new project

I just spent the last 3 weeks doing a full-time temp job and I had to dress like a grownup every single day. Wow, that was hard. So this is the picture I took on Saturday morning rejoicing in the fact that I finally got to be me again - lace, jeans and a hat. What a relief.

I'm sure the whole grownup/job thing will happen again soon (I'm not fond of temping but there doesn't seem to be much interest in my resume these days) but for now I have a few days free to hang out at home and that means it's time for a new painting project.

I got a pair of these awesome cabinet doors at Camp Vintage this year. I plan on repurposing them into jewelry organizers. At first I thought I wouldn't paint them at all because I love that mint green color but I have a couple of different ideas now.

Over the weekend I asked Mr. T to help me move this table over to the patio so that I could set up a nice workspace with plenty of room.

I've got all my supplies together and can't wait to get started!

Charlie, on the other hand, would prefer it if I would stop moving around and just hang out on the couch with her.

it's Camp Vintage time

It's that time of year again - time for the Camp Vintage antique show!

Camp Vintage debuted in September of 2013. It was also the first time I ever attended a vintage show so I wasn't quite sure what to expect but what I found blew my socks off...if I had been wearing socks...which I probably wasn't.

Love is not too strong a word for the emotion I felt when I entered my first Camp Vintage. I felt like I had come home. All the booths had something I wanted - an old window here, a rusted wagon there, a bunch of shutters, old luggage, a door from an old truck - big freakin' sigh of pure ecstasy!

Mr. T, however, wasn't as enthralled. All the words you and I love about shabby chic - chippy, peely, vintage, rusted, distressed - are words that mean only one thing to him. O.L.D.

But now he's watched me take several old, broken down pieces of furniture and, with a little paint and love, turn them into something beautiful for our home so for this year's Camp Vintage, he was actually looking forward to finding something fun to take home and junkify it.

There was so much going on at this spring's Camp Vintage, I actually forgot to take pictures. I think that's a good thing. I mean, I was having a great time and had several things that were under consideration to buy but it kind of sucks now when I have to put together a blog post.

So enjoy a couple of pictures of pretty flowers...cuz that's about all I've got from this year's show.

until I found exactly what I wanted to buy

I bought a couple of old cabinet doors with a really unique wicker design at the top that would be perfect for hanging earrings. I miss my jewelry organizing shutter back in Florida so it's time to make another one. I don't even have to do much painting with this, I love the minty green color and the 1940s styling. love.love.love.

Of course, it's been a couple of weeks since Camp Vintage and they're still sitting, untouched, in the living room but let's not think about that right now. Let's just keep looking at the pretty pictures and count the days till the next Camp Vintage in September.

i'll be shuttered

Welcome to a brand new month - Happy June! I've got to admit that my May was a bit of a roller coaster - some good, some bad, some terrific, some...well, bad. But the month is over now and it's time to look toward the future.

I have a bunch of blog posts planned for this week because there's lots to talk about but I need to do it in order so hang on, it's going to be a thrill ride!

 Remember that shutter that I bought at the Fancy Flea in late April? I had great plans for using it as a jewelry organizer but first I needed to make a few changes to make it more "me" so it became my first Florida project.

Before I could begin painting I had to set up a workspace. I drug an old, broken table out of the garage. This was a leftover from when we rented out our house to vacationers. See how nicely they took care of it? This was a beautiful painted table for the entry hallway but one day it became a crash site and it's been relegated to the garage ever since. I'm quite handy with repairs, see how I fixed it? Ok, it's not pretty but it worked!

hey look, I painted the shutter blue. Didn't see that color coming, did you? 

I do have other colors of paint (as you'll see in my next project) but blue was what I really wanted for this project plus I was missing my blue benches in California. 

It took 2 coats of white primer to hide all the dark burgundy (and keep it from bleeding through) and that part seemed to take forever but finally I got to start with the blue.

The great thing about having a dedicated craft space (rather than using the dining room table the way I did in California) is that I could take my time and leave everything out while I waited for the paint to dry completely. 

Oh who am I kidding, it's not like we ever ate at the dining room table in California but it sounded good, didn't it? I'll bet I had you fooled for at least a minute or two.

And voila - the finished product!

I am thrilled with the way it turned out, exactly as I pictured it on that hot April day at Fancy Flea. Not having much experience with painting or crafting in the past, it's a real victory for me to be able to say that. Plus it really helps to keep my necklaces and earrings in order rather than having them all jumbled together in a basket.

yay me!

I had so much fun, I couldn't wait for my next project. More on that tomorrow.

jonni

beyond the garden gate

Have I ever told you about where I work? I don't think I have. 

If you follow me on Instagram you would know that I work in one of the most beautiful places on the face of the Earth - Tor House. I post way too many pictures of this enchanted spot but it's hard to stop because every corner brings inspiration and the views are fantabulous.

Normally you have to pay for a guided tour but follow along with me as we go beyond the garden gate for a little peek.

The courtyard is magical in any kind of weather. It's not always sunny at Tor House, frequently the fog rolls in and surrounds us.

Abalone shells line the pathways to the cottage. Usually they sit in an orderly fashion but this particular day they were all scattered but there were no animal tracks so I can only conclude that the ghosts were having a wild party before I got there. Oh, did I not mention that Tor House is haunted? I haven't run into anybody but the TV show Ghost Adventures thinks they did. I will say that I have heard  noises that defy explanation.

