Who Wants To Go To Italy?

Raise your hands. Everyone? I thought so.

 (I love this Da Vinci drawing. Did you know Da Vinci could draw a perfect circle-freehand, with just one try? I'm not sure how useful that was in everyday life, but that's some skill! I tried and tried to do that when when I was in college, but eventually decided it wasn't worth flunking out of English 101 and gave up. My circles did look better, though.)

Someday, I want to go to Italy. In a few weeks, my son is leaving for a study abroad program. Part of the time, he'll be in Italy, the lucky duck!

 He'll see so many wonderful things!

 I really wish I could go. 

I imagine I am going, sometimes.

(I wonder what I would wear. I wouldn't want to be labeled an Ugly American first thing off the plane.)

Well, check this out!

Shabby Apple has a new line of dresses, called Roamin Holiday!

Hello, pretty!

How chic is this one?

It wouldn't be hard for someone to pretend they are in Italy with one of these dresses from the Roamin Holiday line.

And did you know that they also have maternity dresses, little girls dresses, and plus sized dresses? I have to confess, I didn't!

Here's the fun part~Shabby Apple has offered to give one of you this dress

from their Roamin Holiday line.

SWEET! It's called the Da Vinci, and

 it's such a cute dress. Pull this on with a pair of ballet flats, some lipstick and you're ready to go! Perfect for summer. We all can think of someone who would love this dress, and possibly that someone is you!

There are three ways to enter. Do one or do all three~it's up to you!

1. Leave me a comment
2. Go "like" Shabby Apple on Facebook.
3. Blog about this giveaway. Putting it on your sidebar counts. You don't have to be a follower to enter, but if you want to follow I won't stop you. :)

That's it!

The giveaway will be open until April 5th.

I'll announce the winner on April 6th.

Unfortunately, this giveaway is only open to those who have a U.S. mailing address. 

(if you don't live in the U.S. but have a friend or relative with a U.S. mailing address who wouldn't mind receiving the dress for you and sending it on, feel free to enter!)

Since not everyone can win, there is something for everyone. Just use the code

"meridianroad10off"

sometime in the next 30 days, you will automatically get 10% off any order! This offer is open to any reader!

Good luck!

I Have Come To The Conclusion

After spending several hours yesterday cleaning, I now know that the real problem is not that I have too much junk, but

that I don't 

source
have nearly 

enough storage!

source

Something I need to work on.

This is all the progress I've made so far.

 This corner of the room looks pretty good.

I flipped the little table to the other wall, and it works much better there.

I even organized the wrapping paper.

Sort of.

I just have some homeless items.

Some cabinets on the wall would work.

I have an old kitchen cabinet in my garage. I should work on that this weekend.

I'm going to go back and clean my room some more.

Have a good one!

The Ugly Truth

This is what I'm working on today.

 Yeah.

I'm embarrassed that it even got this bad.

And I really can't believe I'm showing you!!

But there's no way I can use this room until I clean it up, and I think showing you will give me the motivation I need to do that.

Really, this is the worst room in the house.

Wish me luck~and perseverance!

Really Good Pasta Salad

I usually just make this in the summer, but I'm tired of waiting for that to happen.(we got more snow last night) It's a really easy recipe. You might notice that's the main theme with most of my recipes. (That and dairy products)

Here's what you need.

1/2 cup mayonnaise or salad dressing

1/4 cup sour cream

1 T. snipped fresh dill or 1/2 tsp. dried dill

1/2 tsp. salt

1/2 tsp. dry mustard (I like some bite, so I add a little more)

1/4 tsp. pepper

2 cups uncooked rotini, cooked and drained.
1/2 cup sliced ripe olives

1 medium zucchini, sliced thin

1 medium carrot, coarsely shredded

1 small onion or one bunch or green onions, chopped (about a 1/4 cup)

Mix mayonnaise, sour cream and seasonings in a 2 1/2 quart bowl. Add remaining ingredients, mix. Cover and refrigerate about 3 hours before serving.

 

 Thanks for reading!

It's Never Ending!

I've been moving things around. I kind of had to. I took a few things from my mantle to put on the lockers with the windmill, and it left a gap. 

I don't have a picture that shows everything I took away.(and I can't blame Milo this time. He wasn't here.)

I moved the framed star, and 

I had some windows down below, sort of covering the blank place that wouldn't really be there if it were a real fireplace.

So I stacked my picnic baskets there. 

Then I moved the mirror from the dining room,

(and I'm not crazy about it here. It's not reflecting anything interesting. But it will have to do for now.)

the air gauge and the vase that's covered by the bank bag.

(so now I have gaps in the dining room. I'll have to work on that. And I have to find a place to hang my type key painting.)

