Little Miss Clover is wearing a vintage velvet dress with sweet lace and button details (visible in later pics) and coat, both handed down from her cousin. Her jeans (necessary for crawling around outside) were thrifted from Salvation Army and the shoes are from Target.
The nude color blouse has tiny black polka dots and little black flower shaped buttons. The tricky thing about this blouse though is that it is totally sheer, so the sweater vest turned out to be a perfect alternative to wearing it with a tank underneath.
We gathered for an afternoon of family fun at Red Barn Farm with Lucas’ Mom, his three sisters, and their families, eighteen of us altogether. One of the sisters was house-sitting here for the weekend with her family, not a bad gig. Even on a gray and drizzly day the location was a bit magical. Surrounded by huge oak trees and rolling hills with that woodsy damp earth scent in the air...ooh, I love that smell.
My brother-in-law actually had to learn how to milk “Bella” the cow while the owners were gone.
Clover had a blast checking out the animals, Bella in particular, and playing with her cousins. Clover and Lucia were pretty cute together in their red velvet dresses.
The farm owners have three young children that they home school and they turned the inside of this old chicken coop into a darling classroom with a wood stove, vintage school desks, chalkboards, and colorful maps on the walls.
The main reason for gathering everyone together was to do family portraits with my brother-in-law’s fancy camera, an annual tradition that was started around this time last year. I haven’t seen the actual pictures yet but Lucas snapped a few while Clover and I were posing with all of the girls. I don’t know what’s going on with that face I’m making …
… ok, that’s better. The plaid blazer was another thrift find from our camping trip.
Inside the farmhouse was just as magical. It had an eclectic country bohemian style that I loved with vintage touches scattered about and children’s art on display in most every room.
With a roaring fire going in the wood stove, it was quite cozy as I ran around taking lots of pictures.
The other reason for the gathering was to celebrate two birthdays that week. My niece Fiona turned seven. I thrifted her this wonderful old fashioned frock for dress-up, along with a vintage Winnie the Pooh and Piglet coat from the Salvation Army.The other birthday was Lucas’ which actually fell on Election Day this year, so I’d say he got a pretty good gift ;) We ate yummy lemon caramel cake baked from scratch by my sister-in-law. She used the delicious Meyer lemons from the tree in our backyard.
Towards the end of the day the sun did finally peek out from behind the clouds a little and as we were leaving to head home, oak leaves rained down on us from the trees in the wind.
I feel so lucky to have in-laws who I always enjoy spending time with :) This was last year’s group photo taken at a local park. I’ll post the new one when I get it.
This was our cheesy family shot. Clover was only a couple of months old. Look at how tiny she was, and all that dark hair that has since fallen out and been replaced with blond.
She’s changed so much over the past year and is becoming such a sweet little kid. Oh, and newsflash: she’s just recently started walking!!!
I will now end the world’s longest blog post with this fitting quote that I photographed during my picture taking frenzy at Red Barn Farm :)
