My Grandma's Hutch has arrived!

SHE'S HOME! 

I mentioned in a previous post that I was inheriting my Grandmother's hutch. My Mama has been keeping it in her very unused family room for many years - it was storing glassware and glass art she makes. It was also starting to collect cobwebs and dust, so she offered it to me!

I live about 3-ish hours south of the town I grew up in, so while realistically moving the piece and getting it to my house wasn't a really big deal, it was something we were dreading! Of course, illnesses in the family, a sick dog, a flooded basement - all these things would put off our truck rental to "next visit, hopefully"....

I made the promise to Mama (and myself) when we made the trip up to celebrate her birthday this year, that we would finally bring it home. I sure didn't realize that her birthday coincided with back to school dorm room move-in times! Rental truck prices were CRAZY! But we went ahead with our plans anyways.

The hutch has now been sitting in my dining room for 48 hours and honestly, it looks like it has always been here. Somehow it is a perfect size for my room, its not too tall, and will provide all the storage I need, and have needed for years. It's a really beautiful piece as it is, but I AM planning on painting it - and my Grandma did give her blessing on that long before she passed away.

The things I am noticing - 

The hardware - while beautiful, definitely not my style, so that will be replaced. I'm saying that now, but who knows, once the piece is painted, who knows?

The glass doors - THE GLARE!! Oh goodness, we have realized just how bad the glare is coming in from our glass sliding door with the sunlight and pool water reflecting on the glass. We will most likely be removing the glass.

We love the feet, as well as these decorative carvings. I had forgotten what the carvings looked like, and for some reason was picturing "wheat" - and was planning on having my husband fill it in. Thankfully, my memory was wrong, because we both really like it!

We have settled on a color - after painting our kitchen walls 'Olive Grove' by Magnolia, we decided that will also be the color of the hutch. The dining room is separate from the kitchen, but we wanted to pull that tone of green into the dining room since we like the color so much. Olive Grove also plays very well with our blue and white transferware. 

With all these shelves and drawers, I FINALLY have a place to store my holiday Spode collections. You always seem to forget what you already have when it's packed away for most of the year, so I am so looking forward to unpacking everything and taking inventory. 

I am so excited to have such a large family piece in my home, and so happy to finally have something on that wall in my dining room!

Stay tuned for her makeover!

XOXO, Bunny

Pottering around in July

 How is it July already?

This is the first year my husband hung our Tommy Bahama bunting on the front porch. It has certainly turned some heads!

This has to be one of the fastest years I have experienced in a while. Maybe because it's been a busy (but also laid back) year for us so far. We have worked so hard to finish up some home projects that desperately needed to be done before Miss Thelma Lou joined our family (thankfully we succeeded!), that to be honest, a lot of our "usuals" got put on the back burner.

For once, we actually DID NOT garden this year! The only harvest we have for this year is our annual garlic we put out every Autumn. We were able to harvest that this past week and it is hanging on our covered porch to cure. It's one of our saddest garlic harvests yet! But, we are thankful for what we were able to salvage. After it cures, we will dehydrate it and grind it up for granulated garlic to cook with. We do have some volunteer tomato plants, as well as some zinnias, and our berry patches of course, but vegetable wise, nothing! We will see how those tomato plants do! Because of our lack of a garden, this will also be the first summer I won't be canning anything, which feels weird. 

Our usual garlic harvest is about 6-7 times this amount!

We definitely planned to take the summer off from gardening, of course, to get the main part of our deck finished (will stain it this fall!), and get the house ready for a puppy. We also knew we were going on our anniversary trip, so gardening just really wasn't a priority for us.

This fall, however, we do plan on relocating our garden. We will be having a massive (dying) tree cut down, which will open up the sun to a back part of our property. We will be purchasing new galvanized raised beds, and re-designing everything. I’m really looking forward to it, and I will keep y'all updated. My artist husband will be drawing up plans for bed layouts soon!

