a closer look

Last friday I gave you a sneak peek of Abby's Birthday Gift. This Friday, not only do you get to see the whole thing, but I also have Miah's Christmas gift finished too!  I am so pleased at the way they turned out. Sometimes the idea in my head does not translate to the paper the way I envisioned it. but this time it did!

I am a big fan of Susan Branch- (her stickers are my favorites, & I just snagged some of her fabric) her blog is so much fun and her newsletter "Willard" always makes my day. So between Susan and the Treble Clef that I showed you here  I was inspired to make this-   

 and


















I did make the sun's rays a bit darker so they show up better




















Have you read the book Oceans Apart by Karen Kingsbury? It is one of my all time favorites. In the book there is a little boy and his mom is a stewardess. Since she often has to leave him overnight, she sings a song that she made up just for him. Well, that song inspired me to have a special song for each of my kidlets that would remind them that their Aunt Bobbie loves them no matter what.  That is what I used for each of these pictures/sketches whatever they are. Lijey and Ace will also be getting their songs for Christmas. Lijey and Ace's will be a little more difficult in the drawing aspect because Ladybugs and Suns are easier to draw than Dinosaurs and Kangaroos.  You could use any song that is special and anyones name. The only difficult part was getting the song to fit right on the name- good thing Miah has two songs- even then I had to add a lengthy "from" message. Elijah has two songs as well, but they are both rather wordy and his name is short so I had his mama find out which one he liked best.
           Last Friday I was unable to finish Abby's because I didn't have a pink colored pencil. So on Saturday, I "kidletnapped" Miah and we Had to go to Hobby Lobby! We wandered the aisles for 3 hours! When Lou texted to see if we were on our way home, Miah said "yeah right- its just the two of us at Hobby Lobby and she thinks we are on our way home?!"  We had a ball and got some good sales on Valentine's Day and believe it or not -Christmas stuff!  

wordless Tea Cup Thursday

Others Who Are Participating in Teacup Thursday! * Miss Spenser's*

The Hope Chest * Rose Chintz Cottage
Antiques and Teacups *The Rosemary House

Lady Estelle's Tea Corner * Denise's Delights

Faith Hope & Cherrytea * Beautiful Clutter
Martha's Favorites * Breath of Fresh Air 

Lady Linda Teacup * Gracious Hospitality

Atteatude and Chocolate *Teacups In the Garden
Letters from the Northwest *A Delightsome Life
Poetry in a Pot of Tea *Lady B's Time for Tea
Romance of Roses *From This to That *Fabby's Living 

Miss Kathy at The Writer's Reverie *Art Books Tea
Tea, Friendship and the Fine Art of Card Making
The Nest at Finch Rest 

while I was at work...

From this.....

I work at the local grocery store- and one of my duties is to face the shelves. I like to work on the candy shelves on Saturdays because they are closest to my register. This past Saturday, I was not very busy and was facing the gum shelf. There were only two packs of Orbit gum left in the box so I took them out of the box and proceeded to break the box down to throw it away. Orbit gum has really cool packaging lately and the box that they come in is cool as well. I saw a garland made out of up-cycled boxes here and uh- oh the wheels started turning. I started looking at the other gum boxes and noticed all the colors were very springy. Hmm, what can I use these for?  

So I found a circle  (my coffee cup) and started tracing circles. Some of the boxes had very short sides so I had to search for more circles to trace.

My co- worker saw me searching and said

 "there she goes again, what are you making now?" I really didn't know at this point. I was just cutting out circles. and fingers... I didn't have my wonderful cutter-bee scissors with me so I was using full size paper scissors and well, my finger got in the way. 

(I can now say I have suffered for my art. It really hurt- especially after I forgot and put Hand Sanitizer on my hands... YEE-OUch! ) I just kept cutting circles until I ran out of boxes. I took the gum packages out of all the boxes I could. There were a few I really wanted to use but they weren't close to being empty, so I refrained. They will be emptied soon enough. :) In between customers, I played around with the circles and decided to make an wreath out of them.

I had a glue stick in my purse and we had a three pack of foam double stick tape on the shelf. So I bought some tape and found a piece of brown paper (my co- workers save it off the top of the newspapers for me, its like a thin brown paper bag)  I cut out a wreath shape. Decided it was too big and reshaped it.  I laid the circles out in a pleasing manner, glued the larger background circles on with the glue stick and used the foam tape for others. I double stacked the tape on the smaller circles to give a bit of depth.

