Watery and Outdoor Wednesday.

 

This week I start with Watery Wednesday. Last Sunday we went for a drive in the country and this is what I saw. A typical Dutch sight.

Now for Outdoor Wednesday all the beautiful flowers I saw that day.

Roses and poppies.

 

These are all roses in different colors and sorts. Near the windmill there are little bushes with roses.

For Watery Wednesday go here:http://waterywednesday.blogspot.com/

For Outdoor Wednesday go here:http://asoutherndaydreamer.blogspot.com/

Clever Gambrel

Another lovely home by Steven Gambrel. Imagine sitting there on the water's edge like that. So gorgeous.

My World Tuesday.

 

Yesterday the weather was beautiful so we went for a drive in the country. We visited a teagarden and  it was so beautiful there. I made a lot of pictures and I chose a few to show for my world Tuesday.

Aren't these poppies  beautiful. I never saw them in this color purple.

More poppies, that garden was full of them. I love this color red.

This was near the entry. It looks like an English country garden doesn't it?. Beautiful.

 

For more My world pictures go here: http://showyourworld.blogspot.com/

Final Test: 0.36 ACH, almost half the allowable maximum of 0.6 ACH!

Hello again,
Another action packed week. We completed all the underground service. On Monday Van Van Van der Maten's crew masked off and spray painted the entire interior and on Tuesday and Wednesday Jim Campe, Barry Linder, Alden Adkins, Melanie Stone, Wendy Schwartz, Chris Greene, Susan Kelly and Sonya Anderson came in and finished what the sprayers did not complete. Cabinets were delivered late Thursday and begun to be installed on Friday.

Thursday Steve Potts brought in his portable mill and we re-sawed some of the recycled lumber donated to CLAM by Anna Francis. Potts milled up all the wood needed for the interior trim. Sun First came back and re-installed the solar hot water panels. Jorge finished the front siding and details and hung all the interior doors. Next week we should complete all the trim and counter top and the cabinet installation. There is not much to do after that. Perhaps another week of touch up, clean up and site work (final grading and delineation of parking and living outdoor space).
I am already getting work separation anxiety.
See you all next week............Terry

P.S. Reminder: Come see Blue2 and celebrate its completion on Monday, July 5, 11am-2pm. Details at www.clam-ptreyes.org.

I think Sonya believes in CLAM ... she also volunteered when we painted the front house.

"The barefoot painting Pixies" Susan Kelly and Chris Greene.

Jim Campe cutting a line. He organized all the painting efforts and
with his wife, Pam, selected the color scheme.

Steve Potts sending an old 2x8 through the mill to make 1x8s for the trim.

Jorge putting up the last piece of trim. Potts and the mill in background.

My first full day back at the job. I had to rest every few hours. It amazes me that any one would actually take direction from a guy laying on his back.

Kitchen to be.

George Nesbitt of Environmental Design/ Build is the Master blaster of
blower door technology and testing. As a third party tester he volunteered three hours of rigorous air leakage testing of the Blue Two house. His test and report is one of the final documents we will need to hand in for the Passive House certification- that is assuming we hit the mark.

Thumbs up to our final test number of 0.36 ACH - almost half the allowable maximum of 0.6 ACH. Our air leakage at negative 50 pascals was around 40 cfm.

This may look like aikido but it's Rae and Terry completing a high five
to celebrate the 0.36 ACH. Rae (who recently completed her term as CLAM executive director) spent Sunday here at the Blue2 sharing history being made on a house she believed could happen. Thank you, Rae, for helping us all make our dreams and aspirations come true.

My Life Right Now

My life has been pretty hectic with the arrival of little Max. The life I knew which was that of a working woman with one child, a husband and 2 dogs has changed. I used to purchase my favourite magazines and be able to sit down on the sofa and read them that night. I used to have time to do my own thing. But not these days.

I have had the new Country Style magazine sitting on my bedside table now for a few days and I haven't even had the chance to open it.

