About Me

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Sublimity, OR, United States
****WELCOME FRIENDS****
I am artist of texture and color. I enjoy working with textiles, mixed media and the graphic arts. I am an avid cottage gardener with a love for pass along plants and big fluffy pink peonies and pink roses. Many of my tangible creations reflect my love of the garden and all its wonderful colors. I have been selling my creations online since 2002 beginning as a hobby. After 10 years I quit the day job to pursue my art as a full time passion.

29 September 2011

Dotty Hop!

I thought it would be fun to this week to participate in my friend Holly's Dotty Hop Day (even tho I am a couple days late) . She is having a Birthday giveaway that you don't want to miss! Part of the fun was to do a post with something that has dots....I dug thru my archives of past creations and found these two lovelies!



The best part of going thru these pics was that I actually got some new inspiration! Just wush I had more of these fabrics!
Thanks Holly, you are a gem!

28 September 2011

Cottage colors Party ~BROWN~

Welcome to my submission for the Cottage Colors Party at 

I am sliding in a couple days late...this is not a color I own much vintage in around the house. I do have lots of brown, just not vintage....so I am turning to my graphics collection. These are some of my faves that I have picked up thru the years by scanning old photos or paper. Some are from surfing the blogs for freebie ephemera. With that being said, you are also free to save these for your own use too:)







21 September 2011

another cottage garden favortite

 Balsam
(Impatiens balsamina)



Yet another old fashioned favorite flower that is popular for the cottage garden. This is one that I used to grow as a little girl. I remember getting to pick out a packet of flower seeds when I was about eleven and nurtured these from seed. This year I started these a little late outdoors in pots, but they grow fast, and I am now reaping the rewards of pretty blooms. My seeds were from Burpee seeds Hierloom collection.


I copied this description from Better Homes and Gardens website, it so accurately describes this lovely heirloom.

Once a favorite of Victorian gardens, this old-fashioned annual adds an exotic, almost gaudy touch to the garden. It offers interesting, trumpet-shape blooms, mostly in shades of pink. Many selections have bicolor flowers. Balsam often self-seeds in the garden and is very easy to grow.
Plant established plants outdoors in spring after all danger of frost has passed. Balsam needs rich, well-drained soil to do best, so work in plenty of compost. (It's ideal in containers as long as you don't let the plants dry out for even a second.) Fertilize lightly but regularly.
Light:
Shade
Plant Type:
Annual
Plant Height:
1-3 feet tall
Plant Width:
1-2 feet wide
Landscape Uses:
Containers,Beds & Borders
Special Features:
Flowers,Easy to Grow
I didn't notice when I took this pic, that there 
was a visitor inside the flower:)

12 September 2011

sweet treats pin cushions


Not long ago, I ventured into a new thrift shop in a nearby town and found stacks of vintage metal jello molds. they were only 50 cents a stack of 6, so I bought several not really knowing what the heck I would do with them. A little googling came up with some great ideas from candles to Christmas ornaments to the fun idea of pincushions. And since I am a textile artist, I have lots of fabric scraps and embellishments. So with spray paint in hand, I set off to try my hand a few. It was one of the many projects I have that I just go with what turns out. After looking at these, the pastel ones look like candy and ice cream. The retro ones remind me of my grandma's kitchen.
This bunch I am going to include in the Shabby Lane Shops Boutique bags that will be sold at the Christmas Gift show in Nashville this fall. I will most likely have a few on my website for holiday stocking stuffers too.


07 September 2011

Kiss me over the garden gate~

I decided today I would share one of the less common flowers you see in the cottage garden. Several years ago a fellow cottage gardener from the midwest sent me these seeds. I had never heard of such a flower, she told me to make sure to scatter the seeds in the back of the garden as they are aptly named as "kiss me over the garden gate" (the botanical name is Polygonum orientale) as they can get over 12ft tall! 

 The first year I grew them  I think they were about 5ft--this year they are about 9-10ft. I snapped a pic of my cottage garden--you can see they are taller than my Lollipop Crab apple tree....they are a nice back drop and screening plant. They also reseed freely so you will never need seeds again!
 I was sure they would be all laying on the ground when we had a nickle size hail storm recently. but these plants are sturdy--they only suffered some holes in the leaves. I will be saving seeds for anyone who wants them. Contact me thru my profile page and I will give you my mailing address--you can send me a S.A.S.E and when they are ready you will have them to scatter in your garden--I have a few mixed hollyhock seeds too, first come first served.
I also thought I would share this big sunflower peeking over my fence. We have new neighbors and they are as crazy about gardening as I am. The plus is that they grow different flowers than I do and our flowers intermingle between the fence boards. So I enjoyed her dahlias and she enjoyed my clematis as well as the "kiss me's....

Every Saturday

Where we reside

Where we reside

The Oregon Coastline

The Oregon Coastline