July so far has been slow for us. Lots of puppy kisses, and pool time, after a glorious 9-ish days of beautiful summer weather. It was a heatwave, and I will admit the word glorious would not be coming out of my mouth if I didn't have a pool! It was really nice after working so hard on our deck, to be able to enjoy grilling, eating outside, and lounging in the pool. It made all those late evenings so very worth it. Next up, we will tackle some small repairs on our connecting gazebo, then we will be skirting everything hopefully by the end of summer, and like I said, staining it all in the fall. 

This morning my husband and I went to the back of the property and picked some blackberries and mulberries. I'm thinking....blackberry ice cream? 

These are our first pickings - so many blackberries on our bushes this year, and the mulberry tree was well!

Also, over the holiday weekend, we dove head first into a very small project on the east side of our house. We have 3 hydrangea bushes over there, enjoying the morning sun. For years we have been fighting the weeds, and of course it was a losing battle. I decided I wanted to do something simple, with some small cottage stepping stones and pea gravel in a checkerboard pattern. I was very unsure how this would look, but decided to just go for it. We aren’t done with it yet, but I am so happy with it! 

Luckily the pea gravel is a good match to our concrete/gravel walkway.

My hydrangeas are doing much better this year, after some much needed TLC.

That's all that's going on around here these days, hope to have some fall gardening updates and a finished hydrangea area to share soon - and some sewing! Fingers crossed!

Thanks for reading!

-Bunny

A Fat Quarter Shop Haul

I had a browser window open on Fat Quarter Shop for a few weeks, with quite a few items sitting in my buggy. I was having such a hard time deciding, plus a few things I had my eye on were being released soon. I decided not to wait, and will place another order next month! Here’s what I purchased, with links:

Shown: Autumn Quilt Seeds Pumpkin 8 Block KIT by Lori Holt $25.98

Bluegrass Charm 5" Stacker - Melissa Mortenson for Riley Blake Designs $11.98

Grand Haven Charm Pack - Minick & Simpson for Moda Fabrics $11.98

Sunnyside MINI Charm Pack Camille Roskelley for Moda Fabrics $4.98  - Sold Out?

 

6' Woven Star Quilt Block Foundation Paper | It's Sew Emma $10.98

6" Economy Quilt Block Foundation Paper | Lori Holt of Bee in My Bonnet for It's Sew Emma $10.98

6" Log Cabin Quilt Block Foundation Paper | It's Sew Emma $10.98

Sewline Blue Fabric Water Soluble Glue Pen $7.48

Kimberly's Color Alphabitties Specialty Marking Tools $7.48

Schmetz 5 Count Universal Size 90/14 Machine Needles $3.98

Black Frixion Ball Erasable Gel Pen $2.98

Add a Quarter 6" Plus Ruler | CM Designs $9.48

I have a reservation in for:

Blueprint Charm Pack | Camille Roskelley for Moda Fabrics

Nantucket Summer Charm Pack | Camille Roskelley for Moda Fabrics

Wishlist:

Morning Mist Quilt Kit | Featuring Nantucket Summer by Camille Roskelley

Backing Set for Morning Mist Quilt Kit

I love all the blues and greens of Camille Roskelley's fabrics. I have a lot of blue and white china displayed in my dining room, and recently was gifted some Borallo Pinheiro cabbage ware from my Mama that I will be decorating with as well. If weather permits towards the end of the summer, I will be hauling my Grandma's hutch down to my house to give it a makeover and a new life! It's not 100%, but I'm thinking it will be painted 'Kudzu' by Dixie Belle Paints. Here's to big plans, and praying they happen!

Thanks for reading!

-Bunny

When it rains, it POURS

 

Well here I am, back on my blog. It's been a wild end of January and February for us. What started out as some beautiful and welcome snow in January turned into more than we expected snow and ice. We finally thawed from that, and had a GORGEOUS day of 70 degrees!

Then, round two of snow came. My mind truly is drawing a blank on how much we got, because not long after that days of rain followed, we got a small break, and then IT HAPPENED.

SO MUCH RAIN, WAY TOO FAST.

