Garden blues, vintage hat boxes, more soldered pendants and a give away!

In August I always get the garden blues, because knowing that the beauty of my little garden is going to be over soon makes me kind of blue, so today I like to share with you my dear readers and blogging friends some blue pictures of my August summer garden and seeing that most of you said that you like my mixed posts I'd also like to show you some vintage hat boxes I've recently got and my latest soldered charms and pendants, seen in the picture above as well as in the pictures at the end of this long post. I know it's a lot of pictures to load but if you refresh the site it loads faster, this is my experience and I promise you that you'll not be deceived! There'll also be a give away in this post for you!

The white pelargonia and the blue hydrangea are looking so fresh together:

Some late blooming pink poppies making a nice contrast to the blue glass ball as well as to the the blue watering can:

In the pictures below is deep blue Aconitum blooming in my big border:

And not to forget the beautiful light blue summer sky with fluffy white clouds over my little garden:

Now what is the red thing hidden behind my David Austin rose "Wenlock" ??

It is a beautiful vintage hat box from around 1920 and there even is an original vintage chapeau clac (Zylinder) hidden in the box!

And this is another gorgeous vintage hat box!

So how did I get those boxes? Well last weekend I told my mum about a gorgeous vintage hat box with a black chapeau clac which I had seen at the flea market but couldn't afford to buy, she went in the house and after a while came back with these gorgeous old boxes and gave them to me! She had them stored somewhere at her wardrobe. Woohooo! :D I'm such a happy bunny now! Thank you mum! After the garden photo shoot I've displayed them in my studio, close to my vintage mannequin. Click picture to enlarge and see more details!

Talking about my studio here is a shot of some things I've gathered for the soldered jewelry making which became my new passion of lately:

And here are my latest soldered charms and pendants, all two sided!

Did I mention to you that thanks to my dear blogging friend Ullabenulla I can now make these beautiful scalloped edges too? This is so much fun! Thank you so much Ulla! :D

Well and lastly I like to announce another give away drawing firstly because it's quite a while ago now that I did one and secondly because I like to thank you my dear blogging friends and readers for your friendship, inspirations and faithfulness for almost 2 years now! I started this blog in September 2005 and since then have made so many wonderful friends all over the world and I'm really thankful for this awesome blogging community that we are, it feels so good being a part of it! All you have to do is leave me a comment under this post and you're automatically in the drawing for one of my two sides pendants. I'll let you chose the one you like best! Good luck!!

Oh and I have another magazine swap to propose, I'm such an eye candy magazine addict (like most of you artful bloggers) and you US guys have so many gorgeous magazines that I see on your blogs and which I'd love to get like Artful Blogger, Somerset Home, The Foof-a-life and not to forget that Victoria magazine everyone is talking about and which is supposed to come out soon! So if someone of you would like to do a magazine swap with me I'd be really happy! I'll send you copies of our most beautiful German eye candy home & garden & craft magazines in return, or if you like I'll make you an art supply parcel with German crepe paper, Dresden borders and Victorian scraps. Just let me know what you'd prefer!

Have a happy and creative weekend everyone!

Hugs Carol(a) xox

Studio painting & flea market trip!

Hello and welcome back to Boxwoodcottage on a sunny Wednesday everyone! I'm so glad you came by to see what's new and hope you'll let me know you were here by posting a comment!


Today I like to show you what I found at our trip to the Bremen flea market last Sunday. I wasn't to our flea market for ages because I don't really like to get up this early on a Sunday morning while having to get up early for work all week long, but after all the successful flea market trips of my blogging friends I read about the last few month I decided that this Sunday I'll make it and with the help of my daughter who told me to hurry up the whole morning we actually hit the flea market in Bremen city at exactly 10.00 am lol I know it's late but I really did my very best for a Sunday morning. It was all worth it because I came back with this vintage case full of vintage goodies, what a pleasure! :)

I found lot's of gorgeous old German photos & prints from the 19th century as well as rolls of vintage satin ribbon in pink and vintage mother of pearl buttons:

But the best part were 8 old cardboard boxes full of vintage Christmas glass baubles in different forms, sizes and colors for just 15 Euros including the vintage case! :D

I felt and still feel like having found a treasure! :D Christmas in April yippieh!

I especially love this old fashion catalogue print, don't you? Click on pictures to enlarge and see more details!

Well like I hinted to you already in my Sunday post below, on Friday we decided that our loft room with my studio is too white and boring so we went and bought some turqouise and pink color (the colors my daughter loves too!) to give it a fresher feeling. Further I've painted this little kitchen table in a shabby white last week to have another little work space in my studio:

It really is just a small new space but I love it's new fresh look & colors:

Our cat Sammy loves to have a nap on the big cushion which I've put on our other big vintage case. So she can be around and close to us while we are doing some creative work, or blogging, surfing the net or whatever.

A few of my favorite tin boxes in the studio:


Can you spot them under my big working table?

I posted pictures of my space behind the wall back in January here for those of you who haven't seen the post yet and are curious what's hidden there!

I hope you enjoyed my blog today and I'll come around to check your's now!

Laters! xox

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P.S. I've noticed a lot of quiet french readers recently that I can see on my "recent visitors counter" in the sidebar of my blog and that I'd like to welcome now.

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Bienvenue les blogger et lecteur francais!

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Je sais lire le francais aussie et j'aimerais bien trouve vos commentaires ici et faire la connaissance de vous et lire votre blogue si vous avez un !

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Merci beaucoup et j'espere a bientot! :)

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Il ne sont pas des accents sur les mots francais que j'ecris ici parceque "blogger" ne les aime pas!