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Tuesday, April 30, 2013

Goats! PS


After I did my blog post on the goats, I remembered that I had my pictures of LaVonne on my FB page! I just HAD to include them with my goat blog, so here they are. Miss ya lots my friend.
We laugh and call each other the City Mouse and the Country Mouse and it works!


Goats!


Here it is the last day of April and the last of my photos from my trip to Tillamook! After our visit to the quilt museum, we had to walk across the street to see all the goats! The goats were looking for a hand out and came running when we got near the fence. Here's Nancy greeting them. SO exciting for us city girls you know!



Natalie was pulling the long grass and feeding them. She used to work with goats, so she was the experienced on in the group. She had a great story of sleeping with two baby goats, on on each side to  keep them warm, years ago. She's done so many things in her life-I am always amazed to hear another story I have never heard before!

 


Had to get the turkey. You can see there were chickens running around too. I didn't get a picture of the llama.

Years ago, my nephew raised goats in Illinois. His mom brought him out to Portland for a goat convention. I was in hysterics, a goat convention??? Very odd to this city girl. It was so fascinating to see his booklet and hear what he learned every night when they came back home. I sure would be more open to it all now. I do remember him showing me pictures of a goat cart and how they used goats for transportation in the woods. Interesting....

So I looked up some information on goat carts today and it's really interesting. I guess they were really popular in the 1800's and early 1900's for children. Lots of different types of carts...wicker and wooden. I found some fun vintage pictures to share. This first one is from Central Park in NY. Can you see the goat and goat cart in the middle?

I love this fancy cart and wonderful goat! Not sure the young lad wanted his picture taken!


This boy looks quite serious and knows what he's doing. His cart is like a little wagon.


Don't you love this one? Can you imagine taking a goat cart on the White House lawn for a photo shoot today? This was taken in the late 1800's.


This one is so cute. Can't you just hear someone saying to the kids...smile! Even the goat looks like it's smiling, or at least posing for the camera.


This is a cast iron goat and cart toy that I found. Pretty cute, but out of my price range.


I couldn't do this story without remembering Tasha Tudor. She kept goats and I have always loved this pictures. It's one you will often see. Just sweet.


The Tasha Tudor family is now selling boxed goat soap on their family website. I think the packaging is darling.


I have to mention my friend LaVonne in Montana. I need to get a picture of her milking her goats. I thought I had one, but just can't find it this morning. She loves her goats. She has some helpers staying on her property and they have been helping her milk them. I think she's a bit sad as that's something she really enjoys.

This last photo is a great way to recycle an old goat cart. Seems like people are using them for flowers. Great way to say goodbye April and hello May!


Sunday, April 28, 2013

Crafting Box Exchange!


Blogger friends, new and old, are just amazing. In January, I decided to reach out a bit and join some new groups and meet some new bloggers that would inspire and help me with my creativity. I joined the fun Easter Exchange and met sweet Erica of Golden Egg Vinatage. It's been fun to continue that friendship. So I decided to try again when Elizabeth of Creative Breathing set up a crafting box exchange. You were to decorate a box and fill it with goodied after you learned about your exchange partner. I was matched up with Jennifer at Adventures in Mixed Media. Jennifer is an amazing artist who lives in Canada and I had so much fun getting to know her. She was so sweet to send my my box weeks ago and I do believe I tested her patience a bit. I just didn't want to open my package from her until she received mine. I was a bit late sending it off to her due to my quilt retreat.
She learned that my studio is going to be decorated in bright ME colors and fabrics, so she decorated my box to match, complete with my name! It will be cute to use in my studio and I will remember Jennifer when I look at it!


The box was packed full of goodies. She packed things so well~everything arrived in perfect condition!


The excitement was building as I looked into the box and started to unwrap treasures.


For those blogger friends of mine who make cards, you'll enjoy this treat...complete with buttons and such a sweet note! I love the corners.


LOOK what was buried under the stuffed box of goodies....my name spelled out with vintage blocks!
Won't that be cute in my studio?


Adorable dolly in a tiny show, metal dishes and little ceramic kitties for my doll house.


I hope you can read the KINDESS sign as it is my favorite item in the box! It's going to hand in my tearoom as a reminder. It made me cry. Look at the dolly in her ribbon blanket! The little metal butterfly's wing move.


Vintage buttons, tea caddy, spoon, ornaments....I know she must have heard me squealing all the way to Canada! Jennifer has such lovely taste and was so very generous with her gift. Thank you so much dear blogger friend!


This little miss is just adorable. She's very heavy and a souvenir doll. Love the wooden shoe mold and the stack of vintage paper picture frames.


She also included an entire little sack of vintage paper ephemera of all types. So fun to look at and so inspiring!

And yes, vintage photos to enjoy, tuck here and there and use to create.


