I’ve finally gotten some new fall plantings in my balcony garden. I did a bit of an overhaul on our kitchen balcony. I took out the table and chairs which we never used because they were all inhabited by vegetables in pots. And I brought in a bigger trough with a trellis. I planted some snow peas that will hopefully start creeping up the trellis and providing us with some yummy winter peas.

I also planted some celery in there with the peas and next to the trough is my beautiful blooming brocoli and swiss chard.

I also planted some carrot seedlings I bought from a lady at the farmers market close to my parents house. They’re actually called “cosmic purple” which I thought was adorable. I just love using the old crates I find at the antique market to plant in too.

And last but not least I planted a box of cool weather lettuces and some Kale from seed. I haven’t had much luck with lettuce this year, but I’m trying it again, hoping that in the cooler weather they may fair better.

I’m still moving containers of plants around on both balconies… trying to maximize light and space but its been pretty challenging. I’m wanting to grow so much more than the space I currently have and because I am such a novice gardener, I am still killing plants on a regular basis and having to replace, try again, or resign to the fact that I just can’t grow certain vegetables on my little covered balconies. It is pretty fantastic though when a plant produces and I have had several success’ this year. Gardening was always something I never thought I would take up, but I am so glad I did, even  if I have more failures than success. When that little plant is transplanted into the cool dirt and packed in gently by my eager, hopeful hands and then weeks later that plant grows and produces a bright, juicy, delicious tomato or a little canary yellow pepper… it really seems worth it to keep going and keep growing.

I just finished a lovely little baby blanket for my neighbor’s new baby girl. I’ve never made anything for a little girl and it was so much fun to finally get to use pinks and purples. The blanket came together easily and with Anna Maria Horner’s delightfully beautiful fabric I had been saving for just the right project, the blanket turned out perfect.

I have also spent the weekend working on my Anniversary/Fall blanket. It’s been an interesting one to piece together because I am following Lotta Jansdotter’s directions from her book Handmade Living. She pretty much just cut a bunch of fabrics in different sizes and sewed them together in long strands. I was finally able to find some of her fabric here and it is wonderful to work with. I’m loving her funky, modern patterns with the earthy grays and mustard yellows I had chosen months ago. I wanted different textures as well to give it a cozier feel. I found cuddly wool from here and made sure to add my favorite soft linens as well. It will be interesting to see how it turns out… but here is a little sneak peek for now…

I’m heading to bed after a long day. Don’t forget to “fall back” tonight!

We had a very windy and blustery few days here in Southern California. Enough wind and rain that I had to bring in a few plants from my balcony garden. The weather seems to have calmed down a bit and right before the storm hit (I hate saying “storm” because compared to the rest of the world, California’s “storms” are like little gusts of wind- but that’s what the news is calling it, so I’m going with it) … anyway, I took pictures of what was growing in the garden to share here. Things are looking a bit more windblown now but in these pictures, things are certainly growing.

The last tomato of the season.

My miniature yellow bell peppers (seeds from here) that next year I will not stuff into a little pot. (I think they were ultra mini because of my choice in container).

My farmers market swiss chard is growing like a weed!

This is my miracle Home Depot Big Boy tomato plant that I could have sworn was dead a few weeks ago. I trimmed it back to a little brown stump and the spindly little thing all of a sudden perked up and started sprouting new branches, leaves and growth. I wouldn’t be surprised it next week it had tomatoes!

My little Monrovia Orange tree wasn’t faring too well. I noticed it was losing some leaves and tried perking it up with some worm casings from the farmers market. We’ll see how it does…

And last but not least, my basil that I picked up at Trader Joes ages ago that looks pretty shabby but has yet to brown and die. I think this little pot may be the reason for its lack of vigor. I constantly dream about next years garden and what cool things I can do differently.

I’m loving these ideas I found on pinterest.

Next year I will know more going into my gardening… but for now, I’m having fun keeping things alive and even sometimes producing tiny vegetables… Happy Fall Gardening!