(I need some flowers. This isn't looking very springy. More like fall.)

We found the mantel in an antique store in Sun Valley.

It was my husband who really fell in love with it.

 The clerk told us it was a reproduction. They had the original in the store and the owner liked it so much she had another one made. When the builder delivered it, they had to mark the two to tell them apart. (that was her story. Not having seen the original, I can't swear it's true.)

I thought when Mr. Meridian heard that, he'd decide he didn't want it. But he still wanted it.

  I hope someday we'll have an actual fireplace to put this on. 

(on which to put this, for all you purists.)

The ivy isn't looking so hot, is it?

It's been a hard winter. 

It's not that I forget to water it or anything.

 (could I blame that on Milo?) 

Thanks for reading, and have a great weekend!

Indian Clubs

Some people call them juggling pins.

When I was growing up, these were always in our living room, along with some wooden things that looked a lot like dumb bells.

They were also in near perfect condition

until our town was flooded. My dad found these in the foot of mud that covered the floors of our house. So they're a little beat up. It's part of their story.

 The one on the left still has most of the logo. ("Victor Overman Wheel Co." I think.)

These belonged to a man named 
James Witford Loader Jaques. 
He was born February 14, 1872 and

 died October 13, 1957.

He was my dad's great great uncle;

my great great great uncle.

(I think I have that right. I could be off a great.)

We went to see my parents over the weekend, and my dad gave them to me.

I'm so thrilled to have them!
From what I've read,
they were used in exercise clubs and gyms around the turn of the century. Which fits, assuming James got them as a young man. Around 1890 or so.

Some of the women in this photo are using them. You swing them around, apparently. (sounds dangerous, doesn't it? A room full of people swinging 2 pound clubs that are 19 inches long! You'd definitely want to make sure you're all spaced far apart from each other.)

If you look under those two grooves, there's a mark that says 2 LB, so I guess if you swung them around long enough, you could build some muscle.

 I like that they look great no matter where I put them!

My mom had some house plants that were flowering while we were there.

A Christmas cactus that just blooms whenever it wants to. It's bloomed twice this year already. It's covered with these pink flowers.

And this gorgeous geranium. 

It was so nice to see something blooming!

Thanks for reading!

Windmill, The Finale

One person got it right!
Tracie from Tale of Many Cities!
Send me your address, Tracie, and I'll send you a little something.

Tracie guessed the family room, and that's where it is.

On top of my lockers.

I LOVE it there!

I had this on top of them before.

 I liked it. 

But sometimes I just want a change.

And this is a change!

Since I moved some things from our mantle to put with the windmill, I'll have to re-do the mantle. Which always leads to more tweaking in other areas.

I might never finish.

I'm OK with that.

While I have you here, scroll up one picture.
Curtains, or no curtains on the windows? We don't need them for privacy, so I've never put any up. Plus I like all the light coming in. But looking at the picture, the windows look a little bare. What do you think?

Thanks for reading!

 linking up

 

Windmill, Part II

  OK. Some of you were close. Very close. But no one guessed it exactly. I paid $35 for my windmill. I saw one just like it at an estate sale last week, and it was marked $75, so I was really happy about the price. 
So to give you all another chance, I'll ask you this~where do you think I'll put it?

This windmill is almost 8 feet tall; way too tall for what I want to do with it.

So I got out my Dremel, a comfortable seat,

 gloves and some eye protection. 

(I should probably invest in some sort of goggles.) 

Also, I used a screwdriver and some pliers. 

(They were feeling shy when I did this. "Please, no pictures!" So of course I respected their wishes)

   I cut through the crossed side supports and removed some bolts in the legs, making it half the height. But it was still too tall, so I cut some more.

(I won't make you suffer through pictures of that. I don't have any. I blame Milo. He wouldn't help.

He's not so great with DIY projects. He runs away when things noisy, and he can't hold a camera.

Even though he is a tripod. But I digress.)

I kept cutting and went through 3 reinforced blades. That was all I had so I decided to go old school.

 Then I broke the hacksaw. 

(My husband is going to be so happy with me.)

But the legs came off. With lots of manhandling.

I'm not sure why this baling twine was there.

Since really grungy orange baling twine wasn't part of the overall look I was going for, it came off.

Along with some just plain old grunge.

Some of you might say "EUWWW!" but I just scraped that off.
 I didn't want something that looks brand sparkling new. I like old. I like a little dirt and wear on some things.
(Not clothes. Or furniture. I'm not a fan of dirty people, either. So maybe I just like dirt on this.)
So no washing. I just got rid of the worst ickiness.

So do you want to see where it went? 

I'll show you tomorrow!