Wrapping up November

     Hi everyone. Happy Friday. I hope everyone who celebrated Thanksgiving yesterday had a wonderful day and didn't eat too much.😏  And I hope everyone, everywhere has had a nice week so far.

     Due to a snowy weather forecast yesterday, we're celebrating Thanksgiving today when the roads will be better for driving. Not that we  got much snow,  but who knows how icy or bad any of the roads actually were. Plus it was a dark day so I'm glad I could spend part of mine reading all cozy on the couch.  I did make us a small turkey dinner with mashed potatoes, green beans and gravy, and the apple pie I made Wednesday was for our dessert, so I feel like I did do something useful. Grin.

  

     Before I officially move over to the Christmas season, let me first share a few poultry themed decorations I put out for November. The faces here are for Nicole's Friday Face Off . I'm also linking up to Gillena's  Friday Lunch Break.

     I've picked up these turkey items over the  years. None of them are heirlooms, at least the turkeys are not. It's interesting the collection I now have, and they are lots of fun to put out for a few weeks. 😏 

    And before I sign off of this post I want to wrap up Art Journal Journey for the month of November. Thank you Wendy for hosting.❤ I really loved the ocean theme. And let me also thank everyone who joined in. 

     My last page for the month is this looking down view on a cold shoreline. My scene could be northern New England or even areas of the Gaspe Peninsula I visited in September. If I added a bit of snow it could be a walk someplace near me. (But it will warm up enough today I think our snow will all melt.)

I painted most of this piece, except for all the trees which where die cuts that I doodled in some details, the seagulls which I drew with a Sharpie and the quotes which I stamped.

  Have a great weekend ahead. 

Happy Thanksgiving

 Hi everyone.

Happy Thanksgiving to those you celebrate today.

Today is one of my favorite holidays. I like it because it's low key, and it involves good food. 😏 

       We're actually celebrating tomorrow because of some snow, ice and rain coming in (or so the weather people say) this afternoon and clearing up over night. It's not worth the risk that the roads may be terrible since we're traveling over an hour to my sister-in-laws, and everyone can make it tomorrow when the roads should be fine.

    But let me mention the important thing about this holiday. (I know you know this, but I'm writing it anyhow-😏) It's the small things in life that make it so valuable and meaningful. I am grateful for many things, but rather than boring you with them, let me instead say thank you to all of your bloggers who visit my blog. You share so much good advice, tips, tricks, new ideas, great books, recipes, friendship, entertainment and also many other things I could go on about.

     However you spend your day, I hope you take a minute and find something to be thankful for. Life is too short not to. ❤

Mermaids

     Hi everyone. Happy middle of the week to you. Tomorrow is Thanksgiving here in the US, and today I get to be a domestic goddess getting some food ready. However  I'm not sure we'll be celebrating tomorrow since it sounds like we could get some snow, ice, rain and overall bad weather. We're supposed to go to my sister-in-law's home in Maine, but if the driving looks too sketchy, I think we'll be doing that on Friday instead. We'll have to see what the storm turns out to be and whether everyone can make it Friday or not. I'm going to do my baking today, so hopefully the forecast is wrong or Friday works for everyone.

 This is a short post. I just wanted to share another ocean themed page for Wendy's challenge at Art Journal Journey.

     I couldn't miss making a mermaid themed page  for an ocean challenge. ❤

     

     I made a background with 3 shades of blue watercolor paint. I then used some Art by Marlene fun punch outs for the mermaids and the fish. I attached the images, and then used some acrylic paint to create the seaweed bottom. I highlighted some of the seaweed fronds with some green Stabilo pencil.

     I finished by giving one of the mermaids a crown and adding bubbles around the fish. Then I stamped the quote and added a bit of glitter glue to the mermaids tails.

   That's all for me. An apple pie, pumpkin quiche and chocolate bread pudding are waiting to get made. Wishing everyone a wonderful day.

Time Again for Another New Challenge

Hi everyone.  It's time once again for another new challenge at Try It On Tuesday. 

