The In Between

It's the time of year when fall is long gone but winter has yet to really sink in. When the 4:30 sunset turns the bare hillsides a color I can't quite put my finger on, and brittle leaves buried under ice crunch underfoot. It's the in between.

Happy Thanksgiving + Black Friday Vintage Sale

We left our snowy mountain Tuesday afternoon and headed to Boston for the holiday. It was 59 degrees in the city yesterday, and after a week of "high of 21, low of 4" in Vermont, Boston felt like a tropical vacation. On my walk through town last night I wore nothing but workout pants and a light jacket, and the simple fact that my face wasn't numb made me so incredibly happy. It really is the small things, folks.

In other news, I will be holding a 20% off sale in the vintage shop for Black Friday tomorrow. I hardly ever hold sales in the shop, but wanted to give it a whirl this year and see how it goes. If there's anything in the shop you've had your eye on, tomorrow would be the day. Enter coupon code BLACK20 at checkout.

A very happy Thanksgiving to those of you in the US! Hope you stuff yourselves with turkey and pumpkin pie like I am about to do...

Etsy Favorites, Holiday Edition

Hello all! Sorry for the radio silence since last week. I have been busy with orders and bulking up the shop for the holidays while Josh has been finishing up his chiropractic/nutrition counseling website so he can get back to work. The good news is that after a year of planning and DIY remodeling at our house, the downstairs space is finally ready to be a treatment office. The bad news is I still haven't finished the final touches needed for the "After" photos, so sadly those will probably wait until we return from five days of Thanksgiving and family hang out time in Boston.

But moving on...

It's been a while since I've posted an Etsy Favorites list on the blog, but there have been so many beautiful holiday items on the site recently that I felt inspired to pull together at least a small collection. I find myself drawn to the folk art and Scandinavian themed holiday items, as they remind me of the decorations used at my house as a child.  My mother collected East German handmade holiday items similar to the Christmas carousel below, and we always had lots of twinkling string lights, advent calendars and Christmas crackers, vintage and antique folk ornaments on the tree, and blue and white English china on her red table cloth. This is the first time in 31 years that I won't be home for Christmas, so this list is a little bit of an ode to my childhood home during the holidays. Mom and dad, I will be missing you like crazy this year!

Handmade Wind Chimes $25	Christmas Cracker, $18	Swedish Dala Horse, $52
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Pleated String Lights, $224	Handmade Menorah, $18	Vintage Table Runner, $58
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Festive Washi Tape, $3.50	Custom Family Illustration Greeting Card, $250	Vintage Erzgebirge Christmas Carousel, $152.50

Before & After: Covered Porch Entryway

Although we are still finishing up the last details inside the covered porch (we work at snail pace, I know), the outside entry leading to the porch is now complete! Let's get right to the shameful "before' photos. We had chicken wire covering open window holes, a chain link entry door, and junk everywhere. There were times we could barely walk through the space because of all the tools, supplies, and clutter. Sometimes it felt like we were one bag of clearance merchandise from Pic-N-Sav shy of a feature on Hoarders.

BEFORE

AFTER

What we did in the entry area:

• Poured a cement step
• Installed bluestone pavers on the concrete patio and step
• Sanded, primed, reglazed, painted, installed, and trimmmed out salvaged windows
• Sanded, primed, painted, and installed door
• Installed weatherstripping around door
• Added a fresh coat of red paint to the exterior
• Built a railing
• Wired and installed new wall sconce at the start of the patio (not shown in the photos)

You may be wondering what is happening to the left of the step where there is currently dirt. We are planning to add a few bags of gravel to that spot, then perhaps some nice potted plants or larger flower boxes on stands. All of that will wait until spring.

The inside of the covered porch needs a few pieces of furniture and some tweaks before it will be ready for photos. We also painted our boards for the house foundation eyesore mentioned here, but have yet to install them. Hope to make that happen this weekend.

All in all we are pretty pleased with how it turned out. It seems to flow with the style of the house, and you can bet we are glad to have one more piece of this remodel puzzle in place. Yahoo :)

Deru Origami Animals

Yesterday's flea market produced a curious little find in the form of a leather sheet folded into the shape of a bull. My eye was drawn to it immediately and I snatched it up. After researching the DERU, GERMANY mark on my bull's back leg, it turns out I have a nice little find on my hands.

Deru was a German company that made beautifully crafted animal figures folded out of leather during the 1960s. They used an origami-like technique to create poses and expressions. Today their animals are coveted art objects, fetching prices of $100 to well over $1000.  There is currently a baby giraffe for sale on 1stdibs for $900. Yowza.

photo: 1stdibs

A little more searching turned up these handsome folks.

images: 1stdibs

Don't they just make you smile? I find the likeness and expressions Deru was able to capture simply by folding leather quite amazing. Each animal has a personality and the construction appears effortless and never overworked. This is the kind of art that looks simple enough to make, until you try it and realize it's absolutely an art.

image: trippytrunk on Etsy

image: EUCTG on Etsy

Hope you enjoyed browsing these little creatures. Happy Monday everyone!

More Covered Porch + What's Next?

We didn't get as much done as we would have liked yesterday, but I still have a few more tidbits from the covered porch project to share. The ceiling is wired up for a new light.

I ordered the below ceiling light from shadesoflight.com. I've had my eye on star pendant lights like this one, but our ceiling is not really high enough for something that hangs so we needed more of a flush mount fixture.

The bluestone turned out better than I thought it might at the start of the project. We had a hard time lining up the edges and getting the pattern to look uniform due to the fact that these stones are natural and have slight variations in size and thickness, but after a few rows we got the hang of finessing it. If we had it to do over, we'd definitely use a two over one pattern, but all things considered it turned out quite nice. It's very neutral and seems to blend right in. (I will share more pictures of the full space once the power tools and construction supplies are moved out of the way. With all the materials hanging around it is still hard to get a sense of how everything flows together. For now a close up shot of one of the few clear areas was the best I could get!)

Once this space is complete, Josh will be using it as an entry/waiting area for chiropractic and nutritional counseling patients who come to the house. We are planning to add seating, a Keurig coffee/tea machine, plants, and maybe even a small trickling fountain. One of the first "finishing touch" pieces was added to the space this week when Josh mounted his brochure rack.

When the space is finally "open for business" the next phase of our life starts. We've been working so hard on the house to make it not only functional for us, but also a home practice for Josh. Once patients start coming over I imagine there will be a more lively vibe around here, and I'm certainly looking forward to that. I can't wait to have people coming and going. Just a little more action, you know? More noise in the house, more faces to see. It should be a very good thing, indeed.

Covered Porch Reno Home Stretch

The insulation has been installed, the ceiling boards have been primed and painted, and the ceiling is now IN. Earlier this week it was warm enough to finish sealing the bluestone floor pavers, so we are truly honestly in the home stretch now. Our electrician came this morning to add a ceiling socket inside the porch as well as a wall light outside the porch, and this light has been ordered for the ceiling.

Tomorrow ceiling trim and baseboards go up and we may even bring some furniture in. Exciting stuff! More pictures to come soon of all the progress, maybe even tomorrow. Can't wait to share the final product!