Happy Holidays!

This will most likely be my last post until we return from our Holiday trip to southern California. We will be back on New Years eve day and I promise to have lots of fun pictures to share with you.

Today I will be finishing up the wrapping of the gifts, baking some cookies and packing for our trip. We are having a Christmas Eve dinner tomorrow night at my Mom's house. We are all bringing something so it won't be too much of a burden on any one person. I am bringing a brown sugar ham, grilled salmon, corn casserole, and vanilla sweet potatoes.









We will be flying south on Christmas day to spend a week with my dad and family members down there. I am hoping for warmish, dry weather as it has been pretty soggy here lately. We are going to go to the San Diego Wild Animal Park, and Hollywood for sure. The kids really want to see the stars on the sidewalk. My hubby and I have been there before. If anyone knows of a must see place we should go, let me know. We are open to anything interesting the kids might like. We were down there in June and went to Universal Studios, a water park and the beach. We have done Disneyland a couple times before.

Also, I am starting to plan our family vacation to Maui next June. If anyone knows of a good place to stay, I would love to hear about it. I have been online a lot looking at possibilities and I have a couple ideas, just thought I would ask my blog friends if you have any suggestions.

I hope you are all safe and cozy and have a wonderful time with your family this holiday season! Best wishes from our family to yours.

Another Busy Week

The last few days have been spent running around frantically trying to get my shopping done. I think I finally found everything I was looking for so now, on with the wrapping. Wrapping presents is not something I like to do. I usually wait to the last minute and throw things together not really caring how pretty the packages look. My kids don't care what the package looks like, just what's inside it.

I did manage a quick trip to the thrift stores on Tuesday. I didn't realize that Tuesday is .99 day at Value Village. That means anything with the special color of the week is just .99. I really didn't find anything fabulous, but as I was waiting in line, I noticed the lady in front of me had a really cute old pink bowl. I told her what a great find it was and she turned and handed to me and said, "I don't really need this, do you want it?" Well, yeah! It was marked on the bottom $49.99 but since it had a yellow tag and it was Tuesday, it was only .99! What a deal.


Here's a picture. I couldn't stop thanking that nice lady. Oh, and it says Redwing on the bottom of the bowl too. I haven't done any research on it yet, been too busy with other things. But wow, what luck!

Here is another little thing I got at VV. All of their Christmas items are only $1.00 so I picked up this little fabric tree. It didn't come with the vintage rhinestone buttons, those were courtesy of me. Pretty cute I think.















I also got a few of these cuties. I think they will be great for holding goodies to give to friends and neighbors. Wish I got more. They had a ton and they were only .49 each.











These tip trays were also found at VV. There are five of them, all the same. I have never seen any like this before.














This little wire chair came from Goodwill.

















And while I'm still in the Christmas spirit, I thought I would share one of my favorite Christmas pictures with you. I just love this one. I bet lots of you have pictures that look very similar. That's me front and center. I'm about 2 1/2 years old. The kid with the drippy nose in the red and white pj's is my little brother, Devin and to the left is the lower half of my big brother Mike sporting his new cowboy belt and holster. Gotta love those footy pajamas.

I've been invited to attend the lunch lady Christmas party today. I feel a little weird going, as I am not a regular full time lunch lady, but my good friend Debbie says it doesn't matter and that I have to go. It's being held at a yummy thai restaurant so I know the food will be good.


I really need to get my rear over to Monticello. It has been awhile since I have gone to fluff up the booth and drop off stuff. I do have some things I need to take over so I will probably do that tomorrow. But before that, I am having blind coffee date with a fellow blogger. I will tell you more about that tomorrow. Until then, have a great day!

My Weekend

A fun and busy weekend started out on Friday doing a little thrifting before I met up with Joy and Isabel. I stopped at my usual Goodwill where I found a few little things. Rhinestone bracelet, two old small canning jars, metal shelf thingy. Then off to VV where I found a few more little items. Wire card holder rack thingy, pink plastic organizer thingy, magazine rack thingy, and this:

My guess is that it is some kind of vintage baby seat. Very grungy looking so it will need a good cleaning, but that will be it. Not sure anyone will want to buy it, but I thought it was kind of cute.

Met up with Isabel and we drove to Aurora to meet with Joy at an antique mall there.

