Entries from April 2010 ↓

Phil Feral is my porch muse. For a long time my only relationship with Phil happened on the porch where I had provided him with a heating pad cat bed on my vintage porch glider because he had no home. Before that he just wandered around in back of my house with no place to call his own. Several of the neighbors fed him until the night when I offered him the bed. Then he was mine. That was 2 winters ago and our relationship had a long way to go. I feel like my Barcalo porch glider brought Phil and me together. It was where we first made eye contact. But time and patience and of course food brought him around. Those things and a glider with a heated bed. So Phil Feral has become my porch muse. We spend a lot of time together on the porch enjoying our vintage outdoor furniture to the fullest. Phil comes in the house now. Now he is a lap cat and you can pick him up. Well, Jerry can pick him up and I’m still working on it. The glider on the porch was a cushion for him from the real world. I know just how he feels. We will always share our porch and glider bond. And you’ll be hearing more about Phil Feral as he continues to inspire me about life and how to relax on a porch.

I want to share some pictures with you of my favorite vintage lawn chair…the first one I ever bought. You can see it was rust-covered, but it also had a significant tear in the metal around the bolt near the arm.  At the time I didn’t know about the miracles metal workers could perform, but I decided to take a chance and buy this beautiful chair regardless. Today it sits on my porch and is a daily reminder to me that the vintage outdoor furniture that we sell at Mulberry Street is worth every penny and every effort to give it a new life.  I am sure this chair would have ended up in a landfill or a junk pile. If someone had been looking for rusty but usable furniture, it would have been passed over. But because I was looking for furniture to preserve, I loaded it on the truck with numerous other worn but salvageable pieces of vintage porch furniture. When I saw this one restored, I knew I had to keep it for myself. I am always tempted!  But I think it’s only fitting that every morning when I go out on my porch, I am greeted by the very first piece of Mulberry Street furniture ever purchased, now beautifully restored and dearly loved. I was lucky enough to find this 1940s vintage photo of a chair exactly like mine showing a young boy dressed in his best enjoying a moment outdoors with his dogs. Another reminder that spring has a past.

When I posted on my blog back in January and February, it seemed like it would be forever until spring returned. Today I look around and see a chorus of azaleas, irises, brush plants and blooming dogwood trees everywhere. People are crowding any store that sells plants to add their own color and excitement to that of the natural world.  I myself am searching for a salmon bougainvillea for my porch. So far, I’ve found only red.  And red doesn’t go with the color scheme established by my vintage porch furniture and other accessories. I know of one more place out near Folly Beach where I might be able to find just what I want. Right now, my back door is wide open to the scents, sights and sounds of spring in Charleston. No wonder people come here from all over the world. It is a delight to all the senses. I steal every moment I can to go out and just take it all in while sitting for a while on my porch glider enjoying the company of my cats. We have planted a vegetable garden and are watching over it way too carefully. It is our first garden, so we are learning as we go. I hope you’ll take the time to get outside today.  Get something beautiful to sit on while you enjoy it!