An Attache

There are those things that you buy from time to time that you never thought you needed, or even wanted for that matter.  The other day, it was a wicker attache case with leather handle and brass hardware.

The three of us saw her in an antique store (the babies and me) and by majority vote we decided to buy her for $32. 

For something that I didn't know I needed, or didn't even want, and for something I'll probably never use, I thought that it was a bargain! 

What do you think? 

Shall I schedule a business meeting? 

Probably not, but maybe I should use it to bring my laptop somewhere...like a cafe. Or more practically, from upstairs to downstairs (for very important breakfast negotiations).  

Photos by Hubby.

Peony Tulips

I brought home a bouquet of peony tulips, a variety I've never seen before. It's a proper marriage I think because tulips and peonies are such close companions in a blossoming spring garden.  

I panned out so that you could meet my other photography assistant - my dining room mirror! She stands in when Mike isn't home to assist but let me tell you that she's not nearly as fun to 'work with.' I have to keep her clean, she only works during certain day time hours and her conversation is always quite bland. 

Hubby is much more perky and requires much less maintenance. 

Mr. Handy

I recently came across some old photos that had a very familiar theme - Mike working on the house! 

This photo brings me back! To think of all the work we had ahead of us - thankfully, we were completely oblivious!

Mike is doing a mock-up of what the porch roof would look like. We did a lot of mock-ups like this as we didn't have an architect so the only way to come to any conclusions on building details, like roof pitch in this case, was to play around with it visually. This was mostly for my sake as I think I need three dimensional visuals. 

He mocked up two different roof pitches and I remember standing at different distances from the house to be sure that the end of the porch roof (porch eaves) didn't come down over the windows on the front of the house. 

The gravel was something our contractor put around the house while they were working in order to keep the mud down. It was a great idea but something we had to deal with later on when we started working on the yard. 

After the contractor built the porch roof, Mike painted the porch fascia before the contractor arrived to finish the porch trim. I remember that we accidentally used flat instead of semi-gloss so it had to be done twice!

The is when Mike still smiled for me while working on the house!

I have yet to post on our house entry. Mike did all the hard scape (pathway and stairs). After he built the stair mold, a concrete truck came and poured the concrete. Mike then adhered our concrete pavers over it to simulate rock steps. 

 Putting in the pathway was a turning point as up until that point, we were using small square blocks, which seemed even smaller when it was rainy and muddy. To get up on the porch, we were using wobbly beams. Both were things left over from all the construction. I'll do a proper post on this project soon. 

Our vision for the dining patio was ambitious! This is what we started with and again, I just feel so exhausted thinking about all the work ahead of us. The patio took an entire summer for us to complete. Mike did all the surveying (he's a professional engineer), leveling, building, etc. 

After the retaining wall was built, he built a mold for the stairs. The stair mold was moved into place under the french doors. The mold for the front porch was built at the same time so that the concrete could be poured in one morning. 

Mike uses a lot of math when he's working on his projects. It's amazing to me, being more of a left brain person, that he can write down a bunch of complex equations and come up with amazing results. 

The projects are for the most part behind us thankfully but the photos are a reminder of how much work Mike has put into this house. He's worked most weekends, evenings and throughout entire summers.  

Finding these photos makes me realize how many photos I haven't included in my renovation before and after posts. I'd like to work on updating those not with just more photos but more detail on the resources we used and things we learned along the way. 

Blossoming Landscape

As we drive through the valley this time of year, we never tire of the blossoming landscape.
Their presence is fleeting so you must try and commit as many scenes to memory before the landscape springs to green.

Have a wonderful weekend! 

Spring Roses

I will resist another tall tale on how we acquired this David Austin rose. The truth is, I picked it out and made Hubby buy it for me. Although he buys flowers for me on special occasions, I also buy flowers for myself often. I buy a lot of flowers!

He does however comply quite graciously with my requests to hold flowers so that I can take pictures of them. He ends up holding many other things too...cast iron skillet, a box of cherries, toast with jam, carrots, and the list goes on. I sometimes even request a wardrobe change (into a white t-shirt)! 

This rose is called Campanella. The florist at the New Seasons Market we frequent gave her to me because I was so taken by her beauty. I thought that was so nice of her.

