So What Have We Been Celebrating?

There have been little documented celebrations here and there the past week.  I know I jumped in with Popcorn Day last but there was a day before that that I didn't mention...

January 18 - Winnie the Pooh Day

When I ordered some stamps from Unity before the holidays, there were a bunch of promotions going on and I received this Winnie the Pooh stamp as one of them so I thought I'd give it a go.  Strange to make a Christmas card at this time of year without it being for a Jingle Belle challenge, but the more I make when I have the time saves me the headache of not having enough when I need them in December.  I used my Copic Ciao alcohol markers to color this.

January 19 - Popcorn Day

I mentioned in a previous post how we celebrated Popcorn Day so I won't repeat.

January 20 - Penguin Awareness Day

I did just recently get a penguin die that I thought I would get to use for a card but after die cutting it, I have to figure out how to get the colors in the places that I need them to be.  Sorry, no picture yet, but I'll come back to it soon.

January 21 - Squirrel Appreciation Day

This sounds counter celebratory but I just had to send a reminder of the day to our SIL in DE as he dislikes squirrels even though they've been a source of entertainment for our grandson as a toddler.  I did also just recently go through some cards in my stash and I still have this one which I may finally put to use this year.

January 22 - Chinese New Year

We got Chinese food for lunch and extra fortune cookies.  I had intended to make a card with a rabbit motif but didn't get to it.

January 23 - Handwriting Day

I know I've mentioned before that I collect words and quotations, but I don't think I've shared that I add them to a book in somewhat decorative ways.  Usually it involves using different colors and different writing styles.  It is a purposeful thing that needs concentration - a little more so on the hand movements as I've aged.  Here's a page of the current book I'm using which I committed to using even though I don't like the weight of the paper or the pre-printed design on the pages.  I don't mind the lines - they are helpful, but the paper weight and design hinders me from using certain products or embellishments.  Some people call these Smash Books or Junk Journals.  

January 24 - Peanut Butter Day

I've been trying not to focus on food related holidays but sometimes there's not a better or easier choice so yesterday I asked HWNSNBP to pick up a Reese's Peanut Butter cup on his daily trip to Quick Check.  They used to have the little PB cups you could buy singly near the register and I'm not sure that they don't still but he, being overly generous as is his tendency, came home with the King Size big cup package.  

See those little elves - we went to the Container Store last week to pick up a large storage container for all the outdoor planter holiday decorations that HWNSNBP has accumulated.  I'm glad I went with him because he was looking at a clear container but I found the same one with a red lid in the Christmas clearance aisle for 1/2 the price.  Then I noticed the end cap with some holiday things that were marked down 90% and I couldn't resist these little elf ornaments for 49 cents each.  Win Win.

Happy BIrthday Chickadee

Yes, two posts today because it is our daughter's birthday.  Our little chickadee enters a new decade and we wish her health and happiness today and forever.  This will be an eventful year for her as she will become a mother again in June and will finally get the wedding celebration in August that she and her husband did not get when they were married in 2020.  So I had to make this special card that is a diecut that you stitch on to add your color choices.  I went for a range of dark pinks with a touch of green using various thread counts of embroidery floss. The size of the holes kind of dictated the number of threads/plys to use.

I did a little thread weaving around that center motif to give it a little more dimension.  This project was easy and fun to do except for threading the needle.  I was using a beading needle with the single ply because of the size of the holes and used a needle threader but had to be very careful not to destroy the needle threader as I was pulling in through with the thread.  I did use a thicker cardstock for the die cut so it wouldn't be too delicate to work with.  I'm looking forward to trying other color combinations.

Jingle Belles - Just a Little Bell

We're on the last day of the Jingle Belle bell challenge and I did have other, slightly bigger bells to choose from but I was coloring this image and realized that the gnome riding the bear had a jingle bell on his hat.  He is carrying the pouch and delivering Christmas mail to all the other gnomes who are anxiously waiting to see all the beautiful handmade cards that they will be receiving from their friends and family, so of course he needs a bell to let them know he's coming.  

I used a combination of General's Watercolor Pencils and Inktense pencils to color this.  I must admit that I am really liking how versatile the kraft cardstock is for coloring with different media.  This is 110 lb. kraft cardstock and has some tooth to it.  The stamp I used is Katzelkrafts The Bear and The Gnome and the sentiment came from a PolkaDoodles set called Christmas Fishes (which also has gnomes that I haven't inked up yet).  Can you see his little silver bell at the end of his cap? I hope so.  It is shinier IRL.

