April 2023 – Karla's Cottage

Sweet faces

By Karla Nathan / April 29, 2023

I am pleased that my fairy dolls are still selling well at Good Juju. I really enjoy making them. I had a feeling it would only be a Christmas Angel type thing, but they have sold consistently each month. Not a lot at once, but 1-3 each time. Which keeps me able to continue making them, which makes me happy.

Friends have been giving me old dolls that need repair and I have been playing dolly doc with glue, lace, and goat hair. Plus a few sparkly bits here and there.

I also make the fairies by scratch with these vintage heads I found, plus a wire and wool roving body.

Or sometimes, I just cut off the hideous costumes they often come in, clean them up and display as is.

I have always been fond of dolls, and even as a kid, I liked to give them makeovers. I consider myself very blessed to be able to play with dollies as an adult.

Because it sucks to just act like a grown up all the time.

A tale of tech troubles and many mushrooms

cottage, family, mushrooms

By Karla Nathan / April 25, 2023

Remember my quest to make two hundred mushrooms? I am on my way. Especially if you count three at a time on one display.

Working on fungi this week has been a wonderful escape from my digital woes. OMG, my email issues have been a nightmare. From hours on the phone, re-explaining, waiting to codes, call backs and answers that never come, to finally being able it get into it, but in a round about, not so easy way.

It gave me great joy to chop right into the lacy skirt of a vintage gown to make sweet, lil schroomies! If I am feeling frustration with some of life’s irritations, a dab of creative time can be just what I need to forget my troubles.

Not only was my email messing with me, we had issues with getting tax forms we needed, and were also dealing with a dead phone and a hard to find replacement, then all of the minor little glitches that can pop up in a new phone once it is set up.

Rich lost his phone deep in the woods. He’d found two pounds of morels, but realized his iPhone wasn’t in the pocket where he’d last seen it.

Oops!

So he trudged back through swamps and deadfalls with no luck. Then drove 45 minutes home to get the iPad so he could track the phone. Then re-trudged through the woods and the swamps and the deadfalls to search again, this time, armed with Find My iPhone.

But once again, Oops.

The ipad didn’t have cellular and wouldn’t work without his phone. He drove the 45 minutes back to our house, retraced his steps, this time while carrying my iPhone and a working app. Success! He found it after a full day of looking, or trying to get to the other side of the swamp to look.

He came home very dirty, washed his clothes right away so I wouldn’t get poison ivy from a laundry basket, which I often do after he has been hiking. And you do remember me saying that we had been trying to replace a dead phone? Yep. He was so diligent about getting his woodsy clothes washed that he forgot to check pockets and also washed the phone he had looked for all day that was in the pocket.

It was too funny to be upset about. We invited some friends over to eat fried morels with us, and I spent some time crafting to forget about all of our technology issues. The day off was certainly needed and helped my frame of mind.

Crowning glories

antiques/junking, jewelry

By Karla Nathan / April 21, 2023

Last week, I made some crowns.

And since I had been painting statues and figures, everyone was treated to a crown for their head.

Even if a head was all they had, no body. And even the wildlife was crowned.

A few were steam punk style, but most were simply on the regal side.

Well, that wasn’t a good idea

antiques/junking, Good JuJu

By Karla Nathan / April 16, 2023

At last month’s Good Juju sale, I tried a new out a new booth for my jewelry.

Well, that didn’t go so well.

I think the space was too tight and hard to shop in for so many pieces of jewelry. That stuff needs to be spread out more.

I have already paid my rent for the 3’ x 3’ corner, so I decided to try something else for May’s shopping event. I have a lot of vintage clothing, but could only bring a couple of pieces at a time into my man booth since a gown can take up so much space.

Rich helped me make over this jewelry spot into a clothes closet. It feels more efficient this way, but what do I know? I’m still figuring this whole thing out.

Since I am a big believer in using the WHOLE piece of real estate, I had Rich add some shelves for me.
He made the clothing rod out of one of his grapevine walking sticks and the rest of the installed bits and pieces are things we had in the garage. So the changeover didn’t cost us anything.

It was sad to see him cut up one of his cool sticks, but he has a few and using it does class up the area. I think I’ll ask him if I can have more of those, then I’ll fix them up and sell them. I think there could be a market for his whittled grapevine walking sticks, I really like them. I might add some leather and crystals to them.

Mushroom paintings

Hand painted, hand painted signs, mushrooms

By Karla Nathan / April 12, 2023

The other day, my husband was building a new raised garden bed for us and was using old fencing around it to keep the hens out. He left a pile of these trimmed pieces on the ground after adjusting the fence height. They caught my eye.

The wood was just what I needed for some little mushroom paintings that I’d been thinking about doing.

I scrubbed then sealed the old wood, front and back, before painting on it. Then added my schroomies.

The paintings are pretty simple, so I was able to keep the cost down. I’d like to do more, I enjoyed these and I have got a bucket full of wood trimmings to use. But between my concussion and not knowing if theses will sell well or not, I’m holding back on making more for now. (How mature and unexpected of me)

The garden beds turned out wonderfully! Once we get some dirt and get started, I’ll be sharing those.

Easter morning

cottage, holiday decor

By Karla Nathan / April 9, 2023

Happy Easter!

