Mother's Day

Haven't blogged for awhile, so thought I better get busy. Have done a few crafts, mostly pertaining to displays for Mother's Day. I made up flower arrangements in mismatched china cups and saucers. I had enough in my stash to make 9 arrangements. These will sit on the tables at the deli. I hit a rummage sale this weekend and found 4 more cups and saucers for 50 cents/set. So I nabbed those to replenish my supply!

For the Mother's Day holiday, I wanted to use my stock of aprons and put them under the glass of the tables. I ironed up the old aprons gathered some apron patterns and printed off some mom type poems as well as My Mother's apron poem: by Marie Marshall:

My Mother wore an apron a clean one every day,
a part of daily living it served in many ways,
when she hung the wash to dry, her pockets held the pins,
the apron was a washcloth that cleaned our dirty chins,
when days were hot and humid twas used to mop her brow,
when hands were wet from laundry the apron was a towel,
here pocket hid the needle to sew the rips we'd get,

in Mother and her apron, our many needs were met,

sometimes it was a basket for eggs or baby chicks,

a bag for garden bounty and apples that she picked,
at suppertime the apron protected Mother's hands,
when taking bread from the oven or lifting lids from pans,
it was a fan in the evening to shoo away the flies,
but the apron's greatest gift was to wipe tears from childish eyes.

I also asked all the ladies at the deli to bring in photos of their mom's (and they really brought in some neat old photos) and I put all the items together under the glass, I like the the way it turned out, see the pictures. I guess I always knew I'd have a use for all of these aprons. I picked up most at garage sales and thrift stores and some are just too neat to get rid of! Speaking of neat aprons, check out the blog of Apron queen she has some awsome aprons, recipes and links.

Easter Favors

I've made a few of these paper cones for the deli display. Found old sheet music and glued the cones together, then added a piece of ribbon to hang on the tree, stuffed in some shredded paper and tah da - a vintage looking paper Easter cone. I've added some small eggs inside, but you could put any number of things inside: Easter candy, chocolate rabbits and other little treasures.

I might also put these out again in June, they might look cute on a "Wedding Tree". I also got some little metal glitter letters that say "I do", and some little clear shoe favors and of course some wedding bells. Thought I could put all of this on a small tree branch (I'll have to do some curb shopping this spring and find some cuttings) to make the Wedding Tree. Will post pictures of that in June. Also found some neat old wedding dress patterns really cheap, will use those somehow in a display as well.

Be My Valentine

I don't really do much decorating for Valentines Day, but I do like to put up a few vintage Valentines around the house. I just picked these up at an antique sale for 50 cents each. They are fun images and wording from a much more innocent time. I use metal flower frogs as a mini easel of sorts - works out pretty well. Enjoy!

Family Ties

I've been thinking about my mom and dad lately. Both have passed away, my mom just a year ago. So I've been transitioning into life without parents. Anyway in order to work through my grief, I've been thinking of doing some sort of craft project that incorporates them into it, and I think I've found what I want to do. I got this "Legacy" project book from my sister and I found these cool cigar box mixed media art pieces. See the example of Mr. Twigg.

I'd like to use photos, and I do have some scrabble tiles, old paper ephemera, and other small objects that I can add to these pieces. I like the aged look, will have to look at the directions and see if they used some type of wash.

Here are the pictures of my parents that I'd like to use, I'll probably title them: Cowboy and Teacher, as that is what they were. I really like this picture of my dad, and his horse Dakota Harry, probably from the late 1950's I would imagine. The picture of my mom was taken in high school. I may have another picture of her as a teacher in Medina, where she taught 4th grade.

Buttons and Bows

Ok, I got the heart completed. Spent quite a bit of time on it, picking out buttons from a large supply that I had, some were my mom's, some were from garage sales and thrift stores. I used an off white sweater vest that I felted. I kind of like the tone on tone look, and liked the sweater material too. Then I had to sew all these little puppies on, that was the most time consuming part. Note the tiny key hanging from the heart - found it amongst all the buttons! I had gotten this idea from an image I saw on-line.

Side note on buttons, I remember my mom cutting up old clothes for rags and we always had to cut the buttons off and save them before tearing the clothes into rags. Reuse and recycle, that depression era mantra was instilled in her, and us to a certain extent as well. Sometime I'll take some pictures of my button "collection" I seem to pick them up whenever I see them, have several jars of them. The brightly colored ones look like bits of candy peeking out through the glass.

....lace and paper flowers

Here are the pics of some of the paper flowers I've made for the deli display. I've got about 8 done and want to make about that many more. I found a very easy pattern. If you can find square tissue paper, just put 5 full sheets together, fold accordian style, at the center cut a notch on either side and then wind wire or a pipecleaner over the center area and begin to pull the petals up and out, and then scrunch and fluff. I've found the more scrunching makes for a more realistic flower. BTW, the lace and paper flowers title comes from lyrics in the Stevie Nicks song Gypsy You'll be humming for the rest of the day!

I also got into mitten making this winter. I had been buying wool sweaters at rummage sales, so I felted a bunch and used a pattern out of Warm Fuzzies by Betz White. Some sweaters work better than others. I scored a really heavy hand knit sweater at a rummage and made 3 pair of mittens out of that one. I think I made about 8 pair so far, these pictured are the ones I have left. I'm going to plug away at making more and see if I can sell a few next winter. I also saw a cute hanging heart that I think I could use sweater material for - more on that later. I'll see if I can make one up.

Triple Word Score

I found this image on the Better Homes and Gardens site. I bought a scrabble game at a rummage sale and was thinking of making the tiles into fridge magnets, but this is kind of a cool idea too - you could change out the sayings for all the different holidays.

I did something similar with an old chalkboard that I purchased, I'd look up neat poems and quotes and write them on the board as kind of a greeting for all our guests.