Saturday Spotlight: Life Behind the Blogger

Cheryl from The Farmer's Daughter 

 Saturday Spotlight: Life Behind the Blogger is a feature done each Saturday that introduces you to a blogger you may already know or a new blogger for you to get to know. This feature gives you a peak into the personal life of the blogger.  Getting to know the special person behind the beautiful blog.

There is so much talent and inspiration in blogland so enjoy getting to know these talented bloggers each Saturday.

Good Saturday Morning everyone.  This week I would love to introduce you to Cheryl from The Farmer's Daughter Blog.  Cheryl is sweet and has a beautiful feature to share with us so we can get to know her better.  After reading about Cheryl hop over and say Hi on her blog.

Hello!  My name is Cheryl and I'm happy to meet you!  When Kris from the beautiful blog Junk Chic Cottage emailed me asking if I would like to be featured in the Saturday Spotlight: Life Behind the Blogger series, I first thought...me?  I saw my fingers typing "Yes, I would be happy to" back to her.  I'm not very comfortable talking about myself, but here goes!

I'm a private gal...an introvert...and a middle child.  Also a dreamer, a romantic, with a little bit of sass thrown in.  My sweet hubby has put up with me for over 40 years.  Bless his heart.

 

After a couple of years of college, I went to work in an insurance office and soon met my future husband, another middle child, in a grocery store parking lot.  He had just returned from a tour of duty in Vietnam.  We saw each other every single night almost from the time we met until we married a year later.  He was my 6'2", eyes of blue and I loved his deep voice.  He said he loved the way I walked and my blonde hair.  His family also lived on a farm and that was one of the few things we had in common in those days!  I loved to go dancing, he didn't.  He loved sports, I didn't.  We did eventually go dancing a few times and I began to like sports and was really proud of myself when I learned what a first and ten meant in football.

Our family, which includes a son and a daughter, is very close and we are not just family, but also good friends.  We can talk about anything and love to enjoy a good meal together and play card games and laugh.  Neither of my children are married at this time, but they both have someone special in their lives. 

I live in a small town in the middle of Missouri in an early 60's ranch-style house with an actual fallout shelter in the basement.  My decorating style could probably be called eclectic.  It is a blend of old and new.  I favor neutral colored walls with pops of color in my accessories.  I love the color red and have red walls in my kitchen and, besides cooking and eating, that is where a lot of time is spent visiting and working on projects.  Usually there is a kitty or two sitting on the island begging for treats!

Our property, which I call Pond Hollow, also includes a rental building and 6 acres with a small pond.  I love to watch the wildlife coming and going from my kitchen window or while sitting out on the patio.  I see everything from deer to coyotes getting a drink from the pond.  And I love to watch the many different birds that come to our feeders.

Last year, we bought a small fixer-upper we are currently renovating and our first renter will be our daughter.  In my blog I refer to this place as The Project.  It has been a slow process, but we are getting there after realizing we couldn't do it all ourselves and hired a carpenter for the harder jobs.  The essentials should be done in a month or two.  Above is a Before and After of the mostly completed bathroom.    

I really do enjoy living a simple life.  I love being at home and am rarely bored.  There is so much to see and do that I wish there were more hours in the day!  I love nature, our furbabies who are mostly rescues, reading, taking photos, going to flea markets, and so many things including blogging. 

I began blogging in 2009 after running across a couple of blogs online and thinking how much fun it would be to have a place to write down happenings, sort of like an online journal, with a few photos of the things I love to snap.       

I named my blog The Farmer's Daughter in memory of my dad.  My blog is not about farming at all, although I grew up on a farm and I have a lot of fond memories of riding horses, swimming in the ponds, going fishing and gathering eggs.  Also helping with the roundup of cattle or the pigs to take to market or move to another location on the farm.  I even attended a one room country school the first 6 grades and I am happy to have had that experience.

I have loved taking photos since I ordered a Brownie camera I saw on the back of a cereal box when I was a youngster.  These days, I mostly use a simple Canon point and shoot for the convenience of being able to carry it in my pocket.  Among the many things I love to snap are my garden flowers, the birds I love to watch, and sunsets at a nearby lake.

Aside from taking photos and blogging my favorite hobby is probably reading, although lately I haven't had as much time for it as I'd like.  Years ago, I was big into crafting and owned a craft shop in part of our rental building for a few years.  There I rented out booth spaces and sold a few things of my own.  I made and decorated grapevine wreaths and swags.  BG cut out wooden things for me to paint in acrylics.  I also made a few pillows and other things.  I am amazed today at all the beautiful and creative things that I see bloggers making!

Besides the craft shop, I had several mostly part-time jobs through the years after my children were grown...from floral assistant to church secretary to data processing.  I retired from working a few years ago and now while I'm enjoying the simple life, I look forward to each day with faith, hope and trust in my heavenly Father.

