The Good Shepard

This picture was sent to me in an e-mail. It was taken of an outside Nativity at a church somewhere. The dog stayed in that spot all night. Nobody knows where he came from or where he went. Just a Good Shepard that needed to rest...

A Christmas Wish Amoung Friends!

Don"t forget your precious pets this Christmas!

Sign at the door "NO PICTURES"

Well ladies, I went to The Victorian Mansion on Sat. with my 2 DIL"s and it was GORGEOUS! This one picture I got off from their web-site as we were NOT allowed to take pictures AND we were also instructed NOT to touch anything..well they would have had to tie my hands behind my back for that one! As we entered in the foyer they had a tree with guilded pears and a gorgeous partridge on the top. Then of course as the song goes there were 2 turtle doves, 3 french hens, 4 calling birds scattered about in different arrangements and very elegantly decorated trees.. these were in the dining room, and the table-runner on that table was actually 2 strips about 6" wide, and OMG I HAD to touch them...I would loved to have cut a piece off from that!! THEN comes the beautiful stairway with 22 sets of Five Golden Rings amoungst the garland and sheer fabric swags leading to the bedrooms upstairs.The next room had 6 geese-a-laying, canadian geese that is with the tree decorated with natural elements. And oh the 7 swans-a swimming was such an elegant room. The floor was all mirrors with snow and white lights glistening through the snow, silver twigs adorned with white lights, the tree decorated in blue, silver, and white. Beautiful!
Tomorrow I"ll do a part #2 which definately includes my favorite room. I could not get the link to hook up to my blog so if your interested you can google, Christmas at Victoria Mansion, Portland, Maine there are 2 videos you can watch as a small tour..Please let me know if you do..

The Victorian Mansion & The Nutcracker

Busy, busy day today! I"m off with my DIL to Portland to tour The Victorian Mansion which is all decked out for Christmas. Each year they decorate in a different theme, this year being "The 12 Days Of Christmas"..And if that"s not enough they have a giftshop featuring all things victorian! Can"t wait! Then I"m headed back home to see The Nutcracker tonight at The Opera House! I have never seen it so I"m excited for that too...will be back tomorrow with plenty of pictures!

OMG

Good gravy, what is wrong with me anyway? This blogging thing is not getting any easier for me. The link I posted again still doesn"t work, now I can"t remember how to get rid of it SO please bear with me as I try to do this again. To check Rebeccas gorgeous give-away please go to her blog at (gee I hope I get this right before it"s too late to sign up) http://rebecca-gatheryeroses.blogspot.com/

Correction-Rebeccas blog

Oh dear Rebecca, I"m so sorry I got the link wrong for your blog..so please everyone check here... rebecca-gatheryeroses.blogspot.com

ANOTHER Give-away from Rebecca

Rebecca from A Gathering of Thoughts is having another gorgeous give-away. This time you can win this delightful pink snowman pillow, matching card & tea-bag! Who wouldn"t love a snowman, and a pink one at that! Check out Rebeccas blog at http://rebecca-gatheryroses.blogspot.com/

A Gorgeous Give-away

Rebecca from A Gathering Place is having a very sweet give-away. This beautiful lavender filled sachet with gorgeous laces, milanary flowers and ribbons. Hop on over to her blog and while your there check out her etsy shop with all its delights. Tell her I sent you http://rebeccagatheryroses.blogspot.com

Crinkle Ribbons

I did a little experiment the other day. I had seen on the internet that you can make your own crinkle ribbon with seam binding! I had a few old pkgs. in my stash (original price, 19 cents)! You wet it, scrunch it up, dry it, scrunch it again, and there you have it, easy peasy, crinkled ribbon! I"m sure this will make gorgeous flowers.

Even when you stretch it out it still holds its crinkles..I"m pretty sure every thrift store around has old seam binding that somebody did not know what to do with! As they say, "One mans trash, is another mans (womens) treasure!

FINALLY!!!!

Well, where the heck have I been and what have I been doing?? I haven"t been anywhere and I am now finally back in the swing of things(I hope) and am in a Winter/Christmas DYB RR in CQI. This is the 1st block that I received to work on which belongs to Cathy L.. You see in a DYB RR we have to make up 6 -6" blocks and each girl does one complete block. We send around a little book to go with the blocks requesting what we would like to see on our blocks. Cathy just said do what Christmas means to you & have fun! So I chose this block with this adorable little girl and went to town. I surrounded her with pine boughs with sequins & beads. Also every spot I could find I added snowflakes! Then we have a lightpost similar to this one at the end of our driveway (dooryard for my friends in Colorado) and I thought it would look nice on this block. So Cathys blocks were mailed off Nov.1st to Lorrie in Canada to work her magic on another block!

