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LoYoLife

What to do?

I’m signed up to go to rug hooking camp in June with

Heather Ritchie as my teacher, but I really have no idea

of what project I’d like to work on.

When I go to a workshop I like to try and take something

that I feel will be challenging for myself….rug camps are

good places to learn and stretch your creativity.

Here are a few ideas that I’m thinking of….

I like this piece above, it’s altered from a photo that I took

of Lonnie while I was walking him at the park a few years ago.

I love how the light is shining through the trees.  For me,

I think this would be the challenging part of the rug and I’ve

seen one of Heather’s rugs where she has light shining from

a street lamp. (You can see that rug HERE).

The picture of the distressed butterfly house and foliage

is another option….I like how it’s a bit abstract…another

technique I’ve not explored.

I really love this altered photo of Lonnie as well, but honestly,

I think I could do a fair job of hooking this on my own.

 

The next two are altered photos that I’ve taken as well,

but I just don’t think they are personal enough to warrant

spending that much time on, although I do think

they are very beautiful.

How do you decide what to hook when you go to camp?

Egg on my Face

This is what happens when you ASSUME

or

This is what happens when you have a BLONDE moment

or

This is what happens when you read something and interpret

it incorrectly

or

This is what happens when you are bamboozled.

 

 

I feel a little bit of all of those things right now.

I just found out, with the sponsored giveaway, that

they (Artisoo) choose a blog winner from the blogs promoting their

art, and THAT blogger and that blogger’s winner are the

only ones who get the paintings…..

I was not the winning blogger, which means

NO PRIZE for anyone here.

Don’t worry TRISHA….you WILL get a prize….it will just

NOT be the painting.

Feeling bummed and a bit bamboozled.

And the Winner IS…….

TRISHA

I ended up using a number generator from

Random.org to pick the winner.

Everyone left such wonderful comments!

Thanks for playing!

Trisha will be receiving Claude Monet's

“San Giorgio Maggiore at Dusk”

compliments of

My choice is Georgia O’Keeffe’s “Cup of Silver Ginger”.

I’m a sucker for those chartreuse colors!!

I hope to have more giveaways in the near future!!

I can’t wait to see, when we get the paintings, if they are as

wonderful as they sound on the website….I certainly hope so!!

 

Didn't win? Don't despair!

If you really like the paintings they would like to offer a $30 coupon

(coupon code: 30GIVEAWAY) as an apology gift.

The $30 coupon can be used in purchasing any paintings on

Artisoo.com while it cannot be combined with any other

offers and discounts offered by artisoo.com.

It will be expired in 1 month, please just enter the coupon code

during checkout.

This is a sponsored post from 4sponsor.com with my unbiased thoughts.

A Taste of the South

Believe it or not, this blog post is NOT about food.

It’s about my darling husband, Kenny, and my wonderful

friend, Patti.

When we visited Patti in Florida last year, Kenny was quite

taken with all of the air plants and Spanish moss hanging

from the trees in Patti’s neighborhood.

A few days ago a huge package arrived in the mail and now

this is what our weeping pine looks like.

Thanks Patti for sending the moss…..Kenny was like a little kid

at Christmas decorating his tree!

Also, don’t forget that today is the last day to enter the giveaway

for the free painting. Go HERE to enter. Drawing is on May 20th.

I Spy

Last week, when we were opening the pool, I went into the shed

to get some pool chemicals.  While I was in there I kept hearing

cheeping.  We have a little bird house on the front of our shed, but

it sounded like it was coming from inside.

On further inspection, I found that it WAS coming from inside the

shed.

Inside this bag of bags that Kenny keeps for weeding.

Today I was able to get a good picture of the babies.

I think there are four of them…baby wrens.  First time the

birds have made a nest INSIDE the shed….mama is coming in and

out through a hole in the back of the shed, but the temps have

been rather hot, so we’ve been leaving the door open

for her so her babies don’t get too hot.

Just goes to show….you never know what kind of surprises

you will find when you are doing your daily chores.

Happy Mother’s Day!

 

Lonnie and Buzzbee are so thoughtful!!

Another redo!

Back in 2007, I decided to paint our porch white…..it went

from this

to this

I loved it at the time that I re-did it.

However, little did I know at the time….I would have to repaint

it every single year….what a chore!

(I’ve found out that I should NOT have used latex paint….it draws

moisture and that makes it bubble and peel, every year)

We also had a really hard winter and had to use lots of salt on

the front steps (which I’ve never liked because they are really

odd to walk up, due to the different sizes in the heights of the

bricks) and they are starting to deteriorate.

Right now, the porch looks like this…

The paint is peeling, the bricks are deteriorating, the lattice

is falling apart (isn’t home ownership fun?!)

