My Vintage Christmas

Hi, my living room is starting to come together for Christmas. The living room is styled Mid Century and I have SO much fun adding to it. I have several 1950's TV lamps and they are part of the Christmas action.

Good News Amongst the Battle of Life

    I took a summer break from the internet this summer. I hadn't posted about the sad events that happened to my family. We lost someone to a motorcycle accident. My sister wasn't allowed to mourn like we all should. As her nightmare started unfolding- the "becoming" inlaw family was fighting over the his belongings and forced her out of the home they shared. Kemi and Tommy were in love two years. Living together the last six months as they prepared for their wedding in October. There are no laws to protect a fiance. I hope those people rot in hell.

    While visiting Maryland for this sad death, my phone calls with my husband (in Tucson) revealed he wasn't feeling well. I came home to a very pale man barely able to walk across the length of the house. Off to the doctor's......then off to the hospital for a two pint blood transfusion. Folks, we all run around with just four pints in us. Now he's feeling great, BUT why and where did the blood go? After a few doctors and some tests, our worse fears are confirmed- Esophageal Cancer. 

     For three weeks now, I've been a basket case. This guy has tried to croak on me before, he's had triple bypass (which failed and they plumbed him again). Hot. cold, angry, happy...it's crazy what the mind can do and think. I'm doing Halloween and Christmas crafting to try and keep myself sane. Meanwhile, my husband is cool as a cucumber. The first tests were so frightening, and the doctor was truly upset too. But yesterday we went for an ultrasound with the most accomplished Tucson doctor in this category.....and we have the best news that could come from a cancer diagnosis!

     Stage One, T2 (barely), NO, Mx !!!!!!! Which means, "growing on, barely into", defined edges (not growing everywhere), "no involvement of the lymph nodes". This is a battle that can be won! He will still face an operation and treatment, and I will be there by his side cheering him on.

     So, Good News amongst the bad. Life can really be a battle, I like the smooth parts best. Live every moment as fully as you can.

Peace,
Victoria Swanson

    

Today I'll be interviewed by Valerie Vinyard

 After seeing my "New Pretty Craft Room" post. Valerie Vinyard, a writer for the Arizona Daily Star, has emailed me to discuss my craft room for an article she's doing on Craft Rooms. I thought it would be fun to take a photo on how the room looks RIGHT NOW! To compare with the pretty new room look.

Post add-on 7/13/13 here's the article "Craft Fare: Creating a room devoted to crafts"  It's a newspaper article, so it won't be on line too long in the future. I'm just a just blub, but it's still fun!

Get you boots off the table and don't break that pot!

 Ha! My boots (honestly, these are mine) and some of my southwestern jewelry in a vignette on our hall table. I took a little time and created some art from this photo session, I think the colored boots will look great framed. I also collect lovely books about our Native Americans and splendid hardcovers on the stirring beauty of the southwest landscapes. I'll have to start some post on our Arizona travels.

16 Pool Noodle Exercises

  I don't like the treadmill, but I use it. All winter I wait for the fun pool noodle exercises. I do them most often when I'm swimming with the kids. Gotta be there anyway. Do something good for yourself. 

New Pretty Craft Room

Summer is here in Tucson. School is out and it's babysitting time. I changed out 3 of the bedrooms by changing their functions. The kids room looks great, this room turned out wonderful and the guest room is still a wreck.

The Story of the $6000.00 Dishwasher

It all started with a musty smell. 

I dreaded that my animals might be sinking up the place. 

But how? I use a special litter, wash the floor of their room with custodial strength enzyme cleaner.

Hmmm, this place is clean.

Retro Living Room at Christmas Time

Wow! the holidays can be a rush! No time to blog, but we finished our mid century living room!

We had a ball decorating our living room during the Christmas season. It was an empty room, I started just before Halloween, and painted the room light avocado. Halloween night the couches arrived from Overstock. After that piece by piece we built a mid century style room. Just like when we were kids.

This post has LOTS of photos, to see them all and THE LAMP CAT click on the page break below.

My Atomic Lamps & Mid Century Living Room

Oh My Gosh! I just can't believe I own these lamps! They've both got the spaghetti finish shades. The large one in a gold spaghetti and the little table top lamp in the black spaghetti . $45.00 and $30 for the lamps, and $14.00 for the gold shade. Wow!

Atomic style came out after 1940's and went into the mid 60's with the worlds first satellite and rockets and talk about actually going into outer space. I bought these at Copper Country Antiques and 22nd Street Antique Mall right here in Tucson. 

Thanks Halloween...it sure was FUN!

