Decorating The Tree....

Decorating the tree is much easier for a bird....he can just flutter up to the top of the tree to string the lights and ornaments up high.  The little red bird is practicing being the tree topper while he hangs the lights. The blue bird is thinking more about how he can eat the candy cane instead of putting it on the tree.  Merry Christmas!

It's Christmas Eve...I Hear Chirping On The Roof

Up on the housetop...reindeer paws....okay...so they're not reindeer paws...they're birdie claws. Santa has a new set of critters pulling his sleigh on Christmas Eve. They're new at this, but once they get it together...they can be Santa's "B" team when the reindeer need a break.   From the "Christmas Is For The Birds" paper piecing class at CraftFancy.

Up On The Housetop......

 It's Christmas Eve and Santa Birdie is ready to deliver his big bag of gifts....but he's not too excited about sliding down the sooty chimney. He seems to be saying..."You want me to go in THERE?"  One of the "Christmas Is For The Birds" cards done in the Paper Piecing Class at CraftFancy this month.

Bringing Home The Tree.....

Part of the "Holidays Are For The Birds" classes at CraftFancy...this card is one of a set of four Christmas 2012 paper pieced cards.  The little birdie is coming home from the tree lot with his Christmas tree tied up in the car. He's excited and a little reckless...he's got no hands on the wheel.

Another Christmas Inchies Card

  One more Inchies card.....a neighborhood of houses...all dressed up for Christmas. Except for the red house...Scrooge lives there.

Christmas Inchies Birdhouse

 Sample number three from my Christmas Inchies class at CraftFancy...the birdhouse.  A little bird is checking out the snowflakes while sitting on his birdhouse perch.  The holly vine is a Memory Box die.

Second Sample From The Christmas Inchies Class...

  Sample Two from the CraftFancy Christmas Inchies Class....a Santa  ornament hanging from a branch.

Christmas Inchies.....

   One of the samples for my Christmas Inchies Class at CraftFancy this month...was this fireplace...complete with stockings hung and waiting for Santa to fill them. Let's hope that Santa doesn't get scorched coming down the chimney into that fire. :)

On Sunday, I went to my granddaughter Morgan's cheerleading competition.  Morgan cheers for  Lake Zurich High School...the Bears. The competition was fun...loud...but fun....and I loved watching all the teams perform their routines..but some of the best people watching took place right in the bleachers :).  

 Lake Zurich's cheerleaders came in first both in the Freshman team and the Senior Varsity.... here's a photo of the teams (Senior Team on the left and Freshman Team on the right) and their trophy. Morgan is right behind the trophy.

Angels Are Everywhere....

 

 

  At Christmastime....angels are everywhere including my CraftFancy Stitch Sampler Class. Last week's class was a Mini Sampler...the center mat was only 6x6. It made the actual work a little more difficult because the pieces were so small....but I think it was worth it. You'll have to ask the ladies in the class if they think so.  I heard a few rumblings of mutiny while they were piecing together the tiny angels. :):):)
   The top photo is the whole sampler; and the two bottom photos are close ups.

Oh Christmas Tree....

      It's the holiday season, and beautifully decorated Christmas trees are everywhere. One of my   favorite things to do at Christmas time is to turn on the Christmas music, curl up on the couch and watch the lights on the tree twinkling....until I fall asleep.

An Angel Ornament

   This card  features an angel ornament hanging from a small tree branch....the angel's body is made with the Spellbinder's 2012 Ornament Die Set. The evergreen is from the Spellbinder's Foliage Die Set.

Another Sample Card....

  Another sample from CraftFancy's event.....using Doodlebug Paper and one of the beautiful window dies from Memory Box.

TheChristmas Rush Is On.......

 The Christmas rush has started....shopping, decorating, Christmas carols playing, lights blinking...and there are a few gentle snowflakes falling. Welcome to the Christmas season.

My card is one of the samples I made for the event a couple of weeks ago at CraftFancy....using the Christmas Doodlebug paper. The toy soldier is a new Christmas Sizzix die by Tim Holtz...and the "Merry" is an alphabet die by Memory Box...Typewriter Lower Case.

Happy Thanksgiving

    Happy Thanksgiving.  I hope your holiday is happy, healthy and celebrated with everyone you love.

