The Art of Craft - Sailor's Valentine

(Charlotte and Pam's examples for the class - so charming!)

Oh! I had the most wonderful time at French General on Saturday.

Charlotte Lyons and Pam Garrison are so lovely, warm, sweet, dear, kind - which I knew they would be from their blogs but they are even more so, if that's possible?! Exponentially adorable! It was such a pleasure to get to meet them.

And how fabulous to be in a room jam-packed with other artsy craftsy souls! BLISS! I was seated with six fun, uber creative, ladies and got to meet a few others while gazing (mouth agape) at the yumminess of crafty good stuff, that is French General. Holy moly! I apologize for brain freeze and middle aged brain and not being able to remember everyone's names. Hoping to meet you all again at another event at FG!

There is this wall of marvelous goodies that calls your name, Come Hither, gather me up! hahahhahaa ( Sorry, this is blurry! I didn't even realize it at the time - I was so giddy with excitement.) The other side has marvelous fabrics to make you want to hole up in your home and never leave, stitching into the wee hours.

The only thing lacking in the day was time. I was there for three and a half hours and it went by as if it were less than an hour! WOOOOOOOSH!

I only took a few photos. WAH! And sadly I didn't get one of Pam Garrison but I sure got one of dear Charlotte ... and me.

So much fun!

WOOHOO! YIPPIE YIPPIE YIPPIE

Last year I was so excited to get a spot for Charlotte Lyons class at French General but I got a terrible awful miserable cold and couldn't go. WAH!

Miracle of miracles (thank you CHA for being in Los Angeles and bringing wonderful artists to town!), Charlotte is teaching another class this year at FG and tomorrow I will be happily seated at French General. AND if that wasn't wonderful enough, she's partnering with Pam Garrison! I can't believe my good fortune. YABBA DABBA DOO WOOHOO! So very excited I can barely contain myself!

The class is called Sailor's Valentine.

Look at the wonderful class examples made by Charlotte and Pam.

So romantic, like those wonderful sailor seashell valentines of old!

I hope I don't faint or drool or something. I hope I don't have performance anxiety. I hope I don't lose my mind and break my credit card and plunge us into debtor's prison, buying up all the wonderful things at French General that I've heard about for so many years ... bwahahhahahhaha.

I hope I remember to take pictures!

Happy weekend to you!

Vintage Birthday Vintage Thingie Thursday

(Please join Suzanne at Colorado Lady blog for more Vintage Thingie Thursday fun!)

Happy Vintage Thingie Thursday!

Today is my birthday and heaven knows, I'm vintage hahahhahhahahahahha!

So this Vintage Thingie Thursday I'm sharing with you a bit of my very own Pin the Tail on the Donkey game from when I was little, that I found up at my parents house.

(in the background is vintage Hallmark birthday wrap that I also found.
Yup! My mother didn't get rid of much of anything!)

The game came with a booklet - 25 Party Games For You To Play.
I'm sharing the pages that are illustrated, aren't they fun?

Vintage Doll Rednesday

(Please visit Sue at It's A Very Cherry World for more Rednesday fun!)

There have been many heart tugging treasures found at my parents house the past ten months. A few things were long lost and all hope of finding them was waning. And then ... EUREKA! Out of the depths they sprang forth.


I am sharing a family heirloom today for Rednesday. This is either my maternal grandmother's baby doll (she was born in 1899) or my maternal great-grandmother's (she was born in 1870) baby doll. I can't recall with clarity what my mother told me, so many years ago now. My old brain tells me that my mom's words were "it was my grandmother's doll" but I'm just not sure?

(she has the most charming string of beads around her neck)

I would love to be able to date her - anyone know where to begin?

She needs lots of loving care and restoration. She is still tied to her chair from when my mom's mom passed away and my mother brought her home to our house (so many years ago now, it boggles the mind!).

Oh! I love her so!

(poor thing! she looks like a band of ruffians have tied her up and looted the china cabinet!)

Happy Rednesday!

Lovin' our Prez!

How fun is that?!

Happy Friday!

Vintage Valentine Rednesday

(Please visit Sue at It's A Very Cherry World for more Rednesday fun!)

Happy Rednesday!

We went to the Long Beach Antique and Collectible Show on Sunday morning. I was on a serious hunt for Valentine stuff. There was practically nothing to be had, so disappointing! I did find these darling vintage Valentine's cards, aren't they cute?!

A new year

Waving Hello to my new followers and those who have hung in with me over the past year here. I'm glad to say that little beams of sunshine are making their way through the sadness, finally. What's that famous quote, something about the "one thing I know about life"???

Oh, I just looked it up and found the quote ...

“In three words I can sum up everything I've learned about life: it goes on.”
~Robert Burns

Gosh, what a journey grief is. And to be the last person still here in your immediate family! It is an alone-ness so very deep.