Thank you to everyone who joined our Sparkle All the Way challenge, and thank you Denise from The Crafty Den for being our guest designer too. ❤

Since it is now late November and the holidays are not far off, our newest challenge is

Traditional Christmas.

     While searching for an idea, I came across 2 sets of stacked ornament dies in my stash, and that gave me the idea to make some holiday tags.

     I die cut the actual tags using either glitter paper or some assorted holiday paper. I also used some various colored ink pads on some of the tags to kick up the background a bit. A gold Sharpie came in handing for edging and coloring in the tops of the ornaments.

 

    The designs on the ornaments include some die cuts, some punch out printed images and also I pulled out a few old paper punches that I have. I also needed markers, glitter glue as well as some assorted flat back pearls. The words on a  couple of the tags were stamped and fussy cut.

    I had a lot of fun making these. I could have made a lot more if I had cut out more of the ornament shapes. I actually think I might make some more and add these on blank cards for my holiday mail. 

    Be sure to check out all the other holiday ideas on the Try It On Tuesday homepage. This time around there's a huge variety of art ideas. As always, our challenge runs for the next 2 weeks.

     I'm also linking these tags up to Creative Artiste Mixed Media Challenge blog for their #110 challenge.

     Have a great day, and thanks for stopping by. 

    

 

T Stands for Jardins de Matis

    Hi everyone. It's time for T again over at Bleubeard's and Elizabeth's blog. It's already the last T day of November,  and for us in the US we only have a few days until Thanksgiving, which doesn't seem possible.

     For today's post I am back in Quebec, It's the last day of our time in Canada, and that evening we'd pass over the international border back into the US, coming home through Vermont. (That will be next week's post.)

    Today's post is about a garden  and a historic home we visited called Jardins de Matis, otherwise known as Reford Gardens.  This property was the summer home of Elsie Reford, one of the last of a generation of wealthy "British" Anglophones in Quebec.  

     Elsie was quite the woman. She served in World War one, loved to go salmon fishing and hunting, enjoyed a good hike, traveled extensively and was certainly not very domestic. However, when she got into her 50's and had to give up some of her activities, she decided to put in a garden  at her summer home. She wanted the home and grounds to stay in the family , but due to all the changes in the world, her grandson couldn't afford to keep it up. The estate was passed to the Province of Quebec, where it is now a public garden.

      In the house (that had been the Reford's summer home) was a great exhibit about Elsie Reford, as well as a small art exhibit on the first floor. Before I show you some lovely late autumn blooms, let me share this next photo that goes to show you what type of woman Elsie actually was.

     Even if Elsie wouldn't want to be remembered for the gardens, I really enjoyed them. They were really lovely to walk around on this end of September day, and here are some photos of them. 

Here's a  view of the summer house from one side of the garden.

     After we left the gardens we had a few hours of driving to get to northern Vermont where we'd spent our last night away. Just so that we didn't arrive too late, we decided to grab some fast food for dinner. We saw several A&W's along the way, and we stopped at one to get a burger to go. I only ever remember seeing one A&W as a kid in my general area and I don’t believe I’ve ever eaten at one, so it was also fun to try something different. And for a fast food burger, it wasn't bad.

  

     Here's my drink that I had with my burger. It wasn't a root beer because I'm not a root beer fan, but it was a Diet Coke.

     That's all for me today. I hope those of you in the US have a wonderful Thanksgiving  and that everyone has a super T day and week ahead.

Weekend Chatter

    Hi everyone. Happy Sunday. Last week was a very busy week  (dog surgery, doctor's appointment, mother-in-law rushed to the hospital/ mother-in-law visit, some walks, a Friendsgiving lunch, a movie, a hockey game, daughter and son-in-law visiting, a hacked credit card, the hubby coming down with a terrible head cold, and  a few other things, including one I had to say no to because I was already busy) so I am hoping I can enjoy a quiet Sunday and even a quiet few days early in the week. Why is it some weeks get overly  crazy like that and then there are a lot of quieter weeks in between?  It would be great if things just spread themselves out; at least I think so.

