Vacuuming in high heels & pearls

Sweet Potato Corn Chowder

2012-01-18T05:00:00.000-07:00

I made this soup last night for dinner and liked it so much that I ended up making a pot to take to a friend today. She had a baby in the week after Christmas and just last Tuesday was back in the hospital for an emergency appendectomy! Poor girl, I know the last thing on her mind right now is making dinner, so I hope she enjoys this soup as much as we did. My kids even ate it, which is significant because they're picky little stinkers! Here's the recipe as written; I'll make note of my changes at the end.

Sweet Potato Corn Chowder from Midwest Living magazine

12 ounces andouille, kielbasa or smoked pork sausage, halved lengthwise and cut into 1/2-inch slices
1 large onion, chopped (1 cup)
2 stalks celery, chopped (1 cup)
1 tablespoon minced garlic (6 cloves)
3 tablespoons all-purpose flour
1 1/2 teaspoons ground cumin
1 1/2 teaspoons chili powder
1 teaspoon Cajun or Creole seasoning
6 cups chicken broth
1 16 ounce package frozen whole kernel corn or 3 cups fresh sweet corn kernels
2 cups 1/2-inch cubes peeled sweet potato (about 2 small)
12 ounces skinless, boneless chicken breast halves, cut into 3/4-inch pieces
1 cup whipping cream
1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

Directions

1. In a 6-quart Dutch oven, brown sausage over medium heat for 5 minutes, stirring occasionally. Add onion, celery and garlic. Cook and stir for 5 minutes. Stir in flour, cumin, chili powder and Cajun seasoning. Cook and stir for 2 minutes more. Stir in chicken broth. Bring to boiling.
2. Add corn, sweet potatoes, and chicken. Return to boiling; reduce heat. Simmer, covered, about 20 minutes or until sweet potatoes are tender. Stir in whipping cream and pepper; heat through. Makes 8 to 10 main-dish servings.

**Heidi's alterations:
*Most importantly, I halved the recipe. Half was plenty for my little family of 4, with about 3 bowls left over.
*I didn't want a lot of heat so I used smoked sausage made of turkey, beef and pork. I cut the pieces into quarters rather than halves so it would be more evenly distributed throughout the soup.
*I didn't have any Cajun or Creole seasoning, so I added a bit of paprika, dried onion powder, dried garlic powder, a tiny shake of cayenne, and some black pepper.
*I used drained canned corn instead of frozen or fresh.
*I just used one chicken breast, and didn't weigh it.

When I took it to my friend today, I accompanied it with a pan of Marie Callender's cornbread, which is my favorite. Usually I use a copycat recipe for it, but last week I found bags of the dried mix at Costco for around $3.00. Each bag makes 5 batches, so that's cheaper than I can make it from scratch!

It was a good winter meal, and one I'll definitely be making again!

Tebow Treat Time: Football Oreo Truffles and Embellished Soda bottles

2012-01-17T04:52:00.000-07:00

Saturday was a big day here in Denver--the Denver Broncos played the New England Patriots that night in a big playoff football game. We've enjoyed cheering for the Broncos and especially Tim Tebow this year, so when a friend invited us over to watch the big game, I decided to make some fun treats to take along.

These are Oreo Truffles, rolled into the shape of footballs instead of regular round balls. I first saw these on Bakerella's blog WAY back before she hit the bigtime--probably around 2004-ish? It was on her old blog and there is 2008 Football truffle post on her current blog, but not the original one. When I first saw these way back then, I was blown away--I had been making Oreo Truffles on my own long before I ever saw them on her blog, but it never occurred to me that I could make them in other shapes! I've never had a good excuse for making them until now, and they were a big hit at our party.

If you've never made Oreo Truffles, you should! I like them far better than the cake balls or cake pops that Bakerella is famous for making popular. Oreo Truffles are made of two ingredients: a package of Oreo cookies (not Double-Stuf! it throws off the proportions) and a brick of cream cheese. Process the Oreos into crumbs, then add the cream cheese and process until it makes a thick paste. Roll them into balls (or footballs!), chill, then dip into chocolate. I use chocolate almond bark for dipping (not a fan of the Wilton melts in general unless I need colors) and vanilla almond bark with a teeny tiny #2 Wilton decorating tip to pipe the stripes and stitches.

Several months ago I was shopping at Marshall's and found 4-packs of this fun, bright-colored Jelly Belly soda. I bought the only two boxes of orange soda, intending to embellish them like I did in 2010

to give to Maren's teacher this past year for Halloween. However, I completely forgot about them until after Halloween! I couldn't just keep them for next year because they have an expiration date sometime this summer, but I really wanted to do something fun with them besides just, well, drinking them. When we were invited to the football party, I knew just what to use them for!

I didn't have enough of the Jelly Belly soda, so I ended up buying a few 6-packs of Orange Crush at Wal-Mart. I went very simple on these, since I knew they'd just be put in the recycling bin, and just cut strips of blue scrapbook paper and attached it to the bottles with double-sided tape.

They looked especially cute all lined up in my vintage Hires soda crate with orange lettering! Wal-Mart also carries 6-packs of Strawberry Crush, which you could similarly embellish for Valentine's Day.

In addition to the truffles and the sodas, I also took guacamole & chips (Wholly Guacamole gussied up with fresh chopped tomatoes & cilantro) and a batch of these delicious Strawberry-Rhubarb Bars. That may seem like a really out-of-season dish for January, but I have rhubarb in the freezer and strawberries were on sale this last week at Sprouts, so it wasn't strange at all! They were delicious.

Tebow and the Broncos lost spectacularly to the Patriots, an outcome which we didn't find altogether surprising. Still, it was fun to get together with friends and fun to have a chance to make cute food!

Weekend Junk finds: vintage Christmas, milk bottles and rhinestones

2012-01-12T07:05:00.000-07:00

In the week after Christmas, I got to go antique shopping with my girlfriends, something I've always wanted to do! We went to a huge antique mall across town that is in an old grocery store space, so it's ridiculously huge. By the time you get halfway through, your eyes start to glaze over a bit, but it's a great place to go if you're looking for something specific--with so many vendors, you're bound to find it.

Because it was after Christmas, most vendors had sales in their booths and I was definitely motivated to help them unload their wares. ;) I was of course on the lookout for vintage Christmas:

And found these great old boxes with the items still in them. Someday I'd love to have a great Christmas packaging display like Shara has, but I've got a long way to go! I also bought a great box of vintage ornaments for $1.50 (hooray for 75% off!) but I didn't get a photo of those before I put them away.

