this evening, in the garden

An early evening stroll through the garden neglected due to my overwhelming spring schedule:

spotlight on lighting

Thanks to my sister’s nudge, I realize that five years ago, my husband and I were into the push to clean up and out of new home and get moved into it. On this day back then, I was working on the light fixtures, many of them original to the 1927 bungalow that is now […]

marking the holiday

It isn’t wholly the holiday without my mom’s fruitcake. I never got mine last year due to the pandemic. So they thawed and enjoyed it over Thanksgiving, which is fine. But this year, I travelled home, so this year’s fruitcake is all mine! My mom has made a habit of doubling the candied fruit. Wait! […]

reflecting the present

I reworked the peacock tree last night to add those gorgeous poinsettia reflectors that I found. I also found some lotus flower lights with removable silicone covers. These lights were multi-colored and wouldn’t do on the peacock tree so I found a strand of micro LED garland lights and moved the covers to that. The […]

it’s not heavy, it’s our tree skirt

Catching up on the holiday decor, I present to you the completed tree skirt: Seventy-three silk neckties, a couple hundred Swarovski crystal rhinestones, various glass beads, and tassels. It speaks in whispers of so many ancient things: lace collars, Renaissance finery, luscious hand-sewn heirloom… Rich golds frame muted holiday hues and anchor the massive heap […]

oh, yeah… this, too

Did I forget to mention the outside lights? I may have forgot to mention those…

I am a unicorn!

Tree number three somehow was skipped over, but it’s as magical as a mythical beast.

reflecting the past

I used to thrift to find things that fit my style. On occasion, I fit my style to things I find thrifting. Yesterday was such a moment: I have a small variety of light covers and reflectors, but I don’t recall having seen any so large or so specifically not holiday themed as these. I […]

strutting like a peacock

The final tree is up. Number four in this year’s set: the peacock tree. The teal tree started its life with us two years ago as the first incarnation of what has become the unicorn tree. It sat out last year, the pandemic preempting any plans for a holiday open house, but knowing it would […]

more than a trifle of tribbles

We have a tribble problem… Hallmark’s first plush tribble was released in 2019… and released an exclusive comic con redesign in 2020. And then they clearly got into something tasty. We don’t even keep food in the music room… We’ve definitely got some trouble.