EXCITING week of Tea planning and FUN!

For the past bunch of years I've invited Martha and Oprah to my annual Valentine Tea
I even have special parking signs for them!
I never hear and they never show.
It's ok. I know they're busy too
:)
This year I invited those Fabulous Beekman Boys!
...STOP right NOW and Google them if you don't know who, what!, I'm talking about! And see a past post of mine titled BEEKMANVILLE
As in past posts, famous people really do nothing for me. I truly believe with all my heart that we are all One
So the flutter and skip in me is not that these Boys are stars...which they are! :)...It's that I loveee their hearts, their ways, how they share, and so get what it's all about.
PLUS they tickle my funny bone like no other!!!!
I didn't think they'd be able to come on Valentine's Day but if you don't ask or try, NOthing is possible!
BUT unlike Martha and Oprah they responded and boy did they!!!
Friday, in their Beekman News they said theee sweetest words about my tea and sent all their fans this way!
Now that's a STAR!!
Thank you Josh and Brent from the bottom of my heart. Truly truly xoxoxoxox What an exciting day!!! My blog was on fire!!
Fingers and toes and all the hairs on my head crossed that one year you do make it to my tea!

...mixin' up a bigggg batch of Magic Tea for good measure!

Two weeks til the Tea

Just writing that Scares the Soup Outta Me!!...another one of my Mama-isms

This is my 17th year :) :) :)

I am known to never really stick with one thing too long.

Especially by my Mama

It's just that there's SO much out there I wanna to do!

Once I think of an idea it's complete utter tunnel vision until everything is thought out, designed, and tried.

...for just a bit...until another idea POPS into my head.

I just can't help it.

I've had sooo many businesses since I was 12 and sold my handmade decorated soaps door to door.

You know, the ones with ribbons and sequins, and the beads pinned in on the bottom for legs?

When it was the Cabbage Patch doll craze I was Dr. Cynthia

I would deliver Cabbage Patch dolls to children's Birthday parties.

I lurked and waited hours and hours in toy stores waiting for the secret time when they would put the dolls out on the floor.

It was iNsaNe. Because of the shortage of dolls there were other Lurkers. Whispers and teams. Fear and excitement.

My Dad was on my team. We'd get as many as we could together and then I'd put an ad out and book more parties.

I designed a quilted cabbage that I would put the little naked baby in.

Dressed as a surgeon with a mask I'd rush into the party and deliver the new born to the Birthday child.

We'd dress it and then do the Pledge of Adoption together

Before I left, 20-25minutes, I gave all the little party goers lollipops...like other Dr's did :)

85.00!

Back then that was lotsss and I could not keep up with the party demand!

After the dolls died down I copyrighted the pattern for my cabbage and sold them mail order for 5.00 each

Request would spill from my mailbox. That all was quite a ride!

Throughout life there was a Natural Food restaurant, a Gift Basket shop, Tea Party thrower in other homes, T-Shirt painter, Primitive doll maker...then primitive doll patterns, Candles, Salad dressing that I used to sell at a stand in the front yard...I cannot remember all of them

Now more recently in our little Antique/Country Store here in our home....I make and package organic food mixes, room spray and candles that smell just like a burning hearth, Goat Milk soap and lotion, our brand of Organic Homestead coffee, Hot Spiced Cocoa, Magic Valentine Tea, and Jewelry.

Anything with packaging and labels I adore!!

Now as the years have past I've slowed my brain and now know just what I can and won't really end up doing.

My two sweet girls are taking over. I see it in their eyes

It makes me smile smile smile

Yesterday my youngest, Milli, jumped in our FREEZING lake for Winterfest to raise money for local Charities
It's so so SOOOOO what I would have done!

Snag it and LIVE it to the fullest while we are here!
TAKE THE PLUNGE!

Their team was "Sugar Boys and Girl"
...Maple Syrup makers each and every SpRiNg!

