gain a little more space. I'm praying this place has a kitchen drawer and closet in her bedroom. Andrea has promised some before and after pictures of her new place!

In the mean time I'm sadly watching my garden wind down or being mowed down by the deer and rabbits. The trees are starting to turn colors which is always pretty but I'm hoping for an extended summer. I've picked a few photos from the garden, I will hate to see all the pretty flowers go.

  Delicate dangling fuchsia.

 Garden art, not made by me but some other creative people I found at art fairs.

This is Henry, I love this guy but I really wish he was a girl so I put a necklace on him. Maybe Henry just needs a Henrietta. Please let me know if you know where I can find a Henrietta! Don't you love his nose, it looks like he was a boxer that had it broken.

 Old wine bottles and fish floats in a vintage egg basket. I love old egg baskets, I have several they are great for storing items. I leave this out on the patio, no need to worry about rust or them getting wet.

 A vintage garden basket filled with begonias.

 The petunias before the deer had them as a late night snack.

 Day lilies are not from my garden, I usually don't do orange but these are so pretty I may have to change my mind.

A condo for the birds while they are visiting the garden.

There is one day remaining for our Tea Time Giveaway, just leave a comment under that post and become a follower.


This week we are linking to:
White Wednesday
Wow Us Wednesdays
Nifty Thrifty Tuesday
Show Off Your Cottage Monday
Time Travel Thursday
Vintage Inspiration Friday
Saturday Show Off

Fiesta, fiesta continues....

Andrea neglected to mention in her post about Fiestaware that she only has two dinner plates because they don't fit into her kitchen cabinet. They usually only use the lunch or bread and butter plates at that tiny table. New York City kitchens can be a real challenge!

At the Cottage I have several tables I can use, a few outside setting areas and a lovely dining room table. The colors at the cottage are soft and pretty, pinks, greens and creams so I like to use the pastel Fiesta for the tables. And like most people who have Fiestaware I like to mix and match.

The tablecloth is a Pottery Barn outlet find and the sweet napkins were stitched up by my dear friend Rita. The silverware and glasses are from my favorite discount store Target.

The hydrangeas are in a tea pot which was $5.00 thrift store find, the lid was missing but it makes a perfect little vase. This is close to being the last hurrah for the hydrangeas, they were glorious this year, I will be so sad to see them go.

All clean and ready to go for next time!

Please make sure you check out our tea time giveaway going on thru August 31st.

A side note: Andrea is on hurricane Irene watch, she is on the very edge of the evacuation zone in her area of Nolita in NYC. She has several friends that are in the evacuation zone and they will squeeze into her little apartment. I'm saying prayers and hoping storm blows out to sea. Will keep you posted on how she weathers the storm.

Fiesta, Fiesta!

In addition to magazines, decorating, jordan almonds and vintage wares, my mom has also instilled in me a deep-seeded appreciation for colored dishware, namely Fiestaware. It's been in the kitchens of both our cottage and downstate homes for as long as I can remember, in shades of mustard, tangerine, turquoise, pink, lime, eggplant and cherry. When I moved away to college, I was fortunate enough to be bequeathed a portion of that vibrantly colored ware. And yes, I did use something other than paper plates in college. Though admittedly, I did have a penchant for eating microwave popcorn out of paper coffee filters my freshman year...this may have had been why I was eventually given real bowls. Also, Mom wanted a new color scheme for her kitchen at home.

Since moving to New York I like to think some aspects of my life have evolved. However, my dishware collection is not one of them. The Fiestaware has prevailed. Below are some of the dishes currently in rotation.

Readers, I understand  you may be thinking something along the lines of "huh, what silly girl - why would she use such a little table to display her Fiestaware? It can only fit one table setting." Because this is the only table in my apartment, okay? The place is only big enough for a bistro table. Usually it's a serving place for wine bottles and sangria mix. There used to a coffee table in the apartment too, but it didn't work out. Awkwardly sized.

 Shake it like salt shaker, shake it like a salt shaker!

Don't forget our tea time giveaway is still going on! Just sign up to follow our blog, leave a comment under the tea time posting and you're in for a chance to win! It's going on till August 31st.......


Linking to this week:
http://betweennapsontheporch.blogspot.com/
http://thebrambleberrycottage.blogspot.com/

Tea Time Giveaway!!

