Tales of the Traveling Totes #23 and A Giveaway

Welcome to our June 2020 edition of 

Tales of the Traveling Totes, where a group

of MacKenzie-Childs loving women share where 

our totes have been off to. 

What adventures have we had during the last 

quarter with Covid-19?  Miss Madi K and I surprisingly

ended up having quite a bit of fun!!!

At first I thought I would be sharing pictures of:

La Bored Room

Le Decluteria

Costa De Balcony

Porto Gardenas

Ste. Toilette

La Rotunda de Sofa

But as time passed and Utah went from 

an orange emergency status to a yellow status,

we had the opportunities to do a few things.

It all started with this little cutie-pie!  Her parents 

had headed down south to St. George, Utah for 

my son's birthday at the end of March.  The weather was 

so pleasant and the view out of the condo window 

was of a pool and palm trees, so they ended up 

staying for five weeks!  Towards the end of their 

time they needed help watching this little one 

while they studied for and took their finals.  

We had stayed away from everyone, so we were 

a little nervous, but they had isolated too, so 

we decided to go down and help!  As of today, we 

have isolated down here for six weeks!  We have 

children at home who can check on our home 

and hubby can do all of his work and his church 

work on the phone and internet, so we decided it 

was the perfect place to isolate.

We actually have a lot down here, and have thought 

of building and moving here, but were unsure about 

being so far away from all of the grandkids, who 

all live close.  This has given us a taste of what 

living down here would be like. 

We hadn't done any take-out, but the cases of the virus 

were so much less down here in the heat, that the kids 

talked us into getting some food from restaurants and 

heading to parks to eat.  Our parks had remained open 

and weren't busy.

By May 1st the pools became open and by the next 

weekend we could go over to Lake Powell, 

which is three hours away, so Miss Madi K 

got packed up and we headed to our houseboat.  

We invited some friends to Lake Powell with us 

who were also isolating down in St. George.  

We just went for three nights, and decided 

it was safe and fun so we invited two of my 

kids to come down for the next weekend.

We boated up the lake to see Rainbow Bridge. 

This DIL had never seen it.

The water is way too cold for me this time of year, but 

the kids enjoyed it.

We ended up being there for our 41st Anniversary. 

We had planned on going to Hawaii, and that 

had been cancelled early in April, so it was 

fun to have somewhere to go.

My daughter whipped up a beautiful batch 

of macarons for our anniversary!  I would 

never have thought of making them at Lake Powell. 

We ended up heading over for a third 

weekend in a row.  Miss Pansy got to come along

this time.

Our youngest daughter and her husband came this 

weekend.  He had just graduated from college, 

and of course they weren't having convocation, so I 

ordered a cap and gown for him, and we went just 

down the highway to Horseshow Bend.  It is 

less than a mile down the road, but we had never been.  

It is quite spectacular.  Miss Madi K got to take 

the short hike out to the view point.  

I can't believe we had never come here before.  I 

guess we have always been in a rush coming 

and going, and we had no idea how close it was.

I have been journaling this Covid-19 experience, and 

these 16 picture pages tell a lot of the story.  I have made 

these for the last few years and at the end of the year 

I publish them in a book, to tell the year's story.  It 

makes for a really easy way to document the year. 

With the money we got back from the Hawaii trip,

we purchased ebikes.  We have been taking bike rides 

on the wonderful bike trails in and around St. George.  

Again, this is something we have never done, even 

though we have been coming to St. George for 

over 30 years.  This is up Snow Canyon.

Miss Madi K carried hand sanitizer, sunglasses, 

sunscreen and other necessaries in the car.

Just a little humor! 

Hasn't humor helped with Covid-19?

Pictures don't do justice to the size, scale and color of 

these mountains up Snow Canyon.  This 

mountain is called Island in the Sky and it is massive.

We had scaled this mountain a few years ago with 

a friend who is a professional guide. Yes, you have to squeeze through that tiny crack and spider walk crevices!

 It was a lot easier riding up 

the canyon on an ebike!  

 I have to say we are addicted to the ebikes - 

it is almost like cheating - as you can ride up any steep 

hill as the bike assists you.

We finished the morning by going to 

breakfast at Tifany's!  Miss Madi K 

really liked this.  

Cinnamon Roll crepe and a Breakfast Crepe!  It was 

the second restaurant we have sat in.  We were the only 

ones there.  We were glad to see it was up and running.

