mud season

.....it's here.





well the pleasures of living on an unmaintained, for the most part, gravel road in the country can be celebrated as of this past week.





thank goodness for 4 wheel drive...it's the only way in and out of our road and will be until things dry out.


come some dry weather ....some major changes will have to be made. deferred maintenance prior to our moving to sweetwater bend will have to addressed. can you tell i am not too happy? do you think i will ever get all this mud off? there is simply no reason to run it through a car wash.....until june.

enter sweetwater bend at your own risk.....road under deconstruction....



meanwhile, crocus popping....woohoo! thank you dear lord!

roadside picture frame...done.

ya'll remember this frame......

it had one saving grace....it had the colors of my college alma mater....mizzou!!!!...but really the black and gold colors weren't it's real saving grace.....obviously. it was the unique wood frame.


i blogged about it a few weeks ago....i had picked it up on the side of the road on the eve of trash pick up out here in the country. i am telling you i have the best neighbors.....they throw out the best stuff on thursday trash days...


here's what i did with it.....




a couple coats of antique white spray paint. a few new pieces of material, including the black toile from hobby lobby. and see that tan twill material that was used for the matting? another roadside freebie from another neighbor that i found the following week. they threw out a perfectly perfect twill-style set of curtain panels, along with the curtain rod itself....hehehe. the amazing thing about this find was that i was on my way to the fabric store to pick up just about the same kinda material...what luck. kinda hated cutting the curtains up....but......

costs:

24x24 picture frame....$2.52...the cost of the toile

oh how i wish i could sew.....

now i can say i have.....


i have been admiring those cute pillowcase dresses that a lot of blogging mommas and g-mommas make for the young girls in their lives. i finally decided it was time to sit down at our 8 year old brand new (i had never used it, altho hubby had, once) sewing machine and try to make one for our granddaughter. i found these cute little notions at the sewing store and they inspired me even more to get my sewing on.



found a couple yards of fabric at the thrift store instead of searching any further for a non-existent cute vintage pillow case. where do all these sewers of those cute dresses find them? surely, i could turn this fabric into a pillowcase shape with a few stitches. i was able to....:)




the white cotton fabric had a lovely flower textured pattern....very sweet.





4 hours later...i know most sewers could make this in like ummmm... 30 minutes...a sweet little pillowcase dress for our granddaughter, courtney.





we went to visit her this past weekend....and it was just a wee bit big for the sweet little love.....but i am sure it can easily be altered, right? i see my first attempt at alterations in my future already when she comes to visit us ......and the sewing machine.