Welcome Christmas!

I trust that everyone is in the full swing of Christmas by now. Shopping, baking & decorating. My shows are over with for the year. I have an order to do and now comes the baking. The family cookie bake is this Saturday at my sister's house. Everyone brings their receipes , contents & their tins. It is a lot of fun. I think I will make Gingerbread cookies.

We got a Nintendo Wii this past weekend. We already have put it to use. I am finding some muscles that have not been used in a while. It is a good family game. We have had a lot of fun with it already and I know that we will continue to.

I thought I would show you a few of my decorations. Favorite things that I have collected over the years. A lot of things I have made, just as most families do, so come on in my backdoor.......

Snowman in the kitchen window from a recent swap.

One of my handpainted Santa's and the reindeer my dad made me years ago.

An old child's spoon with Rudolph at the top...

These are a couple more of my handpainted Santa's in the kitchen.....

Star garland that is around my kitchen windows.

A few of my collectibles from flea markets

These little angels hang from my garland in the living room stairway...

My angel tree topper collected from flea markets years ago...

The ornaments on our tree were collected over many years. You may recognize some of them from your childhood. Shiny Brites are on there among others. Old mercury glass ornaments. I took some upclose pictures to show you some of my favorite ones. They are like dear old friends that you see once a year.

When I had a gift shop, a friend made many styles of this rabbit. They became local collectibles to my customers. They were known as Bekka Bunnies. This is a little ice skater with a tree.

This is one of my favorite Christmas movies. Got to hear Bing sing "White Christmas ".

This is our tree. It is a live one. I think it is the most beautiful one we have ever had. It is so pretty, even before the bulbs went on it.

Happy Thanksgiving

Today & tomorrow will be spent in the kitchen. All preparations done a day or 2 early so that I can spend time with the family. Our plans are to eat and then go see "A Christmas Carol" in the afternoon. Just my son & daughter-in-law. Wishing my daughter and son-in-law a Happy Thanksgiving in Canada. (Thanksgiving was already celebrated there in October).

I am seeing blogging friends decorating for Christmas already. We buy a live tree, so my decor will be done in Dec. I have one more show the first week of December. It is with antiques and collectibles. I am looking forward to this one. After that the decorations and the family cookie baking comes.

Hope that everyone has a "Joyous Happy Thanksgiving!"

Little Bit of This & That

Have been still catching up with everything around the house between shows. My next show is in 2 weeks. I cleaned my email yesterday, which was about 400 in the inbox. You have to understand this about me. I try to stay on top of things around our house best as possible. I would check a few everyday. They got the best of me.
Yesterday was a day of taking care of that.Wanted to show a few things I had made. Below is my snowman /star tree. You can barely see the little snowman on the tree. I made everything on the tree & the box also.
This is a picture of my little snowmen.

Here is a picture of some of my Santa pockets. Stuffed with a little reindeer , candy cane, & some greenery. They can hang on a tree or on a peg.

Was going through basement boxes again today. Found this dish. I may use it somehow this Christmas season. It is antique spongeware.

I also was remembering that I had another set of dishes in the basement in a trunk. I am in dire need of some everyday dishes. I found these Currier & Ives set of 7. Cleaned them up & we are eating off of them tonight. I have never used them. Bought them years ago at a flea market, so it will be a nice surprise at the table tonight.

I also was looking for something to put my some magazines in and found this tool box. The little old truck too. I think it will find a place in the office to put some things in it's back, like cards & such.

Also found this brown pitcher in a box to put on top of my cabinets with the rest of my crockery.

A gentlemen who works with my husband was kind enough to send me 2 of these striped gourds. I love them &I hope that they dry out for me. Does anyone else keep dried gourds besides me???? I use them for the next year & have painted on them in the past.

Mr. & Mrs. Pilgrim , were something that I sold at my fall shows. These 2 greet everyone in my living room. It is truly a time to be thankful. I am very greatful for the love of my family ,our health, our home, food at our table everyday, vehicles to drive, clothes on our back. If you will permit to say the BLOOD of my savior JESUS CHRIST, means more to me than you know. I am truly rich.

In the Workshop

It has been a while since I have posted. I have been doing several local craft shows and it has kept me very busy. My house was running away from me with all the dust;that I had to make time to get it cleaned. Emails: I am so far behind with. I am usually a very organized person, but the shows have kept me from doing my usual things. This past Sat. was my second show . I thought I was going to take pictures & post them on the blog. When I went to get my camera, the battery was dead. So sorry, there were so many really cool primitive things there. Thought I would show you a few of my prims that I sell. I have another show this Saturday at the local college. A few more in Dec. Doors have opened up to me for other projects by doing the shows. I have met so many nice people.Below is one of my Santa's that I do.

