A House for the Goaties!

The dear, wonderful love of my life came over the other day and helped me build a house for Dean and Truitt!

Truitt and Dean wondering why I am taking a picture and not feeding them.  Goat house w/ temporary roof in the rear.

Actually, he did most of the work.  He designed the house, did all of the cutting and most of the drilling.  Most of the materials that we used were scavenged from my house or his--his dad gave us a whole bunch of nice cedar planks to use for the framework, and we found some old two-by-fours laying near my garage that we utilized for the base.  A friend gave us an old rubber apron that we used to make a door flap (kinda like a cat door).  The only material we had to purchase was the plywood--and the money I used to purchase it was money that Davis had donated anonymously when Jerry died for the purchase of a new goat.  I'm telling you what, I have got myself one heck of a great guy.

One of the coolest design features of this house is it's removable floor.  The floor slides out the back, causing the droppings, hay, etc. to fall to the ground underneath for easy cleaning.  The roof will also be removable, in case I need to get in topwise for any reason.

  

Gracious wanted to be in the picture too.

The base.

 The base with cedar planks for support.  Sorry it's sideways.

The house was built just in time--we have had some crazy weather going on here in Georgia right now.  It has been snowing and icing all over the place, and hasn't really gotten about 35F this week.  I'm glad the goats have a warmer, more sturdy place to sleep and get out of the wind! 

This is about all the work I did--just held thing in place! ;)  

We (aka Davis) worked pretty late into the night to get as much finished as possible.  

 Attaching the front piece.

The product of a days work! 

It is almost complete--right now it has a temporary roof, and the most recent picture I'm posting here (the one at the top) does not show the cool door flap.  Dean and Truitt really like it!  I love seeing them poke their heads out and bray when I come outside.  Cuties.

Thank you, mon cheri. You are wonderful. Dean and Jerry will love you forever--and so will their crazy, goat-loving, accordion playing, old movie watching owner.

 ~Bessie

Some Poetry

A little something I wrote a while back.  Enjoy, and happy Sunday!

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A Woman's Heart

The heart of a woman

Is like a tender rosebud

Whose delicate petals

Are tightly shut

How she longs to blossom!

And she will, in time

With a little patience

With a little care

Slowly her heart will open

And blessed is he

Whose fortune it is to inhale her scent

And behold her beauty

For it has been saved

Especially for him

~Bessie

Jenny's Dress, Cute Siblings, and Goaties

So I am almost finished with poor Jenny's dress.  I was able to complete most of the construction before leaving to record last weekend, and now only need to make a couple fit adjustments and hem it.  Hooray!  

Jenny and I are the same size, so I decided to model the unfinished dress for you.  Forgive the crazy angles and hat--it was early, and I was having a bad hair day. ;)

 The front: still needs some buttons and is pinned in a few places.  I really love the pockets and front pleat on this dress.

The back: sorry for the twisty-ness!  The back skirt has three panels, in case you cannot tell from this pic.  

 Ok, you can't really see the dress in this one, but I like how it turned out. ;)

This dress definitely needs a belt.  Without it is a bit, um, enlarging.  With the belt, it looks super classy.

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 So on to the siblings and goats!

Yesterday Cael, Josh, Esme and I hung out with Dean and Truitt for awhile.  We had such a great time--especially Cael.  See how happy he was?

Beautiful Esme.

Cael wanted to sit in the hay.

Flint really wanted to join the party, but I was afraid that he would not be polite to the goats.  So he watched us play rather sadly from the other side of the fence.  If I were a dog person, I would probably feel bad for him.  However, seeing as I am not, and seeing as he and Claude decided to rip open a fly trap that was hanging in the yard yesterday and eat the nasty, death-smelling innards and get it all over their fur and smell up the whole back of the house, I do not feel particularly sympathetic.

Esme, Truitt, Dino

Cael got something in his shoe!

Goats are so wiggly--I don't know how anyone ever manages to get a good picture of one.  This is the best face-on pic I could get of little Truitt.  Cutie.

Kind-of a weird pose, but I thought this showed off Dean's lovely coat nicely.  I cannot wait to shear him in the spring and see what kind of yarn comes of that beautiful fiber!

That is it for today.  Gotta work on some pillows tonight, and then get ready for Thanksgiving!  Sky and I are in charge of the cooking, so we have a lot of prep to do over the next couple days.  I can't wait. :)

Have a fantastic day!