 For the bow and the boingy things,  I used the plastic straps that tie the newspapers together- I had to staple those to the paper.  I hot- glued the whole thing to a piece of cardboard to give it some stability.

Voila! a bubble gum wreath!





...to that!

This would be alot easier with circle punches and really fun with some glitter and fancy scissors but you haveta use what you have on hand! :)

My project from friday is still under construction

...maybe this friday I will unveil it!

PS. they are having a giveaway over at My Brown Bag Studio! She's giving away a Fat Eighth bundle of yumminess!

Sneak peek

From this....... http://pinterest.com/pin/5066618300703119/ nifty Treble clef    I started playing around with the letter A for Abigail.


Her birthday is coming up and I was thinking about maybe doing her name and birthday and stats or something and as I was doodling......

I came up with a better idea........

that I am so excited about....

but don't have time to do the whole post today.

So I will give you just a taste

Special Edition Teacup Thursday- on Friday

I have been impatiently waiting to post this teapot! It is one of my absolute favorites! My sweet Mommie presented it to me for Christmas a few years ago and I enjoy using it for Valentine's Decorations. 

I had a little bit of fun playing with the pictures in Picnik.
They are closing and until they close,
 all of the premium features are free to all!
Way too much fun!

Valentine's Day is one of my Favorite Holidays- What a nice reminder in the middle of winter that Someone loves us. If you don't have a Valentine, find one- I don't mean rush out and pick a boyfriend off the street, but find someone who needs a little TLC- be a friend to someone who is down,  - visit the residents at the nursing home, take cookies to the staff. Hand the Mc Donald's or Walmart cashier a flower or a silly Valentine, you can get the kind that the kids give out or make some. Just Smile at someone. You'll be amazed at the reactions!

Have a Happy Valentine's Day!

An Unexpected Tea House

I was at the Dollar store shopping for prizes to "sell" at the King's Kids Store last night. I came across a Dollhouse kit and thought- "the girls will love this." So I grabbed one, and then I noticed that there was more than one version - so I grabbed another- it happened to be a castle. I, of course, had to get another for a certain niece. Underneath the castle was another house so I got one of each for the store. As I was setting up the store I noticed the sign on one of the houses

  

That is when I got really excited! I just had to open the package. I quickly decided that this was one dollhouse that was not going to be added to store inventory! I am claiming this one for me! Look at all the cuteness just oozing out of every corner!








when put together, it is a 3story house



it comes with stickers for decoration
two dolls and a cat and a dog




the kitchen, full of tea time treats is the first floor



the second floor is the tea room
with Teddy and Dolly ready for fun









The 3 floor has trunks of scarves and other dress up delights











Teacup Thursday Sorta...

 I was going to do a special Tea cup post for Valentine's Day... but I have discovered a very important thing about my camera. If you plan on taking many pictures, it is a good idea to charge the battery occasionally. And if you do not misplace the charger, it is easier to charge the battery . I have been looking for the charger all week, when I found it accidentally this morning I realized why I couldn't find it- I was looking for something MUCH bigger- this charger is tiny! I guess I had my AA charger in mind while I was searching and just passed this miniature version by! I will be purchasing a backup battery to have charged ahead so that I do not have this issue again. This battery is not one you can just run in and grab at the Disneyland, Sea World and Seaport Village gift shops - and if you could, it probably cost you your first born. I bought boring AA batteries at all those gift shops and They. Were. Not. Cheap!!  Anyhoo, the battery is charging as I type this and by this afternoon I will have a Tea Shop post and if you check back tomorrow, I will hopefully have a special Valentine's edition of Teacup Thursday- on Friday.

Other's Who Are Participating in Teacup Thursday!

The Hope Chest * Rose Chintz Cottage
Antiques and Teacups *The Rosemary House

Lady Estelle's Tea Corner * Denise's Delights

Faith Hope & Cherrytea * Beautiful Clutter
Martha's Favorites * Breath of Fresh Air 

Lady Linda Teacup * Gracious Hospitality

Atteatude and Chocolate *Teacups In the Garden
Letters from the Northwest *A Delightsome Life
Poetry in a Pot of Tea *Lady B's Time for Tea
Romance of Roses *From This to That *Fabby's Living 

Miss Kathy at The Writer's Reverie *Art Books Tea
Tea, Friendship and the Fine Art of Card Making
The Nest at Finch Rest