WOYWW...#181...but #2 For Me

      This week...my craft counter is a mix of what I'm working on. If you'd like to see more interesting and creative craft and clutter (Forgive me ladies) click here to see "What's On Your Workdesk Wednesday".  As for my very own crafty clutter...I've got thank you cards that have glue drying, another card that is in it's very early stages (That means I don't have a clue what to do with it). I'm packing up an order for my Etsy shop...Walnut Turkeys, Turkey Tags and Christmas Tags.
Right in the middle of it all is my lucky Rose Quartz that fell out of my pocket.  Beyond the countertop is my kitchen table (You can't see it in the photo; but take my word for it, it's there.) It looks a lot like my countertop...only worse. It has pieces and parts of  the cuttings for my next "Inchies" class.  Which means that I have lots and lots of little one inch squares in Christmas colors everywhere. 
      I need to clear everything away...Thanksgiving is almost here and I've got goodies to bake.  (My bird isn't in this picture...it's late...he's sleeping!)

On My Deck.....

     For a long time, each year after Halloween was over, I'd leave our pumpkins sitting on the deck, hoping that one critter or another would eat them.  For 20 years...absolutely nothing happened...except me finally cleaning up the rotting pumpkins to throw them away each year. This year was different, the squirrels decided that my deck was featured on Diners, Drive Ins and Dives....the pumpkin version.
     Jennifer and the girls brought me three pumpkins from the pumpkin farm...I loved them....and so do the squirrels. So much that they're getting fat...look at the size of the squirrel sitting on the pumpkin. I threatened to cook him for Thanksgiving.

 

This is how they eat out of the pumpkins....head deep inside......backside and tail waving in the wind.

Stitch Sampler November 2012

The theme of this month's Stitch Sampler Class at CraftFancy is "Winter".  It's lacy and pretty with lots of dots and checks....and I used the sightly different color combination of pale yellow and dark blue. I love the mix of colors...but after putting the sample together and cutting for the class (With major cutting and punching help from Marnie and Alice...Thank you!) all I kept thinking was the phrase "Don't eat yellow snow!"  I hope that no one else thinks of that. :)

Next month's Stitch Sampler will be a  Mini Sampler (Closer to 6x6 instead of the normal 12x12)......and the theme will be "Angels".

WOYWW.....First One!

    
                   My first "What's On Your Workdesk Wednesday" photo of my workdesk...well, my work counter. It's much easier to work at the kitchen counter when cutting pieces for a class. (You can see the cards I was working on if you turn sideways and squint a little.)  Another added benefit of working in the kitchen instead of my scraproom....I get an assistant.... Cory, my resident Lovebird. He thinks that anything within reach is his for the taking; so I have to watch carefully so that nothing I'm working on disappears or gets nibbled on. He's no crafter.

Thanksgiving Cards

   Thanksgiving is coming....it may be a little early to set the table...but this card gives you the illusion, at least, of a headstart for the holiday.

One More Thanksgiving Birdie Card....

The fourth card from my "Holidays Are For The Birds" Thanksgiving paper piecing class at CraftFancy. This little birdie found the Sweet Potato Casserole before anyone else...and he jumped right in....marshmallows and all.

Halloween Is Over...On To The Next Holiday!

  All the trick & treating is done....now we're on to the next holiday...Thanksgiving. A grateful and tasty holiday.   These cards are the samples for the next paper piecing class at CraftFancy...part of my "Holidays Are For The Birds".

Two More Paper Quilting Cards...

The last two cards from September's Japanese Paper Quilting Card Class at CraftFancy. The first of these is a typical laundry day in a witch's house...washing the clothes well and hanging everything out to dry...everything.
The second card is a skeleton...he may not be able to talk...but he gets his Halloween message across with his beautiful eyes.

Class Samples...

 Some of my classes had to be cancelled recently....so some of the samples didn't really get to be shown.  These are two of the cards from the Japanese Paper Quilting Class at CraftFancy. The first card shows a baby owl meeting a bat for the first time....he's not too sure what to make of it. The second card is a white Jack 'O Lantern with a couple of bat friends.

James William McInrue 11/10/48 - 9/29/12

 
When someone that you love dies...sometimes it's hard to put your feelings into words...this poem by W.H.Auden says it all.

Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone,
Prevent the dog from barking with a juicy bone,
Silence the pianos and with muffled drum
Bring out the coffin, let the mourners come.

Let aeroplanes circle moaning overhead
Scribbling on the sky the message He Is Dead,
Put crepe bows round the white necks of the public doves,
Let the traffic policemen wear black cotton gloves.

