home heart

Sometimes it's difficult to get me out of the house. I love my boyfriend, my cats, my bees, my chickens, my marigolds, my orchids, my projects, my tomatoes, my herb spiral, my roses, my sunny windows, my books, my journals, my pillows, my bed. Hahaha! Knowing how much I love to sleep, I can't forget my bed!

wish list

Today, Modish posted about Loja de estar, great color escape if you're stuck in a cubicle or a cloudy Portland day (rain, rain, go away!). I find myself dreaming of my turquoise and red bedroom, similar in colors to this photo above from loja de estar (which is the main reason I'm posting this. A self-reference, if you will). This summer, I'm going to pitch a tent in my garden, and give my bedroom a full make-over: turquoise walls, red dresser, and possibly a new bedspread.

Also from them, I love, love, love this bike carrier. Hmmm, another possible sewing project?

I also love these adorable birds on wires, which have craft-night project written all over them!

monday inspiration

Brian and I would like to buy a few acres of land, on which we will build a barn, a fruit/wine cellar, a garden, a home, a farm. Ideally, the land will be an hour or so west of Portland, towards the coastal mountains. There will be several colonies of bees, chickens to roast and chickens to lay, ducks (if we have a pond), goats, possibly sheep or angora rabbits or some other livestock. With this in mind, Hardworkinghippy's blog "La Ferme de Sourrou" serves as an inspirational blog, filled with photos and notes from her lovely French homestead. She writes, "I find physical work profoundly energising and the exercise helps us get rid of stress and prepares us to live as warriors and not as victims." They are off-the-grid and sustainable, using renewable energy, growing their own food, and raising animals, all things we'd like to incorporate onto our own land. She also has a flickr account filled with photos such as the one above of stevia being propagated.

Julie over at "Towards Sustainability" has set the goal of harvesting, photographing, and posting about at least one item from her garden every day. I love people who set hefty, slightly crazy goals for themselves like that.

Here's an article on growing strawberries by Gayla Trail. I'm also loving Grow Great Grub and would recommend it to any level of gardener because of the surplus of great gardening ideas and eye-catching photos. Here's an interview about the process of creating this book.  


For the arts, I'm loving the slightly whimsical, slightly eerie work of Tamya Mayers. She reminds me a bit of Tim Burton, a little bit fairy tale, a little bit gothic. Plus, there's a little bee!

I do like to cross stitch, and in the past year, I've designed and stitched two of my own pieces, with the itch to design some more of my own and an eye out for some ideas. I like some of stitchnotion's cross-stitching on Etsy, including this adorable sampler with little honeybees.

the moon was waxing above the waves

Last week, I gardened, sewed, and started my new waitressing job, followed by a weekend at the coast with friends, turn tables, a hot tub with a view, and tasty morel treats picked last weekend near Sisters, OR, including morel and fresh basil pizza made by Brian and amazing morel quiche made by Matt.

Although I will substitute teach as much as I can until the end of the school year (16 days to go), my summer will bring free days. One of the joys of working evenings is the plethora of yoga classes at my gym on weekday mornings. My whole body sings and thanks me after I do yoga, and now that I'm on my feet more, I'm going to try to heal and strengthen myself by doing yoga twice weekly.

Another joy of free days is having the energy to garden and sew before I go to work. I've started my friend Kara's new pillows and curtains, and I have a myriad of projects in mind, including more yoga mat bags for friends, gardening aprons, grocery totes, a wall-hanging book holder, etc.


Subbing offers little in the way of inspiration or activity, so I might use the time to create reference points for myself and others of blogs that I've found inspiring and DIY projects that I want to try. The first one comes from Design Sponge.

I love this colorful pouf that could be made with any assortment of textiles, from floral to paisley to solids. I want to make one to have not just for the color potential and extra seating but also as a place for kitties to curl up and snooze.

the neighbors call him "toes"

A student, when he saw that I have chickens and bees, asked if I also have a tiger. Why, yes, I do.

 

I used the manual setting on my camera to take these pictures. I still need to play with it and experiment, but I really like the lighting and color and detail in these un-altered photos of sweet Elijah, known in the neighborhood as Toes.