Everything was fine, all through the day, and into the evening. I'm sure you know where I am going with this. The last I checked our downstairs, everything was dry as a bone at 1am. I woke around 7am, and wouldn't you know it, there was 7 inches of water in our finished basement. I'd also like to point out that when I woke up to a flooded basement, I was also surprised with the fact that we had two inches of fresh snow on the ground!

Fast forward a week later, and here I am. The basement drained (VERY quickly), our utilities were checked by professionals (sump, furnace, hot water heater, electrics, etc) and all carpeting, drywall, doors, and baseboards have been removed from the house. We have completely dried out and our humidity down there is around 36%. It was a busy week, but now that all of the urgent things have been taken care of, we can take a break and a breather. Absolutely nothing down there is pressing at the moment. We can take our time remodeling. The sun is finally shining, and will be all week, so we have spent some time on the porch in our rocking chairs, and today I have spent a little time at my sewing machine, in front of an open window, and watching sewing and quilting reels on Pinterest. 

Before we flooded, I had quilted the block I sewed in January. I was so pleased with how it turned out, considering I have never done this, and I was ready for binding. Being a beginner, I decided to order a bias tape maker, and I am glad I did. I had watched some videos about cutting your fabric for binding, but with the events of the last week, I realized I needed to watch them again. That's what I've done today, and I practiced a little on some plain white fabric. I'm not ready to cut into the fabric I have picked for my binding yet, I think I am going to practice a few more times!

I have to say, this small little quilt block sure is taking ages to finish, but I guess that is how it goes with any hobby sometimes. Life truly gets in the way, and that's ok! We have these hobbies as a way to relax. It will mean so much more to me when it's finished, and I can't wait to hang it somewhere to remind me of where I started.

Here is the fabric I picked for the binding. I am hoping to finish it all this week. It's coming off darker in the photo, but I think it will look really good.

Hope to have a good quilting update for you soon, and I hope you are DRY and enjoying some nice sunny weather, wherever you are! Three weeks until Spring! 

-Bunny

Another Quilting Update

 Hello!

Is the weather warming up in your neck of the woods? The sun has been out for days, and thankfully, we are moving into 40 degree weather for the next week. I am so looking forward to sunshine and warmer weather. A few days we could even be 50 degrees!

Quilting. This is addicting! I am still learning the ins and outs of my machine, every time I sit down I learn something new. I'm thankful for that. I sat down yesterday and just started grabbing fabric and sewing, with really no rhyme or reason. I am still having problems lining up my seams, but I am slightly improving with that. Any suggestions and tips would be helpful.

Here is one square I pieced together.

I then grabbed some larger precuts and pieced together this. I watched a reel on Pinterest for this same pattern and just went with it. Again, that top row has seams that are way off, but I am quite pleased with the rest of the seams, so I will actually quilt it and hang it on my craft room wall. After I trimmed, this block is 8x8. I can't wait to see it hanging on my wall above my bulletin board! I typically hang a 1x1 barn quilt above my board, since I have so many painted. I change them out seasonally/for different holidays. An actual quilt block will be a nice change! 

I made a quite a few mistakes on some other things I pieced together, which allowed me to break out the seam ripper and try some do-overs. This is all such a learning curve! I have realized I am not proficient enough to sew and chat over text with my friends at the same time! I sewed so much yesterday that I actually finished up all the thread on my bobbin!

Last night my husband went back out to the garage and cut and shaped a wooden "clapper" for me to use after ironing. I've seen them being used a lot in the YouTube videos I've been watching. It definitely seems 

like these will be helpful, and he offered to make me a few in different sizes. Right now its just a wooden block but I'm wondering if I should add some wax to it? I have some Dixie Belle clear wax and wonder if that would be good?

We ran into town to grab a a few things, and we stopped at Hobby Lobby and JoAnn's. I grabbed a few fat quarters to add to my stash. I am hoping that this year I can make a set of coasters, place mat, or a candle mat. I'm not sure which of those I will pick just yet, but I would love to complete a small project with some dreamy fabric and minimal mistakes!

I have decided that I am ready to purchase an Oliso iron. If you can recommend one, or another brand, please leave a comment or e-mail me. I'd prefer to not spend over $100. I'd really appreciate it!

