My baby sister is having a baby,   4 weeks to go and we are so exited! 

 Hosted the baby shower last weekend at a local Cincinnati restaurant, Bella Luna's.  The Italian  food was delicious and taken care of by the restaurant...all we had to do was decorate, entertain, and dessert.  

 Megan picked a sailboat theme for the (still) unnamed baby boy's nursery.  It was way to easy to use that same theme for the baby shower.  We had guests leave messages for the baby, play maternity mad libs, and guess the birth date.

 We couldn't do this all on our own, Debbie made the desserts...these cookies were a huge hit.  As a bonus I had a lesson in cookie decorating, let me say it is way too much fun.

Lots of useful and practical gifts, even a few surprises.  This little patchwork doggy was made by my grandmother, who is no longer with us.  Each of my siblings and my own kids have one.  

We all had a great time, a little glad all the work is over...but spending time with family is the best.

Spring Break is almost over!!  With a full week off school and work we decided to take a few days and head out of town to the Smoky Mountains.  We avoided the touristy parts like Galtinburg and instead made our way to the western part of North Carolina for some gem mining.

There are many places that you can go that will give you a bucket of 'salted' dirt, meaning they add in gems from other parts of the world. We did a little research for places where you could sluice for native gems like sapphires, rubies and garnets.  We decided on the Cherokee Ruby Mine and the Sheffield Mine.

 We arrived early at Sheffield and got treated to an almost empty house with lots of attention from the owner and a staff member who taught us the proper process to clean our rocks and hunt for gems.

 The cleaner the rocks the easier it is to spot the glass like shine of the gems...though some are still hard to spot.  I'm sure we tossed some good stuff but we did find all of the gems we were looking for.  Maria found an 18 carat ruby, Bob found some very cool garnets growing on quartz, and I spotted a 10 carat pink sapphire.

The second day of our trip it rained all day, so rather than mine we did a little shopping and eating in Dillsboro NC.  We also made our way to Sylva...just because Bob found this really fantastic ice cream parlor on the internet.  Jack, the owner, makes you a fresh vanilla or cinnamon waffle cone when you order.  OMG the warm savory cone with the cold ice cream is to die for.   

Now we are back home, safe and sound, happy to be in our own beds.

For the love of wire

I have become a huge fan of Amy Duncan's blog, Four Corners Design.  She's had many posts that just made my jaw drop.  The first one was how to make wire baskets from hardware cloth (here).  I commented back in September how much I wanted to try this out, got around to it in January, and am now finally posting it here in March.

Back in September I was looking for vintage wire baskets to add to the doors that hide the furnace in the studio.  I couldn't find anything the right size and shape.  Following Amy's directions I made the size that that made me happy.

Then in February Amy blogged again with an idea to make a her own wire cloche (here) and as I read the post I remembered all the square scraps I had left over from the baskets.  

They make the cutest little wire cages... now what to do with them?

Still haven't figured that out, but I did make some square ones too.

Thanks Amy for the fantastic inspiration and tutes!

Generosity

Do ever find it a struggle to create in the winter months? Oh gosh I do. Made my way into the studio only a handful of times since Christmas but haven't had much passion when I'm in there.  I did do a little reorganizing but that it...nothing else...nada.

I want to share something that is filling my creative gap.  Just after the New Year I was offered a  position at The Brighton Center. It is a non-profit organization that offers a variety of services to the eight counties in Northern Kentucky.  Housed within the organization is a thrift store that provides low cost clothing and household items, as well a free clothing to those in need.  All this is done by donations, not just donated items but also of time.  My position is as a Donations Specialist, I work between both the thrift store and the lower level that processes the donations.  The system works well but with my merchandising experience the Donations Manager was thinking I could offer up suggestions and improvements to way they do things.  Everyday is a new experience, We've been able to implement a few small changes and some larger plans are in the works for the next few months.  