I knew I'd be coloring during football on the weekend so I made two.  

Now I'm off to chime in with my comments on the Jingle Belle blog.  You can visit by clicking here.

The Gifts We Made

This pink dorset button sunflower became a piece of jewelry when I added some felt and a pin back to it.  I also gifted one of the yellow sunflowers I had made back in the spring after also adding a pin back to that one.

The smaller pink flower that I had experimented with was too small for the smallest pin back that I could find so I made it into an ornament.

This next group was a little last minute idea I gave to HWNSNBP.  I had seen this on one of the FB pages that I follow - Do It On A Dime.  The woman/hostess on that site was giving some easy homemade gift ideas and this charcuterie board, or "chatacoocherie" as he pronounced it, was indeed easy.  I showed him the video and asked him if he had seen the wooden disks at Home Depot and he said yes and the hunt was on.  He went alone first and had to get someone to help him get to them as they were on a shelf out of reach.  He told the woman who came to help him that she could just leave the rolling ladder with him and he would get it but she said customers weren't allowed up there.  So she climbed up and handed him one.......which, after his initial inspection, he didn't like. And he didn't like the next one, or the next one, and I don't know how many he went through but I'm pretty sure that she was regretting not letting him do it himself by the time he was done.  

We decided that he needed to make two more of them and that I should go with him to a different HD to help with the inspection process and to pick out the handles.  Luckily, at the second store the disks were easily accessible, but we did go through the entire lot of them to pick out the two best.  (Note: this doesn't mean that the others were unusable, he was looking for clean edges, no deep gouges, and no loose knots so there would be less prep work given the time frame.)  He sanded them down and then sealed with food safe mineral oil.  He also insisted that they should be put on a lazy susan apparatus, which the hostess had said was optional.  I helped him figure out how to find the center and to line up the handles and he did all the rest.  There are ways to make food safe stains for the wood but that would have taken more time than we had and he liked the look of this wood finish.  I know our SIL has used his already in his "man cave" and likes it.

This next creation was a gift from HWNSNBP to me.  He wanted to make something with swans as that is the theme of our bedroom at the condo.  We used to see a small bevy of swans on the water behind us but they've become scarce.  We're not sure why.  He found the pattern he liked and cut them out of wood with one of his saws and created this shadowbox to put them in.  The only help he had, which he got from our DIL, was choosing the colors for the water and the background. 

He used a paint pen to put their faces on and there is a personal note on the back where he signed it.

I was totally surprised with the finished product though I was aware that he was working on something that banned me from the workshop.  We'll be hanging this up when we open up the condo in the spring.

Popcorn Day

Hey, hey, it's Popcorn Day - January 19th and I thought I'd share my current favorite popcorn.  I really think you can't go wrong with the Brim's White Cheddar popcorn from $Tree.  You get a nice sized bag of popcorn that is light and puffy and there aren't a lot of hard bits included.  Trust me, I've had this a number of times and seldom come home from a trip to $Tree without a bag.

I also have a new seasonal favorite, also from $Tree.  The bag is smaller but the taste is big.

And I have a way to keep my fingers clean when eating snacks - these finger chopsticks.  They clip around your fingers and you just move your fingers in and out together to use them.

You can get a set of 4 on Amazon for about $6. They're good for snacks at home or on the go.  

I think they were made mainly for video gamers so they could snack while they were playing video games but since the pandemic they've become a way to keep dirty hands off your food.

Jingle Belles - Christmas Bells, Those Christmas Bells

As you can probably tell by the title of this Jingle Belles fortnight challenge involves BELLS.  I have to say that I got sidetracked by the familiarity of that title.  I thought it reminded me of the lyrics of a song that was popular back in the late 60's and I was right.  Raise your hand if you remember "Snoopy's Christmas" by The Royal Guardsmen.  You also might remember it was re-released in the mid 90's.  In any case I can vividly remember being in the car with my brothers and sisters and singing along to that song on the radio.  But I digress - let me get to my card.

I had this beautiful candle-filled bell die from Tutti Designs that had yet to be used.  I cut it from white cardstock and then used glimmer paint, perfect pearls, and glitter gel pens to color it.  I still have a good number of these gold metallic card blanks and used one to emboss the jewelled design on adding that to the blank card base.  I wanted the bell to be a little more prominent so rather than position it directly onto the embossed panel, I used another panel of gold glitter paper.

