Doilies

Another so called grandmotherly thing I like-doilies. Not just for sitting around, you can also make crafts with them.
You can scrap book with doilies-you can dye them with food coloring too.

Emily scrapbooks with doilies and even makes clothes with doilies on-love it! In fact-I used to have a green sweatshirt with a doily on the front, that my sister made. I wore that thing for years.

Doilies-they're a good thing.

How do you feel about plastic lace shelf edging?

Though some may consider it grandmotherly, I like it. Actually-I like grandmotherly things.

What I did the next day...

I made a rooster!

How are these little hoops adhered to the glass you ask? Why-with glue from a stick, of course.

Two days later and they're still up there.

What I did yesterday...

I was cross stitching.

I picked up a like new cross stitch book at Goodwill the other day.

I love red, hearts, hoops, and cross stitch-so therefore I love this.

~Still having computer problems. Whaaaaaaaaaaaa!!!!!!~

Hoopla

My goodwill find from a couple days ago. Yipee!!

Me likey.

I'm having computer troubles-so if I'm scarce, you know why. I'm doing this from my sister's house.

My rhododendron...

are startin' to bloom.

Makes me happy ☺ !

Perkin' up my pretty little pencil tree...

with pretty, petite criss cross coasters!

I've got a crush on you!

I recently saw these bottle cap thumbtacks on a blog called Deep Fried Kudzu. She has a tutorial here. I didn't have any quilter's thumbtacks, so I just hot glued two shower curtain magnets to the back of a bottle cap to build it up and then added a regular thumbtack. Seems to work fine. I think they're kinda cute! She also has a tutorial for bottle cap magnets like I made here. Man, she has some pretty little bottle caps.

But I swear I didn't copy the magnets from Deep Fried Kudzu. I got the idea from a store bought fake bottle cap magnet that my friend had on her fridge.

Honest, I swear!

Wisteria Lane

Every May I look forward to seeing these beautiful wisteria. They grow in a wooded area that I pass on my way to town. Gorgeous!

I have about another week to admire their beauty before they fade away. Whaaaaaaaaa!!!!!!!!!

***I might be a housewife, but I'm not a desperate housewife. haha!***

He ain't heavy...

he's my Brother!

Yes-here's my hundred dollar Brother sewing maching, which my husband got me for Christmas, oh about 9 or 10 years ago, I think. He wasn't so happy that it sat in the box for a year, never opened. Then one day I was bored and decided to get it out and I read the instruction booklet and tried to figure things out. I found some old material and started practicing. I went to the library and checked out a bunch of quilting books. Went to the fabric store, got material and sewed together a quilt top. Dusted off the quilting frames my in-laws had gotten me probably two years earlier and hand quilted the darn thing myself. I cannot believe now I had the patience to do that. I don't remember now how many quilts I've made, but quite a few!

Though I've wanted to throw him out the window a few times, my Brother has been pretty darn faithful and reliable for being cheap inexpensive and old vintage!

***I can say this about both of my sisters-She ain't heavy......she's my sister. They've both lost a bunch of weight. hehe☺☺☺

The apple loofah kitchen scrubber has arrived...

Exciting, I know!

Guaranteed to make doing dishes fun!

The packaging that came with this scrubber says-

*Gentle enough to clean fruits and vegetables.

*Tough enough to clean stubborn pots, pans and soiled dishware.

*Cleaning: Just rinse, squeeze, and hang to air dry-always stays fresh.

(HA-Obviously they've never been in my kitchen! I've been known to throw away nasty dishcloths, rather than deal with them.)

For the record...

you can make bowls out of, well-records.

See how here.

My mom made one for each of the grandkids a couple years ago. My friend, Dawnie, picked me up some old vinyl records at Goodwill. I still have yet to make any myself, but maybe soon.

Sorry Helen-I'm getting 'reddy' to turn your record into a bowl ☺ !

A view from where I sit (sometimes) and I love fruit things?!

Here's part of the view from the la-z-boy-where I sit (mostly) when watching TV. But I find myself looking over to the right a lot because I love looking at these lovely photos of some of my favorite people. See those frames with the four sections? These frames hold 4-8 x 10's and I love them. They're fairly lightweight and easy to handle because they have a thin sheet of plexiglass instead of glass. I did tear one a little when I was trying to clean it before I put the pics in, but I can hardly notice it. Kmart-20 dollars a piece.

I even like to keep the hallway light on at dark so I can look at my peeps. But the hubster keeps shutting it off. He drives me nuts with the shutting off of the lights!!!

Now on to the fruit. I had an email from Bath and Body Works in my inbox this morning. They were offering free shipping on any order if I clicked through the email. Bath and Body doesn't usually tempt me-but they had these fruit shaped loofahs and I am a sucker for fruit shaped stuff. So I ordered a couple apples-5 bucks each-yeah I'm a little fruity. (And I don't think my shipping came off-must call them later!)