I’ve been a bad blogger this week. Every day I think up fantastic things to blog about on my way to work and through out the day and then I get home and end up watching tivoed episodes of Parenthood or Anthony Bourdain’s No Reservations. This week has been quite a busy, emotionally draining one to say the least. I’ve had the “I think I’m going crazy” talk with my husband several times this week… so I am pretty thrilled its the weekend.  I’m  hoping to get some sewing done and some dollhouse work accomplished as well. We shall see. For now, I wanted to finally share the little collection of dollhouse furniture I found at last weekend’s antique market. Not a big selection, in fact I had to dig through a few boxes of mildewy doll clothes to find some of the items, but I’m hoping that after this weekend and a little restoration on my part- these pieces of furniture will be nice additions to my doll house.

stay tuned next week for some refurbished furniture… and hopefully some better pictures too.

Happy Friday! (What’s left of it)

This weekend we went to The Ecology Center in San Juan Capistrano. What a pleasant surprise this place and event was! We partook in some beer tasting as well as a “talk” from sustainable beer producer New Belgium Brewing Company. Very cool talk, very good beer and very beautiful and interesting venue. It was a gorgeous fall day which helped hit off the weekend to a wonderful start.

It was interesting to tour The Ecology Center after the tasting and talk. They have a lovely garden with numerous types of vegetables and California Native plants as well as a water garden made from upcycled trash cans, a chicken coop and several vermicomposters.

The rest of the weekend was pretty busy with stops at the Antique Market (looking for dollhouse furniture… I did pretty well and even found some lovely china I could not pass up as well) and the farmers market for pumpkins, persimmons and sweet potatoes as well as getting some laundry done and some fall baking (I wasn’t going to let the 80 degree heat put a damper on my fall baking)!

Hope you had a wonderful weekend and I hope you have a lovely week! Happy Halloween!

As Inspired By SouleMama: 

{this moment} – A Friday ritual. A single photo. No words. Capturing a moment from the week. A single, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember. 

I finally got the chance to work on my dollhouse this past weekend and wanted to post my progress, limited but none the less progress…

One of my fellow bloggers pointed out to me that this dollhouse was in fact a vintage Lundy dollhouse circa 1960’s/1970’s and I should be careful with the vintage details. I accepted this interesting information about my dollhouse and with a bit of trepidation, I ever so carefully went to work, using museum putty instead of glue and scrapbook wall paper instead of paint.

I started with some wood flooring from large scrap tiles from Home Depot that I cut up into smaller planks and fit together. I only got to two rooms but I think I am going to finish the house with them.

The bathroom needed an over haul and so I chose some little stone tiles to lay down to cover up the dated orange floors. I’m not sure if I like the look of the tiles just yet and so I haven’t puttyed these down. I did add in some wall paper to cover up the bathroom walls and I do like the new blue walls.

I will be working on the bathroom some more, but I do like the lighter aura it has now with all the lighter colors.

Before

The upstairs children’s bedroom was plain but the original wallpaper was in pretty good shape. I wanted something a little more “baby girl” for the “child’s bedroom” so I went with some scrapbook paper I had lying around.

After

I think the colors of the wall paper go nicely with the blue floors so I’m not sure if I want to lay down wood here?

And last but not least I made my first teeny tiny pennant with some vintage pillow case fabric. It was very hard hot gluing these little guys onto ribbon, but it came out pretty nicely and all of a sudden welcomed my imagination into this house that’s coming together ever so very slowly… I was busy favoriting things on Etsy this week and will be scouring the flea market this sunday for dollhouse finds. I’m also talking to my engineer husband about putting in some solar power and helping me with a “living roof” I think would look lovely. What excitement over a doll house! How are your doll house reno’s going?

It was quite a long weekend with sick dogs, a husband away, dollhouse renovations and a lovely visit with friends. But, I managed to get a lot done and even become inspired by a few things I found this past week. I hope you become inspired too…

– Just finished this book. And I’m now trying to see things in a different perspective.