Everyday I'm amazed at the generosity that flows through the organization.  I wanted to give you a peek into one day this week.  In the lower level where donations are processed I've been thinking endlessly on a better way to organize hangers.  After a sale in the thrift store all hangers are tossed into large bins and sent to the lower lever, from there the mixed hangers would be sorted by volunteers into more plastic tubs to be available for hanging clothes.  Endless tubs of hangers tangled together seemed to frustrate everyone.  Desperate to find some kind of low cost (more like almost free) method/contraption to sort hangers on I had an idea of pvc pipes fed through classic wire cube organizers.  You can see it in the picture below on the right side.  The same day I brought in my contraption, a large group of ten employees from UPS came into volunteer a few hours. 

We decided with such a large group we'd make a huge dent in the pile of donations, move around some tables, and implement the new hanger sorter.  They started right in loading it up, it had definite flaws and it was obvious it wasn't large enough.  Two engineers from UPS jumped in feet first and took it upon themselves to come up with a better solution.  They asked all sorts of questions then disappeared.  I come back from lunch to see these two feverishly working out their plan for a permanent fixture to suit all our needs.  They got the wood, they had the tools, and the know-how.

All the while the remaining eight UPS employees plowed through a huge pile of donated clothing, sorting and hanging.  In the end I was almost out of tasks for them to complete...we were caught up.  Amazing!

Here is the finished product of our brilliant volunteers.  It is exactly what I would have made if I had the time, money, and talent.  I am in awe of this group, their integrity, their dedication, and their initiative.

This is one day at Brighton Center. Love, love, love it.

Days 11 & 12

Just wanted to follow up with the last two posts for the 12 Days of Christmas projects at Simply Homemade
  I think I'm in love!

11 Pipers Piping  by Lauren Zabaneh



and finally

12 Drummers Drumming by Jo Neville



These 12 how-to projects have been fantastic, really enjoyed each and everyone.  Not to mention I now have more blogs to follow.

Tomorrow, if I can find batteries for the camera I have a little stocking swap to share!
Angie

And the winners are...

Blessings from Cindy, Kim, and Sarah

Thank you ladies for playing along!!

10 Lords A-Leaping

Guest Post : Simply Homemade 

Ten Lords a-Leaping 

In Victorian times paper dolls called Jumping Jacks or French “Pantin” were a popular toy.  Children would cut out each piece of the puppet, assemble the joints then string would be tied together to make the arms and legs to dance about.

This puppet came to mind when working on a the 12 Days of Christmas Project:

A 10 Lords a-Leaping Pantin.   

Supplies:

Empty Wooden Thread Spool

6” Dowel

Acrylic Paints (red & green)

Wooden star

Double sided tape

Gold glitter

Black ink

Black fine tip marker

Tinsel string

Foam pop- dots

Espresso Alcohol ink

Small poly bag

Small number stamps

Brads

String

Small bell

Print copy of the paper doll & crown (provided) on heavy cardstock

Scissors

To make the base:

Paint green triangles around bottom of spool. Paint the rest of the spool red. When dry even out the look of the green triangles with a black marker.  Run a strip of double sided tape around top edge of spool, expose tape and glitter.  Run 2 additional bands of tape around center of spool and glitter.

Cut a 4” piece of tinsel string and place in poly bag.  Add about 6 drops of espresso alcohol ink into bag, seal bag and press ink into tinsel. Once coated take tinsel from bag and set aside to dry.

Stamp wooden star with “10”. Place a foam pop-dot on back of star and place on center of spool. Take the colored tinsel and wrap around pop dot behind the star.

Paint dowel with red paint, when dry add glue and place into spool.

To make the puppet:

For assembly of the puppet I found it easier to explain by including this excellent picture and directions from the website:

http://www.ekduncan.com/

Credit

Once assembled, embellish the puppet with glitter.  To attach the puppet to the dowel stick, use foam pop-dots on back of head and body.  Add a bell to the end of the string, and make your Lord leap and dance.

It was an honor to participate and I can't wait to see what the next 2 days projects will be!

Don't forget about the cone ornament giveaway, I will be drawing names on the 20th!