Christmas Pictures on New Year's Eve

ornament/bookmarks--finished...

Stockings filled...

Gifts wrapped--conserving paper...

A lavender room, dilly dilly...
A Happy New Year to all!!

2011 Calendars

My granddaughter and I put together our second calendar. See the first one here and here. I tried to improve this one by making the boxes for each day larger. I thought I could save a little, by having them copied in black and white then color them in by hand. It was almost too much coloring! These were her Christmas gifts to family, teachers and friends.

I just love all my granddaughter's sweet and funny little drawings, so I made copies, then cut out the copies to make a collage. She balked at first--seeing her drawings grouped together in such a way, but she still had her original drawings. After awhile she liked the arrangement--and me being me, I couldn't help but mess around with all those cut out characters--made me think of playing with colorforms!

Cellphone

My granddaughter's cell phone! Well used--probably obsolete by now.

Clothespin Dolls

Party favors are being made once again! If you remember, last year I went a little overboard making party favors. This year isn't too different, but maybe I'm doing just a little less? It was my granddaughter's idea to make more clothespin dolls. We made them for the childrens craft fair last summer. I do end up doing a lot of the construction, but the faces, clothing design and choice of color are all hers. I just love the faces she draws--look at this motley crew!

Here are a few not quite finished--some need arms--all need hair.

Here are a few from her private collection--it was tough making enough to sell, because she wanted them all!
At the fair we were selling these for 1$! I thought they'd be snatched right up, but they stood on our booth all morning--right before packing it up, a little old lady came by and plucked them up one at a time till they were almost gone, (she didn't choose any ballerinas, I noticed) I was trying to concentrate on how many she was tossing into her bag. After paying, she looked up with a crooked colorful grin just like the dolls!! She could have been one of them! She slowly shuffled away clutching her bag full of clothespin dolls, and her cane in the other.

Snow Princess

The fog came in heavy yesterday--I brought my mattress cover inside to dry, thus becoming the land of snow! She, of course is the snow princess with all her royal subjects. Curious George has the seat of honor. He came for a very short overnight visit from her school. Today the class will read of his adventure and see this picture pasted in his journal.

This is not a painting--I've been playing in photo shop again. When will I get back to painting, you ask? I'm asking myself the same thing!

A Sneak Peek

A prism rainbow makes even an unfinished project complete. Here's a sneak peek at the finished ones...

There's always secrets around Christmas time!

The Grinch!

Waiting for Grampa to buy the cookies we were suppose to make...

Dah hoo forrus--dah hoo dorus--welcome, welcome, Christmas day. Christmas day is in our grasp, as long as we have friends to clasp!

Having fun after the show...


With Cindy Loo Hoo...
A successful and fun performance!

Peace Cards

We were racing to get out the door--I'm thinking about the time and the school bus. My granddaughter quickly drew a peace sign on a scrap of paper, then asked me, did I know the old fashion symbol for peace? "Umm... no, but go put your coat on!" She comes back and shows me this dove next to her peace sign! That stopped me in my tracks--she did catch the bus--and I booked it to the copy store. I added the sparkles and the bit of green. I just love her little shaky drawings!
Here's our Christmas cards for 2010, with the new and old symbols of peace.

Bowl Fountain with Jade

My husband put this bowl fountain together in remembrance of his good friend John who recently passed on. He and John, at a minus tide, would camp out up the coast and spend hours searching the rocky beach of Jade Cove finding jade. All those little pieces of jade on the table are just a handful of what John had collected--he shined these small pieces with a tumbler.
This table was set up at his memorial service--guests could pick a piece of jade to take with them.

Coloring Contest

Today I'm mailing in my granddaughter's finished entry for a coloring contest put on by our local newspaper. She worked hard on this for close to a week. I love her angels! It doesn't come across on the computer very well but, she painted silver glitter on their wings and some on the ornaments.

Vintage Paper Dolls

My daughter found this old booklet of paper dolls to give to her niece at Thanksgiving. I would have loved to keep it all intact as a book, but of course that wasn't to be--this booklet "containing 90 pieces to play with" really means, 90 things to cut out! My daughter took on the task of cutting out the people--I haven't even started on the clothes.

Here's the mom and dad with none other, standing sideways on the left, the maid!





I can't help but think that the maid is the one who cares for all these clothes and takes care of all six kids. The mom will look great at functions and the dad goes off to work as a doctor?, and smokes on his leisure time. Still I love all these great outfits and the style of that era.
I'll have the maid cut out the clothes!

A Tiny Step Back to Thanksgiving

I'm catching up with my pictures after being off line for soo long. I only posted a few from the massive load that was on my camera.
We harvested any crazy root vegetables that were left over from my condensed garden--the apple pie my granddaughter requested--Thanksgiving and maybe Christmas are the only times I use a lace table cloth, I'm not sure where it came from, but it makes great lacy shadows as we found out when my daughter set up a My Pretty Pony play world, (which included a room of gloom. We have to have the gloom too! [an important lesson that my daughter playfully threw into the set])--Our table in a small space, using the pool table for overflow (to heck with the serving bowls, put out the pans)--fireworks of course! Thanks to my daughter for bringing them down and to my son, who loved setting them off, (no surprise there!)

My mom and grandmother did up Thanksgiving much fancier than I do--I love the look of a well planned table, but it's not my style. For me it doesn't make sense to scoop mashed potatoes into a bowl, when it's already being held nicely in a pan. I recall Gramma secretly showing me, while using a hushed tone, how she would wipe away any food inside the rim of a serving bowl. I have done that, and think of Gramma every time I do. If any bottles should go on the table (definitely not at Thanksgiving, tsk, tsk), The lids should be off the bottles and off the table and the tops of the bottles wiped clean. My husband caught me doing this the other day and thought it pretty silly. So my sly and wise grandmother did teach me a few things! I'll have to try that hushed tone, like I'm telling a big secret with my granddaughter and many years from now she just might have learned a few things from me, (like forget the serving bowls?) So Gramma, forgive me for using my pans! Please.