I Can't Believe it's Been 2 Months Since I Posted...

Wow.  Time is moving at warp speed in my world.  At this rate, it  feels like it was just yesterday that i turned 60  - and before you know it,  i'll be 95 years old, and then i'll be dead. 

What i take from that is to have as much fun as possible every single minute of the day even if it's illegal

So, the summer wrap up... 

It rained a lot here

We went to the beach for four days, and of course i came back with a chair stuffed in the back of the car... Last year it was a sofa - so i guess that's the new Oak Island Beach tradition, bringing back furniture so big that you can't see out the back of the car while you're driving home for 3 hours 

Anyway, it's a kind of epic chair in a really different melon color that i sort of love

(you can see my Dorothy picnic basket on the stairs behind it, there is always something on the stairs)

when we were at the beach, we scooted over to Southport, the cutest little village right on a port at the beach... oh my gosh i love it there.  

Here is one of the darling houses in Southport - I love these colors together!

So that was the beach trip - really just nice

Of course there are always the antics of Daisy and Willow to come home to.

This is what Daisy thought was a really good idea

she's smiling isn't she...

and the main place she hangs out is on the white slipcovered sofa... 

Ummmmmm... should i let her in .... ever?!

Willow has totally dominated this box, turned it over and thinks she is super stealthy hiding here...

The rest of the summer was all about the garden, weeding, and lots of flowers!  Especially the Dahlias.  At the end of the summer, when everything else is weedy and raggedy, you get these pretty girls.  I have more pictures of Dahlias than i do of my children

so, when you have Dahlias you make pretty bouquets, 

which your cat then destroys, and chews on - 

and then you're on Google looking up

 "are Dahlias toxic to cats"  

"are crepe myrtles toxic to cats"

"are hydrangeas toxic to cats"

My friend helped me make the cutest fall wreath...

and I hung stuff on the clothesline

Put out some pretty pumpkins

Did a painting of a sweet mama with her fuzzy baby sheep...

and I did a little surprise painting for a friend, which is on the Fedex truck out for delivery to her right now!  

I can't wait to see if she likes it.   

The inspiration photo was thanks to Anita of Castles Crowns and Cottages.  

Here is her Instagram  

Les_dames_dabord -

 it's a beautiful instagram account!

Thank you Anita!

and so that's pretty much it 

and now i've got to go, because I am at work and I'm soooo gonna get busted doing a blog post!

xoxoxo's

...the end...

Have You Ever....

... Have you ever taken eleven thousand years to finally pick out a wall paint color, 

had Benjamin Moore and Home Depot put out a restraining order on you because you took too many paint color swatches

finally picked out a color you liked

Had your significant other 
(who will not allow you to paint because you are so messy)
paint the living room, dining room and kitchen....

and then decided that you really don't like the color at all

and then...

since you want to still live with that person because he is really pretty sweet and totally hot

...you slowly but surely start painting it the new preferred color that you should have chosen all along, while he wasn't at home so he wouldn't notice?

Have you ever done that?


So here is the new stealth paint color.

It is subtle, but if you look behind the lampshade and beside the curtain you may notice a square area that it is a tad less yellow and more grayish white
The color is "Halo" by BM

 Maybe you can see better here... -   see the yellowish color on top? It is Antique White.  That's the color i don't love - even though it is a nice color, the yellow bothers me
and you know how that is, 
if something bothers you, you become mentally ill until you can change it

you can see the more grayish white beside the door.  

and of course the random mess on the table

and here, behind the lamp is the new color, behind the big black box is the more yellow color that i'm changing

below most of the wall with the mirror is now the new color - I do like it better

you wanna hear something really slack

I haven't painted behind the mirror yet

Anyway, it is subtle, so you see how i can get by with it without Mr. Fractured noticing
I just couldn't bear to make him paint it all again...

                        

good thing he doesn't read my blog!

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So things are pretty much the same around here.... 

The roses have been great this year

"Eden"

This is a sweet one - just a little single petaled rose.  I love how simple it is

Here is a messy bouquet from the garden
Our cat Willow really loves to eat any flowers that i put in a jar and give attention to

you can imagine how thrilled i am with that

Messy bouquet again... 