One thing I was looking for on that trip and successfully found were milk bottles:

Because I'm starting a dairy. ;) Okay, no, but I have something in mind for them! I'd been looking on Etsy and eBay but since they're glass and heavy, shipping was always a killer. These were all discounted and less than $8 each, which I think was a great deal. The one in the middle I actually found on a different antiquing trip later that week, and it was only $2! Couldn't leave it behind for that price.

I hit the thrifts hard the week before Christmas when they put all of the Christmas decor on sale, but I didn't come up with much. I didn't have any BIG vintage Christmas thrift scores this year like I have for the previous two, so that was a bit disappointing. On one trip, I did find this gorgeous brooch:

It wasn't on sale and the full price was definitely more than I'd like to pay, so I woke up early on Christmas Eve morning and went back to the store because everything was 50% off that day. Well, almost everything, except--you guessed it--the brooch! Phooey! But I had been thinking about it constantly for two days (and dragged myself out of bed at 7:00 on Christmas Eve morning) and so I decided to treat myself to an early Christmas gift. It's absolutely gorgeous! You can't tell from the photo, but it's easily as big across as the palm of my hand. The stones are clear and beautiful and it sparkles like crazy! It's not marked but I can tell it is a nice quality piece. I paid more for it than I have for any of my other pretties, with the exception of Viola's jewels, but I think it was worth it.

The upshot is that while I was at the store buying my brooch, I found FIVE of the "It's A Wonderful Life" village houses that Melissa mentioned just a few days prior on 320 Sycamore. I would totally have passed them by if I hadn't read that post, but thanks to Melissa I knew to scoop them up (at 50% off, no less!) and now they're tucked away until I put them on eBay next Christmas. I think when I sell those next year I'll make enough to call my pretty brooch a true gift!

And just so that you don't think all I ever drag home is silly vintage stuff:

proof in the form of three Henckels knives that cost me an average of $1 each. They probably retailed for $30-45 apiece. A quick trip through my knife sharpener, and they are as good as new! My main chef's knife is a Henckels so finding these was a true score to me.

What's on your junking wish list for 2012?

Confession time, vintage ornaments and more stripey straws

2012-01-10T11:11:00.000-07:00

Confession time: I did NOT get the tree or the last box of ornaments put away yesterday. I was too busy spending time with some girlfriends, hitting the thrift store, getting cupcakes with Maren, playing Just Dance 3 with my family and buying frames for our family portraits. Would you have wanted to give up one of those fun things to clean? I didn't either, which is why the tree is still standing in the front room! TODAY....I swear....

When I was taking off all of my beautiful vintage ornaments the other day, I couldn't resist snapping a few beauty shots:

Yum. And that's not even all of them!

Also, I forgot to show you all the cute new Christmas stocking that I ordered this year:

I ordered it from this Etsy shop: Bebe Sniklefritz. She's somewhat local so even though I ordered it late, I managed to get it in time for Santa to fill it up on Christmas morning. I've loved her stockings since last year and this year I finally gave in and ordered. The stocking is nicely sewn and I am IN LOVE with the retro print and of course the aqua and red!

I'd love to order coordinating stockings for the other three in my family but I'm not sure I can get Maren and The Mister to go for it. Rats! Porter's not old enough to have become attached to his Pooh stocking, which was a last-minute Target buy a few years ago because I needed something. Maybe I'll just order one for him now before he knows any better!

One more thing, before I go back to the ornament mines...remember the bowl of paper straw bits that I had leftover after making my Striped Straw Wreath? (which, by the way, I'm totally leaving out for Valentine's Day!)

I knew I could make something fun out of them rather than just toss them in the recycling bin. I actually tried to get Maren to do it because I knew it would be easy enough for her, but she wasn't interested so I just did it myself. I used some yarn and some red plastic faceted beads from my stash and made this cute garland!

I just strung the straws and beads on the yarn preschool-style. It took no time at all, and I had enough straw bits to make a good 10 feet of garland. I hung it above a window, but next year I'm going to use it on my Christmas tree. I love how the straws look like peppermint sticks and the facets of the beads catch the light and add just a little bit of sparkle. Not bad for 'trash'!

Christmas 2011 wrap-up

2012-01-09T10:07:00.000-07:00

I've just been easing myself into this new year this past week. Would it shock you to know that my Christmas tree is still up? Oh, all the ornaments are off and it's shoved into the corner instead of in the middle of the window, but still. I worked hard on it on Friday, making approximately 452 trips up and down the basement stairs to put things away, but it wore me out and I had to take a break for the weekend. I'm determined to get it DONE today! I'm almost there, just one more box of ornaments to put away and the tree, so I'm ready to just get it over with. I am sorry to see the tree come down--it really was beautiful. I'm not quite ready to put up my Valentine's just yet, but I might put out a few winter-themed decorations in the meantime.

I did want to make a few notes about our Christmas. Last year, I was a mess. A stressed-out, unhappy mess and Christmas was not nearly the fun time it should have been. Really, I couldn't wait for it to be over so that I could just rest. Having Maren out of school from Thanksgiving until New Year's was a large part of that, as were The Mister going out of town, being involved in a swap, and a few other things in addition to the normal Christmas activities.

This year, I knew things had to be different. I started thinking about it in October, and trying to identify ways that I could make this year better and not turn into a crazy Christmas-hating shrew. I can't say that I made any major changes this year, but I can tell you that this Christmas season was SO much better than last year!

Things that were different this year: The Mister didn't go out of town, and Maren was only out of school for the traditional 2 weeks instead of 6. I tried to get gift ideas early and order things early, though I wasn't as successful at this as I would have liked. I didn't participate in any swaps, I did New Year's treats for our neighbor gifts so those could wait until after Christmas, and I didn't stress that I didn't get our family cards done until after New Year's (heck, they're still not here yet!). I did have one moment of minor freak-out when I started to panic about getting it all done, but it was averted by a kind husband who ran to the store and bought cookies at 9 pm when the homemade ones didn't turn out. But there were no locking-myself-in-the-bathroom sobbing fits like last year (or the year before), so I'm counting it as a victory!

Christmas Day itself was so much fun! The Mister and I kept looking at each other and commenting on how GREAT the day was. Even though we had to get the kids dressed and haul everyone to church at 11:00 a.m. this year because the day fell on a Sunday, the meeting was full of beautiful music and only added to the celebration of the day. The kids loved their gifts, and the gifts we got each other were thoughtful and surprising and much appreciated.

Our dinner was simple--I procrastinated until Christmas Eve morning so I had to take what I could find at the grocery store. I ended up with a ribeye roast (on 50% clearance, woo-hoo!) and it was delicious! Because I was only cooking for the four of us, two of whom hardly eat anything, I just made the things we like best: the meat, mashed potatoes, crab legs, and sparkling cider. I bought rolls and didn't even bother with veggies or Jello or anything else, including dessert. It was absolutely delicious and it was wonderful to not be stuck in the kitchen for hours.

