Halloween swap preparations, painting activities and our new kitten

Welcome back to Boxwood Cottage dear blogging friends and readers. Once again I have to apologize for my long blogging absence. There was so much going on at Boxwood Cottage I'm not sure where to begin. Well I guess I start with the activities in the studio. I signed up for a new swap through the Year of color blog, it is the Sweet and Sinister swap. Seeing as I'm not that fond of the color Orange and the Sweet & Sinister Swap is all about Black, White & Cream colors it is the perfect Halloween swap for me. I started by embellishing some of my little top hats and decorating them in the studio, but for now I can't show you more of the things I prepared because I don't want to spoil the surprise for my swap partner Heather of Speckeled Egg. One thing I can tell you is that it has a lot to do with Silhouettes, because I love them very much and so does Heather :)

For the next finished project that took some time we have to go downstairs into the living room.

The painting bug has bitten me again. I remebered an old 3 pieces shelf lying around in the basement, which I had hanging in my former kitchen in the old cottage. I had not found the right space for it since I moved to Boxwood Cottage in 2005. Well suddenly it came to me that it would look great painted in white and I also had an idea on where to hang it up, so I started painting:

I also painted a brown letter white and placed it on the shelf and tried to hang it all on the screws from the mirror that hung on the wall before, of course that didn't work out lol

So I needed the help of my Dad to hang it up on the space over my willow sofa:

Thank you Dad for hanging it up for me! Then the fun part was to decorate it. I'm not sure if I'm done with it yet, but for the moment I think it is okay and I'm happy with the look of it. My eyes really needed a new sight in the living room.

Here is an over all look of the redecorated sofa corner:

I also painted the shutter in the corner beside the window:

You can even see the reflection of the shelf in the golden mirror over my faux wooden mantle (made for me by my Dad in 1999) which was the first piece I painted white in 2006. Since then I have to paint something more white every few month lol it is like an addiction.

Beeing in paint mood I continued and painted a small round wooden table, also made by my Dad and the little shelf in the shady corner, which was made by Dad too and the plant stand below in white and I think it was all worth the effort because it all fits together now. (Right click on the pictures to enlarge them and see the big version with all the details if you'd like)

So now we come to the little thing that took up most of my spare time since my last post. 5 weeks ago we got a new kitten. He was only 8 weeks old when we got him, but his mama didn't want her babies anymore, she was much too young when she got her babies, still almost a kitten herself with 6 month of age.

I present to you our new family member Riley. A few weeks ago he was not more than a hand full of fur:

But meanwhile he has almost doubled his weight. And he loves to discover the cottage.

Of course I made him a cosy bed in a basket, but he always prefered to lay in one of my boxes with craft supplies when he took a nap in the studio so I gave him his own cardboard box cover to sleep in and he loves it better than any other place lol

Thing is that at the beginning he used only half the box, but meanwhile he's almost growing out of it.

Say bye bye for now to our dear reader little one!

So what have you been up to since the beginning of August?

Today is a wonderful late summer day and I'll better go out in the garden now, before it is getting dark again.

Have a wonderful end of summer anyone!

xoxo Carola

P.S.:

Thank you all very much for the congratulations on my Artful blogging article, your comments were a pleasure to read and very much appreciated!! I further wish a warm welcome to my new readers , I'm so glad that you found me through Artful Blogging and I hope that you are here to stay and follow the activities at Boxwood Cottage!