Honey, we're Home!

I'm so glad this last week is behind us. It's been non-stop packing and stressing since the middle of December when we decided it was time to take that big step with the move. Just in case you haven't been by here for awhile, we've moved to a smaller lease house so we could start updates on our big house. The move went smoothly, and our younger daughter and her hubby were here to give us some help over the weekend. Amazing what 30-somethings can accomplish when you hand them some cardboard boxes!

We only took less than half of our furniture and "stuff" with us, but we quickly filled up the new "little house". But I have to say I'm loving the coziness and convenience of this smaller place. I wish the rooms were a little bigger, 'cause it's a little tight, but all in all it's super comfortable and I'm having fun putting things together. 

One bonus that I hadn't planned on was having enough room in the eat-in kitchen area to make a small sitting area with some wicker and my baker's rack. It helps ease the withdrawal of leaving my sunporch behind. And once I had things in place, a few things that I hand carried over found their way to the baker's rack.

My galvanized bucket full of paperwhites started blooming the day of the move, making it a sweet little "sign" of blessings to come.

I have a few things that stay on the baker's rack no matter the holiday or season; my wooden seed crate is one of them. Now it's filled with my old garden tools and some pots and seed packets. Hard to imagine, but it will soon be time to think about Spring...really hard, since it was about 5 degrees last night.

The move was a little harder on the kitties, as they cried all night the first few nights; they were ok during the daytime, but at night it was a turf war on the bed. Miss Wrigley kept trying to nudge us out from under the covers so we could go home, where she is queen of the bed. Her little sister is vying for the "top cat" position, although right now they are both hiding behind the headboard of the bed; their go-to spot when the garage door goes up or the door bell rings.

Next on the list to get unpacked is my studio/office. I think I'm going to leave a lot of my many boxes of vintage papers and ephemera, etc. boxed up. I just don't want to think about unpacking all of it to turn around and repack it again once we have permanent plans. I may change my mind later, when I'm feeling an urge to create something...

I can't wait to show you more of this room and how it's coming together. I still haven't tackled all the many boxes of ironstone or transferware, but I'm excited to get around to playing in the old pie safe. You won't recognize most of this furniture in here because it was downstairs out of "camera range", which is code for bad lighting and bad decorating.

I'll be back next week with The Marketplace and Be Inspired,

 hope to see you then.

joining in with:

French Country Cottage
Mod Vintage Life
Coastal Charm
Stone Gable
Dwellings

Stay warm, 

and may all your kitties be happy kitties...

xoxo,

p.s. I missed you all this last week!

Be Inspired# 173

I knew this week would be crazy and it has been. Last minute switcheroos on coffee table and accent tables have had me busy doing some painting instead of finishing packing. Amazing how furniture grows from the showroom floor by the time it gets to your home! But things are coming together. Some of you were amazed that I could get things packed in a few short weeks. The answer is that we are only taking a little of our furniture and "stuff" over to the new little house. The rest will go into storage or be part of a sale. I have several months of packing left to do once we move out. So no, I'm not super woman...

I've had white cupboards on the brain lately: they are always a favorite with all of us in the pottery, transferware, and ironstone crowd. One of my favorite bloggers, Kathleen, has a wonderful example from last week's link party. Here are the top visited links from last week:

Faded Charm
Adding to My Collection

Meg from Oliver and Rust shared some decorating tips from

The Gianetti book, Patina Style

And Rita from Panopoly gave us great side-by-side views
of how she took her sunroom from Christmas to "Winter".

Thanks so much, gals for always coming to the party!

Party Guidelines

Please have an individual link back to Common Ground within your post. I'd love to feature you. This is just part of the Party Etiquette.

Please remember to turn off word verification. I've tried leaving comments that didn't go through. I'm sure others have tried also.

Please no direct links to Etsy or Advertising.

Link up to three of your current posts.

Take a minute to visit a few of the other links.

Please be a follower of Common Ground.

Thank you to all of you who come over each week to link up to the party, I may not get to leave a comment, but I try to visit each of your posts. You are a never ending source of inspiration to me and others, so just know how much I appreciate each one of you!

This will be my last post until after the move. I'm not sure, but hopefully you'll hear from me by next weekend. If not, don't worry. We're working on a new Internet plan which is a little complicated. I'll have a few pics of the new place to share by then.

See you on the other side...

xoxo,

If you want a jump on Spring, 

be sure and visit Today's Sponsor, 

French Bleu Vintage.

Dee has a French Estate Sale in progress.  

Repurposing a Cupboard

We're down to the last few days of packing, and I've been trying to mentally place furniture at the new little house. I have a much larger eat-in kitchen area there than I have here, (but no Dining Room) so I'm going to use a few different pieces of furniture in there. I've had to rethink the furniture layout to use pieces that are good for storage. One piece that I want to use is this old pie safe that I had in my studio, that I used for craft supplies and storage. It will be holding my Ironstone and Transferware. I need a good cupboard that I can "play with".

The inside was dirty and stained so I gave it a few coats of off white paint to clean it up. It's hard to see but instead of glass it has what used to be gold grillwork. I just painted the metal white with a brush. In this photo my Brown Transferware tureen is auditioning for a spot.

Here are some examples of inspiration from my Pinterest Board, Cupboards.

You can find all the sources on that board.

I'm looking forward to having this to decorate seasonally. 

I already have ideas for Valentine's Day and Easter...

I'll be hosting Be Inspired this Thursday morning, hope to see you there. We'll be moving over the weekend, so I'll be out of Internet for a bit, but I'll hopefully be back by the end of next week. Say a prayer for us, we'll need lot's of help!