Santa Tutorial

I have been busy getting ready for another Christmas Craft show. I thought I would show you one of the crafts I have been working on. It comes from the book, "Old Christmas" by Folk & Whimsy. If you desire to make these which are really simple & if I have not been clear on instructions, write me & I will clarify as best as I can. You will need; Sculpey Clay
Batting or Felt Square
Chenille Stems: Black & White
Wool Roving for beard
Sprigs of Greenery
Glue , String to hang

You are also going to use this pattern as a template for the hood. The size of the hood really depends on the shape & size of the face. I found I had to adjust the hood according to my face size. Below is a basic pattern, on had to cut to fit around the face.

Taking a pinch of clay, shape into an egg shape oval. Mentally divide the egg into thirds. With the sides of your thumbs lightly press into the top third for the eye sockets. Leave a space between your thumbs & you will have a ridge for the nose. Push up from the chin to form the cheeks. Try to keep it like a flat button instead of a ball.

Then you will need to bake your clay according to instructions on the package. When they come out of oven & are cool, paint face with as much detail as you can in such a small space.

While they are baking; fold a 12"chenille in half with a 1/2" loop at the top. Twist 6"stem around neck for the arms.

Wrap 4 1/2" x 4" piece of felt or batting around his body (4 1/2" lengthwise) just under the arm pits. Lap right over left front edge, glue. Glue white chenille down the front of coat and around the hem. Because of the glue I used, I used clothespins as my clamps. Depends on glue that you use.

For the sleeves, make a 1"slit in the center of 5 X 1 1/2 " piece of felt or batting running lengthwise. Pull this over his head through slit.Glue felt or batting to front and back of his coat and around black arm stems. Glue white chenille stems for cuffs. Glue face to loop. I then put the beard on & added some wool for the eye brows also.

Next is the hood. Remember I told you that this really has a lot to do with the size & shape of his face, but the general pattern is a 3" x 4" size of felt or batting.Lap one side of hood over the other enclosing. Glue in place. Glue white chenille over curved front edge of hood. Fit this around his face. You may need to manipulate this a bit to fit right. Glue in place. Bend up the black chenille for the feet and mittens. Glue on a sprig of greenery. Your done!

FREE GIFT WITH EVERY ORDER

Brr! It's cold here in southern Ohio! It says rain today in the forecast, but it looks like winter skies.

This past Saturday I did my first of 2 craft shows. It was outside . I stood out there shivering & shaking, but did pretty good. I wish I would have taken pictures for you, but did not think with everything else going on. I also had 2 shop owners approach me to come to their shop. I am thinking about that. I have another show in 3 weeks and am starting some new things . I put some new items on my selling blog. I am giving a FREE GIFT WITH EVERY ORDER. The little antique dress below I recently stitched up. Because it is an antique dress, there is only one with this stitching on it. This is a closeup of my first Thanksgiving towel.

This is one of our scented candle scoops. If you are interested you can go to the right side by the seraphim & click on it to see what else I have. Thanks.

Back.... & Running

I am back.... & running. I have a Fall craft show this Saturday and in 3 weeks a Christmas show. For those of you who have done shows, you know I am in the countdown week.

Had a wonderful time at our church "Harvestfest".The LORD showed up in a wonderful way. HE is restoring. I saw knees and backs healed, flatfeet healed, ringing in the ears, and a lot of other things , emotionally & physically. There were over a 1000 people there from different nations & 600 more people (than the 1000) showed up then expected. We were outside in a tent praying for people , but then the rain came. There were many vendors outside in tents also, but unfortunately , I did not have my camera with me to show you all the beautiful artwork & jewelry that I saw. Thought I would show you some pics from our church. Below is just some of the people that were there.
A balcony view of the cafe.

One of the nights of worship; love the words on the screen.

Worshipping one night at floor level. There were so many people there you could barely move.

My friend Linda's painting during worship, "The Lion of Judah."

On stage that night singing, was Ramey & Brian Whelan, along with Leonard Jones. Ricky Scaggs kids are also a part of our worship team. He came one night to do worship.

The people lined up around the balconies, worshipping. All 4 floors were completely filled.

This was one of the best "surprises" that the LORD gave us that weekend. Our daughter & son-in-law; whom we had not seen in a year, surprised us. They overcame a lot of circumstances to get there. They live in Ontario. Our son-in-law was a school of ministry student there, which is how they met.