     The first thing I have today  is a page for Wendy's On, In or By the Sea challenge at Art Journal Journey Here's some more sailboats. I'm not sure I like the water on this one as much as I did on the page I shared this past Thursday, but I don't mind it.

     I made this page by painting and ink spraying the ocean and the sky as well as the waves. The sailboats are also hand made. I drew the base of the boats on white paper and cut them out. I also cut the sails out of some colorful paper.  I did have to play with the water a bit because in order for sails to be out there needs to be some wind. I thought the best way to show that was to try to show some motion in the water.

   The flag with the quote and the seagull are images I punched out of an ocean set of images. 

     And here's a few photos from a few things last week starting with the greenhouse.

     We had some heavy rain Thursday night and that was good because (besides the fact that we needed it) we noticed there was a bit of a leak someplace along the ridge line of the roof. Although it needs to be fixed, it's better to know so it can get fixed. I also cleaned up my mess over in my husband's workshop and brought all my planting supplies into the greenhouse.

     David at Travels with Birds suggested last weekend that I get some cracked corn to put out for the wild turkeys who visit. I did that, and one afternoon they were back, mostly in the area where I spread a lot of corn.

 A few of them ventured into the yard, and at least I could get a better photo of those .😏

    This past Friday night was the Border Battle in college men's hockey, a big rivalry between my and my husband's alma mater and my daughter and her husband's alma mater. This time around the game was held  at the University of New Hampshire.

       It was a very exciting game, as these games almost always are. My family has an annual rivalry game get together, and we have a little family fun. Of course when my and my husband's team wins it's even better- hee hee-😉.  My sister-in-law sent this next photo meme to us regarding the game. The Maine black bears took away the fish which is what the University of New Hampshire throws out on the ice after they score their first goal. I personally feel bad that a fish gave its life just to be thrown out on the ice at a hockey game, but it's their tradition. 

 Today I want to make some reading time since with my past busy week, I've barely cracked open a cover. Here's a meme I came across last week that not only spoke to me but made me smile:

    I hope it makes you smile too. Enjoy your Sunday and the start of the new week. 

The Outdoor Project

     Hi everyone. Happy Friday to  you.  I'm linking up today to both Nicole's Friday Face Off and to Gillena's Friday Lunch Break.

     I thought I'd share my newest garden play area today. It's making me smile, and I'm excited to have it ready for spring. The hubby has had a lot of fun building it too, and he's been working on it for the last few months around everything else going on in life.

     Last weekend's project was to move some of the stone I had delivered into the area around  and on the floor of the greenhouse. Because this is the sunniest available spot, and because there's not much flat about our property, my husband had to do some ground leveling before it could be put up. 

    The walls were constructed in the garage. Back a few weekends ago when my son-in-law was here, he helped my husband get the walls up.  I didn't think I could help carry the walls around the house to this location from the garage. They were heavy enough to move in and out of the garage the few times I needed to help do that.

Here's  the hubby’s face photo for Friday Face Off.

    The panels had to be taped, put in and caulked to keep the weather out.  And before that, all the wood on the panels were coated in another layer of protective urethane. It's been quite the project.  If you think a greenhouse kit is quick to put up, it isn't. Of course this probably took much much longer than most people would need between life being busy and also a civil engineer doing it. 😏 And this greenhouse only measures 6x8 feet (1.8 x 2.4 m), so it's a good thing I didn't buy one that was any bigger because I might never have it finish. 😁

     And here I am in my new finished greenhouse. This weekend I want to clean up a stack of pots I have and then put those pots, as well as my garden tools inside. 

     If the weather holds out we have  some more stone to spread on the area next to the greenhouse. I want to create a spot to put some raised garden beds since my veggie garden isn't getting as much sun as it did when we put it in 30 years ago. The maple tree on one side of it has gotten bigger, and the leaves block the summer sun. But the tree is too pretty to cut down. 

    That's it for me. I hope you have a great start to your weekend.