Thanks for reading!

-Bunny

Part 2 - A Day in Hardinsburg

 If you read my last blog post about our day trip to Hardinsburg, you’ll remember I wrote about the time warp that is their local Walmart. Well, I have another time warp for you. We had the absolute pleasure to dine in at a Pizza Hut Classic. 

My husband and I are children of the 80’s, and grew up in the days of Book-It pizzas. I still have my Book-It pin too, full of star stickers for reading Sweet Valley Twins and the Babysitter’s Club. I’ll never forget the excitement of having that little pizza sat in front of me. I’m sure every generation looks back on their childhood and thinks “Man, we truly had it all.” 

I was so excited to see the vintage art on the walls, and of course, there’s my purple Book-It pin right in the center of this photo. I didn’t recognize any of the others. 

Every single table had the red and white tablecloths and the Pizza Hut Tiffany style lamp! 

They even had THE RED CUPS!!

We didn’t have our Book-It pins with us, so we actually had to pay for our food. 😁 We got a large pizza to share. Now, it was exactly the same pizza we could get at our local carry out/delivery location, but it was better, ya know? 

My husband said the only thing that was missing was a PacMan game! I’m gonna be honest with you, I’m seriously considering buying a Pizza Hut lamp, a PacMan machine, and some red cups for our family room pizza & movie nights! 

On our way out the door, I noticed this plaque at the door. 

If you’re interested, my husband found this website that lists all of the Pizza Hut Classic locations by state. I hope you’ll find one close to you, and relive some 80’s and 90’s nostalgia! 

https://www.sportskeeda.com/pop-culture/news-nostalgic-americana-best-list-pizza-hut-classic-restaurants-across-usa-explored-viral-tweet-sparks-frenzy

See you soon! 

-Bunny

#willtravelforfood

A day in Hardinsburg, Kentucky

 Whenever we get the chance, my husband and I enjoy traveling to our surrounding counties and visiting much smaller towns than the one we live in. I’m sure as we are heading their way, the people there are heading elsewhere, towards a more populated area, with big plans for their day. Better shopping, bigger grocery stores, more variety. We tend be searching for small businesses and grocery stores, local restaurants and hidden gems. When you think about it, it’s quite funny! The grass is always greener! 

On this particular weekend, we visited Hardinsburg, Kentucky, which has a population less than 2,500 and is located in Breckenridge County. We took many back roads, and along those less traveled roads we stumbled upon so many beautiful barn quilts. 

The barn quilts didn’t slow down once we got into town, either! Hardinsburg is such a cute little town, and it seems that lots of the once empty storefronts are filling up. I love seeing downtowns being revived! 

There was a cute boutique called The Exchange on Main that I really wanted to go in, but of course it was closed. That’s always my luck! Also, there’s a restaurant called Nettie’s that’s on my list to try, but it was closed too. They have a Hot Brown Baked Potato on their menu that I’m just itching to try! 

The post office caught my eye. It reminded me of the post office in Camden, South Carolina. Whenever we travel, I’m always looking for the post office. I enjoy mailing things from small towns, but I also enjoy seeing the type of buildings they will stick a post office in. You don’t see many this beautiful anymore, especially in rural parts. There’s a town by me that just recently got a post office, and it’s in a single wide trailer. These beautiful brick post offices deserve to be photographed and admired! I mailed a card to my Mama on this day. My husband regularly cuts out his favorite funnies from our small town newspaper and mails them to her. She so looks forward to getting them, and we enjoy sending them. When we visit her, we see them all hanging on her fridge! 

Hardinsburg also has its own radio station! I used to listen to it a lot when we lived closer to Breckenridge County, but my radio antenna had to be positioned *just right*, and it was still a little fuzzy. There’s just something special about a small town with their own radio station! Clairee Belcher knew what she was doing when she bought KPPD! (That’s for you Steel Magnolias fans!) 

Now, this is something you don’t see much these days. This is an original Walmart that opened on February 5, 1985. Look how small it is! The garden center is in the parking lot, and if you’ll notice, you can still park facing the store. 