I actually glanced at my bedside table tonight and thought I would take a photo of it to show you.

It consists of the Country Style magazine which I am dying to open. It also consists of that pink fabric which, even though I had ordered the yellow colourway on Friday, I changed it today to the pink. I don't usually change my mind once I've made my mind up - what is happening to me? It also consists of a book I purchased on Amazon which I think is very applicable to my life right now - Just Let Me Lie Down Necessary Terms for the Half-Insane Working Mom by Kristin van Ogtrop. I also love the colour of it's cover. Today Harry made me the origami swans which you can see sitting there. I love them. Brad and Harry brought me in a bowl of Harry's favourite treat - ice-cream with coke bottle lollies on top just now to try to cheer me up. It worked.

I'm sure tomorrow will be better. Tomorrow our container full to the brim of Stuart Membery furniture will be arriving on our doorstep. Tomorrow is going to be a very exciting day.

xx
Anna

Art inspired landscape art. Sculptures by J. Seward Johnson

Between work, the fantastic summer were having so far and of course the world cup, I have had very little time for blogging in resent weeks. So this again will be a quick little post of something that caught my interest recently.

When flicking through a book recently I came across this first picture, and for a split second I thought that there was something a bit funny about this famous painting by Edouard Manet. I quickly realised that this was of course not Manet’s ‘Déjeuner sur l’herbe’ but in fact a sculpture by American artist J. Seward Johnson.

‘Dejeuner Déjà vu’ by J. Seward Johnson

‘Déjeuner sur l’herbe’ (1863) by Édouard Manet.

To be quite honest, my history of art is not quite as good as it should be as much of my time in art college was spent drinking large quantities of alcohol, and perusing women, however one era of art that did really stand out to me was the impressionist era, and it is quite obvious that this era has also had an effect on Seward Johnson, as much of his works are inspired by many impressionist artists.

Here are more examples of a large series of works he made titled ‘Beyond the frame’, most of which are recreations of some of the most famous paintings from the impressionist era. Most of these works can be found in the sculpture park founded by J. Seward Johnson in 1992 ‘Grounds for Sculpture’. This 35-acre public sculpture park is located in Hamilton, New Jersey.

‘On Poppied Hill’ by J. Seward Johnson

‘Woman with a Parasol, Madame Monet with her Son’ (1875) by Claude Monet.

‘Were you invited?’ by J. Seward Johnson

‘Le déjeuner des canotiers’ (1881) by Pierre-Auguste Renoir.

‘If it were time’ by J. Seward Johnson

‘Terrasse à Sainte-Adresse’ (1867) by Claude Monet

‘Sailing the seine’ by J. Seward Johnson

‘Argenteuil’ (1874) by Édouard Manet.

‘God Bless America’ by J. Seward Johnson

‘American Gothic’ (1930) by Grant Wood.

Mosaic and Blue Monday.

 

For mosaic Monday, hosted by Mary from "The little red house" I made a mosaic with lots of greens.

For Blue Monday hosted by Sally from "Smiling Sally" I made another mosaic with lots of blue.

For Mosaic Monday go here : http://dearlittleredhouse.blogspot.com/

For Blue Monday go here: http://smilingsally.blogspot.com/

Outdoor LED Lighting Installation Guides

Enhance the nighttime curb appeal of your home—and add a measure of safety and security—with low-voltage Outdoor lighting. These exterior-grade fixtures are typically placed along walkways and driveways, but they’re also ideal for illuminating steps, trees, stonewalls, fences and other prominent landscape features. Here are several guidance in how to installing an outdoor lighting with led lighting.

The first thing should considering before installation is the allow the basic rules for outdoor lighting installations, include checking local code regarding outdoor lighting. Don't forget to always use type UF cable for underground wiring. The UF implies that there must be a fuse breaker inside the house at the starting point of the underground wiring installation.

