As the name of my blog indicates, I spend a lot of time thinking about home. Of course, my Heavenly Home is the one that is eternal, so that’s where I need to lay up my treasures, and that’s the one I’m striving for. But in the meantime, I have been given this tiny piece of the here-and-now—this home on the edge of town, this family, this neighborhood—in which to serve Him. And, though this is in the earthly realm, I want the things that happen here to be investments in the Heavenly realm.




Sunday, March 30, 2025

Blueberry Lemon Scones


Scones are my go-to! I think they feel a tad elegant, but they come together pretty quickly and I get consistent results. So when I needed a little something for my Bible study ladies last week, I made some Blueberry Lemon Scones. I love lemon in the springtime! 

If you did a quick search here on my blog, you'd find a handful of scone recipes, and nearly all of them are variations of the same one that I have been using for years. Here is last week's variation . . . 


BLUEBERRY LEMON SCONES

Ingredients:
2 and 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1/4 cup sugar
1 tablespoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
12 tablespoons cold butter
1/2 cup cold heavy cream
2 eggs
1 cup fresh blueberries
------------
1/2 cup confectioner's sugar
zest of 1 lemon
4 teaspoons freshly squeezed lemon juice
 

Directions:
Combine flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt.

Cut the cold butter into 1/2-inch pieces. Add the butter to the dry ingredients; cut in until mixture is the size of small peas.
(Don't overmix!)

Mix together the heavy cream and eggs.
Stir into flour/butter mixture, just until moistened. 
(Don't overmix!)


Gently fold in blueberries.

Turn dough out onto a generously floured surface.
Divide into two mounds. Add some flour to the top of the mounds of dough, then pat them into a round disk about 4 to 5 inches in diameter.
Cut each disk into 6 wedge-shaped pieces.

Separate the pieces and place them on a parchment-lined baking sheet.
Bake at 400 degrees of 12-15 minutes.

Transfer scones to a wire rack. 
(I transfer parchment and all to the cooling rack immediately after removing them from the oven to stop the bottoms from further browning.)

Make a glaze by stirring together confectioner's sugar, lemon zest, and lemon juice.
Drizzle onto warm (but not hot) scones.

🫐🍋🫐



Tuesday, March 25, 2025

Project #4 (2023): Our Primary Bathroom


It has taken me a long time
(over a year!) to finish telling you about our house projects of 2023!  But I like to finish what I start, so here I am to tell you about our biggest house project of that year. 


Having my dad living with us for several months gave us a first hand view of some of the practical challenges that older people face. So late in spring of 2023 when Ron said that he would like for us to update our primary bathroom, I knew that it was not the yellow 1960's ceramic tile that was the impetus for the change. Rather, Ron wanted to update the bathroom to make it safer and easier for us as we age. He wanted to replace the bathtub with a walk-in shower. 

We did have that yellow tile though. Lots of it. 

It's a teeny tiny bathroom, but it was covered in yellow tile. The whole tub surround, including the ceiling. The vanity. The lower half of the walls. All yellow tile. 

The floor was mostly white tile but with small squares of yellow interspersed. 

Here are some "before" shots. This bathroom is very difficult to photograph, partly because it is so small, partly because it is a fully enclosed room with no natural light. The lighting/color is a bit off and the lines are distorted. 



We called the contractor who had converted our porch into a sunroom and began to make plans.

Of course, the yellow tile would have to go! 

When we moved into Pineapple House in 2016, we moved from a house with one bathroom into a house with two full baths and one half bath (and an additional half bath in the garage!). I was so grateful for this luxury that I determined not to complain about the yellow tile (nor the pink tile of the half bathroom). I remained grateful (truly!) . . . but in seven years, the 1960's yellow tile was still not my favorite. The 60's style did not fit our colonial vibe and the sunny yellow color did not fit with anything else in our house.  

I was not sad to give up the yellow tile! 