He was my North, my South, my East and West,
My working week and my Sunday rest,
My noon, my midnight, my talk, my song;
I thought that love would last fore ever: I was wrong.

The stars are not wanted now; put out every one:
Pack up the moon and dismantle the sun;
Pour away the ocean and sweep upt the woods:
For nothing now can ever come to any good.

 

Halloween Birds....

The rest of the Halloween Birds from the CraftFancy Paper Piecing Class....a witch admiring her new dress in the mirror...and a wild Halloween party that's "For the Birds".

Halloween Paper Piecing...Birds!

 I did a card class this summer with Fourth of July Birds for the theme.  It was so much fun to do them that I kept thinking that it would be a great idea for a Paper Piecing Class series titled "Holidays Are For The Birds!"  So here are two of the cards from the Halloween Paper Piecing Class at CraftFancy....the Trick or Treating Bird and Dracubirdie. Tomorrow, I'll show you the other two cards from the class.

The Halloween Stitch Sampler at CraftFancy....

 The Halloween Stitch Sampler from my class at CraftFancy last week.  It's wonderful to walk around and see close to a dozen of these samplers being created at one time during the class...it's like magic!

From The Wedding.....!

My son Matt married a beautiful young woman named Hayley this past weekend. I haven't gotten the pictures yet....but here is the card that I made for them. Pearled and embossed papers added a soft glimmer and a lot of texture to the all white/ivory card. To personalize it...I added Hayley and Matt's  initials on the front.

The Craftfancy Stitch Sampler Class Photo!

     Finally, I remembered to bring my camera to one of the classes at Craftfancy. For a long time,  I've wanted to take a picture of some of the wonderful people that help make the classes fun.  These creative women put up with my foolishness and they put up with the big numbers of tiny pieces that go into each class project...like this one...the August Stitch Sampler Class.

August's Stitch Sampler-Theme:Quilting

The theme of this month's Stitch Sampler from Craftfancy is "Quilting". Embellished by tiny scissors, a threaded needle and a spool of thread...the sampler also has five little quilt blocks...all made of paper and stitched with embroidery thread. The class is offered every month...and each month's theme is different. Next month's theme is "Halloween".

July Stitch Sampler

Since CraftFancy was celebrating Christmas in July last month...my Stitch Sampler for the month carried on the theme. I think that it turned out perfectly...lots of detail and just enough stitching to accent the sampler well .

The Scent of Vanilla....

The scent of vanilla is all over my hands.  I haven't been baking...but last year I found instructions on Pinterest for making vanilla. It was too late to make it as gifts for Christmas, but I promised myself that I would try it this year. Now...all I want to do is make vanilla. I certainly hope that it turns out to be really good...because I have a feeling that I'm going to have a lot of it around my kitchen. This photo shows what it looked like the day I started making it. One jar has Madagascar Vanilla Beans in it and the other has Mexican Vanilla Beans...I think that I prefer the Mexican Beans. They have a softer, sweeter scent than the other. I have about four jars of "Vanilla In Progress"....I'll let you know how it turns out. (In a few months).

More Holiday Paper Quilting...

  These cards are the remaining two from the Christmas In July Paper Quilting Class at CraftFancy.

Christmas In July...Paper Quilting

Just a couple of weeks ago, CraftFancy celebrated Christmas In July. Most of our classes were Christmas themed...so that we canhelp everyone get a jump on all the holiday projects. These were two of the cards made in my paper quilting class. I love the very fine gold  ribbonlike bows on each of the cards....they're Memory Box.

Farming...On The Deck!

It's the middle of August...it's been horrible weather for growing almost anything...super hot temperatures, huge storms with wild winds...not the best for growing plants in pots on my deck.  My basil commited suicide about two weeks ago after about a week of  90 to 100 degree weather...it just gave up.   Most of the geraniums  sort of melted away. The tomato plant ,however, after starting as a tiny little sprout, (Half dead from the heat) was tucked into one of the pots along with the remaining geraniums. I figured it needed company in it's distress.  Evidentally, the geraniums took good care of it....look at it now. It's standing guard right by the kitchen sliding door...I swear it knocks every now and then to come in.

An Elf Or Two More...

 Two more elves....you can never have too many!

I See Elves....

These little elves were part of the Elfin (Elfen...I don't know any more) Class at CraftFancy. Cute...and they can be gift tags, put on a card,used to decorate your tree or just play paper dolls with them.