A Collector's Cottage

Recently I went to visit my sister

who lives near Asheville, North Carolina.

I am always amazed at ALL of the

interesting objects she has in her home.

She loves to go to flea markets, swap meets,

thrift and consignment stores, and yard

sales to find things for her own home

and for her own booth at an antique store.

Every wall and surface has so much to look at.

Some items are even kind of quirky

but they all work together.

Her husband's great grandmother (pictured in white dress on red background)

was a "cover girl" for an early November issue of Vogue magazine

as seen above. 

Our mother water-painted these gardenias (or camellias ?) back in the 1950's.

This time of year

she has her Halloween "finds" out.

Sister wants me to disavow the stencil along the top of the beadboard walls for her.

It was there when she moved in and painting it out

 is just one of those things that gets pushed down the "to do" list.

This print is titled "Dancing Scarecrows".

Her farmhouse-style cottage sits on

several acres of rolling land

which is just beautiful in Autumn.

Her large cutting garden has just a few blooms left.

Here are some zinnas and daisies that she cut from her garden and put out on her back deck.

My sister reminds me of some of my blogging

buddies by finding furniture bargains and

repainting them to sell in her booth.  She also

 makes wreaths and amazing flower arrangements.

This is a pussy willow wreath from last spring.  Right now, she is making wreaths out of bittersweet.

She literally "threw together" this arrangement from things in her yard.

This is a stem of bittersweet.

The front porch of the cottage is

about eight feet wide and covered

so it is almost like another room in the house.

She finds beauty in many different types of objects...even this paper wasp nest.

When our husband's get together, they say we could start a new TV show called "Sister Hoarders".