The inside was like walking into a time warp, and I loved it! There was something so comforting about this store. It felt safe, reassuring, and didn’t have the hectic atmosphere that the supercenters have. The customer service desk was still in the middle of the store, right when you walk in. It reminds me of the location my grandparents used to shop at in the early 90’s. The only thing missing was a Walmart cafe, and my Grandma and Grandpa sitting in a booth, chatting and laughing away.  Sigh. Those truly were the days, and we’ll never get them back. 

Did you notice that there is only EIGHT registers!? 

I purchased a yard of white cotton fabric for a beginners quilt pattern I will be working on. It will be my first mini quilt attempt ever, and I’ll always remember this first project, so hopefully I’ll remember that I bought some of the fabric for it at this cute little Walmart. 

Thanks so much for reading along on my small town adventure. Stay tuned for part 2 of my trip to Hardinsburg, which will be all about where we ate - ANOTHER TIME WARP!

Hope you’ll stick around!

-Bunny

#willtravelforfood

Quilting is a scrap of happiness

 Quilting. 

Oh, how I’ve dreamed of quilting over the years. I’ve spent a decade plus painting quilts, too afraid to break out that sewing machine. Believe me, I’ve so enjoyed painting barn quilts, but over the past two years, the fabric and the thread and my untouched machine sitting in its box started calling to me. Once I stumbled upon Lori Holt, Kimberly Jolly and her shop Fat Quarter Shop, it was game over, and I was done dreaming and not doing. 

I’m finally answering that call. 

In December, I got on Etsy and purchased a beginner’s quilt block pattern and instructions from a shop called StaceyLeeCreative. It was for a Nine Patch Quilt Block, came with written instructions and a YouTube video. Plus, it only cost $3.50. I have nothing to lose. 

I found some quilting fabric in my craft stash, so this has to be meant to be, right? Actually, I had been slowly buying a few things over the past few years in preparation for this quilting journey. I remember purchasing this fabric bundle from Shabby Fabrics back in 2017. Then, a few years ago I bought a rotary cutter and a ruler, but last month, I caught a sale at Joann’s, and bought some more rulers and a cutting mat at 50% off. I also purchased a Lori Holt binder, and my husband sweetly gifted me some Lori Holt notions for Christmas. As I type this out, and see the year 2017, I can’t help but think “Wow, I really plan in advance, don’t I?!” It’s so silly. Look how much time I’ve wasted simply thinking about quilting. 

I was watching a YouTube video last week from Kimberly Jolly (love her!) at Fat Quarter Shop, and she showed an item they carry - it’s simply a wooden block with grooves in it to hold your rulers. I’m not sure how recent the video was, and I’m sure I couldn’t find it again if I tried. I showed it to my husband and he went right out to the garage and made me one from some scrap wood. He’s a sweetie! Once the weather warms up I’m gonna smooth the edges on it and spray paint it a pretty color!

Don’t you love my HUGE binder with only two patterns in it? 😂

I got my sewing machine unpacked while we were snowed in, and will find a YouTube video for my exact machine to make sure I’m setting everything up correctly before I start. I have a Brother CE1100PRW. Can I even (mini) quilt on this thing? Who knows. Either way, it’s happening. The thread I ordered will be here Wednesday. I can’t wait to get started! 

Here’s the pretty fabric I found in my stash. I already had the wool ironing pad, but am waiting to see if I enjoy quilting before I buy a smaller iron. I brought our big iron upstairs to use, and it’s really heavy. If I really get into this, I’ll probably be purchasing an Oliso iron. Check out the adorable Lori Holt bonnet needle minder my husband bought me! 🥰 

I hope you’ll stick around, because I plan on documenting my progress - my HONEST progress, warts and all. And if you have any tips and advice- please please leave them in the comments! 

Wish me luck! 

I hope to have an update by 1/19/25. 

-Bunny

Here are the links to the two beginners patterns I purchased:

Nine Patch Quilt Block PDF Pattern with YouTube Video

Hourglass Quilt Block PDF Pattern with YouTube Video