a cat speaks

This is how I deal with the heat...



By sleeping. Of course, that's how I deal with most things, but the screened porch is especially nice for a nap when it's hot. You can't see it in this picture but there's a ceiling fan right above me to keep the air moving. And I love this pillow cover that my mom got at the flea market. She says it's not bark cloth but I wouldn't know anything about that. Bark makes me think of dogs and I'm not so fond of dogs.

I didn't know blogging was so much work. Yawn. Time to go back to sleep...

~ Amaya

what to eat when it's too hot to eat

It's been unbelievably hot here the past few days—in the 90s! Thankfully it does cool off a little at night and stays cool for a few hours in the morning so I can get some work done early. After that it's too hot to move. Eating is always a problem when it's really hot. Who wants to add more heat to the air by using the stove or oven? And who want to eat something heavy? I've been turning lately to salads.

Over the weekend I made a nicoise salad with baby green beans from the garden. I've been making this salad for years and have lost track of where I got the recipe, so apologies to whoever the original belongs to. There's some prep work and use of the stove involved but you can do that ahead of time.

Salad Nicoise

3/4 cup olive oil
1/4 cup red wine vinegar
1 clove garlic, crushed
1 tablespoon chopped fresh basil (1 tsp. dried)
3/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon dry mustard
1/4 teaspoon cracked black pepper
1 large head Boston lettuce
1 pound small new potatoes
1 pound fresh green beans
3 hard-cooked eggs
1 medium red onion
2 medium tomatoes
1 red bell pepper
Two 7-ounce cans water-pack tuna
1/2 cup pitted ripe olives

1) In a jar with a tight-fitting lid, combine the oil, vinegar, garlic, basil, salt, mustard, and pepper. Shake vigorously and refrigerate.
2) Wash lettuce; remove core and drain well. Separate into leaves.
3) Scrub unpared potatoes. Place in a medium saucepan, add boiling water to cover and 1/2 teaspoon salt. Bring to boiling and boil gently, covered, for 20 minutes. Drain, cool and peel, then slice 1/4-inch thick. Turn into shallow dish.
4) Trim ends and wash beans. Cook whole in boiling water with 1 teaspoon salt, covered, for 5 to 10 minutes. Drain and cool 10 minutes. Turn into dish with potatoes. Add 1/2 cup dressing and toss until well coated. Refrigerate, covered.
5) Peel and quarter eggs. Slice onion thinly. Wash and cut each tomato into six wedges. Wash pepper, halve and remove seeds, and cut into 1-inch strips. Drain tuna; with fork break into chunks.
6) Arrange lettuce in a shallow bowl. Arrange eggs, onion, tomato, pepper, and tuna over lettuce and chill until ready to serve. (I hate really cold salads so I let it warm up a bit on the counter). Just before serving, spoon on the beans and sliced potatoes and drizzle the whole thing with the remaining dressing. (6)

If you want something easier (and quicker), throw together an asian noodle salad with some shredded leftover chicken, chopped veggies (I like carrot, red pepper, scallions, and cucumber), chopped herbs (Thai basil and cilantro—also from my garden), some noodles (linguine fini is good), and some bottled Thai peanut sauce. Mix it all together in a bowl and chill for a little bit in the fridge. Easy peasy! This would be fine without chicken or with the addition of some tofu for a vegetarian version.

So, what do you like to eat when it's too hot to eat?

rickrack + embroidery

I promised to show you another apron that uses rickrack creatively and here it is. The technique for attaching the rickrack can be used on anything—not just gingham—but this example shows a nice use of cross stitches in between the rows. And it's another idea for trimming your gingham apron if you're doing one for the challenge.


Use colored embroidery floss (same color as the gingham) across the dips in the "waves" to attach your rickrack to the fabric. Running your stitches all in the same direction gives you a striped effect; alternating direction forms a v-shaped design.



The apron shown here has the rickrack along the waistband and pocket tops—one row of the larger size in the center surrounded by two rows of the smaller size. Along the bottom are two rows of this same arrangement with the addition of cross stitches on the white squares in between. Looks pretty fancy but isn't quite as much work as chicken scratch!