Joining in with wonderful parties:

Inspiration Exchange at City Farmhouse

Wow Us Wednesday at Savvy Southern Style

Blissful White Wednesday at Timewashed

Centerpiece Wednesday at The Style Sisters

xoxo,

The Marketplace: Etsy and Boutique Showcase

Welcome to The Marketplace!

We're heading into our move next week, so after this "Marketplace" we will be on hiatus for a couple of weeks until we're settled in and have Internet again. Check back by on January 27 for the party, it may be a go. Thanks so much for joining in each week! And in honor of small houses, this first link from last week just fit perfectly!

Vintage Wooden House

NanNas Things

Vintage Mother of Pearl Buttons

Anything Goes Here

Curly Headed Farmgirl

 Farmers Market Painted Sign

Gizmo and Hooha

Blue Metal Organizer Cabinet

Red Crochet Valentine Garland

The Prairie Cottage

Purple Transfer Pitchers

Western Reserve

Thanks for linking up last week!

Today's Sponsor

Sweet Harvest Farms

Party Guidelines:

This is a linky party that is for items that are FOR SALE only. You don't have to have a blog to link up. If you have a blog post about your items that's great too, but they need to be available to purchase. Please try to link to the individual item that you are selling if possible. Please be a follower of Common Ground and if you have a blog it would be so nice for you to grab the image below to share somewhere on your blog. (not mandatory, just nice). Remember the link is up all week, so please stop back by to check out new items being listed.

knowing the right time...

Just wanted to check in with everyone, since my last post was on Thursday morning. We picked up the keys to the new "little house" Friday afternoon. Funny that I'm calling it "the little house". When hubbs and I first were married we lived in a gardener's cottage on my parents property...we called it "the little house".  This would be a mansion in comparison to our tiny first house. Just one big room with a little bedroom that was heated with an old time gas heater. We were so happy: we didn't care where we lived.

We did a walk-thru Friday and realized that the carpets had not been cleaned so we spent most of the day Saturday over there doing that. I've said it before and I'll say it again, gotta have my Bissell Carpet Cleaner. It's saved the day on more than one occasion. We should have been here packing, but I have a pet peeve about dirty floors...'nough said.

I had to show these pics of one of my sweet birdies that I've been feeding during all the ice and snow of the last two weeks. I grabbed the camera and caught these. The setting is off, but I wanted to share them with you, anyway. The snow is almost melted and we're supposed to have a 60 degree afternoon...yay! Anyway, I kept seed out for the little guys (Juncos and Sparrows) and some ornery squirrels, it was grand central all day around the feeders. I'm going to miss these little guys, but then again, I'll be at this house a lot because we still have packing and sorting and getting ready for a sale to do. We'll be back and forth working at both houses. Our new house is a temporary one, we have a year's lease, but we hope to have some set plans by then. 

Do you ever have an understanding of God's timing? It's hard to put into words, but I know you know what I mean. By our own thinking this wouldn't be the right timing to take a big step. Hubbs had inner ear surgery for Meniere's Disease, (he's much much better) in April, and I've had several rounds in the hospital with blood clots in my arteries next to my heart (I'm better too)...not a good time to plan several moves. But we just knew that the timing was now to get started with this transition...moving into a smaller lease house, getting rid of some of the "stuff" that's been cluttering up our lives. We had a flea market business for about 8 years, and during those years too much "stuff" came home with us. We knew that now was the time to lighten up and get freed up of some things...for some new things. Not just material; but emotional, and spiritual baggage that has held us in one place for awhile. We're starting to feel like this little bird...

This is the scripture verse that has been the center of my thoughts this last week.

Version: RSV

Isaiah 40:28-31

28. Have you not known? Have you not heard? The Lord is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth. He does not faint or grow weary, his understanding is unsearchable. 29. He gives power to the faint, and to him who has no might he increases strength. 30. Even youths shall faint and be weary, and young men shall fall exhausted; 31. but they who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength, they shall mount up with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint.

...have a good Sunday.

Joining in here:

Inspire Me at A Stroll Thru Life
The Scoop at StoneGable

xoxo,

Be Inspired: #172

Thanks so much to all of you who came by last week to link up to our Year in Review Party! Some wonderful Top Tens were out there and some great Reviews of the Year. (If you were like me I couldn't find a lot of DIY projects from last year that were notable, so I did a few, and then my top visited posts) I could only highlight a few of all your great links, so, take a peek for some beautiful inspiration, DIY, and decor. 

Faded Charm

Top Ten Posts

Oliver and Rust

Top 5 Roundup

Confessions of a Plate Addict

Top Ten Posts

Cabin amd Cottage

Beautiful Things

And A Gorgeous  New Year's Eve Tablescape

from The Cowboy's Daughter/Winter Journal

thanks so much gals!

Party Guidelines

Please have an individual link back to Common Ground within your post. I'd love to feature you. This is just part of the Party Etiquette.

Please remember to turn off word verification. I've tried leaving comments that didn't go through. I'm sure others have tried also.

Please no direct links to Etsy or Advertising.

Link up to three of your current posts.

Take a minute to visit a few of the other links.

Please be a follower of Common Ground.

Thank you to all of you who come over each week to link up to the party, I may not get to leave a comment, but I try to visit each of your posts. You are a never ending source of inspiration to me and others, so just know how much I appreciate each one of you!

Meet our New Sponsor

 Antiques and Teacups, 

where you'll find some beautiful china,

 treasures, collectibles, and all things "Tea".

Use code "commonground" for 10% off at checkout.