Heavens! What a roller coaster of emotions it all is.

On Sunday the hubby and I saw yet another production of "Our Town", which we both love so much. And if you know the play, you know it's all about love and family and death. Emily's monologue always reduces me to a weeping mess ...

"Good-bye, Good-bye world. Good-bye, Grover's Corners ... Mama and Papa. Good-bye to clocks ticking ... and Mama's sunflowers. And food and coffee. And new ironed dresses and hot baths ... and sleeping and waking up. Oh, earth, you are too wonderful for anybody to realize you. Do any human beings ever realize life while they live it -- every, every minute?"

Wouldn't that be something to really and truly be engaged in life?! To not sweat the small stuff, to not even let the petty into our lives. But to live mindfully and meaningfully and cherish the moments of our lives ...

Birds and Blossoms

(Please join Suzanne at Colorado Lady blog for more Vintage Thingie Thursday fun!)

Happy Vintage Thingie Thursday!

A lot of the time these days I am overwhelmed with the sheer amount of things I need to go through from my dad's house and fifty years of my family's life. But then a day like today comes along and I am awash in gratitude and pure pleasure and overwhelmed instead by the gifts that literally, have been bestowed upon me and left in my keeping.

This Vintage Thingie Thursday I'm sharing a bit of treasure,
a charming book entitled ...

Birds and Blossoms
and What the Poets Sing of Them

Published in 1887 (YES! 1887! WOW!). Such a lovely book, from the intricacy of the cover, the gilt edged pages, the moving words of the poets and the wonderful illustrations. Even the inside papers of the cover are lovely - green with birdies. (I apologize for the seriously poor photos, I had a dickens of a time trying to photograph the pages, worrying all the while that I would hurt the book.)

"And all the throng
That dwell in nests and have the gift of song;
Whose household words are songs in many keys,
Sweeter than instrument of man's ere caught;
Whose habitations in the tree-tops even
Are half-way houses on the road to heaven."
H. W. Longfellow

(illustration "Cat-birds and Garden-Roses")

The Friend In Shadow

I heard the faithful nightingale:
Like silver notes from blue-bells swung,
Like tender tones of human tongue,
Like golden cymbals clanging sweet,
Like castanets on fairies' feet,
Came forth that welcome, strangely dear,
To soothe my sorrow-freighted ear.
Ah, then I knew I had one friend,
Whose love with sunshine did not end.
Ethel Lynn Beers

(illustration "Cedar-Birds and Cedar-Bough")

"The birds around me hopped and played:
Their thoughts I cannot measure; -
But the least motion which they made,
It seemed a thrill of pleasure."
Wordsworth

(illustration "Sandpipers and Blossoming Beach-Plums")

By the Sea-Shore

The curved strand
Of cool, gray sand
Lies like a sickle by the sea
The tide is low
But soft and slow
Is creeping higher up the lea.

The beach-birds fleet
With twinkling feet
Hurry and scurry to and fro,
A sip, and chat
Of this and that
Which you and I may never know.
John W. Chadwick

(illustration "Owls at Evening")

From "In The Hemlocks"

At one point in the grayest, most shaggy part of the woods, I come suddenly upon a brood of screech owls, full grown, sitting together upon a dry, moss-draped limb, but a few feet from the ground. I pause within four or five yards of them and am looking about me, when my eye lights upon these gray, motionless figures. They sit perfectly upright, some with their backs and some with their breasts toward me, but every head turned squarely in my direction. Their eyes are closed to a mere black line; through this crack they are watching me, evidently thinking themselves unobserved. The spectacle is weird and grotesque, and suggests something impish and uncanny. It is a new effect, the night side of the woods by daylight. After observing them a moment I take a single step toward them, when, quick as thought, their eyes fly wide open, their attitude is changed, they bend, some this way, some that, and, instinct with life and motion,stare wildly around them. Another step, and they all take flight but one, which stoops low on the branch, and with the look of a frightened cat regards me for a few seconds over its shoulder. They fly swiftly and softly, and disperse through the trees. ~ John Burroughs

(illustration "Bobolink and Clover Blossoms")

I heard a little bird sing out one morning
While yet the darkness overpressed the sky,
And not a single streak of rose gave warning
That day was nigh.