It's always a challenge to photograph shiny elements but trust me, it looks pretty classy.

And speaking of classy - today's "Holiday" is Classy Day, created to honor Betty White on what would have been her birthday, January 17th.  

I found a couple of other bells in my stash that look ap"peal"ing enough to me to perhaps make another before the end of the challenge.  We shall see.  But in the meantime, here is the link to check out all the other entries - I bet there are some real hum"dingers".

Window Visitor

This little bluebird (I think it's a female) has been tap, tap, tapping on the window behind where I sit when I'm eating and working on my laptop pretty much every day recently.  She did this last spring/summer also.  Saturday, HWNSNBP woke me to tell me that she found him while he was shaving which is in the bathroom upstairs on the opposite side of the house.  He heard a tapping sound and it took him a while until he saw her fluttering at the window to know it was her.  I usually wave to her, moving my fingers like they move their wings when talking to one another and she seems to be satisfied with that.  The bird feeders are full - seed, suet cake, and dried worm - and the heated bird bath is full and not frozen so I don't think she's asking for anything other than to let us know she's there.

 January 15 - Bagel Day/Hat Day

We opted not to get bagels today on Bagel Day only because we've been trying to use up the package of English muffins that we started.  I found a jar of cherry jam in the cupboard that was nearing expiration and adding that to a dollop of cream cheese on the muffins is a nice breakfast treat.  So, instead of celebrating Hat Day with a hat for my head, I stretched it a bit and recently purchased a "hat for my hand" and it was delivered today.  What is that, you say?  Well, my hand gets really cold using my wireless mouse when I'm on my laptop and I was thinking it would be a great idea to have a heated mouse which I found out actually does exist.  However, I decided to go with a mouse handwarmer pouch that hooks right up to a USB port on my laptop.  It's about 12" square and has a gray fleece top and I just stick my mouse in there (with a mouse pad) and it heats from above.  Of course, this doesn't work when typing, just when I'm scrolling with the mouse (or playing a game).  I wish I would have had this when I was still working.  I had a pair of gloves that had the fingertips free that I would put on when my hands got cold and that helped a bit.  Don't know where they disappeared to.  

Celebrating the Days - The First Two Weeks

In keeping with my desire to celebrate what we can of the so-called "wacky" holidays, I gathered the info via the website Checkiday.com that gives you a daily list of the holidays for that day and chose the one or ones that I thought I/we could relate to and added them to a printable calendar using the Google calendar template.  I have followed that website on Facebook and get daily notifications of the holidays for the next day but I wanted to have a little more advance notice so I could plan around/for them.  I hope to post a weekly synopsis of the days and how we celebrated them going forward but I'm already behind so this post will be a little lengthy.  We shall see how long this lasts (LOL).

January 1 - Apple Gifting Day  

Knowing how our GS2 loves apples, I was hoping to have his mom pick up some apples, one of his favorite snacks, and make sure that he had one on New Year's Day.  Since I was sick the whole week between Christmas and New Year's I had totally forgotten, but as luck would have it, we got a facetime call from them on the morning of January 1st wishing us a Happy New Year and he just happened to be having an apple for his snack.  The gift was finding out that he is going to be a brother in June - a secret that was very well kept by his parents up until now.

January 2 - Swiss Cheese Day

 I made my Cousin Barb's Ham and Swiss Cheese Sliders for us for dinner.

January 3 - Straw Day  

I had come across a bag of straws I had been saving in my craft room and decided to use some of them before I purged the rest.  I had a couple of projects pinned on my Pinterest page but this is what I chose to do

January 4 - Trivia Day 

My good friend J was visiting when HWNSNBP joined our conversation and asked if we knew what Pyrography was and I did - using heat or burn marks to decorate wood.  Something I have dabbled in but need to get more familiar with.  Perhaps a project is in the works.

January 5 - National Bird Day  

Just before Christmas I won a contest on Facebook sponsored by The Raptor Trust.  It was on the day of the Winter Solstice and you had to like their post, share it on your timeline, and comment what your favorite bird was.  They picked the winner later in the day and it was me.  We were supposed to pick up my prize between the holidays, but again, since I wasn't feeling well we didn't make it there until after New Year's Day.  I won this game which appears to be a lot like monopoly only it appears to be more educational.  We need to make some time to play this game soon.

