Inside Portland House

Well, after a long wait, I finally have pictures of my living room and dining room. We still need to get the curtains hung in the dining room, but all of the artwork is up. I’m so happy with our little cottage, it is so gorgeous and we finally have room to sprawl. Here are a few pictures. God Bless!

Sorry, the ugly A/C is in that picture, but it keeps me happy and cool in the summer :-)

I adore this window!

A view of the living room through the dining room.

My happy rose bush. It has just been beautiful to watch it bloom. It was a little sad when we moved here, but after some love it is giving gorgeous roses.

That’s all for now. I’m going to be busy gardening and sewing today. Have a lovely weekend!

Love Lauren

Riding Habits...

Hello All,

  I finally have been kicking things into high gear in the sewing department. Now that we are fairly settled, I feel that I can finally start my beloved hobby again. As you have seen from my previous post, I am working on a Riding Habit for a dear friend. It is coming along very nicely, and I hope to have some pictures soon. 

  I also will be needing a Riding Habit for an event we have coming up in September. I just can't make up my mind as to the style I want. Here are a few of the ideas I have come up with...

A Redingote Style

The ever beautiful Lady Worsley and her lovely habit.

A later high waisted style.

I have a lovely black wool and a grey wool to play with and I don't know which style I want...

Such a dilemma 

Fun With Photoshop…

I decided that Sir Thomas and I needed our own 18th century portraits over our fireplace. Here is what I created :-) Enjoy!

We are slowly decorating the house. I hope to have the rest of my artwork on the walls and the curtains hung this week. I will post pictures as soon as I get things a little more presentable.

Love Lauren (Lady Georgiana)

Finally, A New Project...

I'm so excited to finally be working on a new project. This time, however, it is a commission from a dear friend. I hope to document the process and keep you all informed. Here is the pictures of what I hope to be creating for her. It's the riding habit/ uniform from the Duchess.

I started drafting the pattern last night. So far it is going well. I hope to cut the muslin out tonight and start draping the bodice. God Bless!!!
Love Lauren

Pittock Mansion Picnic 2010

Hello friends and readers. I hope your week is going well. We had some more doggy drama this week. Leila ended up with a nasty infection on her neck and wound up back in the puppy ER. After some good drugs and some loves she is slowly beginning to mend.

On a more fun note, we had a lovely picnic on Sunday with the ORS and Le Bon Ton at Pittock Mansion. It was great fun and the weather stayed cool for most of the morning. Here are a few pictures. Enjoy!

Colonel and Mme de Valois

Captain and Mrs. Cartwright

Sir and Lady Sully( yes we’re silly) enjoying the delights of the season.

Sir Thomas surveying the land.

 

More of Colonel Etienne and his spy glass.

Mme Theodosia and Sir Thomas chatting in front of the lovely group.

Our cunning spy in his Sans Colottes disguise. Our Royalist nearly had words :-)

Yours truly, lounging in the shade. Yes, I shockingly took my shoes off ;-)

Us ;-)

Well, I am finally starting to sew again. I am going to be making a new riding habit for the lovely Mrs. Cartwright aka Angel. I hope to document my progress. Have a great week and God Bless!

Love Lauren

Leila Lu, Max, and the Raccoon

Hi All,

  I hope you are having a great week so far and are enjoying your summer. We moved our furniture into the new house on Saturday, with the help of some very dear friends. Aaron and I decided to put the dogs in the backyard while the furniture was being moved. That way they were out of the way and not frightened by the chaos. I, unfortunately had to work that day, although only three hours, and didn't arrive at the new house until around 2 that afternoon. When I got their, I decided to head around to the side of the yard and say hi to the pups through the fence. Now, normally, our dogs are fairly clean and they don't have bad breath. Well, not so that day; those two reeked to high heaven. I ignorantly assumed it was due to their running around and playing all day in the yard. Well, after a lovely lunch at a local restaurant we returned and the girls were dying to see the backyard. To our surprise and horror, we found the source of aforementioned nasty smell. Little Miss Leila had found a raccoon buried in the back yard. It had been dead about 2 months and smelled lovely. She decided what else could be better than gnawing on it's leg. Max thought it smelled so good he needed to roll in it. It was nasty.

   Well, needless to say, they had a bath and a mouth wash, which helped but they still kind of stank. Anyway, we decided to put them in the kitchen to dry while we proceeded to unpack. About an hour or so later, we smelled that lovely dead raccoon smell wafting upstairs where we were working. Leila have vomited the portion she ate and decided it tasted so good she needed to eat the vomit. Oh, yeah, it was nasty and the whole house reeked. We ran to the store to get air fresheners and opened every window we could. Luckily the smell dissipated very quickly.

