As the days get shorter

I become less motivated. I love lot's of warm sunny days. And now that darkness comes to soon in the day I find myself setting more than doing. That on top of cold for me is not a good combination. This is how seasonal depression feels. I know I need to snap out of it but that is easy to say and not so easy to do. I have lot's of projects I really need to be doing and have even learned a for me new knitting technique for knitting in the round called the magic loop. Beats those dbl pointed needles.

I really can't wait till this election is over. and here it is October 30th and still have not fully decided who I will vote for. I was all set but as it gets closer I wonder if either is a good candidate. It's kinda like should I just go to the polls close my eyes and punch and hope for the best.

Thinking pink in October

For the whole month of October I will be giving these away with every purchase in my Etsy shop.

They are made from polymer clay, and the pin backs are baked on.

you can use these for years to come

Practice makes perfect

or at least that is what I hear. The more I play with my polymer clay the more ideas I come up with. I figured out how to make a bracelet and how to make my own bails for making necklaces. I have a few pics but will be showing more soon

The longest part of doing polymer clay is conditioning. Seems like it takes forever to get the clay conditioned and yes I do have a pasta machine. I would say I probally have most of the goodies required for doing a lot of polymer clay work.

Polymer clay and shaving cream?

Well the other day I was surfing the web and found on mylifetime.com crafts. I was excited so I checked it out and there was directions for doing polymer clay with shaving cream. I had the supplies so I started playing. Now you have to keep in mind that if your item need a hole you out that in before you start the process. Using a heat gun starts the baking process and to try and put your hole in after will make it crumble.

you will need:
shaving cream
polymer clay
alcohol ink
heat gun
small bowl
tooth picks or a small paint brush


prepare your clay

Take your shaving cream and put some in a bowl
add a few drops of your ink using 2 different colors and mix
using your brush apply over the raw clay
use your heat gun as this will melt the shaving cream and spread the dyes

Bake as usual

For more info on this fun craft you can go to www.mylifetime.com

So cute I had to blog this

I found the cutest store on Etsy that sales these adorable costumes and tutu's. 2 QT 4 WORD'S Perfect for Halloween or those cute little ballet classes. You will not find anything this cute in a store.

She is even happy to do custom orders for you too just give her a convo. By clicking on the pictures you can go straight to her store

Home made Chicken Stew

As fall approaches I and especially my husband look forward to the cooler days and a pot of home made chicken stew. Talk about comfort food this is so good and just warms you all over.

Here is how to make it

Ingredients

chicken, better with breast and some dark meat
butter
evaporated milk
whole milk
salt to taste
flour


wash and skin your chicken, using a large pot fill with enough water to cover your chicken and cook till done. Add your butter to the water and chicken.

Remove the chicken and let it cool because you will be removing it from the bones.
using a strainer and another pot strain your broth so as to remove any possible bones that may be in there.

Take 5 tablespoons of flour and put in a plastic container with a lid, add some whole milk.
place lid on and shake till flour mixture is dissolved, you can also use a wire whisk for mixing this as well.

Place your strainer over the pot and pour the flour mixture in. By using the strainer you will eliminate lumps. Stir the mixture in the pot. If it doesn't appear to be thick enough repeat above process.

Add your evaporated milk and your whole milk, keeping your burner on med so as not to scorch the soup. Add your chicken and stir. When hot, ladle yourself a big bowl with crackers and sprinkle a little pepper.

Refrigerate the leftovers

Free form crochet meets scrapbooking

I have been dabbling into some free form crocheting which I enjoy very much so I came up with this fun little book holder or could be a pocketbook. After crocheting I decided to embellish it with all these fun scrap booking elements and added a chain for carrying. It will hold an average size book and the embellishments are removable if desired

knitting jewery

I love small projects and what's better than jewelry.
My local yarn shop has even started careing beads and supplies for making your own jewelry.
Then I spotted this incredible yarn there that is cotton, hand dyed and an incredible 33 dollars a skein and I could not resist.

I can even string seed beads on it and knit or crochet away with breath taking results.

Makeing a good pan of gravy

Being from the south I hate going to a restaurant and ordering gravy and biscuits and when it arrives the gravy is white and thick almost like paste or as my mom calls it thickening and in some cases where is the sausage? Now I learned how to cook from my mom and granny and they are true southern cooks. I remember my first pan of gravy when I was 15 and you could have actually paved the driveway with it. I would say that now a lot of years later I have mastered making some good gravy.

Ingredients:

Sausage

flour

milk

salt

pepper (optional)

Crumble your sausage in frying pan and cookwhen sausage is done take the sausage out and drain on a paper towel to remove excess grease and to prevent burning.

Add your flour amount depends on how much grease is still in your pan.

Keep a close eye on this. keep stirring and for a good brown gravy you let it get almost to the point of burned you want it to get to a dark brown.

Add your milk and keep stirring as the gravy starts to thicken return your sausage to the pan and continue to stir. If it appears to thick add a little more milk till it is the right thickness for you.

Serve on toast or biscuits

Sun Painting

Now this is fun. It is a special kind of paint that you can imprint items in the sun. I did this on a velvet scarf. Now this is only my second project using this but you can do this on fabric, and papers. As hot as it is right now in NC it doesn't take long for the design to imprint onto the paper or fabric and for it to dry as well. I love this stuff. The paint is a little more expensive than the tie dyes but you can be really versatile with it. Here is the velvet scarf or more like a wrap that I did. I would love your comments on this please.