I put up Trick or Treat decorations on the 31st for the little kids. And oh boy did we have kids! We gave out three large bowls of candy. Next morning....it was gone... till next year.

This was just a quick note.....Hi.......Bye:)!

Bright Fall Topiairy

Living things die on my front porch. It's not from lack of water....just too much sun. Artificial flowers look fake and funny around here. So, if I'm gonna use artificial flowers, I won't use them the ordinary way...

Let's go ALL OUT!

This was a surprisingly quick craft. A little pricey, but I'll keep these for years to come!

Thank goodness for the $1.00 flower bunches at The Dollar Tree.

 Here's my list of materials:

2 dowels

2-12" Styrofoam Ring

2-8" Styrofoam Ring

12 bunches gold flowers (big fluffy heads)

8 bunches orange/yellow flowers (big fluffy heads)

500 pins with ball heads (used yellow tipped quilting pins) (!$$$!)

Rust colored spray paint

black craft paint

planter pot and fill

Here's the page break, click below to see step by step photos from start to finish.

A little tour of my casa

Still hot, still sunny and I'm still pretending its Fall. Here's some photo's of my 

recent activities to bring Fall into our lives.

I received this lovely swing for my birthday from my sweet hubby Steve. I hide out on the porch all the time. and its a great place to gaze at the pool.

This is the display I had to take down due to the heat. Everything went to the swing area.

My dining area, then the cat showed up to eat tulle.

a quick revisit to my bath....

Our fireplace in the family room. Poor thing. So far since moving in I've painted the raw red tile edges

to look like the mortar and repainted the venting screens from black to aluminum. Yes, that's a southwestern mirror in front of the opening. That's one my husband will have to fix. The previous owners installed a brass opening with pull chain black screen........yuk. Still, we've been here 5 months,, its all coming along just fine.

To decorate the fireplace, I had to move the Kachina's. Now they are (dancing) on top 

on a cabinet. I think they are plotting.

Thank you so much for visiting my home. I've got Fall all laid out and I'm moving on to my numerous. Halloween projects that are all over my craft rooms.  

PS...........look what I've done to my craft room!

This is the other side of my laundry room. It's just been painted turquoise and the shelves are new. I want to collect turquoise Pyrex (Jann Olson got me started with that new obsession) We haven't finish yet....and there I am using the room for a paper mache station.

sharing with............

Two toned Glittered Pumpkin

I changed out the Summer flowers in my bath and put in Fall. I'm still pretending it's Fall.

Let's get messy with Glitter!

My counter decorations mostly come from The Dollar Tree. Everyone has been buying these great crows this year...they are soooo cool. And the best prices on Fall flowers have been there too this year. On my last visit I saw 6" pumpkins and a little 5 pack of very small tabletop gourds.

I love glitter! The little 6" pumpkins are actually awful looking and they have a pronounced seam through the middle. I tried to sand it off..and got bits and chunks and knocked out color. The little gourds are perfect. I thought glittering the pumpkin would look nice, and it did. But something wasn't right...ah ha! I need shading. After the orange glitter dried I painted new glue in the crevasses and sprinkled dark rust colored glitter. In the same fashion I glitter the top green too. I pulled out a trusty sharpie and tightly wrapped gold wire around it to create little metal spirals for it's leaves. They poke right into the pumpkin easily.

For the flower picks I stuck a skewer in the gourd and glittered them with browns, golds and clear glitters.

I like this set up, but I wish my cat, Bitty, would just stop spreading glitter everywhere.

Well here's a couple of my secrets. I'm off the decorate the bath now. Cheer's!

Sharing with...........

Share your cup Thursday

Pretending it's Fall

Still sunny in Tucson and too hot to place pumpkins and flowers in the sun......but I tried anyway. 

Pumpkins by the Pool

I just LOVE the oranges and blues together! But atlas...it hit 100 degrees only 2 hours later.

I had to dismantle this lovely arrangement. I shall have to come up with a new location for these goodies.

I really did like this, so I'm in the process of creating a HUGE paper mache pumpkin. And I hope the sun will cooperate this next time. 

Thanks for coming by!

My Casa: Faux Copper Finish

My Casa...Mirror and lamps make-over          FAUX COPPER FINISH

 I'm still putting together my new house. I thought a mirror would look nice over the dresser in the bedroom. Well it does look nice....now. I bought a gold with black trim mirror at Big Lots. Put it on the dresser and it looked awful! My furniture in there has an orange tone. The lamps (already in place) were silver. They used to look nice in the old house. So in the course of only an hour, I have a matching dresser set thanks to DIY.

I've taken some photos to explain how (easy) it's done.