Souvenir plates and Shell Collections

 

Happy Friday everyone!

I'm not one to rush the season--I like to savor each day for what it is, what joys it may offer. I love waking up to bright summer sunshine and thinking "let's get things done today!"

My home is all blue and white and will remain so thru September. I love summer!~ [That said, right now it's too hot for me and Mo to walk or have deck hour, that will be later...]

The other week I put up my shell collections and blue and white souvenir plates. No vacation or travel this year--- oh how I miss family days, Cape Cod Augusts---but I enjoy the transferware souvenir plates. They date as early as late 1800s to just made in China last week.

The really good examples are gifts, Statue of Liberty and Cape Cod.

The c. 1960s Chicago is fun. We lived near there when I was growing up. Gifted from my brother.

Note the famous Marshall Field's clock and other familiar places.

I try to only pick up places I have been or interest me to visit someday.

Other pieces sneak in, like this vintage Tiffany Beach Ball plate. "Seaside" is, I think, the pattern name.

Summer daisies, like our September Montauk daisies, a mid century English plate.

A modern but cute and colorful Cape Cod. I love the border details, shells and lobsters.

And my little doll size pitcher collection.

Then some seashell jars and white ironstone jugs.

Small dish from blog friend Penny, Spode? With recent special finds

The coffee table with my fave wicker pineapple and this year a few floats and extra pretty flea market found shells.

The Swedish bench, holding shell strings rescued from TS Debby's winds and the big bowl of Scottish carpet balls [a few modern finds mixed in].

More shell strings hung on the plate rack. I try to make one each year with the winter's finds, though i usually give them away.

And this messy corner holds some of my seaglass collection. I'm looking for another tall jar at Home Goods or the church fair to combine the jars and make them look neater. Of course I have more! A lavender jar, a pottery jar, a cobalt jar, a tiny bottles jar, my mom's Lake Erie and Elizabeth Islands jars etc etc. 

I've asked when I die that these jars be returned to the ocean along with my ashes. Then when someday a grandchild or great grand holds a bit of treasured seaglass in their tiny hands, they'll think of me and wonder it this once was mine. Silly I know--

Off topic, What to do with all those tomatoes you grew or bought at the farmers market? [internet photo]

Make Fried Tomatoes!

Here's a fun traditional/ old fashioned country food recipe from my family. We'd have it once or twice a summer with corn on the cob, fresh picked ten minutes ago at the farm down the road. Good times. [Don't dredge in cornmeal unless you do not want gravy. Even then it's better if you mix the cornmel with white flour.]

Have wonderful August weekend! 

love

lizzy

gone to the beach....

PS the zinnies are late but doing better. Mo is loving early mornings in their shade. 

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I have seen butterflies finally! A bluette, an unusual Admiral with a black and white underside, and playful white cabbages that always come in pairs, spiraling happily in the flowers and fountain's spray. [internet photo]

August

 Hi! It's a lovely cool grey day here today---even a speck or two of rain maybe?--unheard of for August at the beach. I'm looking forward to a day or two in the little sewing room, prepping a few Noah's Ark blocks, a Sara S. hearts block, and cutting the binding for Winter Marsh. We may get some dregs of H Debbie so maybe more than one indoor day?

This morning Mo and I were out early and sidewalk scavenged some windblown hydrangeas. A bit muddy, but so pretty, even tho their brilliant blue has faded.

Most mornings now are hot and breezy. I love going out to greet the day on my deck, the air is so sparkly and sweet like summer honey. I adore my tiny fountain, tinkling away. It attracts bees, butterflies and Mr and Mrs Sparrow. I fill it each night so it's ready to go when the sun is high enough to start its solar battery mechanism.

Isn't it peaceful?

My flowers have been a disappointment. Only my first year here when my geraniums, too ambitiously potted out in May, all rotted and died, have I had such a poor showing. Not only are the blooms few and far between but the flowers are tiny. Why?

Last year:

This year:

The Zinnias were called something like Baby Buttons, I should have gotten a hint with that. Size of a dime!

Another set are single petalled, not much to look at tho the true red is fun.

And who knew Seashell cosmos would also be tiny, again the flowers are mini, smaller  than a nickel .[have not seen a nickel in years, do they still exist?]

One wildflower pot has basically nothing, just mud and the painted coreopsis. And the new pretty tangerine cosmos / coreopsis.

The other two have finally filled with green somethings but  there's a LOT of crabgrass and only a few tiny wildflowers peeping out. Maybe I'll get a late show of who knows what?

Tiny marigolds:

My friend has had poor results too. He has just a bare plot of mud where his wildly prolific tomato garden has flourished for the past three summers. But his flower beds are gorgeous. This is his hibiscus, size of a dinner plate. We think grown from seeds from blog friend Mel. It's hardy and had grown from a little sprout over the past four years.

.....................................

Off topic: I am surprised at so many people watching and taking an interest in the Olympics this summer. My mom loved the Olympics and I always thought it was so odd. Much as I admire the athletes their competitions bore me---maybe if there was Olympic thrifting? Flea-ing?  Imagine the Olympic thrifters set loose in the fabulous markets of France, on a marathon hunt for the most fabulous finds....

Have a wonderful August, savor every summery day! Even if it rains.

love

lizzy 

gone to the beach......

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Perpetual Nature Journal recent drawings. The  purple coneflower came out awful [ a  do-over, if I have energy. Even the best IG journalers paste over corrections now and then.]

And look at this. I am so proud of Mo, who has overcome his year long inexplicable fear of the sewing room! He is back in his bin. Okay he is laying on un-ironed Silent Night quilt top, but it still makes me so happy to have him by my side again.

Hope is a Pug in front of the AC that mom shut off to enjoy the summer day....