Insta-sista

Beautiful flowers from Casa De Flores, in Encino. They were the centerpiece at a Mardi Gras event I went to on Thursday night. Also, I may have gotten a bit business drunk and found out one of my fellow attendees was friends with the art director on Murder She Wrote; so to answer your question, yes I will be following up with him to get the lamp from the set he promised me.

Make: A dog bed for under $5

So I have two big dogs, hard wood floors, and a deficit in my checking account because of all the USDs  I have spent on dog beds that were hideous to look at, couldn't fit in the washing machine, and ultimately got left outside in the rain until they were tossed (I am being brutally honest right now). Naturally I have thought about making a bed for my precious pooches before, but until recently it didn't dawn on me how easy and affordable it could be.

And to encourage you to read on, allow me to add you can also make this a cat bed if you do everything the same, and then put it inside of a box. So now that I have your attention...

Wolf on the Wall.

First and foremost, let me apologize for the blue tint to these first couple pictures. I didn't realize Ben had changed the settings on the camera. Whoops. 

This is my Wolf on the Wall project. The name came about when Ben and I walked up the street to where all the food trucks hang out in Burbank. As we waited in line, we peered into the antique shop behind us and saw a picture of a wolf on the wall. For some reason that turned in to the thing to say, and this project was born...

I love Murder She Wrote!

We sisters love to watch shows and movies while we craft. I am now dedicated to watching Murder She Wrote. I love it. I am on the fifth season, episode four and am comforted constantly by the fact that I still have six seasons left. I will even go so far as to say that I often am able to solve the crime before the big reveal. Also, I like that a lot of J.B. Fletcher's facial expressions remind me of our mom.

Angie Lansbury, isn't she lovely...

 

Here is what else I have been up to... (I don't have instagram like the other sisters).

Cotton necklace project.

Puppy paws.

Urchin cleaning for sisters' visit.

Painting Miniatures.

Lovely weekend light.

Notice The Doyle Diary, it's this amazing book I got for Bennett with sketches by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's father... he was insane. We sisters also love Sherlock Holmes. Jeremy Brett is my fave.

My continuing knitted ball obsession.

knitted ball headboard

felted ball necklace

Backyarding.

It was a beautiful weekend in Burbank, and I enjoyed it by doing some backyarding. It is not uncommon for us sisters to disappear in planting and various backyarding activities. Here is a taste of my day.

Succulents from a friend's clipping.  My, how they've grown.

Pachycephalasaurus enjoying some greens.

Lovely large succulent going crazy...

...really crazy...

...whoa, this happened in the last two weeks.

Little ceramic buddy and a little succulent friend.

Hibiscus tree, the bees love it!

And I love a PB&J snack!

Unfortunately so do the furry ladies.

Sorry, Lucca.

My view of Griffith Park.

Yea, for backyarding and PB&J!

MONSTRO!

Youngest sister Catherine does quite the oil paintings, as you probably already know if you follow the blog. Note the recent post Amateur oils. Luckily, I am her sister and get to benefit from these lovely oily gems.

This most recent Christmas she painted me a picture of one of my favorite scenes from Disneyland. Monstro, the monstrous sperm whale from Pinocchio! He opens his mouth up wide to swallow the charming little boats from the storybook ride. The trick is not to be scared because when you emerge from the darkness of his belly, you are in a magical world of miniatures, which I love!

"Pinocchioooooo..."

The Christmas prior to that she gave me this sweet little portrait of Miss Olive B!

"Oh Olive."

If you love pet paintings as much as we do you should definitely check out these other painting posts by Catherine!

You should probably paint your pets

Cats and corgis!

Whiskers on kittens!



Merry Potter

I recently discovered this amazing $0.98 store down the street from my house. It's great! I have already purchased a gold sequin headband, miniature dinosaur skeletons, tape, glue sticks, and now these great terracotta pots!
The most amazing thing about this store is its legitimacy, these pots were actually $0.98 each.

While I love these pots, I wanted them to be more jovial--you know how some pots are more jovial than others.

I decided to just paint a little colored rim around the top to set it off.

Using a cream acrylic paint I put down a base coat so the colors would show up brighter.

I had to narrow my colors down because I only had five pots; I went with cream, peachy pink, red, blue, and yellow.

Olive watched my back when I was painting so no other dogs (Lucca) would run into my work area. Thanks, Olive.

These pots certainly do cheer me up when I see them. What lovely new homes for some of my growing succulents!

I always have plants waiting for more room.

I added some other smaller succulents to each pot to fancy them up a bit.

All-in-all, an inexpensive project and one that brightens my mornings.

Happy in their new homes.

The lesson here is don't be afraid of the dollar store, it often does have amazing things. Sometimes they are really only one dollar. If you do go there, see what type of miniature animal toys they have, you can always make your topiary a miniature menagerie.

Best Friends!

I just fell under some scrutiny by my boyfriend, Bennett, for looking at pictures of my dog on my laptop, while (to his dismay) she was sitting right next to me. So what? I can't get enough of her right now. Notice I said right now, I would like to say that I definitely can get enough of her sometimes.

This post is going to get me tons of eye rolls but I don't care.

Her Ladyship Olive

Best Friends!

She may look cute...

But don't be fooled.

She can be a pill just like Catherine's bad kitten.

I like pictures where you can only see her dumb little eyes.

And I also like it when she looks posh.

I also have some great pictures of Lucca too. These are my favorite pictures of little Luc. Ben took these one afternoon as he followed her around the yard. He could have easily helped her and fixed her dumb ears, but just like any good documentarian he refused to interfere.

Lucca trying to climb Olive.

Markedly, flea market

While in California (oh, how many post will begin like this?), Monika and I made a Sunday morning trip to the Pasadena Flea Market at the Rose Bowl. 

They gave us $2 bills as change!!!! We were majorly stoked. 

We spent several hours looking through bins filled with all sorts of bits and bobs. 

And came home with stuff like this:

Much, I believe, to Ben and Olive's consternation.