As you can see, once again Hubby's photo assistance necessitated a wardrobe change. He is so patient with me. Nonetheless, since the babies arrived I've also had to take many more photos without his assistance. The poinsettia, the tulips, and the Easter basket were all pictures that I took of my reflection in our dining room mirror! 

I think by the time I took a picture of the Easter basket, I thought to clean the mirror. Oops. 

Yellow Ranunculus

As I was paying for our groceries at the grocery store yesterday, off in the distance I heard someone yelling quite frantically, "Wait, wait, wait!"

Lo and behold it was Hubby. As he got closer, I could see that he was grasping two bunches of beautiful yellow ranunculus to his chest.

Thrusting the flowers at the cashier, he turned to me with exasperated relief and said, "I can't believe I almost forgot the flowers!"

I think I'm remembering this story correctly...


Note: After reading several comments, I should clarify that I was totally kidding in my account of who played which roles in our flower purchase.  ; ) Although I think Hubby enjoys pretty flowers, I don't think the day will ever come (bless his heart) that he will initiate their purchase!  ; )

White Ranunculus

Grocery store flowers - $7.99. 

I would have bought more but Hubby was with us.

When I added them to the already overflowing cart, I said, "I believe you specifically requested white ranunculus on our grocery list...that's right, don't forget pretty white ranunculus."

He doesn't remember writing such a thing. 

xo

Lily of the Valley

We were beside ourselves with excitement (Graham, Margaret and I) after stumbling across Lily of the Valley at our favorite grocery store in Portland last week. 

They smell so beautiful. 

Although very pretty as they were, I thought I'd dress them up a bit for the Easter holiday. Luckily the grocery store also had baskets, so we knew exactly what we'd do when we got home. 

After lining the basket with plastic for watering, we added a ribbon, a little nest and a layer of moss. 

I've always loved live Easter baskets with growing grass or live flowers. However, we agreed (Graham, Margaret and I) that the live basket was a little too grown up for our curious little 15 month-old selves...we still like putting everything into our mouths - whether interesting, pretty or just plain curious. 

xo

A New Orchid to Love

This orchid has come home to live with us. 

I'm crossing my fingers that those lovely closed buds open up into blossoms. 

I would love to find out who makes these beautiful nest-like containers. 

They are the perfect compliment to the orchid. 

My Grandmother

I've spoken a lot about my Grandmother on my blog so I thought it was about time I introduced her. My Grandmother was very, very dear to me, and was the only Grandmother I ever knew.  

Yesterday was her birthday, a day on which I find myself reflecting more than usual on the profound influence she had on my life. When I was a little girl, she nourished me with her unconditional love and adoration. As I grew to be an adult, she was a voice of strength, wisdom and love. Always love. 

In the photograph above, she stands by her beloved rose garden at her home in the hills of Studio City, California. 

My Grandmother was my father's mother. He was her only child, so my brother and I experienced the honor of being her only grandchildren. She lived as a widow for the last thirty years of her life after her husband, our Grandfather, passed away in his sixties.  

When I was around ten years old, I started to leave her little love notes each time we visited. I would slip away at the end of the evening before we headed home and would sit down at her desk to write some words of adoration for her to find after we left. This became a tradition of ours. 

These handwritten notes eventually grew into long letters when I moved to Maine to go to college. And therein began our love affair of writing long letters to each other. Our long distance correspondance lasted for over a decade through my college years, after graduation, during my time in England, and continued after I returned to Maine to live for the subsequent seven years. 

My Grandmother had severe hearing impairment. She struggled with hearing her entire life, and I know that it affected her deeply in many ways. She told me that when she was young, she wore a large, battery-operated device with headphones in order to help her communicate verbally. By the time I was born, hearing devices had improved, so she was able to hear better with the use of hearing aids. But her hearing was a constant struggle for her, especially in the latter days of her life 

Despite her hearing impairment, she graduated from UCLA (University of California at Los Angeles) where she earned a degree in business. For her to graduate from UCLA despite a hearing impairment, and as a young woman in the 1930s, was quite an accomplishment which must have required incredible determination and patience. While she was at UCLA, she also gained a penchant for college athletics - she was a devoted UCLA Bruins football fan for all of her days!