Stitch School: Chicken Scratch

Stitch School has moved to it's very own space on the web! You'll now find the Chicken Scratch post here. Comments are now closed on this post; if you'd like to leave a comment please do so on the new one.

in case you haven't heard enough about gardening

This really isn't a gardening blog but it's hard to tell lately since that's all I've talked about. It's certainly more interesting than talking about my business accounting or cleaning my house, which are the other things I've focused on this week. So, to continue the theme for one more day, let's talk about gardening books.

I actually read quite a bit of non-fiction and gardening books are something I've been turning to lately. Not so much the how-to books but the ones that read like fiction, the personal accounts of people's attempts to garden for the first time or to live closer to the land. I'm reading Barbara Kingsolver's Animal, Vegetable, Miracle right now (from the library) and picked up several interesting-sounding books on my recent trip to the used book store:
• Letters from the Hive: An Intimate History of Bees, Honey, and Humankind by Stephen Buchman
• Two Gardeners (Katharine S. White and Elizabeth Lawrence): A Friendship in Letters edited by Emily Herring Wilson

I'll probably save them to read this winter when there's snow on the ground and the garden seems like a distant memory.

If gardening books interest you, too, you might want to check out Barnes and Noble's weekly roundup of five themed books. This week's theme is gardening and a few of their featured books are going on my must-read list.



• Old Herbaceous by Reginald Arkell
Arkell’s 1950 tale chronicles Bert Pinnegar’s eight decades in an English manor house garden.

• Down the Garden Path by Beverley Nichols
Nichols’ 1932 memoir of a cottage in the British countryside and its attendant flora.

• The Education of a Gardener by Russell Page
One of the most famous garden architects of his time, Page (1906 – 1985) designed the gardens at Leeds castle and the grounds of PepsiCo headquarters in Purchase, NY.

• Gardening for Love by Elizabeth Lawrence (yes, the same woman in the Two Gardeners book mentioned above)
This book, by an American original once called “the Jane Austen of the gardening literary world,” chronicles the author’s long correspondence with a circle of Southern women who traded seeds and bulbs through agricultural market bulletins.

Back to stitchery and needlework next week- I promise :)

a favorite garden center

I'm not sure I've mentioned exactly where I buy all the lovely plants for my garden. I'm blessed to have two great places within ten miles of my house. One of them is Greystone Gardens and it's an irresistible place. More than a garden center, the property is laid out with walking paths and stone walls, arbors and bridges, and water features. Perfect for finding inspiration in their careful juxtapositions of plantings. Very English garden. And that's not surprising because the owners—Paul and Susan Epsom—are from England and the gardens themselves feature an English cottage garden theme.

I love to go early on Sunday mornings when it's cool and less crowded. The birds are singing in the woods, the sun is just hitting some of the more wooded sections, and I'm free to wander around. I usually start in the shade garden area in the back where the plants are grouped together under a black-tented arbor. If it's rained recently, the air will be misty and you'll hear the sound of the water tumbling over the rocks in the waterfall and creek that run behind this area.

At the center is a section for vines (clematis and honeysuckles) and then rows and rows of perennials on tables. I love that they have unusual things and unusual varieties of more common things. Like that Verbascum chaxii I showed in one of my previous posts. There are sections of roses and herbs, shrubs and trees, and water plants around a lily pond that is filled with frogs.

Inside there's a gift shop that's open year-round and that's stocked full of interesting bird houses and feeders, pottery containers, garden ornaments, and lovely garden-themed gifts. I often Christmas shop here. And, if all this wandering around leaves you hungry or craving tea and scones, you can have lunch or afternoon tea in the Garden Cafe. There's an outdoor patio if the weather is nice.

Paul is the gardening correspondent for PBS' Victory Garden and has won Garden Globe awards in 2003, 2004 and 2005 for his on-air work as a garden correspondent . Both he and Susan really know their stuff when it comes to plants and gardening and are always available to chat, answer questions, and give advice.

I don't think many of my blog readers live near enough to visit but it's worth checking out your own local garden centers. You never now what treasures you'll find.