Truly, on Christmas Day my heart was filled with JOY. I remember standing in the shower that morning before Church and thinking how blessed and lucky I am to have so much, and a family that loves each other, and a dear husband. I felt JOY in the reason we celebrate that day, that the Savior came to earth as a sweet baby.

Christmas 2011 was so wonderful that I'm determined to make Christmas 2012 even better! I didn't get to do much crafting and I didn't get as much listed in my Etsy shop this December as I had wanted. I think the key to making those things happen this next year is to get my gift shopping done by December 1. The coming up with ideas/shopping is absolutely the most stressful part of Christmas for me.

I have never been able to be one of those people who shops all year long and then is done by Thanksgiving. I'd like to, but I have birthdays, Mother's and Father's Day spread throughout the year so I feel like those take up any gift ideas I might come across. I don't know, maybe I just have really difficult people to shop for. I try really hard to come up with thoughtful, unique gifts for the people I love--I'm sorry, but I view gift cards as a cop-out so unless the circumstance is extreme, I'm loathe to go that route. This year I did put The Mister in charge of buying gifts for his own family, and that helped a ton as far as taking the stress off of me. I'm going to really make an effort this year to hunt down ideas and get them executed early! I truly do think that will give me less to worry and more time to enjoy the season.

A Very Pinterest Christmas

2012-01-02T14:19:00.002-07:00

Hello, everyone! I hope you had a wonderful holiday--I did, more on that later!

How did I ever get along without Pinterest? I'm coming up on my year anniversary with my Beloved Pinterest, and I have it to thank for quite a few of the fun things I made this Christmas.

First was the gift we made for Maren's teacher, a Disney/Mickey Mouse nut. I first saw these cute Mickey Mouse Oreo cookies months ago and knew I wanted to do something with them for her Christmas gift.

Source: http://twopeasintheirpod.wordpress.com/

Instead of making pops, we just made cookies so that more would fit in the jar. Maren helped me pick the yellows out of 2 tubes of mini M&Ms for Mickey's buttons. We also decided to make some Minnie cookies, using Wilton pearls for the polka dots on her dress and two tiny heart sprinkles put together for her bow.

Then, Groopdealz had a deal for vinyl monograms, and the rest of the gift was taken care of! A visit to IKEA (not a quick visit--it's impossible to make a quick visit through that place) took care of the jar.

I hope she liked it. Actually--I hope she got it! I sent it to school with Maren the last day before break, and only found out later that the teacher was out that day. I hope maybe she stopped in before Christmas to pick it up.

Another gift I made was for The Mister's co-workers. Last year when the Christmas junk at Target went to 90% off, I found a big stack of Christmas cards that came in the niftiest tins with a clear plastic window in the top. They were originally $8.99. I immediately donated the cards, but kept the tins to use this year. When I Pinned this adorable Santa snack mix:

Source: http://cookiesandcups.com/santa-party-mix

I knew just what I would make to put in the tins!

The little Santa hats made from Bugles turned out so cute! I'd definitely make this again. This isn't one of the tins--I had a bit of leftover mix that we placed into cellophane bags with Santa ribbons for a few other people.

One of my church jobs is that I get to work with 8-9 year old girls. I pinned these glittery Christmas ornaments because they seemed easy enough for the girls to make successfully.

Source: http://thegreenbeanscrafterole.blogspot.com/2010/12/all-that-glittersminus-mess.html

I don't have a photo of the ornaments we made, but they turned out so great--they are so pretty and sparkly! The hardest part was finding the Pledge floor wax that you squirt inside the ornaments to get the glitter to stick. I found mine at my Commissary, but later I did see it at Wal-Mart. It costs almost $7 per bottle, but you only use a tiny bit for each ornament, so one bottle would last you a LONG time. Like, decades. Or, you can do what I did and let all of your friends pass around the bottle to make ornaments with their kids!

For breakfast a few mornings before Christmas, I made these fun, festive waffles:

Source: http://www.rutherfordfamilyhappenings.blogspot.com/2011/12/decorating-christmas-tree.html

only I have an aversion to artificially-green foods, so I left the green food coloring out of our waffles.

I didn't have blueberries or raspberries, but I did have blackberries and pomegranate arils to decorate mine, complete with a dusting of powdered sugar snow.

Earlier in December, I also made this cute banana snowman treat for the kids:

Source: http://littlestlearners.blogspot.com/2011/01/eeeeeeeeeekkkkk.html

though again, I didn't take a photo of my own version before the kids gobbled them up, but we used mini chocolate chips for the eyes and buttons.

For Maren's class party at school, we had the kids make these cute snowmen out of tongue depressors.

Source: http://adayofwonders.blogspot.com/2009/12/advent-book-activity-snowmen-at-night.html

Since it's not technically a "Christmas" party, we went with the winter theme and this craft was perfect!

For time's sake, I prepainted the sticks and we used hot glue to attach the buttons, felt scarf and the ribbon hanger.

And one last gift, this one for the ladies I visit each month. I actually didn't Pin these clever soap bottle tags until after Christmas, but we didn't visit our ladies until then so it was okay.

Source: http://darlingdoodles.blogspot.com/2011/12/12-days-of-gift-mas-gift-1.html

I love free printables! This link includes a free printable sheet with the cute tags and I used my scalloped circle punch to cut them out.

I actually still had bottles of last year's Christmas-scented soap that I bought during BB&W's big clearance in January. Soap doesn't go bad, so I didn't feel weird giving it this year. If I'd had more time to prepare, I would have included a cute festive hand towel to make it a more substantial gift. Next year!

Whew! Seriously, what would I have done without Pinterest?

A Major Award

2011-12-19T10:07:00.003-07:00

Mr. Parker: It's a Major Award!
Swede : Shucks, I wouldn't know that. It looks like a lamp.
Mr. Parker : What is a lamp, you nincompoop? It's a Major Award. I won it!
Swede : Damn, hell, you say won it?
Mr. Parker : Yeah, mind power, Swede; mind power.

On Saturday night we went to a friend's Second Annual Ugly Sweater party. Last year, I helped her host and these were our awesome entries:

This year, a different friend helped host the party and they chose the holiday classic movie "A Christmas Story" as the theme. Watching that movie on Christmas Eve & Christmas Day is one of my favorite Christmas traditions, and I couldn't help think of these funny costumes I ran across at Halloween:

I decided that if I could find a yellow dress or skirt at the thrift store, I'd go as the leg lamp instead of wearing an ugly sweater, as much as I love me a heinous sweater. I got lucky and on one of my regular vintage-Christmas-seeking thrift runs, I found a large mustardy-gold knit skirt. Two coat hangers, two yards of black fringe and a hot glue gun later, and I had this:

I wore black fishnet stockings and black patent pumps, of course! It wasn't an exact match to the other costume, but you definitely got the effect and everyone at the party knew exactly what I was supposed to be! If I'd had more time last week, I would have thrifted a cardigan so that The Mister could have dressed as Ralphie's Old Man and he could have legitimately rubbed his hands up and down my leg all night. :D

I even won a Major Award for Most Creative costume. And in a funny fluke, Quin won a random drawing for the big door prize: an Official Red Ryder Carbine-Action Two-Hundred-Shot Range Model Air Rifle and a box of BBs!

