Aromatherapy

Our crafty world has been smelling very good these last few days.  Starting with these:

 ...pilferred from the neighbors tree.  Since they were hanging well over our side of the fence I felt justified in cutting them off.  Oh my did they smell heavenly!

On Thursday Mr. Crafty World and I celebrated our 15th wedding anniversary, and he brought home this lovely bouquet of roses:

Over the weekend I decided to dabble a bit with some embroidery. 

 Those bullion roses are enough to drive anyone up the wall!  For my first attempt I'm happy enough with it, and finished it off as a small sweet bag filled with lavender.

Today while My Favorite Boy happily kneaded and squished some homemade playdough (scented with coconut extract!), I made some bath fizzers. 

 I haven't made these in years, and it was lovely to get back into it. 

On the left I have coconut/mango/pineapple with chunky sea salt and on the right is lily of the valley.  I used a vintage baking mold and I love how they look like little cakes.  I ran out of a few ingredients, but am definitely planning on making some more.  I have tried a lot of recipes for making fizzers, but this one has always been my favorite. 

Bath Fizzers

2 tablespoons of citric acid

2 tablespoons corn starch

1/2 cup baking soda

2-3 tablespoons light oil - I use almond oil, but you can use grapeseed, apricot kernel, even sunflower though it's a bit heavier.  Just make sure you aren't allergic to whatever oil you use!  I used 2 tablespoons.

1/4 or so teaspoons fragrance/essential oil

3-6 drops food coloring if you want

Mix everything in a bowl.  You will probably have to get in there with your fingers and rub it all together.  Shape it into balls (if you used lots of oil), or pack it into a mold.  Let it rest and dry out for a few hours before storing in an airtight container. 

Have fun!

I had four people express interest in the Polstitches chart.  I used the ultra scientific method of throwing a dice to pick the recipient.  I rolled a two, so that means it's going to Annette.  Annette, can you please email me and give me your address?  I will send it off shortly. 

Thank you to all those who left me nice messages; it really makes my day!

Another Finish

Another WIP done and dusted!  I have been working on this one for a loooonnnng time!  It's not like it had

any specialty stitches or anything, it was just the whole working-on-black idea.  I convinced myself that I could only work on it outside while it was sunny, or when my eyes aren't tired.  Well, that policy didn't go over so well obviously!  I used my newly gained motivation from finishing the bird picture to set to work and complete this one.

 I have always had this in mind to be hung up in my craftign space, and that is exactly where it's going!  I have had the frames for a few years, so they can finally be used for their original purpose!  I say frames, because there is a companion piece to this one, I just don't know if I will stitch it or not.  Right now the other frame is happily housing a small tapestry so maybe I'll just move on to other things.

 Last week the weather was unseasonally warm: we were wearing shorts and talking about turning on the air conditioning.  This week has been gray, freezy and raining.  We even had snow on Saturday night and woke to a white Mothers Day.  Good thing I got a new cappuccino/tea/coffee/latte maker to take the chill off!

Stay warm and have a great week!

Finishes

I was rooting through my cross stitch drawer the other day and was surprised at how many stitched pieces I have waiting to be finished.  I decided to finish this JBW design off as an ornament:

My best news of the day is that I finished the cross stitch for my Grammie's birthday!  Well, finished it as much as I am going to!

I have said before that this was not an easy piece for me.  Sometimes you just have those I think.  I love the entire design - so cute, and it made me want to stitch it for my Grammie right away.  However, it has just taken too long and I didn't really enjoy it at all.  So I'm hoping it looks OK as is: I'll have a better idea when I find a frame for it.

This is what the design is supposed to look like:

I just don't have the stomach to start the other two motifs!  Since I am definitely not going to stitch it ever again(!), I am going to gift it away.  If there are any stitchers out there who would like this chart, leave me a comment.  I will happily send it anywhere!  If  more than one person wants it I'll draw names.

And finally, an early Mothers Day gift for me.  Actually I just bought it for myself today because I liked it.  I attended the local pottery guild's sale today and purchased this necklace:

The colors are pale blues, greens and yellows.  There were lots of lovely dishes there, but at the moment I have no room for more dishes.  There is always room for jewelry though!

Have a great weekend, and to all the Mums out there I hope you have a beautiful Mothers Day tomorrow!