My hubby and I do get away from home occasionally and one of the places I love best to visit is Branson, Mo.  And that is where we are now as I write this feature...relaxing and enjoying a vacation.

 

I love to meet new friends and invite you to visit The Farmer's Daughter where I'll be showing Before and After photos of The Project and sharing what's happening in my part of the world.  Hope to see you there! 

Thank you again, Kris, for inviting me to participate in your series!

Thank you Cheryl for sharing your sweet life and family with us.  Have a wonderful rest of your week end.

Kris

:)

Divider Wall Down

Most of you know we just put our home on the market to sell.  I decided to de personalize the house a little bit of my decor.

We are getting a lot of young first time home buyers looking at this house and they seem to like stream line and sleek looking homes.

Well my chippy shabby home is certainly not modern or sleek lines.

Younger buyers seem to have a hard time seeing past decor and looking at all the up grades the house has to offer.

One realtor as hard as she tried to get her young buyers to see the hard wood floors throughout and top of the line stainless steel appliances, newer furnace, air conditioner and windows and roof etc. etc. they just could not see past my decor.

Some buyers are hung up on decor and wanting move in ready homes that fit their taste.  While that is great they still have to be educated on how  costly upgrading things in a home can be.  Most of that has been done in this home.

Most of the feed back has been very positive and we have had a few couples come back for a second look already.  So for one week on the market I think that is great.

With all of this said Terry and I decided on Saturday to take down the vintage door divider wall between my office and the dining room.

So the divider wall before.  Loved that this divided my office area from the dining room.

The divider wall came down to open up the space.  

Hoping buyers will see this space back where my office is currently could be a perfect place for a dining table leaving the rest of the room open for other possibilities such as a family room.

Most of my personal stuff has been removed and packed up to be moved.  I wanted to keep the wall free of too much decor.  This way the buyer can see how neutral the walls are for their decor choice.

The before.  I took a lot of my personal style down and packed it away.

I added a few things back on the wall but not much.  I wanted to not have it be to stark but I wanted the buyers to be able to envision their style in this room.

Now what I have as my dining room could remain like that for the new buyers or it could be used as a family room with french doors out to the back yard deck.
You can see my photo bomber is not impressed with the changes lol!


By taking some of my signature decor down helps me to start to detach from this home.  I have loved this home and have loved it being my style.  Now it is time for new buyers to come and make this home truly their own style.

With all the frustration of Terry trying to find a new job and us having no control over a lot of things going on in our lives it felt good to have control over making some changes to this house to help new buyers see the potential.

Have a great rest of the week.  We are in the mid 70's all week and sunshine no rain expected.  Just a gorgeous week.

Be sure to come back on Saturday to meet another blogger in the Spotlight.
Kris
:)

Trying to Get My Fall Mojo On

Happy Sunday.  

I am slowly getting my fall decor going.  It is still summer here in Illinois but with the nights getting cooler and days in the 70's I know fall is just around the corner.

I do not do much for fall.  Christmas is my season to really decorate but I am trying to put out some fall.

It was fun to start to pull out some of my fall decor and remember the special gifts I got last year from fellow bloggers.  This sweet glass pumpkin was sent to me last year by Diana from Nana Diana Takes A Break Blog.  She also added some yummo Brach's corn candies but they did not make it from last year.  Hmmmm wonder what happen to them?!

Love to keep my fall decor neutral.  No darker oranges or reds for me.  They are gorgeous for fall but just not my style.

 Neutral wheat stalk and sunflowers along with some of my pumpkins.

Even my bird in his cage got some cute little sweater pumpkins.  These were sent to me by Susan from Must Love Junk.  Aren't they so cute.

I got this fun fall pumpkin from Sweet Magnolia Farms last year.  Love their beautiful pumpkins and how Sara uses old pieces of vintage things in her pumpkins for stalks.

These sweet pumpkins were made by Becky at Timewashed.  I have collected pretty pumpkins from her Etsy shop for a few years.  Love her sweet pumpkins.

This sweet owl pillow was made and sent to me by Judy 20 North Ora last year.  He made me smile when I opened up my box of fall decor.  Such a sweet face.

  I love the sweater pumpkins with added lace and vintage buttons.

Some dried hydrangea and baby's breath on my cutting board in the kitchen.

I just added a few fabric pumpkins to my gathering basket in the kitchen.

I did a fall vignette on my dining room table with pumpkins from Michaels and my old yellow chippy watering can with neutral fall flowers.

So I started my fall decor.  I am sure I will be adding a few more things here and there. Even with summer flowers still blooming outside I did start some fall on the front porch too.  Have a great start to the new week.
Kris
:)

Saturday Spotlight: Life Behind the Blogger

AnnMarie from Musings of A Vintage Junkie

 Saturday Spotlight: Life Behind the Blogger is a feature done each Saturday that introduces you to a blogger you may already know or a new blogger for you to get to know. This feature gives you a peak into the personal life of the blogger.  Getting to know the special person behind the beautiful blog.