It was such a fun party--we had an "Oh, Fuuuuuddddggge" fudge-making contest (my entry was fudge with bacon on top), darts in the basement (the "you'll shoot your eye out" activity) and a game called "I triple-dog dare you" involving sticking your tongue to pieces of frozen metal tubing. I love a theme party, and this one was no exception. I hope I can talk them into hosting it next year too! I think I'll hang onto my lamp costume, just in case. ;)

Tutorial: Christmas Reverse Applique shirt

2011-12-15T05:09:00.027-07:00

One of the great classes that I got to take at SPARK 3 was learning how to make reverse applique shirts from Amy Tangerine. The technique was so fun and so easy that I knew I wanted to use it to make a Christmas shirt for Maren. I purchased a red shirt from Target, and the fabric is scraps leftover from a vintage tablecloth that I cut apart a few years ago for another project.

For the shape, I knew that I wanted to trace a Christmas tree-shaped cookie cutter that we have. For reverse applique, basic bold shapes are easiest to work with. I also used a disappearing ink pen and some matching green embroidery floss.

The first step is to find the center of your shirt and mark it with a few straight pins. I actually ruined my first shirt when I 1) tried to just eyeball the center and 2) used a ballpoint pen instead of a disappearing ink pen. Let's just say that I'll be making for Maren a reverse applique Valentine's Day shirt with a BIG pink heart shape in the middle! So trust me, take the one minute needed and mark the center--you don't even need to use a ruler, simply fold the shirt in half, armpit to armpit.

Next, you'll trace your shape. In Amy Tangerine's class we used ballpoint pens, which will generally wash out if you spray them with a bit of hairspray or rubbing alcohol. I don't know what happened with the pen I used on that first red shirt, but it would NOT come out even though I treated it multiple times with hairspray, alcohol, stain pre-treater and even Carbona wipes. Head to JoAnn's with your 40% off coupon and buy a disappearing ink pen made for sewing.

Next, you'll need to flip your shirt inside out. You want your fabric scrap to be larger than your design, because it's hard to get it pinned precisely into place if it's too small. Secure the fabric scrap to the shirt using straight pins, taking care to only pin it to one layer.

Now you'll turn the shirt back right side out and begin to sew. In Amy's class we used embroidery floss (all 6 strands), but for her shirts that she sells, she actually uses pearl cotton. I have lots of colors of floss so it's easier for me to just use that. Thread your needle with no more than a yard of thread and tie a knot in the end. Start coming up from the bottom so that your knot will be hidden on the back. Here is the CRITICAL part: you are NOT sewing on the lines you drew. Let me repeat that--you are NOT sewing on the lines you drew! You are actually making your stitches about 1/4" OUTSIDE of your pen line. Your pen line will later become your cut line. Continue sewing around the entire design. How long your stitches and how far apart they are is up to you. Once you come back to the starting place, make another knot and cut your thread.

Turn the shirt inside out again. Now you're going to trim your fabric about 1/2" outside your stitches.

Turn the shirt right side out again. You'll be able to see your stitches and your drawn shape. Now is the fun part--you're going to reveal the fabric!

Very carefully pinch ONLY the top layer of t-shirt fabric and snip it with your scissors, then follow your drawn line and cut all the way around. Sometimes, my stitches weren't exactly 1/4" inch from my drawn line, so I just take care to make my cuts evenly spaced from the stitches. Remember, any ink lines that show will disappear when you wash the shirt.

And...ta-da! Admire your cute reverse applique shirt! Maren wore this yesterday to her class Christmas party and program. When I dug through my cookie cutters to find the tree, I found a few others that would make really cute reverse applique designs:

I definitely think Maren will be sporting a bunny shirt for Easter, and Porter needs a shirt with that cool airplane shape! The best part about this craft is that you only need a tiny bit of fabric, so you can be creative. You don't even have to do a shirt--you can do a bag, apron, hat, or anything made out of fabric. This is definitely a craft I'll be doing again and again!

Weekend Junk Finds: Vintage Christmas

2011-12-12T05:30:00.001-07:00

Now, to be honest--I didn't find this stuff this past weekend. Another weekend, yes, but this weekend I was too busy for junking! Saturday night I had some friends come over to craft and enjoy brownie & peppermint ice cream sundaes, which meant that I spent the entire day finally getting the tree and the rest of the house decorated. It took literally hours and started to feel like work rather than pleasure at about Hour 4, but the upside is that my house looks beautiful and at least I got it all done in one day! Usually, I have the mess and Christmas boxes strewn about for half a week while I decide, a little at a time, where everything will go. This year I had a deadline, so it forced me to make quicker decisions and just get it done!

I do love opening up my boxes and reacquainting myself with all of my pretties, and adding each year's thrifted finds to the mix. I've been hitting the thrifts regularly, searching for treasures! Here are a few things I've found this year:

Lots of pretty, bright ornaments in primary colors.

Lovely pale pinks and aquas too, as well as a vintage green swirly plate.

A bagful of random Christmas stuff that turned out to be much better than it looked on first glance! There's a plastic Shiny Brite nativity, a handful of sugared bells, a few spun heads, a tiny Christmas stocking, a hard plastic angel, and a few yards of really neat colored aluminum garland, which is now residing on my Christmas tree!

Handmade jeweled ornaments, the second such set that I've found. The base is satin ball ornaments, and then somebody used straight pins to affix ribbon, sequins, and pieces of broken costume jewelry to the balls. I found a set like this last year as well, so it must have been a common craft. I'm generally in the "more is better" camp when it comes to vintage Christmas, but even these are over the line for me. So thirty minutes later I had this:

A nice little pile of vintage sequins, pearls and jewels to repurpose in my crafting. It did give me pause to wonder what crafts I've made that will show up in a thrift store in 30 years, that someone might buy and take apart to use for scraps!

Did you do anything fun and festive this weekend?

PS--I'm linking up with Thrift Share Monday over at Apron Thrift Girl!

