cottage – Page 4 – Karla's Cottage

Painting with grout? Yep

antiques/junking, cottage, Hand painted, how-to projects

By Karla Nathan / July 2, 2023

For years, I have been using the grand fairies’ outgrown craft table as a side table in my living room. Not because I loved it, but because it was the exact size I needed at the holidays to set the Christmas tree up on. It wasn’t ugly, it was just a simple, round, white table. But it wasn’t anything I adored, that’s for sure.

Then, I found this table at a garage sale for FREE. Well, basically free. The lady sold me an entire car load of stuff for twenty bucks, and the car was stuffed to the brim. I felt like this table was a bonus thrown in with all the inventory I’d bought.

Here is how it started, perfectly nice, no problems, just a little too traditional for me.

I wanted it to look old. Well, that’s not exactly right because it already is old.

It needed to look like it had been painted and repainted over time. More cottagey.

So, first it was primed, then I mixed up grout into gray paint and gave it a thick, gloopy coat of that. Next, white paint, then sanding the clumps away. There were some ugly spots that didn’t sand well, so I touched up with the white again, then a glaze of umber went over it all and was wiped away.

To finish, a polycrylic clear coat went over that.

The paint looks properly mistreated now.

My Christmas tree will look great on its new pedestal! And I think I do adore this one. Bye-bye to the kiddo’s craft table.

Once again, that was wine in the teacups

celebrations, cottage, flowers, Food and Drink, friends, We're having a party

By Karla Nathan / June 15, 2023

To celebrate Angie and Beth’s birthdays, we made plans for a day out, and I offered to make brunch first. But then, Angie picked up an estate sale to do, and between that and all of her other obligations, her time off for a whole day disappeared. Our date switched to lunch and I decided to serve it in the gazebo to make it special.

Hmm, not the best picture of us, but you get the idea.

We had wine in our teacups, and drank it with our pinky fingers crooked while wearing floral garden hats and speaking in a British accent, of course.

I draped a little, round table in layers of clothes, and brought out the floral china.

The weather cooperated with perfection, but just in case, I added a fan and extra sun umbrellas to the space.

Teapots were filled with $1 flower bundles (our local Kroger always marks them down after the weekend) and I made place cards with “Angela” and “Elizabeth” instead of Angie and Beth to be extra fancy.

But “Karla” doesn’t come with a fancy option.

So I used the name my dad, Hubert, had written on my original birth certificate.

“Huberta”

As in Huberta Josephine Downey.

Yep, that was my name. My mom changed it to Karla Jo. Not nearly as much to roll off the tongue. I think I could’ve grown up as a Bertie, or Birdy? Instead I was always Karkie Jo.

The silk flower umbrellas from my April Showers Bring May Flowers theme at Good Juju got another go round as garden party decor. I’ve left them up outside a while, they somewhat survived a 24 hour deluge. I’m not sure how many more uses I’ll get out of them, but I have enjoyed every bit of our time together so far.

We had dipped strawberries and lavender honey dark chocolate for dessert.

I fixed honey butter toasted croissants, individual quiches, and fruit salad.
Even though it was their birthdays, Angie brought sparkling soda and Beth brought a salad.

Happy Birthday to two of the funnest people around!

There was wine in the teacups

celebrations, cottage, Food and Drink, friends, We're having a party

By Karla Nathan / May 21, 2023

Last Tuesday evening, I hosted a Mother’s Day tea party. A friend recently lost her MIL, then right before the holiday, her own mom passed unexpectedly. As I planned a get together for her I realized that none of the guests’ moms were still alive.

I thought we should honor all of the lost mothers and asked for photos of the ladies.

Then I picked some flowers from my yard to tuck into tussie mussies.

The plan was to sit outside by the fire and order pizza.

But I wanted a real tea party style gathering, so I made food instead and set it out on the table with the pretty dishes.

This tiered stand from Hobby Lobby, years ago (they still have them) always comes in handy. On a daily basis, it holds fruit, but when company comes, the fruit goes in a bowl and this is used for serving food.

Earlier this month, I found a metal lamp base on a flea market dollar table. It made an ideal holder for a stack of salad plates.

My table is oak, and not the look I wanted for a spring, flowery party. But it’s also huge, and I don’t have tablecloths to fit it. So, I covered it in a painter’s drop cloth and layered these rosey placemats (50 cents from a garage sale this week) on top.

Focaccia bread isn’t exactly a tea party staple, but I baked it to look like a flower garden.