Weatherproof switches are another important thing that are required, its a good idea to prepare an outlet boxes in both flush-mount or surface mount styles. Before you begin, shut off the electrical current at the main switch box, mount a breaker or a fuse box in a location similar to the underground wiring installation.

Dig a hole about 2" deep with an ordinary post hole digger or tiling spade, run cable up trough the lamppost, then fill the hole with about 12" of concrete mix. Insert the lamppost into the concrete mix in an upright, plumb position. every outdoor lighting lamp part exposed to the touch must also be grounded.

Many of the newer outdoor lights come equipped with photoelectric eyes or motion sensors or both. If your light does not have this type of control built in, you may wish add a timer, permanent timer switches are readily available and can be pre-set for any on/off times.

Pink Saturday.

Another pink Saturday, another fun day. Pink Saturday is hosted by Beverly from "How sweet the sound".

There are so many pink flowers this time of year and I made many pictures of them so I thought I had better make another collage of them.

For more lots of pink blogs go here: http://howsweetthesound.typepad.com/my_weblog/

Weekend Reflections.

It is Friday afternoon so time for Weekend reflections hosted by James from NewTown Area photo.Yesterday I saw this swan family ,first mom and babies and  later the whole family. Swans are such beautiful birds.

For more reflection pictures go here  http://newtowndailyphoto.blogspot.com/

Friday Flowers

It's been a while since I have posted some Friday Flowers. Mum arranged this foliage for me last weekend and in amongst our lovely old garden we found a passion fruit vine so we picked some and plonked them in another vase as above. I'm planning on a quiet weekend pottering around the new house. Hope you have a lovely weekend.

xx

Anna

Absolutely In Love With...

I am always on the hunt for new, exciting, beautiful fabrics as fabric is my starting point for the rooms/homes I design. We have just received some absolutely beautiful new fabrics in and I must admit I am completely smitten with this orchid fabric. My favourite colourway is this one above but it doesn't work with my current wall colour at the new house. As painting the house {which is going to be a mamouth cost} is not yet on the agenda I am going to have to work with the existing colours which are all very heritage!! So I am going to cover a couple of old chairs I have in the yellow colourway which you can see peeping through underneath...it's very beautiful too but that pink is just to die for, don't you think?!!

Alphabe_Thursday

For Alphabe Thursday hosted by Mrs Jenny Matlock we have to find Words beginning with the letter W. So here we go:It was a lot of Work.

W is for Welcome on the WWW

W is for Windows, here they are in the top of a beautiful basilique.
W is for Water Ways
W is for Wildflowers
W is for Walking, this path is made for walking.
W is for Waste, such a waste these tulips thrown out.
W is for Winter, as you can see by the snow.
W is for Wedgwood, my cup and saucer here,
W is for White swans in the Water. The parents are teaching their children. So cute.
W is for Windmill, so beautiful.

Please click on photo to enlarge.
 

Outdoor and watery Wednesday.

It is Wednesday so Outdoor Wednesday for me. Here again pictures from the Arboretum in Rotterdam.That chair was made from a tree.

And Watery Wednesday

For outdoor Wednesday go to Susan's blog : http://asoutherndaydreamer.blogspot.com/

For watery Wednesday go here : http://waterywednesday.blogspot.com/

Birkdale House Circa 1888

We enjoyed a lovely first weekend in our new house. Family and friends dropped in all weekend. Lots of wine and fabulous food cooked by my brother, Sam and my friend Annie was consumed. Brad has become obsessed with lighting the fireplaces and cutting the wood perfectly with his new axe. My mother is transfixed with all the wonderful things in my new {old} garden. She created a couple of wonderful arrangements. For me the house has all of those things I associate with my dream house...fireplaces, claw foot baths, big verandahs, large block of land, lovely swimming pool, history, a name, a wonderful garden . This is the place we will stay with our beautiful boys for a very, very long time and if Brad has his way, we will never move. I am looking forward to my new project which will probably keep my busy for the rest of my life!!