Greystone Gardens, 829 Old State Road, Clarks Summit, PA 18411

what a difference a day makes

Not quite an "after" picture yet but we're making progress. The stone walkway is in...



A few plants have been added. And a bench.



I bought the bench for half price at a fancy garden center north of Indianapolis years ago and have been lugging it around ever since. It's been used on the porch of every apartment I've lived in that had a porch. It was in storage for a while. And I think I may have used it as a couch (a very hard one) at one point. It's been in several locations since we bought this house but never one where it "fit" so perfectly.

Next up is a trip to the English garden center in a town nearby. We still have lots of holes to fill!

in the garden

Unbelievable that it's July already - where does the time go? My absence from blogging this past week might lead you to think that I'm adjusting to my state of unemployment by sleeping late and generally goofing off. Not so. I'm up with the birds and at my computer most mornings, working on my website and getting Primrose orders ready to ship. I'm also taking the time to clean my hard drive of old unused files and archiving everything. One of those things I've never had time to do before.

And I've been working in the garden a lot. Last weekend we ripped out a large, very ugly, bayberry bush and some ivy (you can see some of the dead vines on the chimney that need to be removed) on the driveway side of the house. This involved a chain attached to our truck and lots of cursing but you don't need to hear about that part. Now there are two new blank canvases to fill - so exciting!



Brian set two long flat stones for steps at one end and will be making a stone path through the center that will lead out to the herb garden in front. Sort of where the footprints are in the first picture. The stones you can just see at the left in the second picture are part of the wall that surrounds the steps that lead down to the basement and their tops will be a great place for those creeping plants that I love so much.



We came home from a trip to the garden center yesterday with the trunk full of plants. It looked like so much in the car but barely made a dent in the space we have to fill. As with most gardens it will evolve over time and I don't expect this to be fully filled in until next year. I like to see what survives over the winter and will probably move some things from elsewhere in the spring when the plants are small and easier to dig up.

I'm taking a break today to get my hair cut, pick up the DVD of the first season of Mad Men that releases today (yay - finally!), return some library books, and have lunch with my friend Jenny who's a teacher and has the summer off. I've been working on a post about some great vintage embroidery books I found last week at a used book store (one from 1890!) and a Stitch School about chicken scratch embroidery. So, look for them soon!

shop news

I'm running out of space, I want to get started on new designs, I'm just plain sick of looking at them. Time for a blowout pillow sale! All pillows are now 30% off. Including this floral one made from a gorgeous vintage Waverly print and vintage ball fringe.



Two new embroidery patterns have been added—a design of a bird with strawberries that would be really pretty embroidered on a tea towel (the picture shows just the top part) and a cute 1930s-40s baby bib design.


You've got to see the original that the baby bib design was traced from. Isn't this little guy cute? I love the tinted areas (hopefully they won't wash out when I clean this after finishing the embroidery) and the beets. Although the one hoisting himself out of the ground is kind of scary. I love that children's designs from the 30s and 40s often have a slightly sinister quality to them. A little sweetness goes a long way in my opinion :)





Don't forget that all patterns are Buy 1 Get 1 Free during the month of June.

And finally, I've been investigating ways to offer my patterns as pdf downloads. Selling to crafters in other countries has always been a problem because the shipping is so high. Heck, it's high here, too. Pdfs would solve that problem. More on this when I've figured out the details.

Happy summer! I totally missed the fact that Friday was the first day of summer. Probably because it was rainy and in the 60s and didn't feel much like summer :)

outsourced

I don't often talk about the rest of my life here on my blog. One, because I'm a pretty private person, and two, because you all come here to read about Primrose and crafty-related things. My worlds are colliding today.

I've been busy this week finishing up the July/August issue of the magazine I design. I've done this magazine for four years now on a freelance basis, along with another magazine for the same company, different division. Together they make up about three-quarters of my graphic design work (and annual income). And this will be my last issue. I knew this was going to happen eventually but I officially got the axe yesterday. My job has been outsourced to India where they make about $3 an hour. Never mind that a large part of designing a magazine is having a good command of the English language. And never mind that the people that will be working on it are not really designers. Doesn't matter—the parent company (who is not located in the US) thinks it will save money.