And below these loofas I ordered this morning-you can see that I just had to order fruit earrings from Avon a couple years ago. I loved the boxes better than the earrings. Yep-I'm fruity. (And shut up Davey!)

Fabulously funky and fun potholders

I made these today. I think I'm giving one of each to a bride to be and sending one of each to a friend who's getting a new kitchen. There are three wonky ones (I tried to hide them), so I'll make new and keep the rejects for myself!

***I adapted the pattern from the Allsorts criss cross coasters tutorial to make these potholders. I cut the material into 7 1/2 inch squares and used a 7 inch square piece of heat resistant batting in place of the fusible web. They are thick, so they are harder to sew without getting wonky!***

It looks like I've been visited by an angel...

but actually it's just a hummer. Well-not just a hummer-it's one of God's amazing and miraculous creatures!

***hummingbird food-1 part sugar to 4 parts water. boil 1 minute. cool. enjoy!***

And Happy Mother's Day To You ♥ !

Yes, sir-that's my baby!
Still a baby!
Yikes-a teenager! Now, how'd that happen???

Thank you Lord, for making me a mother! The best and hardest job I'll ever have.

And thank you to all you mothers, future mothers, and you who mother! After all the caring, worrying, sleep deprivation, nurturing, laughing, crying, loving, working and everything else you do-you deserve to have a great Mother's Day!

Happy Mother's Day! Love you all ♥ !

Happy Mother's Day to me ♥ !

She loves me, she really loves me!

She knows me better than I thought she did-red, dots, giant teacup, flowers☺.

***Someone please comment on my two previous posts. I feel so sorry for them, just sitting there with ~0~ comments. Thanks.***

~Trying to get some brownie points~

I kept forgetting to use my free photo stamp of the grandkids. Stamps.com was offering a free one sometime before Christmas.

So, I thought I'd use it for Mother's Day-cause stamps are going up very soon-May 11th to be exact ☺.

I love Clara!

I stumbled upon Clara a couple months ago when a blog mentioned her. She's 93 years old now, I think. Her grandson made these videos of her cooking meals her family ate during the depression. Her videos have become very (unexpectedly, I think) popular.

I love hearing stories from the old timers. I think they are very wise and have a lot to offer♥!

Gimme an "H"!!!

I love anything personalized!

So I was looking around my house and saw all these H's. I'm sure there are many more-but I just hadn't come across them. And these are just initials, not names. Between my name and my daughter's name, I must have about 50 doo-dads with our names on. I'm sure it helps that both of our names are "regular" words too.

But I'm not complaining, I love it!

(And yes-I was a cheerleader in high school, and no-I don't even like to think about it.)

Meet Misty and Phoenix-

our parakeets that we've had for about 6 years. I can't believe we've had them that long. I really didn't even know they were suppose to live this long. Misty is our green parakeet. The poor little dear recently lost one of her feet. Yep-she has a peg leg now. She must have injured her foot, because it swelled way up and then turned black and then fell off. I thought she would die-but she's a survivor and is doing great! Who says these little birdies are fragile??? They're not in this case, anyhow.

Phoenix is our blue parakeet. He is very lively and bebops around the cage and sings all day.

I love my birdies, but they do have some drawbacks-Dust, dust and more dust. Feathers, feathers, and more feathers. Poop, poop, and more poop (at least this stays in the cage). And they like to squawk at the most inopportune times (kind of like kids)-like when I'm on the phone. So I just cover them up and they are quiet-most of the time. Now-if it was just that easy with kids!

Cactus terrarium

About four years ago, my daughter saw this cactus terrarium (top) at the grocery store and begged me to get it for her. So I did. Two of the cactuses (it's a word-I looked it up) died and it was looking pretty sad. If you click on the first photo, you will see four or more dead lady bugs. Lovely☺!

Today at the grocery store I saw this big (in comparison to the others) cactus on clearance for two dollars, so I picked it up and thought I'd try to fix up this terrarium a little bit. I dumped everything, washed it out, stuck the cactus(ouch)-along with the terra cotta container it came in, inside and filled in around it with some gravel and glass stones.

I guess it looks okay-better than it did, anyhow. I wonder how long it will take her to notice?

Hey-I just noticed the camera's reflection in the second photo. I kinda wish I had a big black camera-so I could look all smart and photographerish-like my sister!

Lilacs!

I noticed my lilacs were blooming and I just had to bring some in. Gorgeous, I think. I dug up a few twigs with a few roots from my in-law's yard and haphazardly planted them. Now-a few years later-I have blooms. Amazing! I ♥ lilacs!

Now-hopefully they won't trigger any allergy attacks.

Recycle those spare paint chips!

How? You ask. You can make pretty bookmarks from them. Find out how at How About Orange. Basically you trim the corners with a photo trimmer. Glue chips back to back-I just used a glue stick. Punch a hole. Put your ribbon through the hole and you're done. My niece and I made one this afternoon in just a couple minutes.

I think I'll give the orange one to a certain someone who has the same last name! You know who you are☺.

And yes-I'm loving the vampire books.