Please help this ebay seller out

I have been selling on EBay for a few years now and also lead a couple of groups

doing this I have some great people all over the place. In my group Women over 40 we have a member who sells her items on Ebay to take care of the animals that she rescues.
She depends on this to make sure that the animals are fed and well taken care of until they can be adopted.
Well unfortunally about a week and a half ago she was out riding her horse Rosie and was hit head on bya drunk driver. Killing Rosie, Sara ended up with a broken arm and foot.
Her ebay name is lrfncritters and she could use the help now.Take a look at her auctions and maybe bid. She has some great childrens book up right nowthat are old and awesome. By clicking on the picture you can go straight to her auction.

Love the fun things being done with my buttons

I have had several great artist on Etsy to buy buttons from me and I love seeing what they have come up with. The first is Hemplady4u She took and made a beautiful bracelet and a necklace. Now if you are a fan of hemp jewelry check her store out. You will not be disappointed.

Next is sheilascrafts She crochets pretty little button bracelets, makes the coolest crochet monster bags. These bags are perfect for little girls. Check out her shop.

Later this week I will show off some other items that have my polymer clay buttons on them

Tie one on

More barefoot fun as I just crocheted these and they tie around the ankle. Very sexy and comfortable. Looks great with a skirt or capris.

This book is amazing for free form crochet

This is an older book from 1975 and it has some amazing pictures in it as well as directions for making your own free form designs, and since I have 2 I decided to put one on Ebay

and by clicking on the ebay name or the picture you can go straight to my auction and check out this amazing book.

Getting ready for the holidays

I don't believe it is ever to early to start your holiday projects, I just listed these 2 bracelets and hope to do more soon. Just click on the pics and go straight to my shop

Is it really wool or cotton yarn?

Read the label. What says cotton or wool yarn may not be so much. Why is this important?
because if you are going to be dyeing or felting it makes all the difference. Of course I have learned the hard way. Just because it says alpaca doesn't necessarily mean that it is 100 percent. It may be 20 percent and the rest acrylic and that will not felt.

Same with the cottons just because it says it is cotton yarn it might be only 20 percent maybe less and the rest acrylic and if you are looking to dye either the cotton or wool you will be disappointed in the end. So once again read the label

There is a lot of work involved in wanting a felted item and quite disappointing to knit or crochet something, wash in hot water just waiting for the felting process and you pull it out and nothing magic has happened.

So when I am wanting to felt an item or dye my yarn I read those labels.

Teaching a polymer clay class

This was so much fun. Our local yarn shop Knit Picky is haveing a camp this summer and I had the pleasure of teaching there today. We made our own knitting needles with polymer clay topers and they did an amazing job. I love the creativity and imagination of children because they will just go and make the greatest things. I look forward to my next class in July.

After the class I went and had a nice lunch with my son Jason. Now it is relax time.

Up close and personal with the bee balm

I planted this last year in hopes of attracting butterflies and maybe even a humming bird.

I love the pretty red tubular petals of this flower and it goes so well with my cone flowers and my butterfly bush. Yesterday while I was setting close by I saw a beautiful orange butterfly come by for food. As I set and watched I just had to go inside for my camera. Now I didn't get the butterfly, perhaps another day I did grab my micro lenses and decided to get up close and personal with the bee balm. I really like what I saw. I love photographing flowers and really getting into the flower to see all of it's beauty.

From shirts to yarn

Well I went beyond the shirt to yarn. This takes a lot more time but well worth it when I see the finished product. The first set of 7 is a cotton yarn that has been dyed. This is a long process as it requires the dye to set for 12-24 hours and then the drying process can take 1 to 2 days.

The picture of the 9 skeins are where I did 2 skeins of wool. Totally differant dying process but same amount of time for the drying process. You know you can't stick these in the dryer right?

And the best part is they are one of a kind. I couldn't duplicate these if I tried.

Now do I sell them or do I keep them

A new beginning

If you have ever planted perennials you know the excitement of them blooming from year to year. I planted these last year and have been waiting for them to bloom this summer. They are just getting started and the blooms are heavy especially on my bee balm. These pics are of the bee balm and the purple cone flower and I threw in a day lily that is already showing off.

My neice Angie graduated today

After 13 long years in school my neice Angie graduated today at South Stokes High School.

It was a very hot day, temps in the 90's but I would not have missed it for nothing.

The pictures are her in her cap and gown, Angie and her grandma and greatgrandma, (my mom and granny) Angie with her grandma (my mom) as well as her cake. And Angie and her mom (my sister)

In memory of my daddy

It has been 1 year today since my daddy passed away after a 5 year battle with bladder cancer.

I remember getting up that morning to head to the hospital and for some reason just knew I needed to get there, I didn't even shower just got dressed and took off. On the way I got a phone call and it was a friend of the family who had spent the night at the hospital and she said Debbie you need to get here, Yall are going to need to make a decision about putting your dad on life support. I cried all the way to the hospital. I called my son and my husband.

When I got there my mom and the doctor were standing in the doorway. The decision had to be made now was what his doctor said. My sister and brother were on the way and there was no time to wait. My dad had already fallen into a deep sleep and the doctor told me he would never wake up.

Knowing my dad was a christian man and was on the verge of meeting God I knew he would not want to be put on life support to just hang in limbo. So I looked at my mom and told her we should let him go, he didn't need to suffer any more.

They let us come in the room then and my dad was laying there with an oxygen mask on and struggling to take each breath. They told us to talk to him that he would be able to hear us.

That was the hardest thing I have ever done. I remember looking at the nurse and asking her " is my dad dying" and she said yes.

We were all around his bed when he passed, my mom, me my husband, my sister and her husband and daughter and my brother and his wife and friends right outside the room.

My daddy held on till my brother got there and when he said "daddy I'm here" my dad took 2 more breaths and was gone.

I knew he was meeting God. My dad had alway's said that when he died the first thing he was going to do was to kiss Jesus's feet.

And it was amazing the peace that was in that room at that moment and the strength that you can have even at the hardest moment of your life.

We all miss him every day.