I have now received Wendys block and have picked one and having a ball working on hers as well. Her request was to stick to winter rather than Christmas...When I have her block finished I"ll post a pic...In the meantime I"ll leave you with this hint....Have you ever looked in the winter sky and seen a snowman sleeping on a lacey crescent moon??? While were on the subject of snowmen, do you think if a snowman farts does his butt melt?? I"ll leave you with that thought!

"Are you a teacher?"

A little observation here..... One day this week I was shopping at a big name office supply store here in town, they were having a "Back to school" sale. These composition notebooks were on sale for .10 cents a piece. So to take advantage of such a good price I grabbed 10 of them along with a few other items and proceeded to the cash. Now mind you the display where these notebooks were was quite high, and they had several displays the same, they must have had a ga-zillion of them! The girl at the cash said to me, "there is a limit of 3 per customer." There was no sign saying that nor did it say that in the sales flyer..anyway I said to her, "oh I didn"t realize there was a limit." She then says to me, "well wait, are you a teacher?" She kind of caught me off guard there for a minute, after all there were a ga-zillion of these on display! I thought for a moment and I said, "yes, yes I am a teacher. I am a mother and I have taught my children all of their lives as my mother taught me. Isn"t part of our purpose in life to be a teacher?" She was so surprised by my answer that she just scanned my items including my 10 notebooks, said have a nice day and off I went! My poor hubby just looked at me and shook his head..SO what do you say, if someone asks you if your a teacher, what would your response be?

Gerrys Give-away!!

My dear friend Gerry http://olderrose.blogspot.com/ is having an awesome give-away. You must hop on over to her blog and check it out! There are 2 awesome prizes, the 1st being one of her GO-A-JUS pincushions. I have seen these in person and they are to die for.

The 2nd prize on her give-away are some of her again GO-A-JUS birds painted on mother of pearl buttons. I have also been fortunate to see these in person AND sat right next to her when she did a class at the retreat..fun, fun, fun! SO ladies for a chance to win hop on over to her blog and leave a comment for a chance to win!!!!!

A Whole DIFFERENT kind of Victorian!

This is Uga, he is a 2 yr. old Victorian Bulldog and has come to live with Todd & Melissa. I have always said I love, love, love anything Victorian mostly because of its delicate beauty. You tell me, what do you think? Here he is getting a bath.

Don"t forget my wrinkles mama!

This is Sunshine, she came to live with them last winter and she certainly is a beauty..

This is their family picture, Todd, Uga, Melissa & Sunshine sitting on the steps of their brand new home. Life is good!

My Mother

August 19th 1912-Dec. 24th 2009
I could not let the day go by without acknowledging today would have been my mothers 98th birthday. After 12 yrs. living with Alzeheimers Disease she passed away on Christmas Eve last year. I love and miss her so much..

It"s been a while!

Wow it certainy has been a while hasn"t it?? Well you know what they say, "life" gets in the way sometimes and it kind of did. But things are better now and I have started to stitch again.. This 1st picture is for everyone who commented on my sewing room saying it looked too neat and organized. Well so much for that. This is what it looks like when I am "creating"!

One table just isn"t enough sometimes. I was in the process of piecing the Victorian tree-skirt I am doing. I"m thinking this will be a long project as there are 12 wedges for this tree-skirt. I"ll probably be lucky if I do one a month. Sometimes things take me longer than they should as I am easily distracted..then when going through supplies, let"s say I"m looking for a small piece of lace, it seems ALL the lace comes out even after I think I have the right one. I should just pick one and use it but I keep searching in case there"s a better one somewhere..am I the only one that does that??

This is the 1st wedge I have chosen to work on, some of these wedges I pieced on the machine then I wanted to try my hand at hand pieing and I must say I liked the hand-piecing alot..

This is one of the many gorgeous silkies I have chosen to put on wedge #1. The holly leaves on this are a blue-gray so I chose to outline some with Krenik metallic thread and of course holly berries with silk ribbon french knots.