As a business person I understand the need to keep costs down, but I have a real problem with the whole outsourcing concept. There are plenty of people here in the US who need jobs. Next week, I'll be one of them. As will all the in-house people they've laid off in recent weeks. And then there's the whole issue of quality. "Good enough" just isn't part of my vocabulary.

So, I've been polishing up my resume and working on my design website. And I'm officially spreading the word that I'm available. Logos, catalogs, brochures, magazines, newsletters, books, and websites—I've done them all. I'd love to stay freelance just because a regular full-time job won't leave me enough time for Primrose. Or blogging. Not that I have a lot of options for full-time jobs where I live anyway.

So, if you hear of anything, are starting your own business and need some help, or know of someone who is, please let me know. I'll post a link to the new website when it's up and running.

If nothing else I'll have lots of free time this summer to work on projects. Like painting my kitchen table and chairs. Stripping the wallpaper in the kitchen and downstairs bathroom. Cleaning the garage. Keeping the garden weeded. You know, making headway on that running "to do" list we all keep.

happy father's day

A few pictures of me with my dad who, unfortunately, is no longer with us. Going through all the photos to chose one for today's post got me remembering how much fun we had together when I was a kid. And you can see where my early gray hair comes from. He was in his late 20s in these pictures and is already halfway there. I don't even know what color his mother's hair was—it was pure white the whole time I knew her!





Happy Father's Day!

botanical art tote bags

Remember those lovely seed packages I showed you a couple of months ago? I got an email from the company a few days ago announcing that they're using some of their botanical paintings on eco-friendly reusable canvas grocery bags. What a great idea!

They've started selling reusable bags at the grocery store where I shop but they're pretty ugly. So, I've been looking for an alternative. I usually don't buy huge amounts of food at one time so a bag like this would easily hold my purchases—they say they'll hold twice as much as a plastic grocery bag. And it will be perfect for the farmers market when it opens next month.

Now, how to choose from all the gorgeous artwork (everything from beets to oriental poppies). Maybe I'll have to get two :)

$23.95, from Botanical Interests

scenes from the garden

I don't know what it is this year—perfect weather, plenty of rain, the planets aligning—but the garden looks spectacular. Even the grass looks great. Of course, if it stays 90 degrees like it's going to be today, it will probably dry out and I'll be complaining about that. But for now...perfect.


Rock Soapwort, a new favorite—kind of low-growing and creepy and looks really nice spilling over a stone wall.


A yellow Japanese tree peony. Like regular peonies but without the ants.


A mystery flower—I can't remember what this is called. (Thanks to Camilla and Patricia for identifying this as Verbascum chaxii and I believe it is the 'Bold Queen' variety. There's also one called 'Milkshake' with flowers that are pure white; mine are a bit yellower)


Flowering chives.


White rhododendrons—the wild kind—which are much prettier than the cultivated ones. This looks amazing when it's just starting to get dark—it glows.

the ducks are back

I was sold out of these cute duck diaper pins for a while but I now have them back in stock. And (shhh, don't tell anyone) but I've finally found a wholesale source after 3 years of searching. So, I should have them for the forseeable future and can offer them at a lower price. Available in packages of four pins in white, yellow, or blue. $3.50 per package.

a book you might like

Last summer I got an email from C. Dianne Zweig asking if I'd like to contribute to a book she was working on. You may be familiar with her previous book Hot Kitchen and Home Collectibles of the 30s, 40s, and 50s or visited her shop “Kitsch-n-Stuff” at The Plantsville General Store Antiques Center in Plantsville, Connecticut. She had seen some of the photos here on my blog and they (and my work) fit right in with her plans for the book. Of course, I said yes.

Almost a year has gone by while the book was being written, designed, proofed, and all those behind-the-scenes things that happen in publishing. And we finally received a release date of September 2008. Preorders are being taken at Amazon—just click on the picture.

