HIGH BUTTON SHOE
March 15, 2007
..Good Morning,I thought it might be best to send you off a newsletter this morning, when I might perhaps have some moments of clarity. Lately by mid afternoon, those moments are rare. And then again, on occasion, I wake up with none. The 'old' house work continues. Ronnie having done what his allotted chores were, has left me to continue his work on the Gundrum Building, so I am alone in my painting chores. Which is probably just as well. One butt and 2 elbows and wet paint are enough of a challenge. Two butts, 4 elbows and wet paint probably wouldn't work. I will finish the kitchen cupboards this afternoon. They look great. Well, to my specifications of great. Perhaps to others, it may not be. However, I learned long ago, (before my lapses of clarity), that we must first please ourselves. If others like it, fine. If they don't, that's ok. My mother was somewhat horrified, that after I stained all those oak cupboards in a deep walnut stain, that I would be painting them white, and worse yet, peeling the paint off. But she merely tolerates my decisions these days and doesn't say much. I still have the upper existing cupboards, without doors, just the framework, to paint and peel too. They won't be much of a challenge. Except of course for where I will be practically standing on my head upside down to do the base part. As we no longer have the doors for these cupboards and I am not really a fan of open cupboards (mine are always an unorganized mess, you might recall), I decided to use old 8 pane window frames with no paint or glass left to use as doors. I had to convince the 'logical' part of the household that this would be great. Meeting with his opposition at first, daughter in law Cheryl loved the idea, as did Sarah. And of course, Beulah loves it. Great minds think alike. I will put my old bowls, pantry jars and crocks in those cupboards.The packing here continues. More with the 'organized' than me. (For you new to newsletters, Ronnie is the 'organized', I am the 'not'. He has practically emptied out 2 rooms of this basement. My sides remains piled high with quilts, grain sacks, frames, card stock and all the stuff necessary to make the things I make. On one of those 'clarity' days, it occurs to me, that it is IMPOSSIBLE to move into a smaller house when it is still basically full as a shop when this house is so full. The organized however tells me that if I only make headway in one corner, it is a start. As I view the total picture, I think NOOOOOOTTTTTTT, but he is of course, right. Don't tell him I told you that. I must start somewhere. Doing this overwhelming chore, without chocolate or my beloved red licorice is almost doomed from the start, but I am making progress. I will have Beulah post more pictures as we progress. No silly, not of the basement! Of the old house!The countertops come next week. I can barely wait to see them in place, and the new sink and new faucets in. Did you know you almost have to float a loan to purchase faucets??? Ok, enough of the old house. Between the Gundrum Mercantile major renovation, the old house, Beu's house remodeling, and the new building of Steve's house here on the farm, all this spring, summer and fall, paint on my butt will probably be the least of my problems! Yes... I know. You probably have all moved...but I never have. I don't know HOW you did it!! ....unless of course, you had red licorice in generous supply.....March came in here in Michigan like a lion, so I am holding Mother Nature TO the old adage of going out like a lamb. We'll see. Two days ago with temps in the mid 60's, we lost a lot of snow. What was drifted 3' high just the week before is about 8 inches high now. We had major mud. Of course, we still have the big banks where the snow was mounted up with the plow blades. Rather than just enough snowplowing to make a road passable, Ronnie plows up half the farm! Yesterday it dropped 30 degrees and snowed again last night. So the ground is covered again. Just when I was contemplating putting the Arctic packs and my red wool hat away. My continued theory of becoming taller and thinner by shoveling snow all winter, has once again disappointed me. But it does make it nicer to sit on the porch with coffee when the porch isn't knee deep with snow.The red winged blackbirds are back. My heart smiles. Yesterday I saw a robin. It never fails to amaze me that the robins come back in March, sometimes February, when the worm food is probably still froze solid under the ground and has no thoughts of coming to the surface to be robin food! And then they leave in early August (the robins, the worms stay, unfortunately..). We have had open water in the swamps (bigger heart smile). That means soon I will hear the sound of the frogs. Their chorus is distant at first, and then suddenly you realize you are hearing them. I literally hold my breath straining to hear them. Later, they are deafening. And of course, spring in the swamps means pussy willows. Guess maybe I best not put away my boots yet. I love following the swamp edges to gather pussy willows. I LOVE swamps!!www.crowsoup.com is being released today, as it always does on the 15th of the month. AND you will note, I am getting this notice of that out to you ON the correct day. It will probably be late in the day. In the meantime, while you are just hanging around your computer and twittling your thumbs (un-huh) , you can check out the new offerings in the tilda collections. www.highbuttonshoe.net click on the 'farm update' and it will show you links to the collections. we added new things last night to page 5. also on the icon Kitchenware there are two links to rolling pins and linens. I found some more things in the basement this morning, that I probably will photograph later today to be put up too. The new things showing include old wood spoons, a pair of old purple/mustard mittens, a set of two carved animals (living on a farm you would THINK I would know if these are horses or cows, but alas, I don't!) If you haven't gone thru pages 1-5 recently, do so. Beu has added new things on those pages too. Strongly urged by Ronnie to sort thru my benches, I have not done so yet. And I have looked at the lamps but haven't made up my mind yet on those either, but I suspect some of both will be making the tilda collections in the coming days or weeks. Both primitive OLDE benches and lamps are SO hard to find, it wilts my heart to let some go. I thought perhaps with the benches I might just stack them on top of each other until they go to the ceilings, but Ronnie must think not. In all honestly however, I didn't realize I had so many. I used them in this house, and at the shop for display, and never sold them... so apparently I have amassed quite a few of them.Ok, I have to get my schedule going here for today. I caught that smile. You know, my 'schedule' generally is reduced to 'no schedule' by 10AM. And my mom wants me to stop by today. That of course, means I have to wash my face, and comb my hair. In my current cleaning out, painting, packing and sitting in a frump, that doesn't always get done.Check out crow soup. We can be found at http://www.crowsoup.com/Market586.phpThank you for asking to be a part of the farm.Should you decide not to, reply with remove and I will oblige you.Continue to check the tilda collections. As I continue the unpacking of my things, I will be putting more up on the website.in fond regard,Clotilda, saver of the past,an obvious pack rat,delirious with the prospects of spring