– My good friend’s hard work is finally paying off in this beautiful, and delicate collection.

– Love this idea of bringing good local food, farms and lovely dinners together and when they are in California, I will be sure to try it out.

– Would like to try this challenge but not sure if I have it in me yet.

– A wonderful young lady at the Farmers Market we go to every weekend gave me a few eco-friendly links to check out. I had no idea  this (and this) was so close to me!

– Planning on attending this next weekend with my beer savvy husband.

-Planning on also attending this next sunday to hopefully boost my dollhouse’s furnishings.

– And I finally caved and signed on to this and boy has it been inspirational as well as a time sucker! I can spend hours looking at things here!

I keep reading about all these lovely plans for fall gardens on other blogs (usually bloggers who live on the east coast). Well, here in California its still not feeling cool enough for it to really be fall. I decided after doing some delicate research in my container balcony garden that it was time for some containers to be turned over and replaced with new “fall gardeny” plants.

I planted a few pots with purple broccoli and swiss chard I bought from the Farmers Market. After a brief caterpillar invasion was thwarted by my nimble caterpillar pinching fingers, the broccoli is doing wonderfully and the swiss chard is growing like mad.

I also worked through one of the window boxes that held strawberry plants and flowers and replaced a dead strawberry plant and flower with sage and feverfew. They seem to be happier in this location. (The feverfew wasn’t doing so well in its previous home as you can tell by its browning. Hopefully that will subside and it will perk up with a little more sun).

It’s just the beginning to what I would like to do. I find myself already dreaming up next spring’s garden and the things I will do differently. But, for a person who always killed any plant I touched just a few years ago, I think I am doing pretty well for a new gardener. We had a tiny bounty of tomatoes, basil, peppers, blueberries and cucumbers this year and I am mighty proud of all that I produced!

Happy Weekend!

I have been meaning to get to the wonderful trip I took with my husband back to the east coast so here’s a peek into our quick but glorious week out east…

Every year we try and visit my husband’s family in Boston. I have always gone either during the summer or the winter. It has always been really sticky hot or very freezing cold, so it was exciting to finally get to visit during the fall and as I’m a California girl it was also going to be a highlight to see the much anticipated foliage of the east. We spent a few days in Boston visiting with family and friends and then the two of us headed up the coast to Maine. This had also been something I had always wanted to do and we thought October would be the perfect traveling weather to do so. It certainly was beautiful weather. In fact almost too nice. I was hoping for more of that fallish crisp air and it was in fact almost 80 for most of the days we were there. It was lovely stopping in all of the coastal villages along the way to Portland. I loved the town of York where we got to see our first lighthouse of the trip.

and another highlight off the beaten path- Popham Beach State Park.  We spent awhile out there walking along the beach, sitting on driftwood and just relaxing by the shore.

We stayed in some lovely bed and breakfasts while in Portland (we stayed here and here if you’re curious), my husband was patient with my requests to stop in every yarn and fabric store up the coast. We had dinner at a fantastic, original restaurant and we even stopped at “the best lobster roll shack in Maine”.

But, I think my favorite thing was walking through Portland’s Farmers Market. Oh boy was it different than the ones here in Southern California.

rows and rows of delectable vegetables and fruits, an array of color and freshness that I have never seen in California.

It really felt like fall seeing all those heirloom pumpkins and ghords, corn and apples. Never have I seen so many varieties of pumpkin. It was so much fun walking through the market. I couldn’t leave this beautiful farmers market without anything so we bought some homemade cheese and apple cider for the road back to Boston.

We spent a few more days in Massachusetts, said our sad farewells and had a very good flight back to California. I love the east coast and all its beauty and after spending time in Maine and specifically Portland, I now have a fondness for the quirky, historic port city. For this California girl, the east coast certainly has a piece of my heart.