And how lucky were we to get a perfect spring evening? Just cool enough for a fire, but not so chilly that we’re had to be close to the fire for warmth. It was more for atmosphere.

The table was a generous and exceptional hand me down from my sis, Terry. And oh my. It is a dragon mosaic made from genuine stones and can feature either a fire or umbrella in the center.

We just love it. I call it my fire breathing dragon table.

And I love my friends. I’m glad we had a night together to honor our moms and to sip wine from teacups.
I think I’ll make this a tradition. You are never too old to miss your mommy.

Inside the cabinets I just repainted

cottage, Hearth Room, Kitchen remodel

By Karla Nathan / May 17, 2023

While cleaning and repainting my kitchen cabinets, I did mini redoes on the displays inside.

Three of them have glass doors. The very top shelves were where I kept pretty things rarely used.
That stuff had been up there for…well, a bit.

It all needed a dusting even though it was behind glass. And I came across things I didn’t even remember owning. Those got pulled out and will go to my booth to sell. Because if they hadn’t been touched in a decade, why do I need them?

My pretties got a little bit of a shuffle, a wiping, then a thinning out.

Except for these. Oh, yes, they got a cleaning off, but that’s it, then they went right back on display with no changes.

This is a partial set from my mom’s dishes. When she died, the whole set went to my Sissy, who shared them with Bobbie Sue and I. We each got two place settings.

All of the cabinets still look plenty full, even with the pruning I did. And I have more inventory to haul into Good Juju. Although, rose pattern china doesn’t seem to be a big draw there. I try to balance my foofy pretties with some more rustic items for that venue.

I’m liking that sort of combo in my house too.

See what I mean? This is on my mantel. Since we added the hearth room with the dark floors and stone wall, I’m using a lot more natural type elements and darker colors. I’m still all about the Light and Bright with roses, but I like the cabiney-cottagey feel too.

I repainted my kitchen cabinets

cottage, Kitchen remodel

By Karla Nathan / May 14, 2023

My kitchen cabinets were built by my son, and I love them. They are solid and will last forever. But they needed some TLC and I wanted a new look. The tops are now a brighter white and the bottoms are a mushroomy tone.

I also painted the underneath part as well as the window frame behind the stove to the same bright, white.

It feels so much cleaner and brighter. Notice how often I am using the word, brighter? That is what I was going for, and I am quite pleased that I got my bright results.

While I was at it, I took stuff out of the cabinets, cleaned and rearranged them, washed this curtain and the ones on the window, and soaked every glass knob in soapy vinegar water.

The pottery on top of the cabinets got a trip through the dishwasher while I was painting and was ready to put back up there as I finished up with my paint brush.

The walls of the recessed area around this bank of cabinets are painted a very pale blue. I was tempted to redo them too, in a more sea glass shade.

Since I am still dealing with post concussion syndrome, I decided to just tackle one job at a time. But I did take down everything on the wall, wash it, and slightly rearrange the pictures. And I’m still day dreaming of an ocean blue to slap up there later.

The paint I used was Behr latex satin. Since I have been the only person to paint these cabinets, I knew all of the products that were on them, and didn’t have to sand or prime. I’d previously used latex and a water based top coat, so I knew that my satin coat would adhere nicely. That saved time. And my Grandfairy was helpful too, Sugarwings took off all the hardware for me then put it back on when I was done.

Here is an older photo of the room. See, brighter! Another thing that helped was replacing our light bulbs with daylight LEDs. Although two chandeliers’ worth of brand new bulbs felt like a major renovation cost (dang, light bulbs aren’t cheap!), they made a huge difference.

Daylight bulbs versus soft white changed everything.

I saw cobwebs that I hadn’t noticed, my husband could do his morning crossword without reading glasses, and my cabinets looked dirty. I’m glad I got the new bulbs, even though they made me feel like I needed to repaint the room and started this whole production.

I’m pretty happy with the new BRIGHTER look.

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.

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.

Karlas Cottages

cottage, fairies

By Karla Nathan / March 26, 2023

On Thursdays, my glass artist friend opens her studio for our mosaic group. I cannot get into cutting glass but I do enjoy gluing pieces of glass, ceramic, or rock onto stuff. Lately, I’ve been crafting stone cottages.

I’ve been adding porcelaine flowers too.

Some houses are made with broken china, some are painted, a few are mossy. None got good photos taken.

