Friday, June 28, 2019

Thursday, June 27, 2019

Stone Exterior Dollhouse - "My Grandparents Were Artists"


Two years ago I began to think about our upcoming 40th wedding anniversary. I wanted to create something that would celebrate forty years of loving and living with my one and only fab husband. I gave a great deal of thought about making a scrapbook and I even began to collect items to create one. But the scrap book did not fulfill my artistic and creative drive to "make stuff".  I scrapped the scrap book  and began to think about building a house filled with mementos from our lives together, historical events, art work, and photographs. Assemblage has always been a strong drive in my work so I thought why not a dollhouse built by an artist about 2 artists. In the next few posts I will be sharing my journey in creating a house and hopefully someone else can learn from my mistakes.



Tuesday, January 12, 2016

Hip Square Sweaters & Wools

Hip Square Sweaters & Wools
Sometimes I just need to break out and do something different and Hip Square Sweaters & Wools is just the ticket. When I'm out and about at garage sales I often find pre-owned or vintage sweaters that still have years of wear left in them. A good quality sweater should last longer then one season. Wool or wool blend sweaters seem to hold their colors and stitches better then most and now that most modern washing machines have a "hand wash" cycle it makes owning wool sweaters much easier. Aside from that you cannot beat the warmth. Where I work it tends to be on the cold side and I have learned that wool sweaters are definitely warmer then any other. This is how I came to start a new shop on Etsy, called Hip Square Sweaters & Wools.

What is a "Hip Square"?

A hip square is someone who doesn't want to be defined by current "popular" trends in fashion. They want more then what the stores are pushing at the mall. Hip squares prefer not to be defined at all. They want choices and that's exactly why they prefer vintage attire. Hip squares want fun clothing for work and play that last a long, long time.

Monday, December 28, 2015

Christmas Tree Napkin Fold


I’m in love with this technique already, will you give this a try when you set your table for Christmas?
Posted by LittleThings.com on Monday, December 21, 2015

Monday, September 14, 2015

The Kingdom of the Story Garden Fairy Haven

The Saga of the Kingdom of the Story Garden began 27 years ago when my oldest son was having a bit of trouble with sibling rivalry with his one year old brother. We made up a story with characters and adventures that included 2 young princes, a kingdom, a wise old sage, a butter-fairy,and a miniature dragon. Oh and I can't forget the ogre and his dark knight. There's always a villain. As the years went by the story grew and his brother also took part in it. I began to sculpt the characters out of clay and we built a garden at the base of an old tree. They could play and have their adventures outside in the back yard. We have moved a couple times since that first garden but the Kingdom of the Story Garden will always remain a part of my garden. The current garden is comprised of careful stacking and layering of houseplants. When fall comes the plants return to their spots inside the house.



Sunday, September 13, 2015

Apples Abound

We have 3 large apple trees and with all of the rain this year our trees have produced wheel barrels full of apples. I love to cook but I'm not the canning queen. So everyone is getting apples from us!! And of course there has been hours spent in the kitchen baking pies and cakes. Our home smells wonderful!!




Building a Fire Pit With Tough Love and a Little Muscle.

Once again I've neglected this blog but as you can see I've been pretty busy this summer building a fire pit.We moved to a new home last year. The house is in relatively good condition but the yard had been neglected. Once again we found ourselves a little tight on cash to do all the things we wanted but as we looked around we discovered we had most of what we needed to build a comfortable fire pit right here on the property. The main item we needed was a fire ring the rest was muscle and lots of tough love for our new home. There were several overgrown garden areas that we disassembled and used then re-purposed the materials for our fire pit. It also helped that the former owner had acquired a rather large rock pile in the dog kennel. I used a two wheel dolly to move the rocks and pavers. I began thinking I could do all this myself but about half way through I called in my husband who helped finish adding the pavers and the back wall. Amen for the help.







Bring on those cool fall nights!!!