She used to amaze my brother and I with her stories of walking through the long rows of the cornfields that she passed between her family home in the Hollywood Hills and the campus. That was incredible to imagine when we were kids in the 1970s and 80s. 

She suffered from dimentia during the last ten or so years of her life. This was hard for all of us. But for all of the short term memory that alluded her, she was given the gift of absolute clarity in recollections of her youth. She loved telling stories about growing up with her parents and all of the things that they did together. It was wonderful to witness because it was obviously a very happy time in her life. And ironically, I think reliving her role as her parents' only child was comforting for her as she grappled with the vulnerability of her memory loss and aging. 

The last time I saw my Grandmother, Mike and I were standing in her bedroom at her home in the hills. She was being attended to by a nurse by that time. We stopped by for a quick visit on our way out of town after visiting for the Christmas holiday. She looked at me standing next to my new husband Mike and said, "Oh my darling, you look so grown up standing there." 

She passed away that following spring at the age of ninety three. She lived a long and wonderful life but I miss her so.

When my mom and I were closing up her estate, I came across several large three ring binders tucked safely away in her closet. I took one out and sat on the bed to look at it. What I saw took my breath away. Resting in little protective plastic sleeves were all of the letters, photographs and postcards that I had sent to her over the the course of our correspondance, including those first little love notes I left for her when I was a little girl. 

These items that were accumulated over many years were the story of my life, and she held it so very dear. I don't think I've ever felt such utter adoration and love in my entire life. She gave me the most wonderful gift and I will never forget it. 

Yesterday, I went through some of her old letters. It's been about seven years now since she passed and as I read her words once again I was reminded of how beautiful and special she was. Her letters were so lovely. She made the most ordinary things in life sound like poetry. 

I will cherish her words forever. 

Her name was Margaret. 

Pink Tulips

I brought home our first bouquet of tulips for the season. 

Happy Weekend Dear Friends

Butterfly Dreams

We hung a garland of Monarch butterflies over Graham's crib and he loves them. 

Their glowing orange wings are a-flutter over sweet baby dreams. 

The nursery has evolved into Graham's room for the most part, where he sleeps at night and during his naps. Margaret is still sleeping in the crib upstairs. We're never really in here otherwise, except to change diapers on the changing table and to get clothes from the armoire. 

All of their toys are in the living room because it's more centrally located and also much bigger to explore - and they are exploring. Both are now walking and it is absolutely adorable. They are keeping me on my toes!  

Here are a few noisy friends of ours...

What's a monkey say? Ooh-ooh-ooh....Ahh-ahh-ahh

What's an owl say? Whoooo - Whoooo

xo

Down the Road in Late Winter

At this time of year, as quickly as the snow comes...it goes. We've had a couple of glorious days recently that have felt tantalizingly like spring, with that perfect combination of new warmth and lingering chill, and just a little bit of a sweet fragrance in the air. 

Along one of the roads to our house, the fruit trees are still sleeping, with cherries to the left and pears to the right. It won't be long before they show signs of awakening. In just over a month, the valley will be resplendent with white-pink blossoms, a sure sign of spring and one of our favorite times of year.

Mt. Adams in southern Washington is the mountain that we see from our property. Some days it feels like it is right there. It is, however, across the Columbia River from us here in Oregon. 

Magnolia Blossoms

I brought home a bunch of magnolia branches on our last trip into Portland. They already had beautiful pink buds, which the florist thought would soon open as blossoms. But either from the trip home, or because I didn't clip the ends sufficiently before I put them in water, only a few of the buds opened fully into their sweet blossoms. 

As you can see, I take many of these closeup pictures on our kitchen shelf. The window provides good lighting on these grey winter days. But also, I can multi-task as the babies have their snack and watch me take photos. I'm sure that one day they'll lose this curiosity...but for now, they seem to enjoy watching mama with her clicking toy. 

Inspiration for our nest

I love bird nests. They are such beautiful works of art, with each one so unique, and each one woven with different found objects from nature. I started a small collection of nests when I lived in Maine. When I was packing up to return west, I gave my collection to my dear neighbor, who had a collection of her own. 

My husband Mike comes across a lot of abandoned nests when he's in the field for work. All of these nests are ones he has brought home to me over the years, which I tucked away for safe keeping. 