See what I mean? I’m getting into a bad habit of not getting pictures as I finish things, let alone before or during shots, then taking them directly into Good Juju.

I’ll try to get some better pictures because I really like these fairy cottages. And honestly, a LOT of work went into them.

Glass ornaments as mini carafes

celebrations, cottage, Food and Drink, friends, holiday decor, We're having a party

By Karla Nathan / December 20, 2022

We had our annual holiday bookclub dinner at the cottage last week.

As I usually do, I set the table with a hodge podge of mismatched pieces, but with kind of a theme. And I tried a cute trick I’d seen at another party, using a clear glass ball as a mini carafe.

The way I’d seen it done was at a wine tasting and they used small, plastic ornaments. I really don’t know if those are food safe. So, I bought the big glass ones (at Hobby Lobby on clearance for 60% off), washed them well, and glued on roses that I’d painted onto old sheet music.

At our party, I make the food and friends bring the wine, so I couldn’t pre-fill the balls with wine like the previous way I’d seen them used. So I decided to use them for water, sitting on a glass of ice.

Before everyone arrived, I poured one into a cup, to see if it really was a good idea or was just messy.

Well, so so.

I had over filled the balls, and when pouring the water over the ice I realized that there was just too much in them. And no where to set the balls down except right back on top of the glass, or they would roll away and flood the table.

Oops!

I quickly poured some water out of each ball, leaving just the right amount for the glass. Ha, I’m glad I checked!

After dinner, the ornaments were party favors to take home.

I should’ve made everyone take food home too, I made way, way too much. As usual. I ended up putting this pie in the freezer for when the family comes home for Christmas. And I served some of the cupcakes at another party. Oh, and I did manage to take care of the rest of the extra cupcakes.

Somebody had to, right?

A few days after the book club bash, I was hosting a craft day get together. And the day after that, Sugarwings was supposed to have a cocoa party, but it was cancelled due to an ear infection, poor kid.

Typically, I like to have all of my parties in the same week, so I only have to clean the house once. And as I take plates out of the dishwasher, I reset the table so it’s ready to go for the next event. The cottage has a festive feel all week when it is party time.

For the craft day party, I did use wine in the Christmas balls.

Which, come to think of it, probably makes them harder to rinse out if they are meant to be keepsakes. I am not sure if I’ll do this party trick again or not. I enjoyed it, and thought it made the table festive. I hope the guests enjoyed it too.

It was a happy Halloween

celebrations, cottage, family, Food and Drink, holiday decor

By Karla Nathan / November 12, 2022

At this point, Halloween is long past, withering away in its crypt.

Due to my inability to use my blog, I didn’t get to share the holiday, so I’ll post some highlights now. As I upload these pictures, I am sitting in the glow of my Christmas tree.

But that doesn’t mean much. Around here, the flip is fast. Almost, but not quite like at Disney, where over night on October 31st, the entire park is transformed from one holiday into the other.

We go through more of a Nightmare Before Christmas scenario, where they are jumbled together for a couple days during the switcheroo.

Sugarwings loves the spooky decor and does not want it touched if she is with us. But I needed help with getting the big tree put together and Rich was going out of town. My choices were to ask him to help before he left and have the tree set up, with all the heavy boxes of decorations piled up around the pumpkin and bat filled house or do it myself later.

Of course, I asked for the help! So we had a messy mix of two overlapping decor styles.

I used to wait til thanksgiving weekend to deck the halls. Our motto was, “You Must Respect the Bird” and wait for that holiday to pass before enjoying twinkle lights. But not any more. I have changed it to “You Must Respect the Pumpkin” and don’t even let the jack-o-lanterns start to moulder before I fill the house with joy and light fro the trees.

But no, we don’t totally gloss over Thanksgiving. I de-skull and un-spookify the table, but leave the pumpkins out on it till after the turkey has been consumed. The pumpkins either light up or have glitter, so I am happy with the compromise.

Sugarwings still trick or treats, and since my mind is already on gingerbread and garlands, I asked her to save some candy for building our gingie cottages.

As much as I love spring time weather, and the heat of summer, this has to be my favorite time of year. I dread the coming of cold weather, but love all the hustle and bustle that comes around when the leaves drop and snow starts to fall.

Ugh, did I really just say that!? Snow and falling leaves can be truly despicable (and way too cold).

But I do love the transition into Christmas, so if I have to put up with a chill to get to be surrounded by twinkle lights, we’ll, I guess I’ll just deal with it.