It's being published by Collector Books and here's what they have to say about it:

"In Hot Cottage Collectibles for Vintage Style Homes, author C. Dianne Zweig offers readers a new twist on kitchen, home, and garden collectibles, marrying different periods and styles in a look which is vintage chic, country kitsch, and retro-romantic. It's all about 'cottage style,' a trendy and enjoyable way to both collect and creatively use popular collectibles, antiques, odds and ends, and treasured furnishings. This book offers readers over 900 individual and vignette photographs submitted from the top collectors out there. This fresh and exciting look at vintage cottage collectibles contains kitchenware, romantic china, pottery, French enamelware, buffets, china cabinets, tables, chairs, beds, fabric, tablecloths, chenille quilts, pillows, linens, vintage sewing projects, lighting, mirrors, frames, wallpaper, wall decor, wicker, birdcages, cottage nursery, holiday items, whimsical and flea market salvage, objets d'art, garden ornaments, tools, and other 'hot' cottage, beach, and cabin collectibles."

Sounds pretty cool to me and I can't wait to see a copy! Dianne has a links page on her own website if you'd like to visit some of the shops of the other contributors.

working with what's on hand

Except for when I first started my business and had to supplement with an influx of my own cash, Primrose has been self-supporting. That's not the same thing as making a profit, although some months that happens, too. What it means is that I have enough to buy the materials I need without having to borrow money from other sources or from myself. So what happens when things slow down? It means that I buy less stuff and make do with what I have on hand. Not necessarily a bad thing.

Lately I've been going back through past purchases to get them ready to sell. Sometimes, in the case of the baby sheet that I purchased already embroidered with Bambi characters, that just involves hemming the sheet. More often, it's completing the stamped for embroidery projects that I have way too many of. This baby bib with a cat holding a balloon took about an hour to finish. Then I soaked it (it was pretty dirty) and hung it out in the sun to dry. It turned out pretty cute if I do say so myself.

My current project is a set of four napkins with a flower (mums or dahlias?) in one corner of each. It's a nice mix of easy stitches—stem, lazy daisy (straight up for the flower petals and upside-down for the leaves), and French knots. I work a little bit on it each day and it's going fairly quickly. These will need a good soak, too, and then hemming.



I hope to get lots of embroidery done this summer so I'll be sharing more of my projects with you. And look for more patterns, including the balloon cat shown above, on my website soon.

What the heck—let's do another pattern sale for the month of June. Buy one pattern and get another (of equal or lesser value) for free. Just include a note in the comments section of the order form telling me which pattern you'd like.

speaking of gas prices

I've been seeing this graphic a lot lately on some of the political blogs I read. Funny but also not if you know what I mean.

I know that historically we pay much less for gas than people in other countries do (Europe, for example) so they're sort of right when they don't have much sympathy for our situation. But it really is a whole different thing here in the US if you live out in the country like I do. I grew up in NYC and lived in Chicago for a while and took public transportation everywhere (and happily) but it's non-existent here. And the only store within walking distance sells ice cream and a steady diet of that is probably less appealing than it sounds :)

I've always bought cars with high gas mileage - no SUVs for me - and that helps. And I've started to limit my trips to town, combining grocery shopping, banking, and post office runs into single trips.

Most of you probably don't remember that gas was rationed back in the 70s during the oil crisis. I was pretty young and can't remember all the details but I do know that you could only buy gas on certain days of the week and the lines were really long (I used to take a book to read). I'm thankful we don't have to do that yet.

From Wikipedia—
In the U.S., drivers of vehicles with license plates having an odd number as the last digit (or a vanity license plate) were allowed to purchase gasoline for their cars only on odd-numbered days of the month, while drivers of vehicles with even-numbered license plates were allowed to purchase fuel only on even-numbered days. The rule did not apply on the 31st day of those months containing 31 days, or on February 29 in leap years — the latter never came into play, since the restrictions had been abolished by 1976.