It sang with such a sweet and joyful clearness,
The silence piercing with a note so fine,
That I was thrilled with sudden sense of nearness
To Love divine.
Mary Bradley

(illustration "King Bird and Cardinal Flower")

November

The mellow year is hastening to its close;

The little birds have almost sung their last,

Their small notes twitter in the dreary blast--

That shrill-piped harbinger of early snows;

The patient beauty of the scentless rose,

Oft with the morn's hoar crystal quaintly glassed,

Hangs, a pale mourner for the summer past,

And makes a little summer where it grows:

In the chill sunbeam of the faint brief day

The dusky waters shudder as they shine,

The russet leaves obstruct the straggling way

Of oozy brooks, which no deep banks define,

And the gaunt woods, in ragged scant array,

Wrap their old limbs with sombre ivy-twine.
Hartley Coleridge

(illustration "Purple Finches and Peach Blossoms")

Easter Morning

Oh, hark ! in the budding woodlands
Now far, now near, is heard
The first prelusive warble
Of rivulet and of bird.
Oh listen! the Jubilate
From every bough is poured,
And earth in the smile of spring-time
Arises to greet her Lord !
Frances L. Mace

(illustration "Chewink and Trillium")

Beauties of Morning

But who the melodies of morn can I tell?
The wild brook babbling down the mountain side;
The lowing herd; the sheepfold's simple bell;
The pipe of early shepherd dim descried
In the lone valley; echoing far and wide
The clamorous horn along the cliffs above;
The hollow murmur of the ocean-tide;
The hum of bees, the linnets lay of love,
And the full choir that wakes the universal grove.
James Beattie

bits and bobs and a case of the blues

ohhhhhhh ... today is a bit of a sad Sally day. Just when you think you have moved on along the process of grieving, the sadness smacks you like a tidal wave, knocking you over and pulling you down again with it.

The hubby had three lovely weeks off for the holiday break and we ramped up the fun meter and made lots of plans to pass the days. We saw movies and plays and friends and family. We read and rested and ate lots of good food. We happily ignored the things that needed to be done.

But today I feel like I'm in a comic strip ... it's sunshine and smiles everywhere for the other characters but for me, there's a dark cloud overhead.

sniffle sniffle WAH!

I started going through boxes from my dad's house again and came across these bits and bobs of cuteness - funny the things that are kept in a life, huh?! I like to think that perhaps my mom knew that one day they would be needed to bring a much needed smile and spirit-lightener.

Hope the sun is shining today for you! Sending hugs your way if it's raining!

Vintage Linen Rednesday

(Please visit Sue at It's A Very Cherry World for more Rednesday fun!)

Happy Rednesday!

I'm sharing some of my mom's linens with you this week.

This small cutie was hand embroidered by someone - sadly I don't know if it was by my mother or by one of my grandmother's. I'm guessing it was probably stitched by my maternal grandmother since my mom, horror of horrors please forgive me Rednesday pals, was not a Red lover. I also found several of these fun, colorful pot holders like the one pictured above, in various color combinations. So cute!

Aren't these two darling?! I especially love the Mexican themed one, how fun it would be with vintage Fiesta ware.

Baby Brownie Camera

We have found lots of fun stuff in my parents things. After the priceless family photos and documents, this Baby Brownie camera may be my favorite thing. Isn't it the cutest?! I had fun googling it and finding out it was called the Kodak Baby Brownie Special model and was so pleased to read it's made of Bakelite - I finally have some Bakelite. WAHOO!

Happy Friday to everyone and wishing you a fun weekend!

Dennis the Menace Vintage Thingie Thursday

(Please join Suzanne at Colorado Lady blog for more Vintage Thingie Thursday fun!)

I'm sharing some vintage Dennis the Menace stuff with you this Vintage Thingie Thursday. I'm going to guess these items were my brothers and were handed down to me - truth be told, I don't recall a particular fondness for Dennis the Menace. I tried so hard to please when I was little that the character of Dennis on the 1959 TV series was annoying to me hahahha.

(photo from Comics Worth Reading)

A fun vintage Dennis the Menace puppet - I tried Googling it for more info but couldn't really find any. I did find a vague reference that thought this was a Sears licensed item, in the late 50's.

Some fun Dennis the Menace comic books, all from the 1950's - Wanted: Dennis the Menace, Baby Sitter's Guide by Dennis the Menace and In this corner ... Dennis the Menace.

stuck in December on Rednesday

(Please visit Sue at It's A Very Cherry World for more Rednesday fun!)

Yoohoo! Hello! Happy Rednesday!

Another Rednesday has arrived and I do apologize, I am still digging myself out of boxes from my parents house and I came across these Christmas reds in one of the boxes this morning and thought, hmmmm they're RED and today is Rednesday. (the good news is that I am sending at least 16 boxes of paperwork off to be shredded tomorrow HURRAY HURRAH! Sixteen boxes lighter - doing the happy dance!)


I found this sweet repro doll ornament with a frozen Charlotte type head and these fun vintage thingies; two vintage chenille decorative doodads and a vintage Scandinavian candle holder, sadly missing one of its appendages WAH!


My mom would always recycle cute gift wrapping - here's a bit of some darling vintage Hallmark Christmas wrapping, circa the 1960's. Isn't it darling, I love the family portraits over the settee.

Happy Rednesday to everyone! Sure hope I wasn't the cause of any post-holiday heebie jeebie breakouts - I know it can be hard for some to revisit the holidays after January 1st teehee!