good news

hi everyone,

I finally updated the shop website yesterday, and here are a few of the things you'll see:

ironstone (of course!)

aprons sewn from vintage linen

okay, so this next one is for the locals -- warning, if you are not within driving distance of the shop, it may torture you to look at this and not be able to have it:

old pine shoe racks from Maine!

these are the real deal racks that lori mentioned in her blog. lori scrubs and bleaches the racks, which lights them up and brings out the texture -- awesome. this one still shows the handwritten shoe sizes on the shelves!
(I warned you, far away friends -- I don't know why you kept looking!)

in other good news:

you can find us in here!

the november issue of coastal living features a great article on our little home, the north fork, which also mentions white flower farmhouse in the "where to shop" section: (sorry for the photos, our copy is bit "thumbed through")




he he! that's us! I'm not much of a giggler, but I think I just giggled. we didn't know anything about it until someone showed it to lori, so it was such a great surprise. he he!

enough giggling, lori and I are hard at work organizing holiday stuff so that we can give you the sneak peek that I've promised.

megan

seasonal shift

Brrrr. The weather here is just awful -- cold, windy, rainy, raw -- and the heat is out in the shop. I'm huddled under a wool military blanket with the little (four thousand year old) space heater blasting away, gulping down the hot soup Lori was nice enough to drop off for me.

So, it's a perfect time to mention a few bits of seasonal news. First, we've brought wintery wares into the shop, including the fisherman knit sweater pillows:

the pillows I made from an eighty year old wool blanket:

and the grey/green Italian wool military blankets:

Also, Lori has decided to break out the Christmas decor before Thanksgiving since she has so much of it! I'll be posting a sneak preview this week, and then you can expect it to start popping up on the website the first week of November! Here's a quick teaser from last year:

We are also working on another shop update to be posted Monday night or Tuesday. Lori is bringing over a truckload tomorrow morning (weather permitting).

Speaking of weather permitting, I have to announce that I will be closing the shipyard for the season, so driftwood sailboats will be in extremely low supply until spring. Frankly, it is just too cold and windy for me to be trudging miles and miles along our beaches looking for hulls and masts. The frozen fingers, wind burn and ear infections (from cold salt water blowing in my ears!) tend to take a bit of the fun out of it. So, I will resume beach combing in the spring.

I would love, however, to send out a little mast wreath to any current boat owners who might be interested. Just send me quick email through the shop letting me know that you would like one, and I'll send it out in the beginning of November (free of charge, of course!).


I hope it's warm where you are!
megan

a few new things

Hi, it's me again. I just wanted to show you a couple of new things we brought into the store:

work aprons! these, too, are vintage czech military.

and:

flax and lavender eye pillows.

I'll be adding more new things early next week, like: fisherman knit sweater pillows, wool pillows, cloches, and a few surprises.

a white flower first...

... a tutorial!


Here's how it started: Lori found these ...


... wreath forms and a photo of a corn stalk wreath from October's Better Homes and Gardens magazine. Now, being chief elf at white flower, it's my job to make it happen. Lori asked, "do you know anywhere we could find some corn stalks?

um ...
... this is my back yard. So, needless to say, I found plenty of these:

From here, it's really simple, though I should tell you that corn stalk leaves in real life (at least my life) are not as pretty as the picture. They aren't red and they aren't a beautiful golden color. They are split, rotten, and mildewed, and they are filled with bugs and spiderwebs. But once you get back from the field with little gnats crawling in your arm hair and deer poop caked in your shoes, you are ready to get to work!

Really, all you do is fold the leaves around the wreath. Instead of gluing all the way around the wreath form, I recommend just gluing the back end down and the part that touches the top of the wreath:



Do this all the way around, and you don't really need to overlap the leaves because you want them to stand straight up/out rather than at an angle (although, now that I'm writing this, it would probably look neat if they wrapped around at an angle -- someone do this and post photos, please.) Anyway, I then added two or three more layers, and ended up with this:

Nice, right? A little something different and organic for fall.

one more thing

oh boy, I'm must be getting seriously old -- I forgot to say that I just finished a web update!

www.whiteflowerfarmhouse.com

why didn't anyone say anything while I was blabbering on and on about my little specimen jars? you guys are so polite! just for your kindness, I'll be posting a couple of other new items tomorrow night.

megan

a happier ending

after posting my mini floor disappointment ... (and, thank you so much for all of your kind words and tips -- though, I still don't know what I'm going to do except ignore it for now!) ... I thought I would just throw on a little project I did at the same time that had happier results.


so, as I mentioned in my previous post, I'm in love with antique utilitarian display cabinets (from hardware stores, apothecaries, medical offices, and barristers offices). the appeal is, of course, aesthetic, but also practical. I have cats (and dogs). and cats walk on, shed on, and chew on ... well, everything. and, I can't stand having fur on ... well, everything. nor do I like having ... well, everything .. chewed on. so, I keep most of my things behind, under, or in glass.

slowly, I realized that I was creating curiosity cabinets ("wunderkammers"). I had my dried wedding flowers in glass canisters, my yarn in glass canisters, my jewelry in little glass canisters, even some of my books are in square glass fish tanks ... and I love it!

I'm running with it -- it's the perfect combination of simple, beautiful, practical and curious for me. here's the latest:

little "specimen jars" filled with vintage sewing notions and thread

I think I like it. it's my version of fall decor.

megan.

homework

So, a couple of people (literally, two) have inquired about my floor disaster, so I'm happy to share my sad tale.

My husband and I have off on Saturdays together, and Saturdays are home-work days at our house. Every Saturday morning, the first thing Christopher says is: "you know, today we should really ... ( ----)."

Tragically, that blank is always filled with something like: rip out carpets, powerwash the house, put up a fence, convert our cars to wind power, build a bomb shelter out of toothpicks. ugh. I don't see why we can't stay in bed and listen to my old records. sigh.

But, this him before I've even finished coffee:


So, two Saturdays ago we ripped out our wall to wall carpeting in the living room and painted the floor (and the walls, windows and doors).

To make a very long story short -- the carpet got ruined. We tried to "patch" it; it got more ruined. We tried to replace a whole section; it got MOST ruined. We ripped it out. Underneath the carpet, linoleum, cardboard, staples and mold, we knew we had the original floors -- yes, amazing, original, wide plank wood floors -- but they were in terrible shape and partly painted, and it's beyond our abilities and funds to restore them now.

So we painted them the same putty color we painted all the walls and finished them with three coats of a high gloss poly.

We hate it.

I know it's not really that bad, but I hate it. It's too beachy (we live in a hundred year old farmhouse, so that's not the right look) and it looks "matchy matchy." We now have too much white and putty -- white, putty, white, putty, white, putty, whiteputtywhiteputtywhiteputtywhiteputty .... it's nauseating.

I think we really just want the original, rough, worn pine floors, and anything else is going to pale in comparison (no pun intended).

But, we're thinking that we might go over the high gloss poly with a coat of satin finish to tone it down a bit (awesome idea courtesy of Lori, of course!) I would also like to introduce some darker wood into the room to anchor it a bit. Finally, as much as I love a nearly empty space, this room is now calling for more furniture so it doesn't "float away." This would do the trick, don't you think:


I'm so in love with these antique display cabinets and can't wait to have one of my own.

And, as for this weekend, I'm looking forward to Saturday since Chris will be coming home from a business trip to the South, and I miss him. Maybe we can build a sauna around the clothes dryer vent.

Good night,
megan