But, because we were doing this remodel for practical reasons, there were specific things that we wanted. These were:

  • Walk-in shower
  • Grab bars 
  • Comfort-height toilet 
Those were the essentials for the remodel, but getting those things meant that we had to gut the bathroom! 

Good-bye yellow tile!

And good-bye yellow ceramic toilet paper holder and yellow soap dish and yellow toothbrush holder. And good-bye fluorescent light over the medicine cabinet. Good-bye crumbling grout, dripping shower head, and crack in the floor. 





At the beginning of the summer, we began to choose all. the. things. Yikes! So much was happening in our family at that time (my dad had entered a nursing home, I was visiting him daily, and he was nearing the end of his life) that choosing tile and shower units and fixtures felt overwhelming. It was a stressful process. I remarked more than once that I would not want to have to build a house and make all of those choices. (I am sure that many of you have done exactly that. I applaud you for it! But I don't think I have the mettle for such a thing.) 

We chose tile for the floor and a slab of granite from the remnant section because we only needed a small piece for our countertop. We pored over the books of shower enclosures, comparing ones with seats and without seats, ones with one niche, two niches, three niches. We chose fixtures from the same book. 

When our contractor came back to get our choices, he measured the space to see exactly which size shower unit to order. OOPS! Because of the hot water baseboard heating pipes, there was not enough room for even the smallest shower unit to fit. He called the company to see if they had anything smaller and they did not. 

At this point, our only options were to abandon the whole project OR to have a custom tile shower built. We weighed our options, but since our primary goal was to have an elder-friendly bathroom, we decided to proceed with our plan. 

There was another OOPS. The floor tile that we had chosen did not come in a smaller cut, so we had to choose something else. Ugh.

Back to the tile store. Not only did we have to find a new choice for the floor, now we also had to select tile for the shower, for the niches, and for the shower floor. We got more samples and brought them home. We couldn't get the same shade of flooring as our original choice and we worried that a new choice wouldn't go as well with our granite selection.

So. Many. Decisions. And in the middle of overwhelming family issues that required much of my time and emotional energy. 


Okay . . . let me shorten this story! 


I was ready to abandon, or at least postpone, the whole idea, but with Ron's encouragement, decisions were made and demo began two days after my dad's memorial service. Kati and her little ones were still here (take note of that) but flying home later that day, so we all got ready and left the house early to avoid the noise and chaos of the demo. Ron and I were so glad that the project was underway! 

The next month was full of change and adjustments and business . . . and lots of work in the bathroom! We had told our contractor, Joe, that we had family coming for Thanksgiving and he kept the job moving towards a timely completion. Joe, Curt (the tile guy), and Ron were all working on different parts of the project. 

And the bathroom was completed just before Kati and family arrived for the Thanksgiving holiday! Hooray!! 





Here is the finished project, and we couldn't be happier with how it turned out!

(Again, very small space and not natural light makes photographing this room a challenge.)

Ron made the vanity out of wood taken from the sunroom remodel. It was a fun way to repurpose the wood, continue its use in the house, and take advantage of the patina. 


He made paneled doors and attached them with black iron butterfly hinges. Up close, you can see the character of the old wood. 

Our contractor, Joe, put it all together with the granite countertop, oval sink, and simple black faucet. 


I wanted to keep this small space simple with a colonial vibe, so I purchased an antique mirror to hang over the sink instead of a medicine cabinet. We found a pretty vanity light on eBay. (I had originally ordered it in Pearwood, but after I saw it, I realized that the black would look better in the room, so we exchanged it. I'm glad that we did because it echoes the black fixtures.) 

Several years ago, we had happened upon a small chandelier in an antique store and purchased it for a song, knowing that we'd used it somewhere, someday. This bathroom was the perfect place for it. 

