Life in These Here Hills…..
I noticed that our porch has turned a little quirky. We have never gone out of our way to collect Georgia-related memorabilia, but we have Dawg stuff and Coca-cola stuff that is very unique…not too mention other signs, etc. that are very local in motif. We have a very old (well, 30 years or so) wooden sign that used to hang at Noontootla Creek over our porch doors…The porch continues to evolve……
We’ve put some neat stuff on our porch walls…We have more room on the walls there to decorate than in the cabin. We have over 1500 square feet of porches.
The tomato plants are growing like crazy. The roses are in full bloom (though still not as pretty as past years…the petals are thinner and more papery).
I have roses…. creamy white, red, dk. pink, light pink, yellow (my climber).
I guess you can tell my current obsession is my garden. We have planted two tomato plants surrounded by milk jugs with holes punched in them for summer water. Our roses are finally coming out a little at a time. And, we should have a bumper crop of morning glories to spill over our lower retaining wall. I just wish I had an extra day to caretake my own cabin! I wonder if my neighbors will mind if we put up an attractive wooden sign to advertise our cabin care business?
We are fortunate to have a wrap around porch (well, two) that is big enough to use as an outside living room. We have decorated the outside walls with signs and paraphenalia that remind you of an old Adirondack fishing cabin. Some of the signs are really neat. It seems everyone has their favorite. Men seem to like the one that says, “If we get to drinking on Friday and invite you to stay until Tuesday, we don’t really mean it.” Some of the kids like the one that reads, ” In 1897, nothing happened here.” Women don’t care…they are just glad they are at my house, not at their house making dinner.
We have a huge chenille hammock at one end of the porch, an old picnic table from Tim’s childhood and two porch rockers. We need more seating space and I can’t decide what to do. I will try to get a picture posted.
And what, you say, does this have to do with decorating a cabin? And, I say, give me just a minute…I’ll get there! We are going to be leasing some pasture land for our horse. We have to do a little work, for example, repair a section of fence as well as move some things around in the barn. Once that is done, we will probably have room for at least one other horse. (It’s about 7-8 acres with a spring-fed pond). If any of you that have summer homes in the area would like to bring your horse up for the summer, just post here or go on the Contact page and send me an email. The pasture is about 5 or 6 minutes from the intersection of Hwy 5 and 515 in Blue Ridge and on a paved road. Very convenient.
Now, as to the decorating part, I saw some neat junque/antique stuff in the barn…hehehe…If I find anything really neat to hang on the cabin walls, I will take a picture and post it here! A real treasure hunt awaits…..
I know that the generic style for decorating a log cabin basically rounds down to rustic/country. You know, ruffled curtains, ducks, braided rugs and the like…nothing wrong with any of that, but there are other options and after all, you don’t want a cookie cutter look in your home.
We have chosen to decorate our cabin in an eclectic/Pottery Barn/Arts & Crafts style….I think the essential element connecting all three of those types is the use of natural materials, textures and colors…that is something important to remember when you decorate by mixing styles…the styles need to have some “element” in common. By that I mean the general feel of the style..mixing and matching is not difficult but it does take some thought…there are plenty of good books on the subject.
Arts & Crafts style, Craftsman and Mission designs all have overlapping characteristics..the terms are often used interchangeably. A real purist would disagree with the use of the terms that way but we aren’t dealing with purism here….
Anyway, log cabins have a natural affinity for Craftsman style design. Many of the motifs of Craftsman are based in nature, such as the use of stylized leaves and acorns, copper accents, pottery with earth-tone glazes(and other uses of ceramics), earth-tone paints and natural textures in fabrics. The familiar “Tiffany” stained glass fixtures also originated during the development of the Arts & Crafts style(generally during the mid-1800’s as sort of a reaction to the heavy Victorian styles of the time). It isn’t hard to work these features into a log home in the mountains, is it? Here is a link to American Bungalow magazine
We just stained the deck last spring and the steps and the edges of the floor planks are already wearing off. They are the only part of the deck exposed as the rest is under roof. I am really not very happy with the brand of stain we used…I think we will try something different to re-do..I would really like to rock the steps but I think that might be very slippery when it rains, snows…oh, yeah..snow…what it is doing right now in Georgia on April 15. Go figure.
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