Told you it was a beautiful place!

The quail are frequent and very welcome visitors in our courtyard.

There are many benches where you can rest and reflect.

This is the far end of the courtyard, looking out to the sea. What lies beyond?

More beauty than you can even imagine. We've recently begun a project to bring back the natural wildflowers that would have been there in Jeffers' time.

Would you like to see inside the cottage? Let me go find the key (yes, this is the actual key that I have to use each time I go in there) and we can go inside the next time you visit.

See you soon!

instagram me

Did you know that I'm on Instagram? Well I am...on Instagram. I am.

Sorry, I got caught up in a loop there. 

I'd love to have you follow me on Instagram though. I try to post at least one picture a day of something pretty. I do hope you'll join me over there.

in conclusion

I'm sure you've been asking yourself all week "what else did Jonni do to spruce up her little front stoop?" Ok, humor me and pretend that has been your first waking thought each morning. 

Here's a reminder of the way my front stoop looked originally.






















Then I added some fencing

What was I going to do next? I painted something, of course. 

Yeah, yeah, I know that to some of you crafters out there, just slapping a coat (or four) of paint on something isn't anything to get all excited about but for me, it's a pretty big deal. I don't have endless amounts of artistic creativity and most projects I've tried end up in the garbage so the idea that I can take something rather useless and make it pretty once again, well that's pretty darned exciting in my book. 

Enter the mini bench.

This had been buried in our backyard for years and was looking pretty drab after spending so much time out in the elements. I still had a whole lot of that blue paint leftover from my first painting project and it was just going to waste so I decided, why not?

Plus I had a "new" toy to play with because we'd uncovered the mouse sander in a box in our garage. I was just itching to sand something!

So I gathered up all my favorite supplies and got to work sanding and painting. 

This was a fairly quick job, pretty easy because I didn't prime anything and used a mostly dry brush technique to keep some of the original wood showing through. All too soon the fun was over and I had a much improved little bench on my hands.

And then it was time to put all the pieces together.

Keep in mind that I would dearly love to get rid of the water-stained green rug but that's not my call. Besides that, I think the whole effect is pretty cute and welcoming.

I really get a kick out of walking up to my front door now and the best part is that I can take all the pieces with me to the next Jasper's Cottage and recreate the look.

picket fences

I've always loved the idea of a sweet cottage surrounded by a white picket fence so you can imagine my joy when I moved into my own little picket-fence cottage a few years ago. It was like having a dream come true.

But I've never been particularly fond of our front entrance, it just needed a little something to spice it up. Inspired by my love of picket fences, I came up with a brilliant plan at the beginning of summer - I wanted to attach a miniature picket fence to the wall right outside the front door. The man of the place took a little convincing but soon enough we were off to the local home renovation store and found the perfect little edging fences. There was a large selection to choose from but eventually we chose the real wood ones even though they might need maintenance from time to time, mostly because they were the perfect price - all the materials we needed for under $10.

Before we got a chance to attached the fencing to the wall, we learned that it wouldn't be in our best interest to make any alterations to the house so my project was on hold. Every day I'd go in and out of the front door and think how empty that space looked.

Then, one day, I got another brilliant idea - I am just full of it brilliance, I tell ya! Why couldn't we nail the fencing to a narrow piece of wood that could stand on its own right next to the exterior wall? That would serve 2 purposes, no walls would be harmed AND we could take it with us when we left. Perfect.

 

We found a perfect board out behind a shed in the backyard and the man of the place got right to work sanding it. We measured the front and, low and behold, it fit perfectly in that space. A nail here and there and, voila, my little picket fence was ready!

Isn't that exactly what the space needed? 

But wait, there's more!

Operation Porch wasn't finished quite yet, Check back next week!

watch this space!

So this was my front "porch" at the beginning of the summer. 


Boring, right?

I had a whole bunch of plans to transform it based on ideas I'd gotten while reading some of my favorite blogs. After all, this was going to be my forever cottage so I wanted to really fix it up cute and put my own mark on it.

And then, in a stunning blow, we learned that this won't be our forever place after all. Oh, we're not moving out right away but by this time next year I wouldn't be surprised if Jasper's Cottage had a brand new address. It's taken me a couple of months to be able to think these thoughts without a few tears but I'm ok with it now.

But even though it was now impractical to make any changes to the actual exterior of the house, I still wanted to un-bore-ify this front entrance...without spending any money or making holes in the walls or make any changes that couldn't be put back to the original immediately. Sigh.

Does that pique your interest? (I had to look that up to make sure I was using the correct word )

Tune in tomorrow (same cottage time, same cottage channel) to see if I was up to the challenge!

the kitchen project - one year later

A year ago I came up with this great idea. Wouldn't it be fun to spend days and days, including a holiday weekend, sanding and painting our kitchen cabinet doors? Ok, I never really thought it would be fun but I was so tired of looking at our VERY orange kitchen.






The only thing I liked about the kitchen was the pink tiled countertop but I kinda hated the way the pink tiles clashed with the orange that ran rampant everywhere else.

So we sanded and painted and installed new hardware. I may have complained one or two tiny little times during the process but I knew we were creating something wonderful even after the first day.



And now, even after a whole year has passed, I still get a goofy grin on my face when I walk into my little cottage kitchen. It's still absurdly small with almost no counterspace but it's bright and light and cozy and cute. Best of all, what was once just a vision in my head is now a reality.