Joe installed the comfort-height toilet. ✅



Of course, the walk-in shower was the primary purpose of this remodel. We love it now, and will appreciate it more and more as we live in this house. No regrets . . . even though I have taken baths instead of showers my entire life! ✅

Despite the extensive variety of choices in the tile store, I had my heart set on something simple and chose a 4-inch square white tile. I wanted a simple, clean look for the basics, preferring to have the eye drawn to the details (mirror, chandelier, vanity, pottery). The contractor, tile installer, and tile salespeople all suggested contrasting tiles for the niches, but I stuck to my vision and had those done in the small white tile also. We did take the tile installer's advice to use pieces of our granite for the niche shelves and corner shelves, and for the "curb" for the shower, and I love how they look. We went wild and crazy with the shower floor, going with a pebble mosaic tile. :) 

And there are three grab bars in the shower. ✅








A few more details . . . 

All of the fixtures (shower head, faucet, drain, toilet handle) are matte black. Again, I love the clean look. We ordered a black wrought iron toilet paper holder and hung a colonial spade hook on the back of the door.




I found my shower curtain at Target, a matelassé medallion design. (Unfortunately, it is no longer available, although there are currently a few for sale on eBay.) 

Ron made a Shaker style peg rack to hang our towels. We had a peg rack in The Farmhouse bathroom and I loved it. Not only does it fit our style, but I also find that a peg rack will hold more towels in less space and the towels dry more quickly. I found these towels at Target that have loops for hanging! 


We painted all of the trim in Quaker Green, an Olde Century Paint color. 



Sixteen months later, we are still happy that we made this change and remodeled our bathroom. Not only do we love how it looks, it is also an investment in our golden years!

(And I still don't miss the yellow tile. 😉)



Monday, March 3, 2025

Gathering the Moments | February 2025




🎔 In February, we gave our bedroom a little love.

First, we hung a clock that Kati had found when she went antiquing on her birthday in November. She had texted me a photo, saying that she thought of me when she saw it. She did the same with a sweet pumpkin pillow. I asked her to buy both items for me and I dubbed her my personal shopper! She mailed the pillow so I'd have it in autumn, but the clock she brought at Christmas. I hemmed and hawed about where to hang it and finally settled on this spot in our bedroom. 


Then we (re)hung this picture in our bedroom with its new grain painted frame. (You can read more ~ here ~.)




🎔 Ron continued working on our first big house project of the year: the conversion of our pink half bathroom into a main floor laundry closet. 



🎔 Are you surprised that my friend Barbara and I went to a coffee shop and then antiquing?  (You're probably not.) 


🎔 February brought more snow . . . and more. 


🎔 This seems like a very "February" thing to do! 


🎔 Soup was on the menu in February. 


🎔 I don't think I told you that I did a little chair switch-a-roo.

I put the recently upholstered mustard-colored chair in the living room (yes, even though I chose that fabric specifically to coordinate with the love seat fabric!), and I brought the red-checked chair back to its former place in the library. I love the red checks against the green trim, and now I love the rug too (the rug that I had doubts about with the mustard chair). 

You can see the mustard chair in the library in ~ this post ~.  Don't you think the red-checked chair looks better against the green? 

By the way, I made the switch months ago, but it was February when I took this photo with winter morning light shining into the room. 

On the other side of the library is a real life look at Bekah's study corner. She is working hard this spring semester of her junior year. 


🎔 Also in February . . . 

At Mom's house, she and Linda and I are sorting through old (and a few new) family photos. This one captured my attention recently: Thanksgiving dinner at Mom and Daddy's house, circa 1984. But there is a mystery that no one has been able to solve. Who took the photo?! We don't remember! 



🎔 There were a few Valentine splurges in February: 

Chocolate-Covered Strawberry 
Crème Frappuccinos. Yum! 


I cobbled together a new recipe for a Valentine luncheon at church. 

A new heart was a small non-caloric splurge. 


🎔 Late afternoon light on a February day. 

Do you see misty light and shadows? 

I feel this as representative of life. Oh, there is light . . . the light that is from The LIGHT OF THE WORLD! I know that light! But sometimes - in the dark, in the shadows - that light appears misty. Yes, life is full of shadows and misty light. There is much that looks shadowy and misty and unclear and mysterious. And yet, the Light is always there! 

