Farewell 2010! Au Revoir!

And so we close down the days of 2010 and prepare to open the New Year into which we shall traverse with merry steps for at least the first two weeks.

After that, all bets are off!

Red and White, snow and hollyberries

Still feel like I don't have enough RED and WHITE stuff! I am just loving the red and white this Christmas season. So I decided to whip up a little throw for the back of the sofa. My challenge was to use just what I had on hand and not buy ONE THING for this project.  Heaven knows I've got enough in my fabric stash to make many a quilt...but there is always just one thing you want to add to it and the next thing you know you are at the fabric store buying lots more fabric!

So here it is. It took 2 days.

I really whipped it together. It's 8 inch squares, with  machine zig-zagging all around...including the binding! I had no idea how that would work or look but I like the effect. I would like to do this with deep browns and greens, next! Use up some of that fabric stash!

A Santa Sighting!

Yesterday I went to meet a friend for Sushi Lunch. It required going on the Business 80 past the Arden Mall Corridor which means MAYHEM and MADNESS on the highway.

It can take 10 minutes to merge onto the freeway and then another 15 just to get to the next exit where more people are trying to merge onto the freeway.

In the middle of all this merging the retard designers of the freeway itself have placed 2 lanes that END abruptly and you have to merge left because there is nowhere left to go.

So it's always a bottleneck and during Holiday Shopping Time it's just awful.

Yesterday, I was waiting and waiting to merge...creeping along slowly because my lane was going to END in an embankment if I didn't get over...and nobody was budging whatsoever. It's like their attitude is: I'm in a lane that works, screw you!

When suddenly, what should appear behind me but a small red vehicle being driven by...SANTA CLAUS! And he waved me right in! And I merged ahead of him and looked into my rear view mirror and sitting beside him in a bad white hair wig was MRS. CLAUS! You don't see them out for a spin together very often!

They both had Rosy Red Cheeks and Santa, who was not wearing his hat in the car, had flowing white locks and a very beautiful snowy white beard! Very real! And perched on his nose was a lovely pair of gold wire rim glasses.

It just gave me the happiest day, in that moment!

Santa is an excellant driver!

Out with the Old In With the New!

 
Oh I love it when I get to salvage something and fix it up and make it brand new again!

Last year I managed to get bleach on my Christmas PJ's! 

Out Damned Spot, OUT I say!

But they are barely worn and still so cute and the colors are bright and merry...

So I cut the good part out of the t-shirt and sewed it onto a new t-shirt and VIOLA!! I have re-made, re-tread Christmas PJ's!

Winter Blues

Yes, I've got a case of the Winter blues!  Or maybe I should say the Silver and Blues!

I have been dealing with a big flare-up of my fibromyalgia, and with that comes a good deal of depression. Work is slow right now, I'm always on the verge of homelessness anyway, and it all starts to pile up on me in ways that dry up my creativity and make me feel very, very blue.

And yet, I love these dark days of winter! I do not mind the grey, grey skies or the rainy nights. I don't mind the cold or the dreary drip-drip-drip of water falling off the trees. All that seems minor if you've grown up in the Midwest and know what REAL cold weather, gloom and winter feel like! HA!

Occasionally I like to close my eyes and imagine I am  back home again in Indiana, walking the icicle streets on one of those silverthaw mornings. So I guess that is what inspired these new blue cards, which I will be using for my New Years Greeting Cards! Which is just around the corner, isn't it? New years.

Anybody want some unmounted rubber stamps? The theme is Victorian clip art. They are very cool! They are already mounted on cushion. I used these with a plastic block and double sticky tape for stamping. I'm selling the whole grab bag for 20 bucks. It's at least 40 stamps, very good quality, too! It's just time to ring out the old, ring in the new! And this year I want to pare down my 'stuff' to even more minimal stature. I've just got TOO MUCH STUFF!



I have had some fun lately: it hasn't all been pain and plodding! I got to meet a blogging heroine of mine: Kimberly Morales of "Poor Girl Eats Well" She is a local woman who creates her own recipes on the tightest of shoe-string budgets and comes up with some wonderful edibles. She lives only about 8 blocks from me and had a garage sale this last weekend. So I tracked her down and introduced myself and it was really neat and fun. Go check out her blog (on the sidebar) and she is also on Facebook.

I hope you are all having a wonderful, blessed, light and love filled pre-Christmas pre-solstice Holiday Season everybody!

It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas...

Sometimes things just come together and make magic!

I love how this turned out! And it was just a fluke when I put it together.

I took my normal pitcher: because I can't live in a world without pitchers, can you? and I decided to use it for the handful of poinsettias and plastic holly that I got last year at the Dollar Tree.

And then I just decided to string some teeny white lights through them. Because teeny white lights that are twinkly but not BLINKING are very pretty and make everything look like fairyland, don't you think?