Winners From My Teaparty

Where did the time go? I haven't quite finished my teacup but it's coming along. I hope to post a picture of it tomorrow. The winners are:

Magpie Sue who wins the teacup magnet/pin.

CC who wins the sea anemone ATC

and KV who wins the tea ATC.

Congratulations to all of you. I'll get in touch with you to get your addresses.

Thanks to everyone who joined with me to celebrate my one year anniversary of blogging. I heard of teas I didn't know existed (I enjoy several different kinds but Lipton's original is my stand-by).

Weekly Inchie

This week's theme for Inchybyinch was to do something with the mail post. I had only one stamp to use for this and it was too big for an inchie so I made a couple of tiny envelopes and a letter to go into one of them. Enlarged here they look a bit sloppy so perhaps next time I'll work under a magnifying lamp when I want this much detail.

The background is some leftover background I made for my Christmas cards. I had a one inch strip so I cut it into several squares. I think it's generic enough that it will be used for some future inchies.

This week there is an added bonus besides the fun of making these inchies. Purple Faerie Paper Crafts has sponsored us and is offering some blank inchies and a rubber stamp to the name drawn from those who link back to Inchybyinch and Purple Faierie Paper Crafts. Sounds like a good deal to me. See what fun you'd have if you'd join us?

One Year of Blogging

Wow. I have been blogging for one year as of May 18th! I didn't realize it until I checked after visiting Grace's blog Gracebeading. She is celebrating her one-year anniversary so I thought I'd better check out when I started. On May 18, 2007, I made my first post: Hi! I am on my first flight with the blogging world. Joining a beading journal group got me into this. Please excuse me if I ruffle a few feathers. I would like some smooth soaring but computers are a challenge to me. Here goes......... whee! Well it has been an eagle's flight! I've soared to places and people I never dreamed to and have grown so much, enjoyed so much and learned so much! I've made new friends, joined new groups and have even taken classes after finding mentions of this or that on someone or another's blog. What a world we live in! It's wonderful and amazing. Don't you agree?

Like so many others who have reached a milestone on blogging whether it's one year or 100 posts, I want to celebrate. Time for a tea party (yeah, I am one wild kind of party gal!) so leave me a comment telling me what your favorite tea is (or party beverage for you wild ones out there) and on the evening of May 31st I will pick 3 names from my party hat for prizes.

The third name drawn will receive the first ATC I made which falls right into the theme of my celebration - Tea For Two.

The second name drawn will receive my sea glass fabric ATC which I call Sea Anemones.

The first name drawn (I did this in reverse order as that is how my pictures lined up on the right - I really am not contrary!) will receive something I am working on right now. You can see the start of it on the right. I am not sure how it will turn out so I started two just in case (even after almost a year of doing bead embroidery I am still unsure about a piece). I plan to turn it into a
magnet but I can leave it off till the first name drawn tells me she/he wants it like that.

So, are we ready to party? Leave me a comment and a way to get back to you in case your name is drawn.

Inchies

I have finished my inchie for Inchybyinch this week. Pretty early too! The theme was places and for me there was no hesitation. California. To be more exact, it would be southern California.

I cut out an image from a catalog, glued it to a piece of card, used a sharpie pen to edge it and added the words. I wanted to add "right back where I started from" but there is only so much room on an inchie, after all!

They don't have to be difficult or fancy. They can be beaded like my last one, hand drawn like the one before it or collaged like this one. They can even be made of fabric but any which way, they are fun to do. Try it yourself. Go to the link at the top of this post and see what you can do.

Inchies

After being gone for the Mother's Day weekend (which meant a week really), I didn't think I'd be able to do this week's inchie for InchybyInch but I made it after all.

This week's theme was faces so I took a button blank from which I had previously removed the shank and covered with a hand painted face and glued it to my inch. Then I peyote stitched around it first with size 6 seed beads, then 2-drop number 8's and finally a round of number 11's. I added the touch of 11's to the corners to carry the brightness out to the edge.

The inchie is sooo textural and has my favorite medium (beads) on it so I couldn't be more happy with it. Maybe I'll glue a magnet to the back of this one and put it on my fridge.

March BJP - To My Mother with Love

I've done it! I have finished my March page. It
didn't take near as long as any of the others. I love how it came out as it looks pretty true to the real thing.

The "real thing" was my mother's Cecil Bruner rose bush. It was a climbing rose with small flowers that my Dad bought for her and planted on the fence that was at the edge of the pool which I did for my July page.