Willow was helping me with this bouquet as you can see by the broken rose 

Yummy fading "Eden" roses

Here is a little photo of the front porch near dusk
I like to sit on that little bench, and watch the world go by

here is the view from the bench looking toward the street...  

My little "Daisy" is still blending in with the furniture

Willow has a new favorite toy - Paper that's in a box

apparently there are monsters and mice and all kinds of things to attack and kill under that paper...

Mr. Fracturedfairytale attempting to explain the rules of good behavior to Willow...

little does he know that the wall behind him is two different paint colors

 here she is just dying to go outside

and here is our solution

people think it's so weird and funny to see a cat on a harness

actually she has adjusted to it pretty well - except for the part where you put it on, or take it off

then she tries to kill you

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I did do a series of 3 paintings that i kinda had fun with 

They're each 24 x 24 and I painted them using only 3 colors

Here they are again

I kind-of love them... 

I asked my daughter to help me name them

The one on the right she said he kinda looked like "derp", which he does - sweet but derpy - that's how he ended up being Wyatt Derp

The one on the left she thought looked kinda like a Billy Arthur - seemed perfect to me!

And then of course "Marley" named after Bob Marley - this is the second time i have painted him

I think they'd look cool on a dark grey/brown wall 

Ok, enough about these guys!

Sooo... I guess that's pretty much the overview...

I've been more on Instagram lately, 

so if you have an Instagram account let me know how to find you!  

It works better for me when i'm at work to do a quick instagram post or scan everyone's new pics

and did ya'll see Miss Mustard Seed's blog post about how she first got started...

It was so inspiring and touching to me

you should go read it...

Miss Mustard Seed

...much love...

...the end...

Still here, Still crazy... But Loving the Spring!

 I'm guessing you either hate me now for my complete neglect of your blog posts, or...most likely,  or you haven't even noticed because you are all out doing and keeping up with a million things too 

I'm still stuck in the whole overwhelmed with Social Media thing.. and have not in any way figured out which thing to focus my ever compromised attention span 

How do you guys do it?

Are you preferring instagram, blogs, facebook

are you keeping up with it all?

I'm kinda all or nothing, so if i get too behind on things, sometimes i just give up

 But, between working in the garden, dealing with work, mailing out prints, and generally being all over the  place, i did manage to finish a painting that i think is kinda sweet...

It's called 

"In The Moment"

  

which is something i'm actually not ever in... 

people with anxiety/panic/everymentalillness usually aren't in the moment

but when i look at this sheep, it reminds me to try         

 Speakin of the garden, ... Oh my gosh, the roses...

Mine are in their first flush of blooms and they are so wonderful

I found this new rose that i could just kiss to death it is so pretty

It is called Francis Meilland

I mean it really looks like that!

and it fades to the softest cream blush with thick velvety petals

Could you just die !  I am completely enchanted with it.  

We'll see how it performs and I'll let you know

Here is some prolific "New Dawn" growing on the arbor

This is "New Dawn" again on the corner of my lot - there must be a thousand blooms on it - It has gone so crazy wild, I'm in total awe  of how one rose could be so big!

... and I have to share one of my other favorite roses again

"Peach Drift"  

It is the best color and so hardy.  It's a frequent bloomer too !

I like to put a little cluster of them on the mantel with "Miss Daisy" because they match her pink nose

Sweet "Peach Drift" 

The window boxes are all planted full of pink geraniums 

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Ok, so enough with the flowers

I'll move on to other random happenings around Rosebud Cottage

Here is the formerly brown suitcase that i painted pink

I mixed it in with all my other suitcases. 

I finally figured out that i should store all of my Christmas ornaments in these suitcases - since they are downstairs, and accessible 

The worst thing for me about decorating for the holidays was going into "that closet" upstairs that has everything stuffed in bins under bins and more bins, dragging them out and hauling them downstairs

Now, no stair climbing, no bin dragging from behind lord knows what

Just open the suitcase, and voila!

Pretty sparkly ornaments and things!

                *************************

Recently Ellie ( my daughter) and I did the funnest thing too - Mr. Fractured gave me a gift certificate to Sephora, cause he knows i love playing in there

wasn't that sweet of him 

so just for the pure fun of doing girl stuff with makeup -  I scheduled an appointment for Ellie and I,  and she had a makeover! 