Red and white striped straw wreath

2011-12-09T12:07:00.001-07:00

When I flew to Arizona last month for The Mister's Ironman race, the woman sitting behind me on the airplane was looking at the December Women's Day magazine with this cover, which caught my eye:

And then what I realized that the darling wreath was made of red and white striped straws, I practically snatched it out of her hands to get a closer look! Then I spent the rest of our vacation searching for a copy of the magazine of my own, but didn't find one until we were at the airport for our return flight to Colorado!

On Wednesday, even though the decorations weren't out, I still have loads of gifts to buy and the tree is laying in pieces in the front room, I decided I was making that darn wreath! I already had the straws, purchased by the gross from Orson Gygi this summer. I bought them in-store, but they are definitely the most economical source from whom to buy the straws that I've seen yet. They also carry blue and gray striped straws.

If you don't have the December Women's Day magazine, you can find the instructions for this wreath and 5 other cute wreaths here. I was able to find the 6" flat floral and craft ring at Michael's in the aisle with the other wreath forms and floral wires. I simply used a piece of white computer paper glued it onto the form with a glue stick. From there, I proceeded following the instructions as written.

When I got to the final ring, I very carefully applied just a small amount of glue to each straw before sticking it down. I wanted to make sure that no excess hot glue would squeeze out and show since it was the top layer, but for the previous two rings, I just put the glue down and then placed the straw on top of it.

It really was easy, and I love how cheery it turned out! It took me almost two hours to mark and cut all the straws, then glue them one at a time, but the time went quickly since I was catching up on the final two installments of "Downton Abbey."

And now I have a bowl of leftover straw bits to repurpose--you had better believe I'm not just throwing those away! I have some red beads and white yarn and I think I'll have Maren make a garland with those and the straw pieces.

This was such a fun project! I know those striped paper straws come in all sorts of colors, and you could make a wreath out of any of them--black and orange and gray for Halloween would be neat, pink for a baby or bridal shower, or rainbow colors would be really fun as well! And if you can't find the striped straws, check out this clever paper 'pixie stick' sunburst wreath at Sassy Style Redesign.

Vintage Christmas books by Susan Waggoner

2011-12-08T05:00:00.000-07:00

There's the $1 store, and then there's the $100 store. You may know it by another name: Costco. I'll tell you, I cannot seem to get out of that store without dropping one hundred bones on something or other, and it's usually not anything very interesting: diapers, wipes, TP, OJ, string cheese, butter. Knowing how easy it is to part with Benjamins, I usually steer clear of the books and movies section of the store to keep temptation at bay. This last trip, I was not so successful and it took me about 5 seconds to put these three books in my cart.

Each one was $11.99, which is a bit lower than the Amazon price. All three books are by the same author, Susan Waggoner, who has written several books with cute vintage illustrations on the cover. Waggoner has four vintage Christmas books:

Christmas Memories: Gifts, Activities, Fads and Fancies 1920s-1960s

It's a Wonderful Christmas: The Best of the Holidays 1940-1965

Have Yourself a Very Vintage Christmas: Crafts, Decorating Tips and Recipes, 1920s-1960s

Under the Tree: The Toys and Treats That Made Christmas Special, 1930-1970

Costco only had the first three on the list, but I've seen the last one in the stores. I've made it through It's a Wonderful Christmas, and am reading about the 1930s in Christmas Memories. So far there is a little bit of overlap of information between the two books, but not so much that I wish I'd only bought one or the other--I'll update when I finish Christmas Memories. The Have Yourself a Very Vintage Christmas book is new for this year, and it contains craft instructions in addition to the historical information. I haven't read that one yet either, so I'll come back and add a review when I finish.

In all, they're cute books; easy to read and they have good information about the history of some Christmas traditions we enjoy today (such as decorated store windows, sending Christmas cards, etc.) I'd definitely recommend them if you are a fan of vintage Christmas style!

Nutter Butter Christmas treats

2011-12-07T05:00:00.000-07:00

Three cute, easy Christmas treats you can make using Nutter Butter cookies and dipping chocolate:

Chocolate-dipped reindeer with pretzel antlers! From laceyreimann.com, but I can't seem to find the original source post on that website.


http://myprettypurse.blogspot.com/2009/01/snowman-cookies.html

Snowmen sporting M&M buttons and TicTac noses. From My Pretty Purse.

Santas with white chocolate beards and red sugar hats. Love the white chocolate chip used as a pom-pom! From Penguin Stamper, via Brown Paper Packages.

I do believe I'll be putting Nutter Butters on the ol' grocery list this week!

Yardstick Christmas tree

2011-12-04T06:00:00.000-07:00

Still no Christmas tree up around here--in fact, the Thanksgiving junk is STILL up! Ack. I brought the bin up from the basement and I started taking things down, but just haven't managed to devote the measly hour it will take to get it all done. The high temperature for today is forecast to be a lovely 10 degrees above zero, so I think it will be an ideal day for staying inside and getting rid of the turkeys and pilgrims once and for all! It's time to get Shiny & Brite all up in here!

In the meantime, I do have one small tree displayed:

I bought this darling yardstick tree at a craft fair from the girls who run this Etsy shop. The truth is, I have enough vintage yardsticks saved up in my garage that I could make a forest of my own trees, but the instant gratification of this one won out over my DIY sensibilities.

The star on the top is made from yardsticks broken in half down the width. I think it would also be cute to make a star out of folding ruler pieces. I have a couple that my kids have broken that would be perfect, in fact.

I love projects made from yardsticks! I bought a cute frame in Arizona made from a blue yardstick that I can't wait to put up in Porter's bedroom, and I bought an awesome $3 table at the thrift store this summer that's just begging for a yardstick makeover (which will have to wait until it's more than 10 degrees out). I even have a whole Pinterest board devoted to things made from yardsticks and rulers.

What's the coolest repurposing craft that you've seen using old rulers and yardsticks?

Ironman Arizona & Meeting a blog buddy!

2011-12-02T06:34:00.001-07:00

Today it's snowy and cold and icy here in Denver, but just two weeks ago we were looking at palm trees in Arizona when when we traveled for The Mister's Ironman race!

If you're unacquainted with the insanity that is an Ironman Triathlon, let me break it down for you:

2.4-mile swim
112-mile bike ride
26.2-mile run

For a total of 140.6 miles

So you get to run a marathon, but before that, you get to swim and bike for a million hours. And THEN you get the pleasure of running a marathon. Crazy, no? Athletes start at 7:00 am and have to be finished by midnight, and in both the swim and bike stages there are time cut-offs as well. I think I'm putting it mildly that it's not for the faint of heart.

The Mister had done a half-Ironman triathlon (70.3 miles) last summer and decided he wanted to try for the Big Daddy Ironman this year. He has been training literally all year long, putting in hundreds of hours at the gym, in the pool, on his bike, working with a trainer, a nutritionist, and a coach. He is a good example to me of goal-setting and working hard!