They are all so distinct, equally rugged yet graceful. Each fragment of their construction is so fragile on their own, yet woven together they collectively become strong.

This wirey nest is woven together with a mix of fine thread-like branches, what looks to be horse hair, with a little fishing twine thrown in for good measure. I found the robin's egg on one of our walks. On its back is a sweet little hole from which the robin chick popped out. 

This nest is an intricately woven wheat vessel.

 I love the wheat flower tucked in along the rim. 

Plastered with dry dense mud on its exterior, this clay nest is sturdy and strong. Feathery golden grass blankets the interior.

The plastered exterior. 

When Mike brought me this moss nest, it was almost electric green. Even now, several years later, it still smells like the damp lush Pacific Northwest woods. 

The downy moss. 

This is a Maine nest. It was the very first that I collected, and it is the only one I brought with me when I moved back west. She is one of my most sentimental momentos from Maine, reminding me of the many hours I spent in the Maine woods. 

This nest also reminds me of my dear neighbor in Maine. When I gave her my collection of nests, she shared with me a story about her mother who had recently passed away. Her mother loved birds, and made it her practice to always set the hair from her brush outside for the birds to use in their nests.

Her mother had been ill for several months and finally passed away in summer. By fall, my neighbor was closing her mother's estate and while walking in the garden, noticed a bird's nest visible through the barren autumn trees. When she looked closer at the nest tucked safely between the cradling branches, she saw that the sweet little nest was woven with beautiful white shimmering strands of her mother's hair. 

I'll never forget that story, especially when I see a nest and recognize all of the beautiful unique items used to create it. 

As someone who is passionate about the warmth and coziness of our home, I admire and respect the birds loving devotion to creating a warm and safe place to cradle their young. 

Flowering Quince

The quince branches are blossoming. 

I love their sweet pink blossoms. 

Spring Flowers and Some Visitors

Against the dull grey skies of winter, the azalea is luminous in spring color. I couldn't resist bringing this one home from our local grocery store the other day. Wrapped with bright red cellophane, I think it was left over from Valentine's Day. I removed the wrapping and gave it a new home in this 

wicker and tin planter. 

The other morning we also had some visitors who refreshed our perspective, even though they were here for just a few moments. In the early morning light we caught a glimpse of our local elk herd migrating along the edge of our field. About seventy strong, these majestic creatures gave us an intimate glimpse into, and a reminder of, the larger world of wonder outside our door.

I was able to get a quick photo, although the fallen branches from our winter ice storm several weeks ago obscured the herd. These elk have migrated through our property since long, long before we arrived. They reminded us that, in a sense, we are the real visitors on this land. 

It was one day in a whole year. And within that day, it happened for just a few brief minutes.  We were  lucky and just happened to be looking out the window when the seventy or so elk streamed through, ever so quietly. It was a beautiful thing to witness, and makes us so very humble to be a part of this great glorious world filled with so many majestic and amazing creatures. 

Chocolate

In the spirit of Valentine's Day (but mostly due to my enduring fondness for baked goods), I made chocolate muffins. These are gluten free and although we are not a gluten free household, we do enjoy varying our diet as often as possible. 

The recipe comes from the book,"Gluten Free Baking Classics" by Annalise Roberts, which I've posted about before. 

Chocolate Ricotta Muffins 

1 1/4 cups Brown Rice Flour Mix 

1/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder

1/2 cup granulated sugar

1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1/4 teaspoon xanthan gum

1/4 teaspoon salt

2/3 cup semisweet chocolate chips

1 large egg

1/2 cup ricotta cheese 

2/3 cup milk

2 tablespoons canola oil 

2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract 

Preheat oven to 350 degrees Farhenheit. 

Whisk flour through salt in large mixing bowl. 

Whisk egg through vanilla in smaller mixing bowl. 

Pour egg mixture into flour mixture and combine until well blended. Don't over beat. 

Spoon batter into greased muffin pan and place in center of oven. 

Bake 18 - 20 minutes. 

Or until inserted toothpick comes out clean. 

Cool on wire rack. 

The only unique ingredients for this recipe are the brown rice flour mix (which you can find in the gluten free section of your grocery store) and the xanthan gum. All the rest of the ingredients are pretty standard. 

Happy Valentine's Day

xo