It was a blast, and yes, it is a ton of makeup, but she looks like a glamorous movie star 

Just look at that face and snow white skin...  

but as glam as she looks, believe me, that girl can get some dirty work done.

She's an animal lover and works in a dog kennel 

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Ok, so now that i've turned into one of those people who show pictures of my cat 

Here is Willow wishing she could go outside

Poor Kitty...

We have managed to get a harness on her 

after preparing for the fight of our lives

and take her out every once in a while - 

Last night, she ate a lightening bug 

The next thing i knew she was drooling like she had rabies - 

So emergency vet???

Of course it turns out that there are a few bugs that are toxic to animals, and yes lightening bugs are!

She's ok

Good Grief -  if it's not the kids, it's the animals !  

It's always something!

Here is her luscious furry tummy of which i am never allowed to touch

And finally - here is little Daisy with her stash of nasty, stinky, chewed up stuffed animals and treasures... she puts them on our bed to save them from Willow - and we get to sleep with them

I absolutely adore this little dog...

She is the sweetest thing ever

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Gosh, I'm sorry, I know that was a lot

After not talking to you in a while, it turns out i have more things to share than i thought!

Anyway, I'll leave you guys with one more of my favorite roses 

"Abraham Darby" it's doing it's thing right now too

The roses are having a good year

xoxo's

... the end ...

Carpet Begone -The Third Attack on the Carpet ! - Painted Stairs

I am a notorious carpet ripper upper.  I'll tear that nasty stuff out any time i can and paint whatever is underneath - I don't care. 

When i showed my daughter a photo of my painted stairs this weekend she told me how much she used to hate it when they were younger and lived with me - and i tore up carpet and painted the floors.

Ok... you know, after the fifty million traumas they put me through - I guess i can just live with them not liking that habit of mine

Anyway - they still need some touch ups and some sealer but 

here they are!

I don't have any before photos, but just imagine an off white berber carpet that was about 12 years old and looking gray and dingy - 

Here it is all taped off

Doing the whole thing was more about patience than it was about being difficult.  I hired someone to rip up the carpet because it was so totally worth it to pay $20.00 an hour for the hour and a half it took to pull out the carpet,  tack strips and staples 

Then i painted the stairs white with floor and deck paint - which for some reason took 4 coats - that was torture 

then taped it off

and then.... 

had to choose the stripe color

Sooooo, why is choosing a paint color for walls and or stairs the hardest possible thing in the universe?!!!

FINALLY  I narrowed it down to two colors, started with one of them - nixed that, and then painted them this gray that looked like it would be perfect 

AND..... 

IT WASN'T PERFECT!

It was just OK

You know how you do something and you try really  hard to like it - and then you go #&!?%#?! because you know you aren't ever going to like it...

That was me

In the photo below can you see that the stripe on the left is more gray?

that is the color i did not like

the rest of the stripes that are more blue gray are the stripes i had repaint by hand AFTER i had pulled up the tape 

patience patience patience ... grrrrrr

It is pretty fun though to walk in the front door and see these pretty stairs, so it was worth it 

Alrighty then, enough about the stairs!

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Check out "Willow"!

She is around 9 months old and she is so grown up!

This is a photo of Willow when she is being good...

I swear this cat has attention deficit disorder - seriously - i know cats are active, but she has no attention span

she will snuggle in with you, get all just right, and then 4 seconds later she's over it and up doing something else

leave it to me to get a cat with ADD

...and she can be so very sweet, follows us into each room we go into... so happy to see us after work and full of purrs

she's fine with face petting, and face kisses

rubbing her back is ok sort of if she's in the right mood

but don't even think about touching that cute furry tummy

 i just want to get all in there, but it ain't happenin because i don't want to loose an appendage

Willow wants nothing more in the world than to go outside, but she's supposed to be an inside cat.

It seems so wrong not to let her out to walk in the sweet spring grass - she flings herself at the storm door trying to catch moths and get outside

it's sad and it just doesn't seem natural to me

have any of you ever tried an electric fence with cats?  

I'm thinking about it and could use some advice

and now i'm turning into a person who talks about their cat

sorry...

still ... electric fence with cats? anyone tried that?

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Anyway, the phlox and candytuft and viburnum are blooming and it is just all to die for... 

hope you all are having an amazing spring...

...the end...