We’ve decided to have the porch totally ripped off and redone

with flagstone and a bigger sitting area. The flagstone will

go from the house all the way out to the row of hostas and

it will be level with the driveway, so the porch will be not

so much a porch, but a large sitting area.

The man who is going to be doing this wanted to see what,

exactly, was underneath the porch.  We did know that the

existing porch was built OVER an old porch.

So, he sawed out pieces of boards to see what was underneath.

Okay, he took out several boards.

(Don’t you love our temporary mail box?!)

There is a huge piece of concrete (a landing) in front

of the door, that goes almost out to the brick steps.

Underneath the window, there is a Roman stone planter.

We’ve decided to keep and use both, if the integrity of

the pieces are good.

We like “re-doing” things, but it’s fun to try to stay with the

integrity of an older home.

We’ve chosen Oklahoma blue flagstone, which looks like this

I’ll share more pictures as progress is made.

Once again, don’t forget to enter my GIVEAWAY….to enter

click on the picture below to go to the giveaway post.

Goings Ons

Goings Ons…..is that even correct?!

Oh well, this is just a little of the “goings ons” happening

here at home.

The weather has inched into the 90’s for a few

days and now we’re back in the comfortable 70’s.

YAY!

The flowers are loving it!

We have a few poppies out by the street and they are beginning

to bloom….these are truly one of my favorite flowers!!

So papery and delicate, yet so roguely rough!

The alliums in the same patch are gorgeous as well!

We also have columbines blooming.

The lush, girly peonies are opening up…..

I love the layers of flowers on the side of the house, near

the gate….rhododendrons….

bleeding hearts….

We’re starting on a new project….replacing our front porch…

will share pictures of that tomorrow….it’s a mess now, but

hopefully it will be beautiful when it’s finished.

 

Click below to enter the

Drawing will be May 20th!

Giveaway time!!

I’m kind of excited……..

I’m having my first “give away” on my blog!!!

I’ve come across a great website called

They have hand-painted oil painting reproductions of popular paintings.

(You are supposed to be able to see the brushstrokes, and the

canvas comes ready to hang.)

So, not the ORIGINAL,

AS IF

we could afford an ORIGINAL master painting,

BUT, it’s not a print either….

somewhere in the middle….

I think that’s kind of cool!

They also have FREE SHIPPING and FREE RETURN SHIPPING!

All you have to do to enter is to leave a comment on my blog

saying which painting below is your favorite!

Easy Peasy!!

And you just might win!

Please choose your favorite:

You can click on the name to see a larger picture

of the painting and you can even see what it looks like

hanging in a room.

1.  Fishing Boats At Sea

2.  A Dream

3.  Cup of Silver Ginger

4.  San Giorgio Maggiore at Dusk

5.  Wheat Field with Cypresses

6.  The Birth of Day

Winners are chosen by comments, so please remember to comment!

Choose one painting that you like best from the six paintings mentioned

in my blog post and make a comment.

1 winner will be chosen after 2 weeks;

blog owner (that’s me!!) and winner both get a prize - 1 piece of hand-painted oil

painting reproduction (costing about $100 at specified size)

which you comment that you like best.

There are 6 pieces, and you can choose any one of them,

at the specified size in the photo, you will not be charged for shipping.

 

I know which one is MY FAVORITE, but I’m not telling!! I’m curious to see

what YOUR favorite is!!

This is a sponsored post from 4sponsor.com with my unbiased thoughts.

Highlight reel vs. Behind the scenes

“The reason we struggle with insecurity is because we compare

our behind-the-scenes with everyone else’s highlight reel.”

 

Do you struggle with this?

I must confess, that on occasion, I do.

Blogs and Pinterest and Facebook certainly don’t help,

but what can I say, I’m addicted.

I think we all want the “perfect life” or perhaps

what we think is the “perfect life”.

I love to post pictures of Kenny’s gardening….

it’s his passion.  Here is a picture of a new garden area

that he has been working on.

I think it’s lovely and I just know that the birds will like having

another bird bath to splash around in this summer.

Here’s Lonnie enjoying another area of the garden.

What you don’t see in these pictures are what is going on

“behind the scenes”….

Pool being opened up, murky water,

assorted “stuff” strung everywhere, concrete that needs

to be power washed.

I guess, today, I’m just checking in and trying to “keep it real”.

I want you to know that in all the garden pictures, if you look

closely, you’ll see wild violets, wild strawberries, dandelions,

etc.

If you live in a perfect world, kudos to you, as for me, I just

prefer to “crop” out the not so pretty parts.

Mr. Runt

Yay! Mr. Runt has found a home.  I just knew that someone

would fall in love with that face….he just reminds me of

a dog that has been loved for a while and then tossed to

the side….thank goodness someone else has found it in

their heart to adopt this precious soul!

Good luck Runt!

 

I found this really interesting….click on the title if you are

interested

21 Facts About Dogs That Will Blow Your Mind