And so, when I am troubled, I need not try to understand the darkness. I need only look to The Light and understand Who He is. One day, all that is mysterious will be clear. All that is shadowy will be illuminated. All the darkness will disappear in His glorious light! 




Friday, February 28, 2025

A Grain Painted Picture Frame

This was one of those "one thing leads to another" kind of projects. 


When we bought the poster bed from Marketplace in October, we had intended to store it to be used in a future guest room.

But when I saw it, I wanted to use it in our bedroom (at least for now), and Ron agreed. 

But the picture we had over the bed looked too big between the bedposts. 

Too big and too high!


Ron really wanted to keep the picture. We had seen one in a Cracker Barrel restaurant a few years ago and it had rekindled a childhood memory for him. He believes that it was hanging in his grandparents' house. Our son-in-law Andrew tracked it down online, and Ron had ordered a colored print and made a frame. 

So we cut the matting down and Ron made a new frame. 

Then there was thinking/planning time . . . and the holidays . . . and some plain old procrastination.

But in February, I determined to get that frame painted and I wanted to try my hand at colonial grain painting. Although I was able to find examples of grain painted frames online, I was unable to find any real "how to's," so I just jumped in and tried to replicate a simple design. 


I painted the frame with two coats of barn red. Then I did the design in burnt umber, using the beveled edge of a foam brush to dab the little lines. I finished with a coat of Briwax stain.



Ron had already had a piece of glass cut at Lowe's, so he quickly put it all together and we (finally) hung the picture over the bed! 



It looks so much better than our first try! The proportion is right, and, as a bonus, I think the colored frame suits the colored print more than the plain wooden one did, and it complements the other colors in the room. We think it was quite worth the do-over! 


Friday, February 14, 2025

A Winter Chat


I thought I'd pop in with a little this-and-that!  

First of all . . .
HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY! 

I gathered a few hearts and scattered them here and there. I made the two coverlet ones. The calico hearts with buttons I purchased (several years apart!), one of them on a recent antique shopping adventure with my friend Barbara. 

On that same antiquing trip, I picked up the vanilla latte candle and the colorful penny mat under it on the sideboard. The heart on the tea tray I made many years ago, seventeen years ago to be exact. I remember because my granddaughter Eve was a baby when I sent a similar one to her family, and Eve will be eighteen this summer! Oh, how the years fly by! 






We had some more winter weather this past week. The snow fell quickly and was so pretty. All activities were canceled. I lit my candles, made a pot of chicken noodle soup and homemade biscuits, and enjoyed the down time. The snow was mostly melted within twenty-four hours and life resumed. That's my kind of snow! 

Manzy enjoyed the snow from his cozy perch. 





When Kati was visiting at Christmas, she introduced me to Elevate, an app that offers "brain training games" to boost cognitive skills. I only use the free version (you can subscribe for more games), but I love the challenge and have just completed a 50-day streak. 






I made these chocolate cherry scones for my Bible study group yesterday. They are the same scones that I made last year (Cherry Vanilla Valentine Scones) except that I drizzled melted chocolate on the top instead of the vanilla glaze. 






I came across this quote this week and it really made me think. Oh yes, there is so much that we do not see!

But I also want to take note of God's blessings that I do see, and with that in mind, I began a gratefulness journal this week. My friend Carla has been doing this for years and recently hit the 12,000 mark! Inspired by Carla, I am taking a few moments each day to simply list things that I am grateful for. 








We decided that we didn't want to compete with the crowds for Valentine's Day dinner this evening, so we have ordered carryout from our favorite Mexican restaurant. Ron will be here any minute with our meal . . . 


I hope that your week has been filled with simple delights, gratitude, and a knowledge of God's immeasurable love for us!

"This is love: not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins." I John 4:10 







P.S. I wrote a Gathering the Moments post for November, but just finished it published it last week. So I backdated it and sneaked it into the blog, but if you're interested in reading it (Thanksgiving pictures are there), you can find it ~ here ~. 


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