There is so much talent and inspiration in blogland so enjoy getting to know these talented bloggers each Saturday.

Happy Saturday everyone.  This week I would love to introduce you to AnnMarie from Musings of A Vintage Junkie.  AnnMarie is a very talented writer, knows her way around antiques and vintage treasures and is very strong in her faith.  Please grab a cup of coffee and read and get to know AnnMarie this week.

I am so excited to have been asked by Kris from Junk Chic Cottage to write a post for this great feature. Thank you Kris!

The beautiful view from the wharf on the Boston Harbor taken on our recent trip.

Acts 17:28 ESV
²⁸ for ‘In him we live and move and have our being’;^[a]

This verse says it all, for all that I am about to share of my life is a result of having my faith and giving my life over to my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

That said, I am at a point in my life where I am living it to it's fullest. I consciously live in the here and now, not what was, or what I want it to be. I believe I am right where I am supposed to be, doing what I am supposed to be doing.

In a way, I am living a second life. I married young and had two daughters in the 80's....Candice, now 33 and Jena, now 30. It was a wonderful time of my life raising my children in a 1900's farmhouse in the middle of an apple orchard. After being a single parent for years I met and married Frank, my Knight in Shining Armor. That was 19 years ago!

This was on my day out for this past birthday in January.

At age 41 I had our son Christian Michael, who weighed 1 lb.10 oz. when he was born at 28 weeks. He just turned 17 and is a healthy teenager who is crazy for basketball.....NBA, of course. He doesn't care much for college ball!

Another favorite pastime.....eating!

My life revolves around my Lord, my husband, my children, grandchildren, and my home.

Please meet my oldest daughter Candice, who is also my hairstylist extraordinare!

 and my youngest daughter Jena....



It has been a whirlwind, in a good way, the past 17 years. Both daughters are married and have children. My grandchildren are Cassidy, age 10 who is Candice's; Chloe, age 4 and JC, age 11 months who are Jena's children.

Cassidy with the flute I played at her age



Chloe and Jc

 Frank wanted me to be a stay at home Mom for Michael's growing years and I was fine with that! One of my passions is decorating my home and antiquing and garage sale-ing for things to fill it up.

I inherited my love of antiques from my grandmother Ga, who was my favorite, and I was hers. She did her antiquing in Europe and I was fortunate to inherit many of her gorgeous pieces. I still remember her house and cottage at The Thousand Islands, filled room by room with beautiful items.



My passion for antiques and vintage items has grown over the years so about three and a half years ago I started my blog Musings of a Vintage Junkie.

Another passion of mine is creative writing and I did do it freelance for awhile when Candice was a baby. A blog seemed like a great outlet to write what I wanted to, whether it be about found treasures, baking, my family or my faith. A month later I opened my Etsy shop NaNa's Things and I thought it would be a great place to promote that also.

Sunflowers are in my banner because they are my favorite flower!

NaNa is the name my grandchildren call me. I remember always referring to my grandmother's things as Ga's Things. It seemed to work for the feeling I wanted for my shop.

Once I started selling some of my things, I got really sad to see them go! My picking and treasure hunting went into full force to fill my shop with treasures that were not personally mine!

  

When I am not at the computer tweaking my Etsy shop or writing a blog post, I am in my garden in the summer, out pickin' or trying a new DIY project! In the winter I will be baking, decorating or painting another room that needs updating.

I love decorating outdoors and late July, early August is my favorite time for my gardens. They are pretty low maintenance so I like to change up the garden decorations every year.

Those are Chloe's little feet in my garden!

Besides all that, my husband and I run a Christian community theatre for the arts. We have done it for almost 15 years and our home base is right up the street from us on Main Street in the small village we live in, in the Finger Lakes area of Upstate New York. It is called Impact Theatre and my husband directs the drama troupe, The In Your Face Players. I am the woman behind the man in this venture!

I will close with a few random facts about me:

*I am a middle child....did you know that National Middle Child Day was August 12th? 

*My favorite movie of all time is Wizard of Oz

*My favorite color is Aqua, with Red as a second

*Fall is my favorite season

*Baking is a passion of mine. I am known far and wide for my biscotti ;-)

*I love coffee and drink 4 cups every morning of Starbucks Blonde only because that is what my mug holds all at once!

Blogging has become a way of life for me and I just love the amount of fun, useful and interesting information there is in the blogging world. The friends I have made through it are a bonus and there is a fun camaraderie with people I have never met.

 I hope you can stop by for a visit soon!



AnnMarie xoxo 

Thanks AnnMarie for sharing yourself with all of us today.  It was fun to get to know you better.

Have a great Week End everyone.

Kris

:)