So how are gas prices impacting your life? Are you driving less or making changes to your routine?

feels like summer

This holiday weekend was a flurry of activity—most of it taking place outside. I'll tell you about Saturday in a minute but Sunday and Monday were all about the garden. We planted fruit trees (another peach, a new pear), vegetable seeds (corn, beets, carrots, cucumbers, and green beans), vegetable plants (the baby cantaloupes and Greek tomatoes I started in February and some heirloom tomatoes, poblano peppers, and bell peppers from the garden center), and annual flowers in pots for the porch off the kitchen. We put netting over the strawberry plants, which are loaded with blossoms and teeny tiny future strawberries. I planted hostas in the shade garden and weeded flower beds. I even mowed the lawn. And yes, I collapsed into bed each night. But it felt good to get so much of the heavy work out of the way.

Saturday was equally exhausting but for different reasons. I got up early and drove to Stormville, NY for the Stormville Airport Antique Show & Flea Market. This was my first time attending the show and you'll find a full review (the good and the bad) over at Vintage Indie. I'll use this space to show some more of my purchases.

I thought most of the vintage linen/textile dealer's wares were very overpriced but I always manage to find a few bargains wherever I go. I got this embroidered pillowcase for $3 because of the weird stain running above the embroidery. An oxyclean soak got rid of 90% of it and I'll try a few tricks to get rid of the rest. The bluebird is super cute and I love the flowers (rhododendrons, I think).



I passed up the $4 hankies at one dealer's booth only to find a basket full of $1 ones at another's. This one with embroidered roses and daisies is very sweet.



I found some cool vintage 1920s needlework catalogs for $5 each. Catalogs are great for dating linens—they show what styles were in fashion during certain time periods. I think I'll show some of them in a blog post of their very own.

I talked the seller of this rose-print apron into a lower price ($3) because it was really dirty. It cleaned up just fine! I love the fabric this is made from and it has a stiff red netting (also used for the triangle pocket) underneath to give it shape.



This is the white beaded purse for $5 that I mention in the VI review. As it turns out it's not just a clutch—it has a chain handle that tucks inside, too.



I wish I could have gotten more than scraps of this fabric. It's a vintage DuBarry screen printed cotton with roses and bows and the colors are amazing.



I have a few more trips planned for later in the summer - shows that I go to every year. Other than that I'm not sure. With gas so expensive ($48 last time I filled the tank of my VW bug!) I think I may be sticking closer to home this year.

Happy Mother's Day

A photo from a long time ago. This is my grandma Elizabeth in one of her perfect sweater sets, my mom with her ponytail and bobby-pinned curl and me looking a bit overwhelmed with the attention. Somebody let me out of here :)

And I couldn't resist including another picture, of my mom and me on my second birthday. I can't figure out why I'm focused so intently on that birthday gift. Just look at that gorgeous barkcloth pillow above my head and I'm sure it was the genuine article, too! The curtains aren't bad either. Silly me :)



Happy Mother's Day!

feedsacks

A couple of years ago I started a group (Feedsacks) on Flickr to catalog some of the 15,000 existing patterns of feedsacks. This was a project I started on my website (you can see it here) beginning with swatches from my growing collection of feedsack cottons. Then I got busy with other things and the whole thing got set aside. There's really no way I could ever get all of them anyway.



Lately, a few people have discovered the group and asked to join. And I've decided to try to inject a little life into the project again. I invited a few people who already had pictures of feedsacks in their own pools (Flickr-speak for a group of photos). And thanks to those new members who accepted, joined, and shared their photos this week! Stop over and check out the photos and feel free to join us if you're so inclined.



Some of you are probably asking "What the heck is a feedsack?" I'm not going to attempt to explain in detail because several others have done so already, and much better than I could have done. You can read all about them here:
Feedbags: From Rags to Riches by Joan Kiplinger
Feedsacks: A Tradition of Recycling and Repurposing by Kayte Terry
Feedsacks! by Kris Driessen
Feedsacks, Frugal and Fun by Judy Anne Johnson Breneman
Collectible Feedsack Cloth and Quilts: the Past Revisited by Patricia Cummings



The feedsack examples shown here are some of my personal favorites. I love the large scale florals in bright colors, but there are plenty of patterns for everyone whether you like small-scale florals, stripes, polkadots, geometrics, or novelties. And about that 15,000 number—according to one member of the group it's actually grown to 20,000! Oh well, what's another 5,000?