In order to help celebrate the launch of our new blog we are doing a giveaway. It is simple to enter, become a follower and leave a comment.  Please tell a friend or a mention about us on your blog (if you have one) would also be greatly appreciated. The giveaway is something from the Cottage, we will do a Broome give away at some point in the future.

You can win a vintage tea cup and saucer, spoon and tea packet. Along with that is a cute little book about Charlevoix the Beautiful by Mike Barton, the photographs are amazing. We are also including a vintage hankie in case you get teary eyed looking at how beautiful Charlevoix is. So winner, winner, chicken dinner, I hope you will be the winner! Get your comments in before August 31st.

Tell us about your favorite tea time moment.

A comfortable shoe thing!!!!

While Andrea is in the fashion capital of style, clothing and everyones favorite thing, shoes! I'm still at the cottage, where to me comfort is king! Those cute leopard oxfords that she has would not last very long at the beach or in the yard covered with grass stains. In the summer Teva flip flops are the way to go for me. I can garden in them, walk into town and run down to the beach. I keep them in a vintage egg basket by the back porch, no need to worry if they get rained on.

And the cute little blue flats, I got those on my last trip to NYC when then the shoes I brought with me were giving me a blister. I think there was eye rolling going on, Andrea's comment, "well they are serviceable". Daughter translation, I can't believe she is buying those! 

More eye rolling on these I'm sure, they are my Bogs boots, great for gardening in the northland. They are insulated and good in weather down to 40 degrees below zero, keeping my feet warm and dry. For early spring planting and fall clean up they are must, great for sloshing thru wet snow too!

When I go to New York City to visit Andrea it seems like I always get the extreme weather usually in the form of a monsoon! So being the good daughter that she is, Andrea keeps rain boots there for me. I had a cute pair of Marc Jacob rain boots with yellow soles (they did not have any pink) but on the last trip they sprung a leak! So yes, I packed them in my suitcase and now they are serving as a planter for some white petunias. I think I will have to follow Andrea over the cliff and break down and get some Hunter wellies or another pair of Bogs ! Tell us about your favorite pair of shoes or boots.


 P.S. Mom translation for "impractical shoes" how the heck are you going to walk in those things for blocks and blocks! And I really do like those leopard oxfords of hers, if only we lived closer.......

A Shoe Thing

So I was watching the Today Show last week (I have it on every morning while I get ready for work and have become weirdly obsessed - I recorded the farewell show and cried when Meredith Viera left - don’t know what’s wrong with me; routines are scary things), and they had a feature on a nice, but possibly crazy lady named Beth Shak who won a boatload of money pro gambling, and has subsequently bought a lot of shoes. Like enough to fill a tiny landfill. 1,200 PAIRS.

Obviously, I don’t have that many shoes. Not many people do. But I do have enough impractical pairs of shoes that my mom seems to think I’m on par with the crazy lady. I don’t really understand what she means by impractical though. I mean, why wouldn’t I need a pair of leopard loafers and leopard oxfords? Or the silver, ballet slipper version of Dorothy’s glitteringly magical shoes? Or motorcycle boots when I don’t own a motorcycle? Essentials.

My shoes are actually completely practical for the most part; I just tend to go through a lot of them given that my feet are my primary means of transportation. Here are few of my special shoes, plus maybe a few that I’m just a fan of:

Behold: My efforts at shooting street style a la The Sartorialist. They were failed efforts. That's why there's only two shots. 

Pair of Banana Republic stompers. I wore 'em to death last summer, but the rose gold detailing so beautiful I had to show you despite their wear and tear. 

If you haven't already gathered, I love me some leopard. These faux-ponyhair Steve Madden oxfords totally do the trick. 

As much as I stop and stare at and ogle and covert a sturdy wedge or a saucy stiletto I spend my life in flats...and usually wishing I was wearing heels instead (I have a height deficiency). These are a few of my faves. Dorothy is that you? No, it's me! In sparkly J.Crew ballet slippers! Marc Jacobs and Franco Sarto are also my lovers.

Dum, dum, dum....my un-fun but completely practical and totally worth every dollar boots. If I were to add up the amount of raindrops avoided vs. dollars spent on these rain boots they would look like the most economical purchase ever made...by me, anyway. Hunter wellies are ubiquitous in the city, and last winter I finally bit the bullet. I followed the crowd, hopped on the bandwagon, became the lemming that jumped off the cliff. I started using multiple aphorisms in a single sentence. As as result, my feet are dry. Cliff jumping validated.