The race was scheduled for November 20 in Tempe, Arizona, so we decided to take the whole family down south to cheer him on. We stayed at a Courtyard Marriott just 10 minutes' walk from the race site, which was extremely convenient. However, as a tradeoff--we were all squished into one small room, and we had the pleasure of hearing the freight train across the street roll by, horns BLARING, at ALL hours of the day and night. Porter has a hard time going to sleep when he's not in his own bed, and since it was imperative that The Mister get some sleep before his race--I got to drive Porter around on his own personal tour of Tempe & Phoenix each night to get him to fall asleep, then had to haul his sleeping body inside and up to the third floor and pray he'd stay asleep the whole time. Oh, and due to our schedule, 3 of the 5 nights I started this little routine at later than 10:30 pm.

The race with the swim started at 7:00 am and I didn't get to see that part--just couldn't handle dragging two kids up and getting them fed, dressed, and down to the race site that early in the morning, especially since I'd been up all darn night long listening to that stupid train! We did get to go and see The Mister when he came back to start his second bike loop.

We also got to see him when he finished his bike ride and started his run.

He looks pretty good for having been going for 9 hours already, right? After that, we didn't get to see him again until he came to the finish line at 10:21 pm. At that point Maren was freezing cold and whiny and exhausted, so much that she fell asleep in Porter's stroller. Porter was beyond wired and insisted upon being held (since sister was in his spot), and I pretty much felt like I had run a marathon of my own in trying to keep track of everybody, keep the kids patient and fed and dry-diapered, and stress over my phone's battery dying and being terrified of missing The Mister at the finish line.

But he did it, and I couldn't be prouder of him! It's an incredible accomplishment that few people are able to claim. He says he wants to do another one in a few years. It may be that long before I'm rested enough to consider it. Ha!

On Monday morning after the race, The Mister's agenda consisted mostly of laying on the hotel room bed, so I stole away for a few hours.

I got to meet the lovely Linda from Reminisce..and this and that! I've 'known' Linda through blogging since at least 2007. She is just as warm and sweet and friendly in person as you would imagine if you've ever read her blog! And let me tell you that her kitchen is even cuter in person than in the photos you see on her blog!

We had lunch and then Linda took me shopping to a few of her favorite thrifty haunts in her neighborhood. We visited SAS fabrics by the pound (amazing place..wish we had one in Denver!) and a couple of thrift stores. At the last store, we both found treasures! Linda found the darling glass cake plate shown here and a few other great things (including vintage Pyrex) and I found these:

which had to be hand-carried home on the airplane, but happily, made it all intact!

It was a busy and exhausting but fun weekend for us all. It was exciting to cheer for The Mister and see the results of all of his hard work, and an absolute pleasure to finally make a blog friend into a 'real life' friend!

And this is why I can never get anything done around here...

2011-12-01T13:00:00.001-07:00

Alternate post title: Why has nobody invented boarding schools for 2-year-olds?

This is what happened in my bathroom this morning, in the time it took me to scrub half the baseboards in the stairs and run to the basement to switch the laundry.

He works fast, I'll give him that.

I read other blogs and always wonder how the authors manage to get so many projects done and cute crafts made.

They must not have two-year-olds in their houses.

Or maybe they have one of those mythical creatures of whom I've only heard about and dreamed of: a non-destructive, well-behaved toddler.

We don't have one of those in our house. He starts first grade when?

Pinned it and Made it: Thanksgiving edition

2011-11-30T06:00:00.000-07:00

Welcome to the Thanksgiving edition of Pinned it and Made it! Last week I was able to make two more of the many things I've Pinned.

The first thing was this cute Thanksgiving Snack Mix. I've actually made something similar before, but I liked this one because it included a free printable tag to tie onto bags of the mix.

I didn't end up using the tag after all, because I made large bags instead of the individual-sized bags in the pin. I also wanted this to be a craft Maren and I could do together, using a set of cute little Thanksgiving stamps I got in my goodie bag at Spark No. 2 last year. I stamped the cute little pilgrims and Maren colored them in. I printed the meaning behind all of the snacks on the back of some kraft cardstock, and we mounted the pilgrim cards to the front side and tied the whole thing with brown felt ribbon from Stampin' Up! I made these to give to the other families we shared Thanksgiving dinner with.

The next pin was one I've had my eye on for a while. I originally bookmarked these cute acorn treats long ago, way before Pinterest. Then I saw these acorn treats on Pinterest, made using mini Nutter Butter cookies and a Hershey's Kiss, and fell in love with the way the pattern on the cookies resembles a real acorn cap! I wanted to make these to take to Thanksgiving dinner, but I had forgotten to buy a bag of Hershey's Kisses and I just couldn't bring myself to go to the store on the holiday.

So I saved them for the next day, which just happened to be a friend's birthday. For my girlfriends' birthdays this year, I've been making them cake stands out of vintage dishes and glass candlesticks. I needed a treat to fit on this stand, and the acorns were perfect, especially because of the leaf border on the plate!

To make it a little more fun (and to make sure that the recipient could tell that the treats were supposed to be acorns!), I cut out oak leaves from pretty colored cardstock and placed them around the plate. I also cut out a pair of leaves to act as gift tags, and tied them with pretty ribbon to the base of the plate. They turned out pretty cute and more importantly, they were YUMMY little treats to pop into your mouth!

You can see the rest of my Pinned it and Made it posts here. You can find the rest of my iins & boards here, or you can click on the red Pinterest link over to the left to follow me!

Weekend Junk Finds: vintage hankies, Christmas ornaments, and buttons

2011-11-29T06:00:00.000-07:00

Hello, friends! I hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving holiday. We shared Thanksgiving dinner with some friends, which was wonderful--good food and great company! Then on Sunday, I cooked a turkey and all of the fixins' because to me, part of the fun of Thanksgiving is having yummy leftovers! I'm still washing dishes (love my vintage Pyrex, hate not being able to put it in the dishwasher) so I didn't get a post up for yesterday, but I wanted to share my latest junky finds.

A few weeks ago there was a rare estate sale not far from my home. I live way out on the south east side of town, and it seems like most estate sales are held in the opposite parts of the metro area--the older, more established areas, which makes sense. It's bad enough that I have to usually drag a kid or two with me, and driving 45 minutes to get there in the first place just makes it worse! So when there's a sale on this side of town, I'm there! This one was in an older home and although it was run by a professional estate sale company, the prices were really, really low! I found some fun things to buy and I know if I hadn't been trying to keep a certain 2-year-old from trying to break the antique toy trains, I could have bought more. Here's what I managed to stash in my bag before The Toddler Tornado went on his rampage:

This cool old astronaut pillow is perfect for Porter's vintage space and robot-themed bedroom! I believe it was $2. I also found two unused boxes of skinny red-bordered Dennison labels, a roll of old tickets in the perfect shade of pale aqua blue, and a pint blue glass canning jar, which is destined to become one of these just as soon as I find another zinc lid for it!