Isn"t she just the cutest little angel you"ve ever seen. I highlighted her wing with Krenik blending filament. This is the first time I really get into doing the hair and I love it. I used reg. DMC threads and boullion stitches. Fun, fun, fun. I"ll post some more pics as I go along and thanks for stopping by..

Another Give-away!

My dear friend Kerry http://kerrykatiecakes2.blogspot.com is haveing an awesome give-away on her blog. While your there visiting scrolldown and check out her quilt she made for AAQI that will travel with the exhibit for Alzeheimers Disease, "Heartbreak To Hope." Her piece is stunning and is for such an awesome cause,to help raise money for research for this horrible disease that pulls at everyones heartstrings. This cause is very near and dear to me as my mother passed away on Christmas Eve after living with this disease for 12 years.

I know I haven"t kept my blog up very well but will post this week pics of the Victorian Christmas tree-skirt I"m working on. Also I"ll show you a pic of what my new sewing room looks like while I"m "creating." Not so neat and tidy anymore......

Great give-away & a new etsy shop!!

My friend Cathy http://cathyscrazybydesign,blogspot.com is having an awesome give-away to celebrate her new etsy shop (http://cathyscrazybydesign.etsy.com Best of luck to you Miss Cathy! Please check out her blog and stop by her etsy while your there!!!

A Give-away!

Pat Winters is having an awesome give-away! Be sure to check it out on her blog at Pat Winters Gathering.blogspot.com

ALL MOVED IN!!!!

This is the corner I said I was going to have as much surrounding me as I possibly could. And I did! Sewing machine central...

Well I couldn"t have EVERYTHING around me, so if I need anything over here I actually have to get up from my comfy chair. The wooden cabinet to the left is something my son made for me for Christmas one year...it"s got my supplies for dying and stuffed with fabric as well.

This little form I bought when I went to Colorado last year..See the neat butterfly, I am supposed to try and make one of these. The wings will be easy enough but I"m not quite sure what to use for the body as it needs to be pretty sturdy. Any ides ladies please let me know.

More pics tomorrow of a few of my all time favorite things I have surrounding me in my sewing room...oh yeh, all moved in but haven"t done any stitching at all. Super busy with yardwork, yardwork, yardwork!!!

Sewing room almost ready

Had to sneak in a picture of my little (ah, I mean big-112 lbs.) helper! This is Bentley, he"s a Choclate Lab and I would love to have 1/2 of his energy.. This is the corner that I will have as much stuff surrounding me as I possibly can. The room is clean, ceiling painted, walls washed and carpet cleaned. Yes a RED carpet, and it"s staying.

This is my "thread tree". It really is a towel holder for the bathroom but now it holds some of my threads.

Sneak peek at some of my organizing, old jewelery parts, charms, faces and large beads.

My lace motifs.

I am actually almost done moving in this room. I must say, my hubby was right, I did manage to fill it up in no time with all my things...ah Heaven....

Next post--All Moved In!!!

What a beautiful mess I"m in!!!

This is a picture of my son painting the ceiling in my new sewing room. This was my youngest sons bedroom but he has just bought a new home and moved out a few weeks ago, so I lay claim to his room as it"s so much bigger than the sewing room I already have. Only thing is the wallpaper & border in here are fishing. The wallpaper is flies for fly fishing and the border is fish. Guess what? I"m NOT changing it. Too much of an expense, too much work and besides it is still in good shape, so it stays. I will probably hang so much stuff on the wall it won"t matter anyway!

Cleaning out the old sewing room.

And check out this mess! I"m actually trying to get things organized before I move in the other room. Hopefully by next week I"ll be all moved in my new room so I can finally get stitching again...will post more pics as I move..

Another great give-away!

Please run over to Nicki Lees blog and check out her great give-away. (mention my name too). Pretty creative lady that Nicki Lee!

http://www.cqnickilee.blogspot.com/

Give-away!

Please hop on over and check out Kathys give-away and check out her awesome etsy shop while your there!


http://www.shawkl.com/

CQI Purse contest pictures!

This is a close up view of the front view of the purse I made for the CQI purse contest. I can now blog about it because today the winneres were announced..NO I did not win, but with all the creative talented bunch of girls that made purses it"s no wonder. The winners were all gorgeous and truly deserved to win.

