No to frescoe, no to faux

I took this picture while I was sitting on the couch at the cabin, a really crooked snap - no thought to what was in the frame, no getting junk out of the way. I've been looking at it trying to decide on paint colors.
The views are one of the things I love about the place. I think the only answer when it comes to paint colors is white, I want the emphasis to be on the beauty outside...don't really want to detract from it.
I'm not really a white paint girl, well...except for barns - I like white barns - and farmhouses. But inside? I'm all over the color..fearless as a matter of fact. I've painted rooms moss green, chocolate, oxblood red...you name it.
But right now, the only answer that I come up with that doesn't compete with my views is white...boring old white.
Ideas anyone?

Bluebird of Happiness

Every spring these little guys are everywhere I look when I'm working at the cabin.
So cute, and sooo blue!
I wish I could get good pictures of them...they're so busy, snacking, fluttering, pecking at the bird seed I scatter for them. I don't have a snazzy camera so the odds of getting a good shot are pretty slim even if the little guys sat still for a photo-op.
I'll just enjoy them while I do my spring chores, I guess they're not the only ones who can't sit still for a good shot.
It's spring... the list of chores is long!
Things are growing and blooming.
Happy blogging garden girl ;)

Big Fat Ice Trucker Fakers

I'm not much into reality TV...so I wasn't aware that there was a show called "Ice Road Truckers"...or something like that. From what I gather it's a Discovery channel show about truckers driving on icy roads, okie dokie...not interesting to me but I guess there is somebody out there watching, and they think it's the real deal.
Well, last night I had the misfortune of watching them "fake it".
Driving home over the mountain pass from the cabin, the seventh car in line, the first ones through after the long winter closure...I was soooo happy not to have to drive the long way around.
And then.
We stopped.
Because this truck was hanging off the edge of the highway at the hairpin curve. The story is that the Ice Road Trucker people wanted to roll a big semi truck over the cliff and film it, but the truck got stuck...no tumbling, no rolling, no fire, no crash...no Big Faker Ice Trucker footage to suck people in...oooooing and ahhhing on cable TV.
Just one cranky lady who still had three hours to drive who really wanted to get her own show on the road...dang it!
Today I googled Ice Road Trucker just to see what all the fuss was about.
Hmmm....people watch this stuff.
Oh well....some people babble away on blogs ;)
Other people watch fake truck crashes on cable TV.

The show is supposed to air in May, I think I'm busy.

Perfect Planters

Oh my goodness...I want these planter boxes. This is the worst case of planter box-itis I have ever had. They remind me of the old whiskey barrel planters, only with attitude... sometimes a little attitude is such a good thing.

We're racing around handling a lot of deferred maintenance here at the farm. Lots of blackberry brambles are getting chopped and snipped, branches are getting sawed and hauled off to the wood shed. Yesterday we put together some new raised beds since my old ones are falling apart.

Today I'm off to the cabin to get a handle on the weed problem there...but ohhh boy...when I get back?
I wanna build some planters!

Honey? Did you say you have some old weathered lumber in the barn that I can use?

I didn't need to know that

Last week the furnace croaked.
Saturday the furnace sales guy came over, gave us the sales pitch, tried to sell us a heat pump (unsuccessfully) and today the new furnace was installed - sans heat pump.
Here's the deal. My house is 100+ years old, don't get excited...it's not a cool 100 as in built-in cabinets and character. It's a really simple plain farmhouse that was built solid but on a budget....no frills whatsoever.
The furnace sales guy crawled under the house to look at the duct work...he crawled back out and said it was icky under there. Duh...then he said something about a bio-hazard. Not really sure what that means, maybe because over the years a few critters were making themselves a little under-house home there.
I didn't really need that little morsel placed in my brain...under my current living space there exists a bio-hazard.
Today the installation guy needed to go under the house to add a drain pipe to the furnace...he said it was scary down there. He said that there is a tree stump holding up the center support beam of the house, if there is an earthquake - the whole house will cave in on itself - he advised me that if I'm in the house when there is an earthquake I should try to stay to the exterior walls of the house.
I'll put that on my "to do" list.
Thanks so much guys.
This is all stuff I would really rather not know.

I'm going back out to the garden where spring is making all sorts of beautiful promises...sunshine and lollipops and rainbows and daffodils.
There will be no talk of bio-hazards and structural instability in my garden.

A New Adventure

Finally...I can spill the news.
We bought a house on an island! I'm so excited I can hardly stand it.
Things have been really crazy around here for the last couple of months, I haven't been blogging much because my brain has been on overload.

A couple of months ago I went to visit a dear friend out on San Juan Island. We had so much fun, she's a realtor and I helped her host an open house for other realtors at one of her listings. At the end of the tour we went to look at some other properties. While we were looking I asked her about a house I had looked at last year...it still hadn't sold and the price had dropped quite a bit.
Uh oh.

I've always wanted to have a place on the island, we've rented a couple of houses for the summer ...and we have friends who live there that we always have a great time with.

So, we made an offer..and it was accepted! We're going to open a Bed and Breakfast and live there. We've had offers on the farm so we've decided to sell while people are still interested in it, after all...who knows what's going to happen with the economy - strike while the iron is hot!

Hubby is looking forward to hanging out, hiking with Bergie and he says he's going to take up kayaking.
I'll be managing the Inn and doing the cooking. Hubby will take care of maintenance, maybe he'll even do some kayak tours - the house is in a perfect location for whale watching and kayak tours.

I don't have a lot of photos but here are a few to give you an idea of what the place looks like. We'll be doing some redecorating so I'll be posting about that and probably asking for some advice on how to make our guests comfortable.
Oh...and of course we'll be setting up a website for the place.
Such an adventure, I'm on overload!



Looking up at the house from the pool deck.


The view! The house is built so that you can see it from virtually every room.


The swimming pool, covered for the winter.


The breakfast nook in a turret!
Ever since I was a little kid I've wanted to live in a house with one of these!

I'm so excited...and I hope you will come stay with us at our B & B...I'll make you one of my specialties - a baloney sandwich....because that's what this story is - a big bunch of baloney.

April Fools!

Bistro Baffi

Chef Michael with the birthday girl

The good news...I have a new favorite restaurant, the bad news is that it's two-plus hours away from home!
Saturday night we had a little birthday dinner for my friend Diane at Bistro Baffi in Burien.
Eveything about this place is delightful. The decor is warm and cozy, the staff is attentive and charming. The food? In a word, absolutely fabulous.

There are a lot of restuarants that serve great food, but these days...if I'm going to dine out I want the total experience. I'm thinking twice before I spend money at a restaurant, a lot of people are doing the same. This little Bistro makes sure that every patron feels special, I noticed that Chef Michael stops at every table to make sure of that.

I just wish I didn't live so far away.