Bessie

Being Home

I love being at home. :)

Today John and I decided to do a still life.  He picked out four pretty little apples and placed them in a line on the kitchen table.  John was so good as to share his colored pencils with me. :)

John and I talked about how shadows worked.  He did a great job on his first shadow attempt, and was very excited to learn something new about drawing.

My finished product--I like it. :)

John's almost finished product.  Note the crinkles--he didn't like the way the third apple turned out (it was too "wownd")

Instead of beginning another apple drawing, John made a really cool picture of a wiener dog. 

Ok, off to work on Jenny's dress! Have a great weekend!

~Bessie

Music music music!

Davis and I are going to see the amazing Sufjan Stevens this weekend.  I'm so excited I can hardly stand it.



Hooray for good music, right? :)

Speaking of music, Davis and I are also getting ready to go record our first album of songs next weekend at Iron Wing Recording Studios.  The studio is owned by some good friends of ours, and we are super excited to visit and record with them.  We are hoping to have CDs available sometime in the spring.  Yay!  Another exciting aspect of our recording project is that we will be donating 100% of our profit from CD sales to a local organization called Calvary Children's Home.  As neither one of us is looking to make money from our music, one of our main goals is to use our musical gifts to bless others--both aesthetically and monetarily.  Davis and I are both very fond of children and children's ministry; Calvary Children's Home seemed like a perfect fit. :)

So I think that about sums it up for now!  I have vowed to finish Jennifer's dress THIS WEEKEND.  Poor Jenny--she is so patient and wonderful with her disorganized big sister!  I'll post pics as soon as it is finished.

Have a fantastic day!

~Bessie

 

Da Capo

I've been perusing some old journals lately and came across a quote by W.M. Thackeray I had written down several years ago.  I like it. :)

"There may be nothing new under (and including) the sun; but it looks fresh every morning, and we rise with it to toil, hope, scheme, laugh, struggle, love, suffer, until the night comes and quiet.  And then we will wake Morrow and the eyes that look on it; and so 'da capo'." 

~W.M. Thackeray, The Newcomes

Have a lovely day!

~Bessie

The Man Shirt

My First Man Shirt

Pattern Used:

The fabric I used was a nice, thick, soft flannel plaid.  It washed really well, and is super warm!  Here are pics of the front and back:

 The buttonholes (which I realize you cannot see here) are hand-worked, and the buttons are vintage.

I made a tag for the inside.  I've always wanted to do this, but keep forgetting until it is too late in the construction stage to add it!  For this one I embroidered a bit of linen, edged it with some brown piping, and sewed it onto the yoke facing before stitching everything together.

The cuff buttons might just be my favorite thing about this man-shirt.  They are antique copper buttons, with a touch of oxidation here and there.  I found a whole bunch of these in my huge jar of estate sale buttons.  Doesn't the copper contrast nicely with the blues in the plaid?

As per the pattern instructions, I used flat-felled seams for the sides and underarms of the shirt.  I think they turned out nicely!  This was the first time that I had tried flat-felled seams--I usually do French seams on blouses (which can be over-doing things a bit, depending on the fabric, but I like the way they look).

So there you have it!  I really enjoyed this sewing project, partly because it was fun sewing something boxy and plaid (I think working with plaids is the bomb), and partly because I was making it for someone that I care about.   

Have a fantastic Saturday--and pray for me...math finals this weekend!

~Bessie

Just because

1. He's so darn cute 

2. I feel blessed today.  Well, I am blessed. :)

3. Bessie

Music in Marietta

Davis and I went to the Marietta square and played music yesterday with some of our friends.  It was super fun!  My sister Skylar took some great pictures; I'll share one with you here, as I am wearing one of my favorite vintage creations.  More pics should be up on our band page soon!

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In other news, I've been working on the bodice of Jenny's dress, and it is coming along nicely!  Sorry about the funky coloration in these photos:

 Hopefully I'll be able to finish the bodice and begin work on the skirt this week.  :)

Have a great day!
~Bessie

The Apple Festival

I am supposed to be doing math homework, but I keep remembering other things I "need" to do and getting distracted.  Like I really needed to post about my trip to the mountains today--like right now.  I also needed to package a few patterns to ship, go through the mail, fiddle around with the camera, and watch a few videos on YouTube.

Yes, I am putting off my homework and I own it.  That's right, I own it.  One more week to go, Bessie.

