• Blog - Crafts - Creativity

    Gnome ornaments

    January 5, 2023 - By 

    I always like to have a little something to give to friends… usually it’s handmade…what else would you expect from me.

    Mini-me brought home a large spool of kitchen twine that she had used in an art installation last year. I wasn’t sure how we were ever going to get through all the yardage until I started making these cute gnome ornaments.

    I was inspired by a Pinterest video. https://pin.it/4wRPmea

    I wrapped the kitchen string around my hand until it felt thick enough. I tied the middle then slipped off my hand and cut the opposite side from the tie. I then tied a loop of bakers twine to serve as the hanger before beginning work on the hat.

     I made a circle template with a bowl then cut it in half. I used scraps of flannel from my stash for the hats. After rolling my half circle of flannel into a cone shape.  I used a hot glue gun to adhere first the hat together then stick the hat to the gnome body being careful to thread the hanger loop through the top of the hat. I then added a coordinating button or two to the hat and a wooden bead tucked up under the rim of the hat for the perfect gnome nose.

    Thankfully I also have a stash of wooden beads to make the noses.

    They turned out so cute and I used up the whole spool! Renew, reuse, recycle. ♻️

  • Blog

    Snow, snow, snow

    January 4, 2023 - By 

    What a wild ride at the beginning and end of my winter break. We’ve had snow storms that bookended the time off.

    Winter break started two hours early with an early release due to weather. Now we are having our second snow day in a row! That just doesn’t happen!! Can’t say I’m sad about two full weeks off.

    Leading up to break we did a couple fun things at school such as winter week theme days, treats and even pancake breakfast cooked by our administrators.

    We each got a mug to fill with treats. I decided to add a my signature flower as well as my name to my mug.

    Our special education team had a week long secret Santa exchange…this was day 1 for me.

    I also made a bunch of Gnome ornaments for work friends. I’ll do a separate post on how I made those.

    Christmas is a favorite time for Marvin. He loves a good box.

    And bows!! Bows are his favorite. We actually save them so he can have some to play with all year long.

    Mini-me got him this very special bow. He LOVES it!

    The whole family was off work between Christmas and New Years. The company Mr. G works for generally closes that week and J took the week off so he could move. Yep you heard me…he moved out. He is living in a house in the neighboring town with one of his buddies from high school. Of course with the crazy horrible weather yesterday, we went and picked him up from work and brought him here for the night. None of the roads were plowed and his little sedan would have never made it. Thank goodness for four wheel drive.

    New Years Eve we went for brunch at Hell’s Kitchen and enjoyed some great live music.

    And a massive Bloody Mary! I couldn’t eat more than a couple bites of my meal after that. Lucky for me, I had a good leftover lunch the next day! 

    I’ve been doing a bit a creating as well such as this card from scraps laying around my desk. There are a few journal pages as well but that will be a different post.

  • Blog

    Happy New Year!

    January 1, 2023 - By 

    Another year is in the books as they say…but really who are “they”?

    Yesterday I started thinking about my Word of the Year…realizing I hadn’t picked a new one or reflected on my WOTY for 2022.

    So lets look back at 2022 first… My word was treasure.

    I took time to treasure time with family and friends. Treasure memories of those no longer with us. While doing this I realized that some of the things I had that I treasured were more about the memory associated with it than the object itself. This has been quite freeing. Not that I have become a minimalist by any stretch of the imagination. I’m an artist and maker…we collect stuff.

    And now for my word to help guide me in 2023…

    I am all about refreshing things in my life this year. Refreshing spaces, personal goals, attitude, and mindset just to name a few.

    I honestly almost used renew again for my WOTY but that was my word for 2017. However refresh is a similar word. Reset was also on my mind. It is really hard to pick one word. I like to think of it having a broad meaning yet being something I can measure.

    As the year goes by I will touch on ways refresh is guiding my choices.