January 6 - Take Down the Tree Day

We were well-intentioned to do this but it didn't actually get done for two more days.

January 7 - Old Rock Day

I planned to do something with the rocks I still have under our bed that we used to heat it 10 years ago after Superstorm Sandy left us without power, but we made a day trip to Delaware to deliver one of the gifts we had given our daughter that they couldn't fit in there car when they were here.  I really want to do one of those rock wrappings or to try to crochet something around one of them.  I will be keeping that on my "To Do" list.

January 8 - Hysterversary

I took the day for some self care honoring the 14 year anniversary of my hysterectomy.

January 9 - Word Nerd Day

Three words came up in some reading I was doing that I had to look up.

Coppice - an area of woodland where the trees or shrubs are or formerly were, periodically cut back to ground level to stimulate growth and provide firewood.

Pollard - a trunk of a tree cut back to the trunk to promote growth of a dense head of foliage.

Fyke - a bag or net for catching fish.

January 10 - Houseplant Appreciation Day

I'm at odds with this one only because it seems that the soil that HWNSNBP used to pot the amaryllis bulbs has fungus gnats in it and they're driving me crazy.  But we do have almost all of the orchids and both of the amaryllis bulbs in bloom or almost ready to bloom right now.

January 11 - Learn Your Name in Morse Code Day

.-.. --- .-. .-. .- .. -. .

January 12 - Hot Tea Day

I enjoyed a nice cup of Christmas Morning Tea that I found in one of our Christmas cards.

January 13 - Peach Melba Day and Friday the 13th

So, I had this jar of Peach Melba sauce that I was planning to use on some ice cream for dessert but I guess the bad luck of Friday the 13th struck because it was spoiled. Oh well!

January 14 - Organize Your Home Day

Does it count that we took down and boxed up the rest of the holiday decorations?  I hope so.

Last Christmas Round-Up - Hopefully

On my windowsill I have added this little Christmas tree pig that I found at the Swede Shop in Cape May on our last visit there.  (I'm saving some other pigs for show and tell in March.)

This is our "bird tree" - the pencil thin tree we got last year to hold all the bird-related ornaments.

This little tree sits on the corner of our kitchen island and is full of the felt ornaments I've collected over the years from that same Swede Shop mentioned above.  I keep a picture of the ornaments on my phone so I don't duplicate any, but that hasn't always been the case.  It's getting a little crowded.

This little tree was an addition this year and is made from $Tree supplies.  The tree itself is actually two of their trees fastened together with zip ties.  The base consists of an empty ribbon roll inside the buffalo plaid pencil holder.  I have used a set of battery operated red truck and tree lights on it.  The topper is a counted cross-stitch framed monogram originally purchased for a Halloween craft but worked out better here. 

There are truck and tree ornaments the $Tree had ready made.  The other ornaments I made from the $Tree Jenga blocks by first painting them with black acrylic paint, then stamping them with a small snowflake stamp in white acrylic paint.  On some of them I wrote a holiday word with a paint pen.  On all of them I added a buffalo plain bow and hung them with a length of jute string.  We figured it cost about $12 to make and I'm really pleased with it.  

Jingle Belles - Thank You Santa Once Again

I'm squeaking another card in for the Jingle Belles challenge this fortnight.  This one was inspired by a card I saw online on the Spellbinders web page for this cute set called Dancin' Gnomes Etched Dies.  I collected a bunch of cardstock scraps in a rainbow of colors and started cutting out the pieces.  I did remember to use my large roll of sticky tape on those cardstock scraps first so that each piece I die cut became a sticker.  That sure did make it easier than having to glue each individual piece, but I still had to use my trusty tweezers to help with that job.

This card is huge though.  After I got all those pieces die cut and laid out I couldn't bring myself to chopping off the bottoms of the gnomes and had to alter the design to fit on a 6" square.  Luckily I still have a few sheets of 11" x 14" bristol board paper that I was able to use for the card base cutting it down to be a 7" x 7" square.  Crazy, right!

I didn't want them all dressed in one color so I did a little bit of alteration of their color combos which makes for a very colorful and non-traditional Christmas card.  But I love, love, love the way it came out.  (HWNSNBP - who is colorblind - just gave it a wow too.)

The sentiments are also from Spellbinders' Mini Christmas Greetings that has 21 to choose from and also includes a die that will allow them to be perfectly framed.

