Sue's World

Bulbs, Bulbs Everywhere!

In this past week, I've dealt with more bulbs than ever before.  The day after Thanksgiving I put up Christmas lights at home.  The next day I put them up at the cabin.  And today I FINALLY finished planting the last of the flower bulbs.

I planted at least 200 bulbs today:  daffodils, muscari, iris, and freesia.  With the warm weather I thought this was a smart time to finish the job.  I should have had these in the ground at least a month ago but things kept getting in the way including cold snaps and rain.  But today there was no excuse.  I still have a few pony packs of plants and winter vegetables to go but those can wait a bit.

I've already enjoyed the Christmas lights and before I know it will enjoy the late Winter/early Spring flowers.  Now we just need a little more rain in the near future; I'm already going to pay the price for not watering the sweet pea seedlings at the back of the yard.  I suspect most of those are too far gone to resuscitate.  

P.S. Yesterday I did something fun:  I raked leaves!  Yes, the gardener comes tomorrow and would have taken care of it, but the big sycamore leaves strewn all about the front yard and driveway were irresistible.  I wished we lives in a place where it was okay to have leaf-strewn yards but...

Spring Luncheon

A couple of times a year our women's bible study has a luncheon.  Each group decorates their own table and, of course, I had to sign up to do it.  I promise that next year others will get to do it...

I had in mind birds and nests and, over time, that morphed into more of a natural Spring theme.  I wanted real flowers so I got several pony packs of flowers.  With some I took out the individual plants and plopped them into clear party drink glasses.  With a few I put the whole pack into a baking pan and put individual plants around it to make it full and then filled a basket.

I love doing crafts but don't have too many opportunities to do them so I decided it was the right time.  I had a butterfly project in mind.  I found butterfly images on the internet and created a file with mirror images of them.  I found by printing the same file on both sides of card stock I would have a paper butterfly with printing on the front and the back. I cut them out and then glued them onto wires that I bent and then stuck those in with the flowers.

  So now I had a garden theme but still wanted t get my birds in there.  I played with paper birds but they lacked the dimension.  Duh - I decorate with birds in the home so I just grabbed a bunch of them from display and brought them along.  The result was my indoor garden.  It was a lot of fun.

I also cut some flowers and put them in a vase to add some dimension to the table.  After the party, I had the pleasure of planting the pony packs in our front yard.  Talk about recycling!

 

Valentine's Day Table

 I volunteered to decorate the table for our Bible Study luncheon.  I really wanted to do a Spring/Bird theme but it was the week before Valentine's Day so I changed my plan.

The flowering plum tree provided me with lovely pink blooming branches so I just put them in a nice vase and that was the centerpiece.  I had a great time making custom hearts for the table.  With the exception of the large red foil hearts, I cut out every heart by hand, including the foil heart centers.  The little red boxes on the dessert plates contained a little box of conversation hearts.

What fun it was to do something really different.  Each table had a different look but they were all very creative and cheerful.  Can't wait for the Spring luncheon in a couple of months!

Fall Has Arrived At the Antiki Hut

It happened.  I was at Green Thumb yesterday to buy Fall bedding plants.  They had little bales of straw and scarecrows and pumpkins and it felt so much like Fall!  I bought marigolds, snapdragons, and purple salvia. 

Earlier I'd drive up Copperhill drive in Saugus.  The street is lined with maples and many of them show a good amount of red in them.

At Walmart today, I couldn't resist buying a little sugar pumpkin.  Fall decorating has begun.  I dug out the Fall decorations and started.  First thing was actually to put wood and kindling next to the fireplace (as I'm typing, the A/C is on, but I don't care).  Then I lit the Yankee Candle Harvest candle and that immediately makes it smell like Fall.  The downstairs bathroom is decorated:  foliage, pumkins, squirrels, and yummy candles. 

I'll do more tomorrow.  It's a great way to ensure the house gets a thorough cleaning!  I'm thinking I may skip decorating for Halloween this year and just have a couple of months of Fall stuff out.  We'll see....

So Here We Are

So it's Saturday.  It feels like a Saturday.  I baked hubby's favorite blueberry coffeecake for breakfast.  Mmmm!

I hung few more pictures in hubby's local office and went to one store at the mall for a couple of items.  I like when I actually find what I need and then it's on sale and I can use a coupon.  Cha-ching!

I worked on my first ceramics project.  We're going to be doing a class project, a bas relief mural where we each contribute a tile.  This week's assignment was to create a 4" test tile.  Now I'm know for doing flower art in class so I made it a point not to do a flower.  I kept thinking and thinking.  I recently saw a greeting card where a cat is eating a lizard.  The text is a spoof of the insurance company whose "spokesman" is a gecko.  You know the one.  I decided that was a bit too much but then started looking at pictures of Zorro, our striped cat.

I took an old photo of him and then started playing around with it in Photoshop.   I really just altered the look of it to bring out a higher contrast level.  I decided my piece should have a bird in it so I photoshopped one in. 

Yes, it's silly and that's exactly what I wanted to play with.  We each got a clay "tile" that's about 3/4" thick.  The idea is to carve it.  This is way out of my league but I gave it my best effort.  I traced Zorro's outline on the clay and started carving.  I decided not to carve the bird but instead to add the bird to give it more of a 3-dimensional feel.  I carved and carved and when I felt good about it, I stopped. 

I wrapped it up in plastic to it can start to dry, but very slowly.  It's actually helpful to look at the picture instead of the actual tile.  I can see there's some cleanup needed and I think the bird needs tweaking so it doesn't look like a dolphin...

