Quilter's Home Comes to Visit!

I am on a wild ride. It seems that my little world has sped up and I am running to keep up with it. We leave soon for the Hawaiian cruise that I will be teaching on.  I am getting all the patterns ready, not to mention trying to find shorts,  in my size, in September.

Maybe being a stay-at-home mom all those years has slowed me down but right now everything I have ever prayed for or dreamed about is happening, all at the same time. Like right now! This very minute.  I have been getting ready for this wonderful Hawaiian cruise and have been invited to teach in Toronto, Canada when I get home.  Next year, I'll be teaching in Dublin, Ireland. Wow!    

Two weeks ago I got a phone call from my friend, Jake Finch, who is the editor of Quilter’s Home magazine. They would like to do a photo shoot of my house, not just the studio, but the whole house, on September 18.  Jake said, with a little giggle, "if you need to get new drapes, this would be the time, and don’t forget to dust."  Great!

I barely have time wash my husband’s shorts, much less make drapes.  But that is what I am doing right now.  Making drapes for my bedroom, not doing the laundry. We have been hanging light fixtures, finishing up unfinished projects and cleaning up the yard.   They are going to show the outside of the Yellow House and share the story of this house I love.  The famous Gregory Case is arriving this Saturday and will be here for 7 -10 hours, he said, shooting our home.

I am staging the house with quilts everywhere, which means covering up the scrapes or imperfections on the walls, some left by Cosmo.  I haven’t really wanted to get rid of them yet, but I guess it’s time.

Oh, and I forgot to mention that I am doing it all with little cash.  We stripped the money tree in the backyard bare months ago with the addition of  new windows and siding so the wind would stop blowing through our living room.

I talk in my lectures about being more creative, which is making something out of nothing.  In my life, that has usually come because of little cash.  I am very experienced in doing great thing with no, and I mean no money.  So I have been digging through the garage, hitting the flea markets and discount stores to make something out of nothing.  Again!  This is called Creativity.  I found this fabric glue that works great to hem drapes and add trim.  I found safety pins work great instead of a zipper.  And if the buttons I got from WalMart, are not the right color, paint them. 

About 6 months ago, I bought a hallway light fixture that no one can figure out how to hang from our very high entry ceiling.  Well, they can figure it out, but I don’t have the cash to pay them.  It's more than the light cost.  So, Joe and I have a new idea.  We will fix up the one that is already there like I did for the dining room chandelier.   

The laundry room is wallpapered in pages out of a botanical flower book.  And I am hiding Joe’s beer making equipment behind the gathered drapes.  No one is allowed to use the room until after next Saturday. Sorry Joe, you may need to go shopping.

I even cleaned behind the washer and dryer. It was yucky!   Next is the frig. God only knows what is growing back there. I know they aren’t going to show behind the refrigerator.   Do you think Martha Stewart cleans behind her own frig before a photo shoot?  I don’t think so.

I wanted to show you some of the tricks I have been using to make my house magazine-ready.  If I only had a magic wand.  Oh, but I do, it’s called CREATIVITY and a glue gun.