All warmed up and happy she was brave enough to step out of her comfort zone and take the plunge

YAY Milli Girl! xox

True Confessions

While doing the interview for Where Women Create magazine I made up my mind to blog once a week for a year.

Last week was the end of that year.

Throughout the months there was a bit of stress and pressure...all self induced!...but I really LOVED it!! My wacky world became more alive and even crazier and I loved seeing it creatively through the lens of the camera. 

The very BEST part was all the new friends I met <3 

Coming here to find comments of love and encouragement from kindred souls was like having little presents delivered straight to my heart!

Still unsure where to go from here but for now I'm not ready to give that up so I'll just keep rambling on for a bit longer.

Thank you all for coming along on one of the best rides of my life!! 

With my love and Light for you and all that is xoxox Cindy

Not much happened in my world this week because I was in hiding...

ok.
I have a fake tooth

Yesss FAKE

Some years ago I had this autoimmune thing where my body rejected my perfectlyyyy good eye tooth.

(part of the reason I decided to go gluten free...don't want anymore of this crazy stuff)

While waiting for an implant my dentist made me a "flipper" as he calls it.

A tiny little plate with one little tooth that kinda clips on up and in.

I have a love hate thing with it.

I NEVER leave home without it and need to take it out when I sleep and eat some foods.

...chocolate. My favorite food.

...I think it covers up the chocolate tasting taste buds or something. Why those!!
I'm usually so very careful where I put it...left over from those braces days when the rolled up in a paper towel retainer ended up in the trash.

Monday I lost my head and rolled the tooth up in my sleeve because my pants had no pockets.
Had lunch and a caramel from a Whitman's Sampler...
(almost killed myself once with a caramel from a Sampler and the flipper in a NY subway )

After lunch I took a nap on the couch with Carolyn
(sorry for another pooch story...last one for awhile I promise!)

Whilst I slept

She found it and ATE IT
Not the flipper thing, the TOOTH!!
Bit the gosh darn thing right off

Honest to God, she looked like she laughed after she did it andddd she did her little back leg skip thing when she got off the couch

Panic, anger, and OOOMMMGGG, ran up and down and all around me

Mostly PANIC

SHE skipped and danced and giggled all night long

(I thought that part was a little funny)

Whenever she passed by me I pictured an x-ray of that longgg body and could see MY tooth in herrr belly

If it went in, it had to...
Should I...It would save me 300.00
Could I...Reeeallyyy ewww and then what? Super Glue?
Would I...
Word would get out and forever people would stare and wonder which tooth went on the Fantastic Voyage.

Panic Panic Panic. I've neverrr been out of the house without it and never let anyone seeee me without it

For three days I hid
While a NEW one was made
WHEW Right?!
:)

All is well now at Hidden Pond Farm
Back to taking naps together





Dave did end up recovering the tooth
Yep

THAT'S true love. But sooo not Hot
I remember when I wouldn't even let him see me blow my nose.

Seven year itch

I started feeling it last year

It will arrive in full force next year sometime. Right on schedule.

The pattern has been that I change my decorating style every 8 years.

The shift begins on the 5th year and gradually builds until the day Dave comes home for lunch and everything is at the end of the driveway with a 5 dollar sign on it.

It's happened twice to him since we've been married.

On the 5th year I begin to whine a little, sleep a lot, and walk around with a dazed look.

The 6th year I get harder to live with. NOthing feels quite right. Like when I used to wear jeans.

By the 8th year I just KNOW. And everything goes out the window.

Poor Dave.

Because this has happened before I'm kinda getting ready for it.

Easing into this bout eyes wide opened

At least this time I know what I want.

Still lovin' primitive antiques but with a more creative, fun, up-cycled...deep breath....updated...deeper breath, INDUSTRIAL feel

There, I said it.

Last Sunday it began.

When we first were married I did a cottage Victorian mix

(no pics to show you)

Then onto 50's Kitsch

Here are 2 pics taken in '99... kitchen and dining room

 This is hard for me to look at now.

Shaking as I shock my blog with brightness

And this!

What the hey was I thinking?