All in all, I was happy with it.  I know what I would do differently next time but I admit it was nice to be encouraged to do something new.  I know some of the others in class weren't so thrilled because normally we're just cut loose to to what we want.  16 out of the 17 enrolled have been in the class before for multiple semesters so it was kind of fun to get a new challenge. 

Goodbye Halloween; Hello Thanksgiving!

This morning I intended to start putting Halloween decorations away.  Before I knew it, all traces of Halloween were gone and now it's decorated for Thanksgiving.  It's so fun to pull things out from their boxes and enjoy decking the house out.

Fittingly, I made mom's Pumpkin Nut Crunch for my Grace Group last night and they loved it.  I served it with vanilla bean ice cream and whipped cream and it was gobbled up (pun not intended).

It won't be too long before our home is filled with the heavenly scent of turkey and all of the trimmings.  We have a lot to be thankful for!

Swiss Photo Collage

At last!  I've finished!  Today I decided to put up the Swiss photo collage I've been working on.  And yes, if you look closely you will see I need to fix the big piece; I didn't secure the photos well enough.

The collage looks better in person where you can see the surroundings.  I centered the big piece vertically against the open thermostat.  The top row is even at the bottom and the bottom row is even at th top.  I learned that from decorator magazines and shows.  When the light is right I will photo graph some of the individual pieces.  I really had fun creating 3-D art out of mismatched pieces.  I knew I wanted some mementos from trips up but wanted it to be sort of fun.  I got that!

In between putting things up, I created some paper mache birds and hearts using soap molds I recently purchased.  It's an experiment but so far, so good.  I guess I was in a create mood today!  I admit that I went to the craft store right before lunch to get the paper mache stuff and ended up with a couple of things for Halloween crafts.  I'll be working on that shortly.  As usual, the "to do" list is long.

Random Saturday Musings

I can't believe my last post was only a little over a week ago.  It seems like an eternity.  I'll write more about that later.  For now, I'm just sort of musing on a Saturday afternoon.  The weather reminds me of a Fall day.  Crisp at night and long into the morning but warming up.  There's a nice breeze and I love it.

I've just finished spray-painting some frames.  I've been looking for decent frames for 2 1/2" x 3 1/2" photos and I finally found a good solution.  I found decent frames at the dollar store.  They are gold plastic but I immediately recognized the potential to transform them.  I sprayed them with plastic-specific primer and then finished them with flat black.  Ooohhhh...so nice!  I'm waiting for the second coat to dry.

In the meantime, I'm assembling my travel packing list and preparation list.  I like to take my time with something like this and get stuff done in advance so there's not the last minute scramble.  If I do this rationally, I avoid "emotional" additions to the suitcase which aren't really needed.  I've almost forgotten what it's like to take an official vacation and it's both exciting and a little scary.

Now I *have* to get away from the computer.  My neck is telling me to get up and get back to moving around.  I'm headed out to get some groceries, some papier-mache material (for a bird-related craft project) and then some lunch.  Right now I'm thinking Taco Bell, but that may change. 

A Perfect Saturday Afternoon

I'll cut out the long series of events that got me here, but today I decided to resume progress on my photo project.  I made four piles:  framed photos ready to hang, empty frames/shadow boxes, empty photo albums/scrapbooks and framed pictures that should be in different frames.  That right there freed up several dresser drawers.  Whew! 

I have another stash of pictures to be framed but now it's reality time.  Do I really want so many photos hanging?  Our whole house could be plastered with fun photos.  So no.  Some need to go into albums even if they're really cool pictures. 

With this project I'm also motivated (again) to decorate the family room. Walls have been bare since January.  Art?  Or photos?  Or some of both.  We'll see.  I have some neat Swiss art pieces that have been stashed in closets and drawers all these years.  Maybe it's time for some of them to make an appearance.

I can never quite stay focused on one thing at a time, so while I'm at it, I'm also doing a little tidying up of my craft supplies.  I found instructions for making "plantable" paper.  It's homemade paper with seeds embedded.  The idea is to plant the paper and have flowers grow.  People use it for bookmarks, wedding favors, etc..  It's something I am to try.  It could make for some fun gift tags or gift cards.  I shredded three old paperbacks and put the shreds into a couple of plastic bags.  So now that goes in the craft closet until I'm ready.  I like having supplies ready to go so when I'm in the crafting mood, I just go into my craft room and pull stuff together.  It saves me time and money.

I can never get an early enough start.  Let's face it.  Christmas is only five months away.  :)

Summer Project - Pictures!

We have drawers full of framed pictures and hanging pictures is perpetually on my "to do" list.  I vividly remember picking a few pictures to hang in our upstairs hallway in preparation of our housewarming party.  That was 9 years ago....

Recently I came across two paintings of birds on silk.  They were from hubby's grandmother.  When we first got them I didn't care for them but I think it was mostly because the frames weren't our style and they looked old.  They're an odd size so for years they sat tucked in a drawer.  I was recently on eBay and was looking at custom frames.  I took a chance and ordered 2 of them for the bird paintings.  Success! 

So now I'm gathering up some odd-sized photos and such and will order more custom-sized frames from the same vendor.  First on the list to be framed is the old photo of my grandmother's family dating back to her childhood.  I've wanted that up for a while now and it's time to get it done.  The board it's mounted on shows the years but I'm going to leave it as is and just pick a frame that looks worn as well.  Then it's time to start hanging things!