I’m super low on energy as I have some sort of upper respiratory infection.
Also, coming down off the Paddy’s Day festivity excitement is slightly depressing.
Also, I always get a little weirder than normal in the spring. Even as a child, spring has messed with my head. All that potential life and energy and just plain potential, stored up and waiting to burst into…. well, I never quite managed to burst into anything particularly special so maybe that’s why I get a bit bummed out.
Anyhoo – I got a wee ceramic watering can and some narcissus bulbs for Christmas. I planted them and left them on my kitchen windowsill to grow.
And they did, of course. And they also looked like Spottie’s favourite snack – a long stringy thing. After he had a good munch, I moved them to the fireplace mantle, which is out of reach and too crammed with stuff for Spot to consider jumping up.
I thought I was just taking a picture of my flowers. But what I saw was a little snapshot of me and who I am, displayed above my fireplace. Shall we have a tour?
Left to right: The plate is one made by my dad and his wife. She is a potter, amongst many other talents, and for several years they made Celtic pottery and toured the USA selling their wares at Irish festivals. Absolutely stunning work, and I’m very happy and proud to display their craft where it can be seen immediately. I’d love to share a link, but sadly they have retired from pottery-making.
The skulls – in old Ferrero Rocher chocolate boxes, no less – are ones I found myself. Top is a fox, bottom is a groundhog. I have a cat and an opossum, too – they just aren’t in the photo.
Well, the flowers of course. The wee watering can actually works as one, so it is pretty efficient at getting rid of excess water, despite having no drainage holes at the bottom (ye know, where they normally are). If you have time to stand around holding it at an angle to drip while keeping the long leaves from breaking. Meh. Will move the narcissus elsewhere I think.
The wonderful Celtic-carved skull! Man I love that thing. I bought it at the Cleveland Irish festival one year when dad came to sell their wares. I just fell in love with it. I believe I got it from Gaelsong – be warned, they are more than happy to send you catalogs full of drool-worthy items. I don’t see much stuff of their quality even over here. Maybe they just have an awesome photographer…
The wee white thing is a Philips IMAGEO LED candle light – we have them in red and blue and just love them. That’s the US/Canada link, but of course they sell them in Ireland and the UK (not sure about Australia/New Zealand). Cheap to run, charge quickly and cheaply, can be used on the charge base while lit, and give nice flickery light for hours and hours with no fire danger. I’d give them a 10 out of 10.
There is also the tiniest bit of a postcard that Socks sent me from her vacation to Maine in the fall of last year. ‘got lobstah?’ Hahahaha! I’d love to go to Maine.
Last – because it is not the least, not by any means – is the Ouija board.
I wrote so very much about that board that I think I will have to take a better photo of just the board and do a separate post. It’s incredibly important to me and deserves an explanation.
What treasures do you keep in a place of honour?
heretherebespiders 
Ah! I liked, and I was about to close the window, when I noticed you changed the orange message… Now I feel bad, but I have nothing to say 😦
Don’t feel bad. As below it wasn’t directed at people I know. Clearly I need to rethink what I said.
And clearly I’m not doing a good job if I can say all that stuff and no one has a response! Oh well.
What about when I have nothing to say? I’m not ALWAYS witty, you know….
It wasn’t directed at people I converse with already, actually. More the ones I’ve never seen before who like and say nothing at all. Comment, people! Make me want to come visit your blog, too!
Week after week, I try to get people to leave comments below my articles, and you know how well it works… I’m totally with you on that, but I guess there’s nothing we can do. Some people like to read and never comments. And sometimes you have that very new visitor which decides to talk without having been asked to.
I agree you might want to rephrase that a bit. It’s so rare I have nothing to say, but I felt bad for that. But we love you Spiders, come here so I give you a hug 🙂
(Hug) Thanks. I still haven’t read your last post – I’m about 70 emails behind. Fuuuuuuuck.