I cannot get enough of old felt and sequin Christmas decorations! This is a really fabulous example. What you can't tell from the photo is that it's about 3 feet tall! Rudolph is missing a red gem for his nose, but I can fix that up right quick.

More vintage Christmas: aqua blue Shiny Brites, and a pile of perfectly aged feather tree ornaments. I also found a pile of old velvet ribbons. Vintage velvet ribbons are so much nicer than their new counterparts!

There were quite a few cute vintage hankies at this sale, marked $1 each. I wish now that I had picked up more, but I had limited cash on me and a few items were unpriced so I wasn't sure how much I had to spend, and I played it safe.

Several of them were souvenir hankies. I chose this one because of our recent trip to Washington D.C. I love the bright apple green color!

Isn't this one charming? I love the airplane and the ship! It goes perfectly with my recent nautical obsession.

I've also found a couple of big bags of vintage buttons recently. For me, part of what I'm buying when I purchase the buttons is the total enjoyment of the time I get to spend sorting out the buttons.

After sorting these two bags, I was left with a good pile of mother of pearl and shell buttons, the charming baby card above, and lots of other fun little treasures.

What about you--did you have the chance to get out and find any junk this weekend in between cooking turkey and scouring the Black Friday ads?

Happy Thanksgiving!

2011-11-24T07:27:00.001-07:00

George Washington's original "official proclamation," made at the request of Congress, establishing a day of Thanksgiving in the newly formed country:

Ghost of Blog Posts Past: Posh Squash

2011-11-22T06:47:00.000-07:00

We're on our way home to Colorado today, so I have one last repost for you featuring a project I still LOVE!

This was originally posted in 2009:

Oh, how I love my Posh Squash!
Last November on our girls' weekend trip to Phoenix, I purchased the wee pink squash on the left. It's teeny and made of the most beautiful rose-colored velvet. I loved it so much that even though it's a pumpkin it has stayed on my desk for the past year, where I could admire it's soft pink sweetness. When I found out that Kim from Olive Juice & Company was selling kits on her blog for her "Posh Squash" you better believe that I hopped over there in a hurry and ordered! I received the kit back before Halloween but just haven't had the time to get them made until now.

The pattern and construction itself is ridiculously simple--in fact, you can probably find instructions for free on the internet by Googling. What makes these so beautiful is the scrumptious velvet in the loveliest fall colors that Kim hand-dyed and included in the kit. I did use a thrifted skirt to make the brown pumpkin, an idea I got from Amy. I'm afraid the kits are all sold out for this year but bookmark Olive Juice & Co, because hopefully Kim will do them again next fall.

In other news, we had an unexpected guest the past few days:

Awwwwww! Isn't that a sweet little furry face? We played foster parents to a little ferret for the past few days. On Tuesday afternoon we discovered him hiding beneath the steps in our garage. We put food & water out but he disappeared that night, only to reappear in our neighbor's arms the next morning--seems he bunked with them on Tuesday night. He was out wandering again yesterday around noon so we let him back in the garage, where he stayed until about 30 minutes ago.

Maren was obsessed with him, as you might imagine. He's really friendly and ferrets don't exactly roam wild around our subdivision, so we knew he was somebody's lost pet. I was all set to make "FOUND" posters this afternoon but the neighbors spotted a "LOST" sign one street over, so they called the ferret's owner and made a joyful reunion. Turns out they are our back-fence neighbors, so little Westley (his mate is Buttercup! CUTE.) probably did a prison break out the dog door and hopped the back fence into our yard. It was a fun little diversion and I have to say that he's pretty darn cute for a weasel!

Weekend Junk Finds

2011-11-21T05:00:00.000-07:00

Today I'm still in Phoenix, but I have some new junk goodies to share!

One trip to Goodwill to look for vintage Christmas goodies netted this cool vintage hard plastic lighted Santa.

He's on a Styrofoam base covered with some really pitiful-looking fake greenery and apples. At first I thought I'd just rip him off the base, but now I believe he needs some Shiny Brite and sugar bell magic, don't you think? With my trusty glue gun, I'll have him spruced up in no time!

A great old souvenir plate from the Harold Warp Pioneer Village in Minden, Nebraska (which is apparently still there), and a Lu-Ray butter dish missing its lid. It must have jettisoned by a dealer, because it still had the remnants of an antique store price label. Even lidless, I'm happy to find any Lu-Ray I can get my hands on!

Vintage ornaments in all sizes and shapes, with a mini glass tree topper to round out the collection.

This cute little oak chair was $6.99. Ever since the Great Desk Chair Debacle this summer, I've been on the hunt for a new chair. This one was cheap and in great shape so I grabbed it. I had originally wanted a chair to paint a glossy red, but I think I'm going to leave the oak finish rather than chance messing it up with paint. Again. I do need to recover the seat cushion but that's a 30-minute fix. The hardest part will be deciding which fabric to use!

This find had the ladies at the cash register oohing and aahing! It just so happens to be a close relative of the pink Therm-a-Jug I picked up at the Horseshoe Market earlier this summer.

The lids and spouts are different, but they're both darling! The white one is in very good shape--often I find vintage jugs like these with huge dents in the metal sides. With the addition of this new jug to the pink one and the red plaid one I thrifted a few years back,

it looks like I have a new (unwieldy and space-hogging) collection on my hands!

Did you find any good junk this weekend?

Ghost of Blog Posts Pasts: Thanksgiving Bits and Pieces collage

2011-11-18T06:42:00.000-07:00

Originally posted in 2009:

I'm getting all the Thanksgiving decor ready to put away so the Christmas decorating tornado can commence, but wanted to show you this before it disappears into a box for another year. I initially started this collage to put in my etsy shop, but 1) I took too long to make it so couldn't get it listed in time and 2) I fear I might like it too much to let it go!

I've said it before, but these bits & pieces collages are SO much fun to make. I love having a way to use up all the precious little treasures I've collected, and a 3"x3" square is a whole lot less intimidating to fill, even if there are a dozen of them to do. I think this is my 5th bits & pieces collage, and it certainly won't be my last.

Hope you're all enjoying the weekend. I'm going to try to get the house cleaned up today so I can start bringing up the Christmas boxes. I can't wait to get a look at all of my vintage Christmas pretties again!c

Ghost of Blog Posts Past: Autumn Yarn Wreath with Felt roses

2011-11-17T06:35:00.001-07:00

Today we are heading south to the Phoenix area, where The Mister will be competing on Sunday in the big Ironman Arizona! While I'm gone, I have a couple of oldies but goodies posts to share with you, in case you missed them the first time around.