This is the back side of the purse.

Front side of the purse.. I"ve decided that next year I would like to pull some creative "magic" out of my hat and enter the contest again. It"s all fun!

Now for some other news, since my youngest son moved out I have been busy taking over his bedroom. I already have a sewing room but oh his bedroom is SO much bigger. I"ve had the ceiling painted, I need to wash walls and move right in. I"ve been going through my stuff and getting things ready to move in there. My hubby insists that within a very short time that this room won"t be big enough for me either. I"ll post pictures of this "process" shortly!! So stay tuned.....

BIG changes around here!

This is a picture of my youngest sons new home. Brandon & his girlfriend Sandy have decided to become homeowners at the ripe old age of 22, and 21. We are very proud of them as they are both good kids. So last weekend Brandon moved out of his family home. So now my hubby and I are empty nesters. I have to learn to cook for just 2 people, laundry just once a week...big changes for us around here.. I love my quiet time but I also love having a house full too... Now keep in mind we have a 5 bedroom , 2 bath home. What the hell am I supposed to do with a big house like this now? I may now move my sewing room into Brandons old bedroom as it is much bigger than the room I have now. There"s work to be done there before I can even begin to move in there. I"ll be sure to take pics as I go along..I have done absolutely no stitching for a few weeks now but hope to be back to it soon...

This is my son Brandon and his cute little girlfriend Sandy. They have actually been together 4 yrs. now. I wish them all the luck in the world in their new home and as I said before, we are very proud of them.

Well until next time, hopefully pics of my new sewing room and some stitching too..

A give-away!

My friend Cathy K. is having an awesome give-away on her blog, please check it out, the link is below.


http://www.cathyscrazybydesign.blogspot.com/

Things I learned from the Easter Bunny!!!!

I"d like to share with you a few things I learned from the Easter Bunny--- Everyone needs a friend who is all ears
There"s no such thing as too much candy
All work and no play can make you a basket case
Everyone is entitled to a bad hare day
Let happy thoughts multiply like rabbits
Some body parts SHOULD be floppy
Good things come in small sugar coated packages
The best things in life are still sweet & gooey
Last but not least--don"t put all your eggs in one basket!!!

HAPPY EASTER!!!!

Progress on the house!

This is the progress so far on Todd & Melissa"s new home. Sorry for the smudge in the picture, it is rain, which it"s supposed to do for a few days. The windows are in, the siding is on two sides (rain delay). They are working on the plumbing and the wiring and things are going well. They are very excited!!! Maybe next time some inside pictures....Debbie

Almost done!

Where have I been for 2 weeks? I"ve been right here plugging along working on this piece quite a bit. Be sure to click on the picture to enlarge it so you can see the beads. All the tiny sweetheart roses have beads in the center, and the leaves took quite a bit of time also. Still not sure about a few of the appliques I have just pinned down. I think I over-think my choices too much. Oh well!

This picture here really shows all the leaves and can you see the cute little bear I used for the center of the flower. Every little girl needs a bear!

So this is near the end, now I have to re-paint the frame it will go in and that will be it. I do have a few other projects I"m working on for CQI but I can"t blog about them yet.....stay tuned..........hugs & best stitches, Debbie

LOVE those little girl silkies!

I always forget and I load the pictures wrong so rather than change I will explain. This is the fan which I will work on next. I plan on doing more embellishing with beads and SRE, and I think I see a few tiny dragonflies on there as well. This is the butterfly I beaded on the edge of the silkie.

This is a gorgeous piece of lace that I bought at some fancy smancy store in Colorado. It is much prettier in person.I added gold beads to the centers of the flowers then did some dragonflies. The wings are done using silk ribbon floss..

This is the embellishing I"ve done so far on the little girl silkie. Oh how I love these little girl silkies! Maybe the fact that I have 3 boys has something to do with it. When I made "sane" quilts it was always hunting or fishing related or some kind of wild-life. Now they all have quilts of their own I can play with something more feminine and these silkies are my favorite! I"ve embellished with lots of SRE sweetheart roses and rose-buds. I have not added any leafs yet as I don"t want them to get smushed up while I finish so will save those for later..

Gotta go for now, supper is cooking...turkey and all the fixings..YUMO!!! the weather is gorgeous here today, in the 50"s. Even have a few windows open to let the fresh air in. I guess Spring IS here!