I hope your day is filled with blessings.

We have a quiet day planned, I’ll mostly be resting up from my Good Juju event. I am blessed by good friends who helped me out and covered my shift so I could leave early.

We will have a mini egg hunt tonight and a simple dinner. Till then I am going to be taking it easy and resting up from yesterday’s festivities and be ready to enjoy tonight’s get together.

Resting and relaxing with a little bit of weeping

Good JuJu

By Karla Nathan / April 7, 2023

Well the weekend is beginning and it is the first Friday of the month, usually one of my favorite dates. But I’m still not quite myself after re-jiggling my brain by tripping. I’ve kept my days very low key and darkened since that happened, with a few mini excursions back into the world. Usually a foray into real life is fine up to a certain point, then I am wiped out completely and unexpectedly and need a nap.

Writing my previous blog post required a three hour nap after. I think it is the reading glasses that strain me. I can check some messages, skim a little social media, and read small bits without that problem, but have done that reading without the glasses.

2022’s Annual Spring Concussion seemed much worse than 2023’s. I am hoping that this one doesn’t take the months of recovery that last year’s needed. I look back on most of last summer like I was peering through a tunnel.
This newest addition to my never ending concussion collection feels more like looking through a fish bowl. I have a much wider field of vision. Maybe because I took the doctor’s advice of resting and dark rooms seriously. Plus, I already knew the PT to start after the full week of nothingness.

Juju is Friday and Saturday from 9-6, and fingers crossed that I can hold it together that long without napping. I might take breaks in my car if needed. I honestly think that I’ll be fine after ten days of serious rest, or I wouldn’t do it.

It will be good to be around people and smile again. Concussions can also make you emotional, so I’ve had a couple of weepy days. A day of smiles will be wonderful medicine.

And I might just give myself some aromatherapy tonight before I face the crowds tomorrow. I’ve made some helpful scented scrubs. I will recommend this one for tonight.

Then maybe this for Friday night.

And after the sale is done? Time to relax!

The labels were made with an image from some ephemera a friend brought back from France that I edited together with a garland and blue birds from a Victorian postcard. I wanted something completely original. I just hope it isn’t too girly girly for Good Juju, many shoppers are there for the primitive stuff. At least as far as furniture goes.

Please wish me luck with the weekend. I really love being there and doing the sale, so I am hoping it’s a healing experience for me. And I could use some luck with my new scrubs too. Heck, while you are throwing around wishes and sprinkling luck everywhere, share a little with yourself and use it for having a blessed Easter weekend!

Always be prepared, right? I am glad I am not a procrastinator

antiques/junking, Good JuJu

By Karla Nathan / April 4, 2023

The Good Juju sale is the first Friday of each month. Which means we have a full month to set up after the previous event ends. I typically get right in there, get all the furniture shifted, wallpaper changed, and basics set up as soon as I can. Then start filling in.

Over the next few weeks, I tidy up and add more, but it is usually looking okay if something comes up and I cannot get back to do more.

Well, I sure am glad that I have that habit of getting done early, because something sure did come up.

After my head bonking last week, I have done nothing but rest. Then rest some more.

I have had nothing going on but rest. Usually, I’d be bored by that much laying around and tempted to sneak out to the studio to find a project. Not this time. I felt so bad, all I could do was doze in a dark room, listen to an audio book, or watch tv with a blindfold on.

I’m finally up and even going for walks now, to get my rubbery muscles moving again. Between my jiggly brain and unused body, I am a mushy mess.

But my gray matter no longer does summersaults when I look at a screen and my stomach has settled, so I am easing back into the real world.

I am even starting to feel curious about some of the shows I listened to while my eyes were covered. Was that Meryl Streep, Ed Norton, Ross from Friends and that guy from Hamilton on Extrapolation? I think I might have heard Diane Lane too.

That show might deserve a rewatch while actually watching.

I can’t say that I am fully back. I am enjoying the improvement, though. And need to be ready to spend 12 hours on my feet Friday and Saturday.

Come by to see us there if you can. I will be very happy to be out of the house, functioning and talking to friends.

I hope.

For right now, writing this might have used up my entire screen time for the day, so I’ll be slapping the satin mask back over my eyes, going back to my dark room and listening to another episode of Extrapolations and trying to guess which stars are popping up.

A good new trick and a very bad old trick

Hand Painted Furniture

By Karla Nathan / April 2, 2023

I took a bit of a tumble, and have spent the last five days in a darkened room, trying to heal my poor, jiggly brain that had wacked against the cement floor in my studio.

So I haven’t been doing much. And I am supposed to be avoiding screens. This is just a quick post, popping in to say hi and to show you my latest trick that I’d been playing around with before I tripped over a lamp cord while carrying a big, fluffy, tule and lace bundle of vintage gowns.

I think this calking in a mold to make trims to add to furniture is going to be a wonderful addition to the fresh “old” paint I’m adding. A much better trick than the one where I bounce my head off stuff and get concussions all the time. ( At least I am not getting a black eye this time)

Well, this is about long enough for me to be online without my head spinning and my tummy rolling. I need to rest up, Good Juju is Friday! I’ll be back to show you what I’ve got ready for it.

Man, am I ever glad that I always insist on being set up early, because if I were a last minute type, I’d be in trouble right now.