  Everything seemed to calm down until around 10:30 that night. Aaron and I were still unpacking and organizing when we noticed Leila didn't look so good. Poor girl had a slight fever and her tummy was bloated. She also was not her normal perky, goofy self, and she looked very pitiful. We called the ER vet and they said to bring her in. We arrived at the vet around 11:00 that night and Leila, though not feeling well, proceeded to kiss the faces of the vet and the vet techs. They said she was very sweet and happy, but her kisses smelled nasty. To top things off she was farting the whole way there and at the vet's office. Nasty, nasty. Anyway, they pumped her full of meds and fluids and sent her on her way. We received a copy of her chart and under personality they wrote "Mentally Appropriate". Clearly they don't know her very well. Thankfully it was just an upset tummy and after a few days of rest she has been set to rights. We definitely don't want to repeat that anytime soon, although it was funny after the fact and it does make for a great story :-D

The Perpetrator, Leila Lu...

 The Accomplice, Max...

Well, that's all I have for today. Have a blessed rest of your week. We have an event this weekend so I should have some new pics soon. God Bless!

Love Lauren

It's Official!!!!

Aaron is now officially licensed with the State of Oregon.

Now he can finally start practicing!!! Yeah!!!

That just about captures the feeling!

A Feast For The Eyes....

I found an incredible blog called, Treasure Hunt, today. It contains images of the UK National Trusts' Acquisitions. The interiors and artifacts are beyond words. Enjoy!

Just Beautiful Eye Candy!

1795 Doodles

I found this on Wikipedia while reading about Luise Princess of Mecklenburg. This was a series of doodles she drew around 1795. I just love bits of history like this. I wonder if she knew her random doodling would end up in a museum one day.  It reminds me of my college notebooks, I would doodle while taking notes to help stay focused.

Bastille Day 2010

We had a wonderful Bastille Day Celebration this year. It was a little on the warm side, but not nearly as hot as it had been earlier in the week. We had wonderful food, libations, and games. The games consisted of Historical Combat and a live action game of Guillotine, a card game.

Setting up for the event, flags, guillotine, and arms.

The Guillotine, beautifully built by Aaron, aka Lord Thomas Francis Sully, Bt.

Tara, aka Theodosia Rowan de Valois, our lovely Hostess

Xian, aka Colonel le Chevalier Etienne de Valois, our Host and Maitre d'Armes

We even had an appearance of Mme Defarge, is she really Mme Defarge or a cunning spy in disguise… (Guy went all out)

Lord Thomas Sully, Bt., shortly before his “execution”

The Committee of Public Safety, Theodosia Rowan de Valois, Lady Georgiana Sully, and Lady Abigail Cartwright, looking stern and unmerciful. (Tara, Me, and Angel)

Our “executioner” Brad, aka Captain Edmund Cartwright at his post.

Ahhh, the poor victims awaiting their fate.

 

Our Hero of the People doesn’t seem to mind so much.

Aaron, with the help of some officers, (Xian and Sean)  illustrates King Louis XVI’s execution. The King was forced to be executed on his back to he could see the blade fall.

Pas d’Armes, Challenges in Historical Combat

Preparing for the next round of Combat.

The last execution of the day, the final member of the Committee of Public Safety looses her head.

Me and my stiletto, actually I borrowed it from Xian. I wanted to pay homage to Charlotte Corday.

Here we are! It was a hot day, and since the men were going to be executed, we let them take their coats off.

Well, that’s all I have for now. I will be offline for a little while, probably through the end of the week. Furniture moving day is this Saturday. God Bless!

Love Lauren

Bastille Day Preview

Things have been CRAZY in Portland House, well both Portland Houses, lately. We are moving and I feel like today is the first day I have actually sat down for any stretch of time. Anywhoo, we had a lovely time at our Bastille Day Party. Here's a sneak peak with more to come, I promise....

Yes, we had a working Guillotine that hubby built for the occasion.

Our New House…

Today we went over to the new house with the pups and birdy boy in tow. We moved some smaller boxes and my costume supplies in too. It was a lovely day.  I also had a nice chance to snap some pictures before we move all of our stuff in. Enjoy!

Birdy Boy in the back yard enjoying the outdoors. He made a number of friends today. He and the birds in the neighborhood were chatting up a storm.

Doggies love their new yard. They had so much fun exploring and running around.

My sewing room. It’s much larger than it looks in the picture, but because of the layout, it’s hard to get a good picture.

This will become Aaron’s office and the dog’s room because it has the sliding glass door leading to the yard.

Downstairs bath.

The living room. I absolutely adore the large leaded window.

The dining room.

The kitchen, viewed from the breakfast nook.

The breakfast nook.

Master bedroom. Again, the looks of the picture are deceiving. It’s a nice large space.

Master bathroom.

This is the bonus room/ basement.

Guest bedroom, also in the basement.

Basement bathroom.

And one of my favorite things about the house… All of the doorknobs on the main floors are original.

Well, hopefully the next pictures I post of the house will have furnishings. God Bless!

Love Lauren