Food: A Find; Some Fun

I love to cook for my family, but in the summer it gets to be a bit of drag.  I want to enjoy life outside, not menu plan.  The rotation of hot dogs/hamburgers/pizza/salad gets a bit monotonous.  So, I devised a plan.  Starting last week, I have implemented French Suppers.  Every day for supper we eat salad, grilled something (veggies, meat, fish) and a demi baguette.  You probably think that sounds monotonous!  However, salad is never the same.  I have been putting everything on our salad, including left-over wild rice and cold roasted chicken.  Mr. Crafty World comes home, puts something on the grill; I put the baguette in the oven and chop the lettuce.  The kids eat the lettuce  (minus the dressing), eat  the meat/ veggies/ fish, and the bread.  Everybody's happy.  I had to take a picture of last night's salad because it looked (and tasted) sooo good:

Grilled veggies, Israeli couscous, goat cheese and fiddlehead ferns.  I shamefully told the kids the fiddleheads were forest worms just to gross them out so I wouldn't have to share :o

A big bonus to eating salad is that you can't just scarf it down.  You have to eat it slowly, thereby enjoying it and giving your body a chance to realize it's full before it's over full.

Now to totally negate any benefits of salad, I have been baking.  Actually it's for the school bake sale, so we're OK!  I made vanilla cupcakes with buttercream frosting and lemon bars. 

I have been thrifting a little lately, and found a small bag of silk thread on wooden spools.

The colors are very pretty, and combined with a few other wooden spools I have make a neat decoration displayed in one of my vintage canning jars:

And lastly I did a bit of card making last night.  I love how this one turned out:

It's actually more green than the grey that you see here.  Although, grey would have been nice....

I love making cards but it usually takes an hour per card, just because I have to go through every possible combination of paper/stickers/embellishments.  By the end of it I'm out of creative ideas for the verse, so it's usually just "To... From Me"  Hardly inspired!  So if you get a card from me, just know all the love is in the outside!

All Sorts

It must be spring!  I have had a few 'gentle reminders' that I haven't posted lately; I have been busy but it never seems to be anything truly spectacular.  However, if I only posted when I felt I had something spectacular to say, I think this would be one empty blog.  I've just been coasting along, doing my usual stuff since April 8.  The biggest time taker for me lately is reclaiming the upstairs of my house:  I can see my whole living room now!

This was previously filled with "stuff" from the basement during the renovation.  For two and a half months there was only a little pathway through here...

I have been catching up on a few projects that have been way too long in the works:

I started these for My Favorite Boy almost two years ago.

Yes, you are reading that correctly: it says 2006.  We have been to France twice more since then and those pictures are not in an album yet either!  The sad thing was it only took me a day to complete the album.  Actually I choose to look at that as a good thing, so I don't feel overwhelmed about those yet-to-be completed albums.

 

I started something new:

...and re-vamped some old things:

(before)

(after)

I have also been at the garden center, where I was supposed to be looking for a fern and some dirt.  I got bewitched by these flamenco pansies, which remind me of little girls in ruffly party dresses.  I'm going to pot them in a planter so I can be bewitched every day:)

 

A fair amount of spring cleaning has been going on too, but really it's not blog-worthy!

On the topic of gardening and spring cleaning, let me share a small story.  On Saturday Mr. Crafty World and I were sitting on the deck, lamenting on the huge expanse of dandelions in the backyard.  I always say we should just come to peace with the dandelions, because it seems we can never get rid of them (we don't spray due to the kids); they are at least green, and the kids think they are great.  Mr. Crafty World is always teasing the kids, telling them that their birthday parties will be weed-pulling parties, etc.  So on Saturday I suggested that we give the kids a penny for each dandelion head they pick off, and that way they won't spread so fast and we would only be out a couple of dollars.  Like three dollars maybe.  He thought it was a great idea so we recruited Our Favorite Girl who is always eager to earn a few loonies.  She worked and worked, and soon Our Favorite Boy came out to work his share of the two or three dollars.  They asked if buds counted for a penny too, and we eagerly said yes, thinking that if we could prevent the next crop from coming up it would be worth the now five dollars we figured we would have to pay.

The kids worked and worked, and when it was time to count the dandelion flowers and buds, Mr. Crafty World and I ended up forking out seventeen dollars to our little workers!  We have since implemented an hourly rate for weed pulling.

Have a great day everyone!