The Latest Finds

My apologies for missing yesterday’s post! We had a busy weekend followed by an even crazier Monday with projects and finds I’m so excited about that I get butterflies in the pit of my stomach. I had something else in mind to post about today but we’ve been making some progress at home and in the garden and because some of you have asked to see more of our garden plans, I thought you’d enjoy a peek.

A couple of weeks ago I was thinking of ways to beautify our garden and found a garden arbor on sale and ordered it on a whim. I have always loved the look of cottage gardens with arbors overflowing with roses and thought the look would fit our little house really well. My Instagram friend Cammy Pollak’s garden has been on my mind ever since I saw it last year and although ours is nowhere near as beautiful as hers is, I kept this photo as inspiration. 

It took a couple of weeks for the arbor to arrive and I sort of lost hope it will but then it arrived on Saturday morning. It came in bits and pieces with NO instructions for assembling. It was painful. As much as we love puzzles, and this one only had 30 pieces or so, it took the three of us (Isabella helped) several hours to assemble it. Then I got to priming and painting it in the garage. (It’s the season everyone’s fiddling with their garden and white arbors were out of stock so I ordered the stained wood instead and spent looong hours painting the lattice and checking for drips.) Our landscaper had an opening yesterday morning so I had to rush and get it done as soon as possible. He did install it yesterday and I love it!! Mind you, it’s not perfect, or finished but I did paint the top parts and I’ll be out later today to finish painting the base before it rains.

Anyway, I wanted to share with you the arbor in place because it’s already made such a huge difference in our garden!

To recreate my inspiration, I’ve also ordered New Dawn rose climbers that are yet to arrive. We’ll plant one on the right side of the arbor and the other one next to our house. We’ll train it to climb a trellis we’re building (hopefully) soon following instructions I’d found in a gardening book.

I am not sure how many years we’ll have to wait for the roses to reach Nantucket-cottage-like proportions but hopefully a year or two will suffice 😛 No?

Another project we’re planning to do outside later this year (time and skills permitting) is building a small shed for our fire wood. Something simple like this one below, but free-standing. We occasionally make a fire during the winter months (so far we’ve done maybe 15-20 fires during the cold season) so we don’t need a lot of storage space.

I’d also like to turn the small spot of land behind the arbor into a cook’s garden but for that we first need to deal with a drainage problem on the left edge of our property and that is going to take careful thought and consideration. But how sweet is this little veggie patch? The image is from this gardening book I found extremely helpful so far, a beginners’ guide called Gardening Made Easy, edited by Better Homes and Gardens.

Now onto the interiors… Over the weekend we found this pretty Ethan Allen camelback sofa on Craigslist. We even got it delivered all the way from Connecticut! We’ve been very careful and kept our distance at all times, wearing masks and gloves. The sofa will be in the garage for at least 3-4 days… It’s in excellent condition, clean and I plan on recovering it in a soft caramel velvet…

Something similar to this one below…

And last, yesterday we also found a lovely hutch! Go figure!! After months of looking for something to go in our living room, something with timeless lines, and just the right size and price tag, we found this beauty by accident and arranged to have it delivered last night. I kept my distance, again, and plan on refinishing it as soon as possible.

And that’s about it… Both the sofa and the hutch will require some serious TLC (tons of loose cash), but they both give me all the feels! Eeeek!!! (Is it weird to get this excited about someone else’s discards? Probably… ) Anyway, I know many of you are here for the pretty pictures so I’ll do my best to deliver a handsome home tour later this week. Take care!!!