This was originally posted in 2010:
2010 seems to be the Year of the Wreath for me. Even though I'll be pulling out the Christmas tree on Friday, I was determined to get this autumn wreath finished so that I could display it for a few days at least.

I first saw this lovely wreath on the blog take heart back before Halloween. I've seen yarn wreaths all over blogland and I was struck by the gold, deep red and ivory color combination of Danielle's wreath. Yellow is not a color I'm normally drawn to but I just loved the warmth of the gold and the contrast with the beautiful russet color, so I decided to throw originality out the window and just copy Danielle completely! I purchased all of the supplies at JoAnn's while I was buying last-minute Halloween costume stuff, but there was one problem: when I got home, the golden yarn I had chosen looked too bright and along with the red, all I could think of was ketchup and mustard!

I meant to exchange the yarn, but my preparations and subsequent trip to London got in the way. I thought maybe I'd just give up and use the wreath form for another project, but last week on a trip to the thrift to check out the Christmas offerings, I found the perfect color of yarn so I decided to go ahead with the project anyway!

I've made a lot of wreaths so far this year, but this one was definitely the quickest and easiest. I followed Danielle's excellent tutorial so I won't retype it here. If I did this project again, I'm not sure I'd use a straw wreath form. I left the plastic wrapper on but it the wreath form itself was so lumpy! In some places the lumps were so bad I had to slit the plastic and remove the piece of straw underneath to get rid of the bumps. I've been using those extruded foam wreath forms all year and they're nice and smooth, so I would have preferred that look but I just wanted to get this one done so I used the straw.

I made my felt roses just like Danielle's and they were also really quick and easy to make. If you're curious about sizing, I used a circle almost the size of a whole sheet of felt to make the largest flowers. I had some green felt in my stash so I added a few leaves as well. I wrapped a piece of crocheted lace around the top to make a hanger and simply slipped the holes in the flowers over my hook to hang it!

This pattern would lend itself to a really beautiful Christmas wreath! What colors would you use?

Pinned it and Made it: Caramel, Pretzel and Chocolate Chip cookies

2011-11-16T06:00:00.000-07:00

I woke up this morning dreaming of Pinterest. Do you think that means I spend too much time there? Nah!

This week's Pin is a recipe that originally comes from the blog Your Homebased Mom for Caramel, Pretzel and Chocolate Chip cookies. I found this recipe at the perfect time, because I had just finished packing Maren's school snack of pretzel sticks and noticed that although it was time to buy a new bag, there were still lots of broken bits at the bottom. This recipe was the perfect use for all of those little broken pieces!

I followed Leigh Anne's recipe and used a bag of these handy little Caramel bits.

I had originally purchased them with this cookie recipe in mind, but then I ended up using half the bag in these Mars Bars Rice Krispie treats. They melted a bit, but mostly added a nice chewy component to the finished cookies.

You might notice if you click over to the original recipe source that my cookies spread a bit more than Leigh Anne's did. That's a problem I've been battling in my chocolate chip cookies lately, and I can't figure out the cause! I always use all butter in my cookies, and I'm careful to make sure it's not too soft when I cream it with the sugar. Any ideas what might be causing my cookie spread? I prefer them to be a little thicker.

In all, these cookies were good and I liked the combination of the salty, crunchy pretzels, the chewy caramel, and the sweet milk chocolate chips. The next time you get to the bottom of a bag of pretzels, hang onto them and whip up a batch of these cookies!

To see more Pinned it and Made it posts, click here!

Vintage Christmas wrapping paper Scrap Packs

2011-11-15T06:00:00.000-07:00

I've been collecting vintage Christmas wrapping paper for a few years now, and this year I finally did something with all of it!

I've put together several Scrap Packs that I think would be great for vintage-style Christmas crafting, whether it's card-making or scrapbooking or simply making your own cute gift tags.

There are all kinds of patterns and prints. Jolly Santas, festive bells,

dancing couples, snowy villages, glowing candles,

beautiful embossed foils, and more. Most of them are in traditional reds, greens, golds and silvers,

but there is one bundle with pinks and aquas

And one with greens and blues. Each Scrap Pack has 20 pieces of paper, ranging in size from 4" x 6" to 20" x 30" depending on the bundle. Some of the pieces are big enough to wrap a small gift, and some are best suited for cutting up and crafting.

In addition to the Scrap Packs, I have some full-size sheets of paper for sale as well. This grouping has really non-traditional colors of black, gold, orange and red.

This one is gold, green, aqua and purple.

I think this one might be my favorite, though--one sheet decorated with a snowy village, and one sheet decorated with darling little leaping deer!

These and more are all available right now in my Etsy shop!

SPARK Giveaway winner and Weekend Junk Finds

2011-11-14T06:00:00.000-07:00

First, I forgot to choose the winner for the SPARK 3 Giveaway last week.

True Random Number Generator Min: Max: Result: 3

Which means the winner is LYNN! Lynn, please email me with your address (you can use the link over on the left) so I can send you some goodies!

After a long thrifting drought, things finally seem to be picking up around here! The thrift stores have followed the retail stores in putting out their Christmas wares in the days after Halloween, so I've ratcheted up my thrift store visiting hoping to score some of my favorite vintage Christmas goodies! I've already had some small success, which will hopefully set the tone for Christmas goods to come. :)

This doesn't look like much in the photo, but in real life it's a perfectly aged, worn antique ironstone plate. It's small, but it's pretty! This one will be headed to my Etsy shop.

This find was one of those examples of the need to see past the present and find the potential at the thrift store. This old Ball jar has been fitted with a socket kit to turn it into a lamp. When I found it, it was filled with dried beans and topped with an ugly late 80s-era blue lamp shade. I re-donated the lamp shade literally as soon as the cashier rang it into the register--popped that sucker off and walked it right over to the big donation bin, and then dumped out the petrified beans once I got home and was left with this! Just think of all of the fun things I could put into the jar--mother of pearl buttons would be beautiful, and there's always Shara's fabulous lamp filled with vintage Christmas ornaments. What would you put in the lamp?

Vintage Shiny Brites never fail to make me happy! This batch had some pink, some of the pretty ombre variety, and even a pink indent and a green one with stenciled stars. More, please!

And the last find, which was plucked off a to-be-shelved cart. I'm absolutely crazy for the cheery decals on both sides, the red painted rim, and the perfectly crazed glaze. It looks the right size and shape for a flowerpot, but the stamp on the bottom states that it's "Oven-proof Bak-Serv". I can't imagine what you'd bake in such a tiny pot. I certainly won't be using it for cooking!

Did you find anything good this weekend? Have your thrift stores started putting out the Christmas goodies?