I used some fake pearls that my mother had (they were really, really in bad shape but worked great for this page) to make the centers of the roses. I goofed and used dark purple for the background instead of light as my other purple page was but there isn't anything like serendipity as the dark purple symbolizes suffering and my mother did a lot of that. Her dad was killed be a hit-and-run driver while crossing a street, her third child (first son) died at one month while sleeping in bed with her so she was blamed by the coroner for his death, her fourth child needed open heart surgery and was about the 5th one to use the new heart/lung machine which gave her a 50/50 chance of survival (she did and now has 3 children of her own), and then she got multiple sclerosis finally dying during surgery for a ruptured appendix at age 56.

I didn't know what I was going to do on this page except that it would be for my mom as this was her birthday month. I thought of a sewing machine as she made a lot of the clothes us five daughters wore plus doll clothes and some of our wedding dresses. I thought about making a decorated cake as she did many of those including some of our wedding cakes. After many other ideas I found myself worrying about a family situation and so I prayed to her asking her to pray for my family. The next day I knew I wanted to put flowers on her page. I didn't know what flowers or why I wanted to do this so clearly so I wrote to my oldest sister who understands odd things like this. I told her only that I had a strong urge to put flowers on Mom's page but didn't know why. She came back with: She LOVED pink Cicel Bloomers, the very small pink rose. And I think that she is sending you love which she would do with pink roses. She is letting you know that she is with you and sending you blessings. It is a be in the moment thing again. sewing, decorating cakes, hats, shoes, are all doing or memories, roses are an enjoy the beauty of the moment, growing thing, that we get to enjoy. Tell me if this helps, for she is enjoying your company and the honor that you give to her. It was so perfectly tuned to my prayer which my sister did not know about. I did feel so close to Mom just then plus to my sister. (Sisters are one of life's blessings as are daughters and...). So, roses it became and it went soooo smoothly and quickly.

Island Bedroom

My daughter painted this island room for her oldest daughter. It was a birthday gift last year and though it took quite a while to plan and execute I think it was well worth the wait.

The bed area is painted beige and has bamboo roll-up shades so that it can be closed off. This is the bamboo shack.

Outside of the shack the walls were painted to look like an island with the ocean as background. The cat tree was even decorated to look like a palm and a beach chair was added to complete the idea. Even the ceiling was painted.

I think my daughter did a fantastic job. Her husband has come a long way from fretting over her painting walls (not ceiling or closet doors even) a pale pink in anticipation of a baby girl, to pretty much an anything goes attitude - as long as he doesn't have to see it in the process. That would be too stressful! And that is okay with my daughter who
is ready to take on the living room stairwell.

Hope you enjoyed the tour.

Inchie

The theme for this weeks inchie for the Inchybyinch group is to use the first letter of your name and see what you can fit on the inch.

I have the letter T to use so I went for a desert Tortoise walking in a tan desert with thorny cactus under a turquoise sky with thunder clouds rolling in. How's that for the letter T? Oh, I forgot. I edged it with turquoise trim too.

This was fun as the idea came quickly and worked up just as fast.

The Snail

I thought I would point out the "snail" in my picture I posted earlier (my printer is not doing color well at the moment). Some of you couldn't find him - I think you might have been looking for a real snail which we don't have here since it is so dry. (We have lots and lots of other bugs though - crickets, grasshoppers, scorpions...)

Now go back to the other post and you will see him for sure. I always find things when looking at the clouds (which are really strange here at times. You can watch a cloud form in the clear sky and then watch it fade away in minutes while another one forms- must be the lack of humidity) and now I find things looking at the landscape. I might be the tiniest bit wacky but I do find life exciting in the details (even though most details like time, what people wear - unless it has lots of color - buzzes right on by me).

Walking in the Desert

My husband and I took a walk around the "block" last weekend. It's 2 1/2 miles around so it's a good sized walk. We have to go more slowly when he goes than I normally would because of his heart problems but it was good for him to get out. He hadn't shut the gate on the goat pen (his memory isn't so good either-- just joking) so the goats joined us as well as our german short-haired pointer. You won't see her because she runs all over chasing rabbits the whole way around. I bet she goes 10 miles to our 2 1/2!

The goats have never taken such a long walk but they really enjoyed it. This is the good part about living in such a rural part of the desert. We can
take our animals with us and not worry about traffic. Do you see the flowers in the road? This one gets only 1 car every few days! The other side of our house has a road much more
frequently traveled. Yesterday we passed a car as we left for town and one as we returned. I don't think that's ever happened before but really, cars do come in and out some.


How do you like the last picture? Everytime I pass these two cacti I see a snail. Do you see it? It's the largest and prettiest one I've seen. Hope you've enjoyed your little bit of desert for today.