Tables on tables. Stuff on stuff.

I can't breathe

When my girls were older they told me that growing up they'd do anything not to have their friends come over to Freakville.

I thought they were just kidding and being whiny teenagers. I convinced myself that down deep they really did love it all.

They really didn't.

But this they really do love!

For three years before the end of color I could not get my mind off a simple green pear on a white ironstone plate upon an old worn table inside a sparse log cabin that we saw in Old Sturbridge Village.

Once I reeeeally knew. Practically over night...

Color out one door and drab in the other. I could breathe clear and feel the calm.

And have for the past 7 years

Last Sunday morning out of the blue...spurrer than spur of the moment. I decided I wanted to cover my kitchen wall with the coffee bags I'd been saving from where I work.

I love love loveee the graphics and thought I should see them EVERYday.

It didn't take much for Dave to hop on board my burlap train.

If I pretend to not know how to do something and tools are involved, in he swoooops.

I knew my state of being would still need the more muted neutral colors

 Sorted through almost 30 bags

Chose the first one for our Brazilian boy 

 At first I was going to cut out all the graphics I liked best and iron them all nice and flat

 Then we decided to just jump in and work a collage as we went

 Helper girl

 Watching every move her Dad made

...I know this short stuff with all her issues was judging.

 Just cut raw edges and stapled them up.

Raw edges = primitive

Staples = industrial

...the beginning. 

 Making sure it was perfectly not so perfect

 Covered up several of my markings

Favorite recipes are written all over my walls

Finished with the first section

LOVE this man for knowing I would maybe just die waitin' til the end for the shelf to be put back up

 ...and sconce, and all the others

 8:30 pm

Started at 10am

Ate our dinner of tuna sandwiches standing

 He loved the bag with the bright RED 

How could I not put it up

...behind the door.

 10:00 pm last stop on the burlap train

Both of us totally and utterly exhausted.

Thought it would take 3 hours at the mosttt

All of us here love it. Lacy's coming by today to see 

...still cravin' their approval

...wait til these maaaybe sneak their way in

Whatcha think of mama now girls?

The evening of January 6th

This Brazilian boy has wiggled and bore his way into the depths of my heart.

It isn't just his smile or amazing curls or dreamy accent.

He is kind through and through and his excitement for the world around him and all that is, 

is truly captivating. 

Being near him makes one happy happy happy and want to see the world through his glasses.

So

When he asked me not to take the tree down January 2nd when I usually always and forever do

I listened

And again on January 3rd

4th and 5th

On January 6th the day he said maaaaybe I could take it down

I thought I would surprise him with another day or two

 While he watched TV I glanced at the tree and it really was lookin' a little dusty and tired

Heart Beating outta my chest I waited

I could not possible do it in front of him for fear he might be damaged for life

My innards are shaking still as I write this.

 When he left the room I started just a bit. 

When he left for the evening

I did a little more

 These big ones really show the dust so they had to go

Oh no

My Mother's glass ornaments from when she was a little girl

Paper "hooks" were used to save metal for the war

Deep breath
I'd leave the garland and lights and the few balls up top

Still pretty

He will love it

Yikes. The garland.

Couldn't stop

I knew I was being bad and breaking hearts but I just could not stop

 OK maybe just the lights and top things

No turning back

Heart beating

Beating

 How will I reach the top and then dispose of the evidence

Beating Beating

AND I had to deal with this

 STILL snooping for presents

There's NOtthing there!

NO Carolyn SHOOO

Noooo more even if you sit cute with your paw up.
...can you believe she's sitting? She can actually be in two rooms at one time with that long wormy body.
Verrrm as Boy Boy says

To the rescue

He's my living breathing hero ladder

Beating 

Beating

Beating

If I'm gonna do it I've got to do it all

Maybe he won't even notice

 Come on Carolyn GO AWAY

Let's all sit and pretend to watch a movie when they come in

 Telling me SHE'S mad and just wait til HE gets home

This is the part that made my heart stop beating