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SO!  Today my dear friend Stephanie and I went to a humongous apple festival in the mountains.  It was very fun, and there were TONS of people there.  However, there were two problems:

1. It was about 90 degrees outside.  It is supposed to be cold in the mountains in October, so Stephanie and I wore jeans and sneakers.  We should have worn summer dresses or shorts and tank tops.  But it seemed so wrong, neither one of us could bring ourselves to do it.

2.  They didn't have any caramel apples!!!  What?!  Well, I take that back.  They had sliced caramel-covered apples in a bowl (which were tasty, but not the same).  But no apples on a stick!  What is this world coming to, anyway?

So that was a tad disappointing.  However we did get to see a couple camels, and that definitely made up for the disappointment.  Yes, there were camels in the mountains of Georgia today.  Stephanie wanted me to ride one, but I was chicken.

Here are a few pics of our day! :D

 The crazily large crowds

 Wow.  Can you feel the excitement?  Do you feel the urge to push my hair out of my face (I do)?

 Camels!

 We ate some very interesting and slightly questionable food.

So we had a fun time. :D  My favorite part of the day was spending time with Stephanie.  We always have a blast, whatever we end up doing.  I feel blessed to have her in my life!  

"The great need is not to do things, but to believe things.  The Redemption of Christ is not formed an experience, it is the great act of God which he has performed through Christ, and I have to build my faith upon it.  If I construct my faith on my experience, I produce that most unscriptural type, an isolated life, my eyes fixed on my own whiteness."  Oswald Chambers, My Utmost for His Highest. 10/9.

~Bess

Coasters: A Tutorial (because I am obsessed)

I had so much fun re-purposing those old coasters a couple weeks ago, I decided to look online and see if I could find any more.  Much to my surprise, I found a TON!  Apparently these Japanese dead-butterfly coasters were very common back in the day.  The ones I found online were in much better condition than the ones that I found at the barn sale, and actually look quite pretty in their original form.

Anywho, I bought about a dozen more and decided to chronicle the process I used to re-purpose them in case anyone else is interested in doing the same.  :)  Enjoy!


Vintage Coaster Make-over Tutorial--Whoop!

Step 1:  Find coasters.  Try going to Etsy or eBay and typing in "vintage butterfly coaster."  Here are some links to current listings: eBay 1, eBay 2, Etsy 1, Etsy 2.  Some listings are super-expensive, and some are very reasonable.  I hate that the shipping is so high, but I think it's worth it. :D

Step 2: Disassemble coasters.  Unfortunately I got a little too excited about my new coasters and didn't think about taking pictures of the process until after I had disassembled all of them.  Whoops.  It's pretty easy to explain though. :)  All you have to do is gently press on the glass/plastic from the front of the coaster.  This should pop off the wooden ring in the back and enable you to remove the insert.  Once you do this, slide (or peel, if necessary) the old dead butterfly and tissue paper off of the glass.

Step 3: Wash and dry glass and plastic inserts and backing pieces.  

 I like to fill my sink up with hot soapy water and let them soak, as they usually have a little glue residue around the edges (and sometimes in the middle).  A few of the plastic backings here had a lot of residue and discoloration. 

This is a plastic backing piece that has cleaned up very nicely.

This is a plastic backing piece that has NOT cleaned up nicely.  We will put this behind a darker-colored fabric...:p

Step 4: Cut out fabric circles.  Using a back insert piece as your guide, trace circles onto your fabric of choice.  You can use a coaster (empty of glass) as a sort of frame to help you choose aesthetically-pleasing sections of fabric. :D  Here are my circles:

(Some of these photos are w/ flash and some are w/o flash.  This one is with.)

Step 5: Apply Glue. Using an old paintbrush or q-tip (or your fingers, if you like), cover the back insert with  lightly with glue.  Elmer's glue worked great for me.  

Just a very light coating of glue will do.

Step 6: Apply fabric circle to back insert.  Using a bit of pressure, smooth the fabric circle over the glue on the back insert.  After smoothing it with your fingers, you may also wish to turn it over and rub it on your work surface, just to make sure there are no air bubbles.

Step 7: Put it all together.  Turn a coaster upside-down on your work surface.  First insert a glass/plastic piece, then place a fabric-covered back insert on top.  Put a small amount of glue around the edges of a wooden ring piece (the part that fits into the back of the coaster and holds everything together) and press into place on top of the back insert.  Press firmly, but not too hard.

Step 8:  Let it dry.  You may wish to set a glass or mug down on top of your coaster as it dries, just to help it stick better. 

Ta-da!  That's it!  It is such a fun project.  Don't you just love the end result?

Have a fantastic weekend,

Bessie