I've got some extra gnomes cut out in colors that I didn't use on this card, so you will be seeing some more of them.  I seem to have embraced the gnome trend and I'm probably teetering on the precipice of being overboard as I have some other new gnome themed goodies to play with.  There are different kinds of gnomes - as HWNSNBP will tell you he's learned since I had him pick up a lighted Christmas gnome for me before the holidays.  I prefer the Scandinavian type gnomes where you don't see their eyes.  There are also forest gnomes.  And some will say that they have a specific way to dress/uniform, so my gnomes on this card above would be considered quite unorthodox.  You can find more info on gnomes here.

Okay, let me be off to post this over at the Jingle Belles before I really do miss the deadline!

Jingle Belles 2023 - What Did Santa Bring You

Our first Jingle Belle Challenge of the year - the 13th year to be exact - is to use something that you may have received for Christmas, whether it was from Santa or something you gifted yourself.  I was forced to clean up my craft table go through the container of Christmas stamps that I have on it and am embarrassed to say that there were quite a few of them that had never been used - you know those pre-Christmas and post-Christmas sales just kept showing up in my e-mails and I should know enough to just delete and move on, but e.v.e.r.y.t.h.i.n.g. was a temptation and I gave in, way too many times.

So, this might be breaking the rules a bit, but I first chose a stamp set that I actually bought for myself last Christmas but hadn't used yet.  There was a recent tutorial on Splitcoaststampers on Kraft Pencil Coloring that I wanted to try.  I perused my unused stamps and decided to use this one by Unity - Blessed Baby (which still is available, but wait and get it on sale).

I stamped it a few times and did some experimenting with my Prismacolor pencil colors and came up with a color choice that I liked.

I decided to trim down the panel and add it to a base that closely matched the baby's swaddle (it does really match IRL).  The sentiment is also from the same set and I embossed it in Gold which doesn't show up well in pictures.  That also goes for the gold gel pen I used on the stars.  

You might be able to see it better here.  

I have something else in the works and I'm going to try to post it before the cutoff tomorrow.  But I encourage you to visit our lovely Jingle Belles to see all the other new goodies that everyone got for Christmas by clicking here.  I'm going to look, but I'm going to try very hard to not be enticed to add to my bucket until I use some more of the goodies I already have.  

Sharing Their Creativity - Christmas 2022

I wanted to share the beautiful cards that I received from my cardmaking friends over the holidays.  This first one came from Sunshine in New Zealand.  I wish I could have captured the sparkle of that snow when I took the picture.  It is so dreamy.  And the snow adds so much texture.

Steph, one of our Jingle Belle hostesses sent me this lovely.  I think it was so creative how she used the tag on the front of the card.  

LeAnne of Wee Inklings created this beautiful wreath bedecked with a sparkly red bell. You can't go wrong with the red, green and white combination.  

Lauren, our other Jingle Belle hostess created this slimline vintage Santa card with her signature machine stitching.

She also included this gorgeous card with a beautiful......

handmade crocheted ornament.  I just love those vibrant colors.  I wish I could link her IG post so you could see all the combinations of colors she used in the collection of ornaments she made.  

My blogging buddy Sabrina sent this card from Ireland.  I love the little scene she created with this cutie.  Sabrina is the Queen of Techniques in my book.  Just look at that aurora borealis sky!

This original watercolor came from Nanette who lives in the Netherlands.  Such a sweet little scene and so beautifully done.

Nanette also sent me another paper garland to add to my lemon tree.  This one is made of glitter paper Christmas trees in a rainbow of colors.  

I am so lucky to have these creative friends from all over the world and here in the states.  They give me the great gift of inspiration and support in my creative endeavors.  It's so wonderful to share and learn from each other.  

Happy New Year

I haven't finished my Christmas posts yet and I owe some thank you's too but I've been a bit under the weather the last week.  Nothing serious, just prolonged.  And I promise I'll get to that before the first week of January is done.  In the meantime, let me say Happy New Year and wish everyone a healthy and prosperous 2023 full of laughter and joy.  We could all use that, couldn't we.

I finished up my Temperature Spiral to the extent of getting all the beading done.  I still will have to decide whether to leave it in the hoop, make it into a banner, or perhaps a pillow. 

Finishing this 365 day project really gave me a great sense of satisfaction.  Looking forward to another iteration in 2023.