And last week the TJ Maxx opened in St. George.  Only 

85 people are allowed in the store.  

We had to wait outside just 

for five minutes. 

Of course our treasure hunting here 

paid off!  

My sister Joni said she had stopped in theirs and 

the shelves had been emptied by pent up shoppers!

Because of our age, we still are social distancing, 

 wearing our masks and limiting our grocery 

shopping.  We feel blessed that our family has stayed 

employed and healthy and some can work from home.  

Who would have ever thought we would be posting 

about living through a pandemic, but we are glad 

we were able to loosen up a bit this last month. 

Hope you are all doing well.

Now for the giveaway - what you have been waiting for!

Join our other travelers and leave a comment on Linda's blog to enter the giveaway!  See where 

and what they have been up to during the pandemic.

Debbie with Miss Aurora @ Mountain Breaths 

Emily with Miss Courtney Childs@ The French Hutch

Jenna with Miss Coquille @The Painted Apron

Linda P with Miss Lola @ Life and Linda

Patti with Miss Kenzie @ Pandora's Box  You are here!

Rita with Miss Luna C @ Panoply 

Sarah with Miss Merri Mac @ Hyacinths for the Soul

Ricki Jill and Countess De Monet @ The Sketchy Reader

Cherry Kay and Carrie Ann Hall @ Entertaining Women  

Here's a peek at my MC friends as we had 
a Zoom meeting and I saw their faces and 
heard their voices for the first time.  Thanks 
Patti for putting this photo together.

Join us in September and see where our adventures take us.

Reclaimed Wood and French Script Dining Table

I finished this remodel project some time ago

but when a close friend asked if we had ever

finished remodeling our St. George condo,

I realized I had never posted more about it.

I had shown you my first tile job which was

the backsplash in the kitchen. 

Click here to see that post.

But I had left you hanging on the rest

of the project (bet most of you forgot!)

We took everything down to the sheetrock

and redid the kitchen, floors, fireplace

and baths.  

We were down there this last week and I 

decided to take some photos and create a

tablescape highlighting the remodel of the

dining area.

The inspiration piece was this reclaimed

wood table on whitewashed columns.

I found this at a local store

Osmond Designs.

Next I found these two French script settees

online.  I love the look of settees

mixed with chairs.  It makes such a warm and

welcoming table.

Coordinating French script chairs from

another online site provided chairs on

each end.

The beautiful black drum chandelier

was also an online find while

the mercury glass vases were from 

Home Goods.

So I set off to my favorite Home Goods

store in St. George, Utah to find some

fun plates and accessories to create

this beautiful tablescape.

I was captured by these wonderful

silver polka dot china plates, so

I had fun collecting coordinating

items at Home Goods.

In the condo I just had some ocean inspired

plates and since I had just done a tablescape

using that theme, I decided to find something

else that went beautifully with the remodel.

This silver backed plate was slightly

larger than the silver polka dot dinner plate

so I chose to use it as a charger.

I already had the flatware but I found these

cream and silver linen placemats and 

thought they coordinated perfectly.

The stack was topped with a matching

bowl and I was thrilled with all of

my new finds.

I also found cream and silver napkins

with silver napkin rings 

and these

gorgeous silvered goblets. 

I have never gone to the store and

just picked out a whole tablesetting

before.  It was a challenge but fun.

I was limited by the number of

linens and napkin rings I could get

so I set the table for four,

but fortunately they had more plates and

so I was able to get 7 of each of those.

It all looks so different and upscale

from before.  

We have had the place for 15 years and

it had carpet in the dining

area.

We redid the flooring so that the entry,

living, kitchen and dining is all in dark wood.

I love this cheetah rug from Ballard under the table.

I also made these lined 

burlap and flocked pinch pleated

curtains with bling detail for the

dining area and the living area.

I will finish with a shot of the

dining area at night with

the drum chandelier lit.

I love the fun patterns the chandelier

makes on the ceiling.

You can find a lot of these items

on my Pinterest board

My Building Projects.

I will show you more of the remodel

in later posts!

Thanks for coming to visit

Purple Chocolat Home

where something new is always

happening.

I will be posting this with

Tablescapes Thursday

Home Sweet Home

and 

Metamorphosis Monday

Amaze Me

The Scoop

Weekend Wrapup