Haha it’s okay! By reading them late, you give a longer life to my posts. After all the subscribers went through them, all I get are hits from random Google users (and sometimes from odd unpopular bloggers who decide to randomly link to a post as a source). Actually I’m quite short on time too these days, so I basically try to catch back on one of the blogs I’m subscribe to any time I have a few minutes left — I’m catching up on Sled right now.
Actually now I have something to say… I’d be interested if you made a post of just the pet skulls. Close up pictures, explanation of how you got them or how you prepared them. I knew someone who insisted that we had to bring him any pet we had when they died, because he really liked to collect skulls. He once explained to me how he prepared them (really, I wouldn’t be able to do it — for some reason I feel like it’s something you enjoy doing lol)
Actually, that is a pretty boring set of stories. I have a “super-sniffer” nose, so I can’t deal with decomposition very well. But I have a friend in Alaska who owns her own carrion beetles solely for cleaning animal skulls. She’s considering setting up a YouTube channel for all the neat things she does, and this would be one of the neat things.
Oh! The person I talked of used chemicals to do the task. I guess looking at the bugs doing their job might be… interesting (trying not to make myself any mental image right now).
I usually let nature do the job. If a bit … meaty… I’ll use bleach. I’ll do a post.
Rather a grey day, so I’ve been sluggish getting around. LOVE the collection – all of it goes together. (Never had much luck with forcing bulbs, so that’s impressive…you can get a special drill bit to make holes in there.) We had that board in the old farmhouse.(no electricity, so it was pretty spooky…and it did move on its’ own – ask any of the cousins!)
One of the best parts of having woods and fields as a kid was the “leftovers” all cleaned and ready to take home…we marked trees sometimes and came back after finely bleached by sun.
Can you show more pix of the pottery? very cool. I can’t throw a pot worth a darn – quite a skill…not to mention the glazes.
Glad to know about the LED candles – I’d dismissed those, but may have a look now.
You sound more like a fall person than a spring sprite…spring is OK fine at first – but then the long days of scorching sun and oppressive heat just does me in.
Hi! I didn’t comment on your post because my big love was the dogwoods – not the point of the post at all! But they are lovely.
It’s the time of year here for the narcissus and daffodils – they are out in force! If kept dry-ish and cool for a few months they will bloom. A month in the fridge will get hyacinths to grow. I just love the way they smell – why don’t I have any?!?
I think I’ll put a smaller pot with holes inside the wee can – it sure isn’t suited for those long leggy plants. I have several chunks of Jade plant that will love it in there! Damn dog keeps breaking off bits of my ginormous momma plant. As they do!
I’ll write more about the board – it is super special to me 🙂
I’d LOVE to share the pottery! I have a good bit – I used to have more but Spot’s mother jumped six feet straight UP and slammed into a shelf where I had it all. My downstairs neighbour said it sounded like a bomb went off. Aargh!
Apparently they make a tea light version of the candles – slightly safer within reach of big saggy tails, as they are glass. Kitties have knocked the tall ones over a few times, onto stone, and they didn’t shatter. That’s a plus for me, too.
Summer is good – away from high heat. I didn’t like Florida at all in the heat – the fall was the best! X
Yes, those boxes are great! I have one of the pyramids that I “charge” stuff in.
Love the ouija board, and you’re lucky to have the blooms. Nice post.
Pyramids? Do you have the Phillips lights too? They are kind of a triangle thingie… I’m so very tech, aren’t I? Ha!
No.. not familiar with the Phillips lights. I was talking about the Ferrero Rocher pyramid boxes. Haven’t seen them for a long time, though!
Oh! I don’t think I’ve ever seen those! Might be a holiday thing, pile them up like a Christmas tree? I get made fun of for saving a lot of weird stuff, but those boxes are so great for keeping dust off of things you can’t, or don’t, want to dust!
I’m sure it was a holiday thing, and I haven’t seen them for a while now. Yeah, there’s all kinds of stuff here that is just going to be perfect for um… something!