Jennifer, thank you so much and thank you for the opportunity to get to know you. I so enjoyed this exchange too. I hope you liked the goodies I sent to you...you sure spoiled me! I'm sure I didn't highlight everything you sent...so much to just look at and enjoy over and over! I look forward to our continuing friendship.


Thursday, April 25, 2013

Tea Time Thursday #13 Tillamook


I saved my blog post from last Saturday for my Tea Time Thursday today! We went to a delightful tea shoppe in Tillamook OR~ La Tea Da. Two friends have been running it for 13 years and the high tea is just fabulous. The food is yummy and the offerings are wonderful, as is the presentation.
The building is just plain but once you step inside, you are in another world. Is there anything more delightful than tea time with friends?


The sunlight was streaming into the tea room, so it was a bit tricky to get good pictures. Natalie and I are just admiring the goodies, the flowers, the tea cozies....just everthing.


Here's my other two special friends...Ann and Nancy! Don't you love the smiles on our faces?


The high tea presentation! Each of us got one of these lovely tea time towers...I do believe we could have split one with some pots of tea and been quite satisfied. We all took home a doggy box!


I loved the little sorbet cups. Nancy and Natalie brought us some little tea time treats.


The table cloths were just beautiful and I loved the heart shaped tea strainers. So pretty.


We had a great time, very relaxed and well worth the trip to the beach. If you want to have tea at La Tea Da's....you better do it in the next year. The friends are retiring after many years of hard work. They would like to sell the business, but they are not sure that will happen. So enjoy it  before it's gone.

Wednesday, April 24, 2013

ANTS!


We have lived here for almost 37 years and this is only the second time we've had a problem with sugar ants. The weather is very warm today-75-and every time it warms up, we have another invasion. I thought they were gone, sigh.
They are coming in by the patio door, so have some stuff that should take care of this gang soon.
I guess our mild winter has created quite a problem with the little critters.

Tuesday, April 23, 2013

A Visit to Latimer Quilt and Textile Museum


Last Saturday when I took a road trip with my friends to Tillamook Or on the Oregon coast for tea, we stopped at the Latimer Quilt and Textile Museum. I am the only quilter in the group, but this place is amazing and is so entertaining, you don't have to be a quilter to enjoy your time there. It's housed in an old school house which makes it all the more charming. Please take some time to visit if you are in the area. There is also a room devoted to weaving, spinning and knitting, so all the fiber arts are represented.Classes are offered and exhibits change throughout the year in the old auditorium, which still has the stage! Remember that from your childhood? You can become a member for $20 per year to support the museum and enjoy some of the extra's. Of course, there are always goodies to purchase...finished products, patterns, fabric and yarn.


Nancy had called ahead and discovered that the repository was opening again for 3 showing on Saturdays. You get to go behind the scenes and see some vintage quilts and other goodies in the back storage room. Quilts are carefully kept in wonderful boxes to preserve them.

Do you know what a BED TURNING is? They have a bed and it's layered with about 15 vintage quilts. The volunteers, with their gloves, go through the layers and turn them so you get to view the entire stack! Great way to see so much and it's just a fun way to flip through the quilts.

Here are some of my favorites to share with you. This first one was made from hexies that were soooo tiny. The little triangle blocks were only about 3 or 4 inches long, so the hexies were tiny. Everything was hand done. Get this....this was this lady's very first quilt! We all wondered if she ever made another quilt in her life!!!




Beautiful examples of hand applique. I was interested in these as I am just learning to hand applique.




The quilt below is quite old. They dated it to be about 175 years old. The really interesting thing about this one was the tiny tiny binding! I had never thought about bindings really. I guess that even can help you date a quilt.

You know how I like Sunbonnet Sue! This one was so sweet all in blues.The volunteer was telling us funny stories about people either liking or disliking Sunbonnet Sue. I can't imagine not liking Sunbonnet Sue. 


These are the special boxes used for storing the quilts in the climate controlled repository.


My eye spotted some dolls on a back shelf. They were new arrivals, so the lady didn't know much about them. The cornhusk dolls were so bright and really cute.

I liked the collection of paper mache dolls as their outfits were amazing. They were up on a shelf, so it was hard to get photos. They seemed to be dressed in different time periods, so I wonder if that was the dollmaker's plan.  I liked this one in the cream colored dress.


The back of this French Fashion doll's dress was amazing. Lots of work.


 These ladies were in a glass case so I got a bit of shine. An old fashioned quilting bee!


We were all fascinated with this quilt top. The entire thing was sewn on newspaper. Was this an early type of paper piecing?

 There were boxes and boxes of fabrics, of course. They will help you with a piece the right era if you are trying to repair a section of a vintage quilt. Of course, museums are not doing that, but individuals often wish to. Museums now are just placing a piece of netting over the area to stop it from falling apart yet not disturbing the original work or fabric.


I could have stayed ALL day but my friends had reached their limit and the museum was closing! Cannot wait to go back. So fun to live in quiltland for a bit!