My one and only purchase there was this bread box. I was thrilled to find it, but even more thrilled about the price. Marked down to $15.00. Plus that dealer was having a 20% off sale so I got it for $12.00. I just adore the hand painted roses. Something I wish I could do. It just made my day.

After the antique mall we decided it was time for a bite to eat so Joy took us to this deli she knew about nearby. The weird thing was all of these sandwich toothpicks stuck in the ceiling. We asked how they got there and was told they were blown up there with straws. First I had a go at it and couldn't do it.

Then Joy tried it and no luck. Isabel gave it a try and on her second attempt, success! Wish I got a picture of her or the ladies at the next table looking at us like we were crazy.

After lunch we headed over to a little thrift shop where I got two things.

This cute little crocheted hanger and a little vintage style clock. Joy got a few items and Isabel managed to fill up a shopping cart with goodies. Unfortunately I had to head home to pick up my son at school but it was a fun time.

Saturday morning was spent at my daughters basketball game. I actually took pictures this time, but they didn't turn out so great. Every time she was in shooting distance and did something good, I would be too busy watching to take a picture. After that I promised that I would take my basketballer shopping for some clothes. She had some report card money to spend and so she did just that. I was geared up for a miserable time arguing over what was "appropriate" attire for a 14 year old, but actually she managed to pick out some nice things. I even convinced her to try on a dress. She didn't buy it though.

I previously had promised to show you a couple projects I have been working on, so here they are.

Made this little diorama for my hubby for Christmas. He never reads my blog, so I don't have to worry about him seeing it. I love how it turned out. The image of the trees and snow was from a picture he took while hunting. The thing that really makes me laugh is the fact that the picture is of him and his dad hunting and he is drinking a cup of coffee and the deer is just standing in front of him posing. I added the little tree, some glitter, a little vintage tinsel and some batting for snow on the ground. I know it will give my sweetie a chuckle. He has a hunting/fishing themed office, so it will be perfect in there.

Click on picture for a better view.

Here are three little vintage tin Christmas collages I made. I love the chippiness of the tin with the vintage Christmas images. I still need to add a wire hanger on the back, but then I will be done. What do ya think? Cute? Weird? I would love the feedback.

These two are my favorites of the three. You can't tell from the picture, but they are kind of little. Only 6 inches square. I have a few more tins left so I might try making some more with pink roses this time.

And finally, my completed "home" banner. I think it turned out pretty cute. My ribbon is a little twisted, just noticed that. Fun to put together and so easy.

I had to work at my lunch lady job today. So much fun, but I'm pooped. Hey, maybe I can get a wee nap before the kids come home from school.

Thanks for visiting today. By the way, I love to get comments and would love to hear from you. Even if you just say hi, it will make my day~!

And We Have a Winner

It's Priscilla from Sweet Remembrance!

Congratulations Priscilla! Thanks to everyone who left comments. It is so great to hear from you all. I really appreciate everyone who entered my giveaway.

I spent yesterday doing what I said I was going to do, cleaning house. I also made four different types of fudge using Karla's recipe. Yummy! I still want to make some more. I have lots of neighbors/friends I like to give a little something to, so this will be perfect. That is if my kids don't eat it all first.

Today Isabel and I are meeting up with Joy for a little Friday Fun! I hope to be able to finish up my Christmas shopping this weekend. That would be a great accomplishment.

I haven't mentioned this before, but I will be gone the week between Christmas and New Years. We are traveling south to spend time with my Dad and relatives in Southern California. I am really excited to see everyone and have a little reprieve from the rain. At least I hope we will. No matter what the weather, I'm sure we will have a lot of fun and good times.

Sorry no pictures on this post. I don't like to post without pictures, but I have finished a couple projects that I will photograph and share with you on my next post. Have a lovely Friday everyone!

Late to the Party as Usual

I don't know what my problem is lately. I can't seem to get my act together. Yesterday, instead of posting about my Holiday Home, I went to the movies. My house was too dark, couldn't get the pictures right. I felt like I didn't have much to show. I do have a ton of cute Christmas ornaments, but didn't realize until I got everything out of the boxes, that I don't have many Christmas decorations. So without further ado, here are some shots of my Holiday Home.

Here's the tree. Kind of a dark picture, but you can see it much better if you click on it. I probably put too many ornaments, but really I have a ton more that didn't make the cut.
















An idea I stole from Joy. Sweet white crinoline for a tree skirt.












I got this vintage style tin wall hanging a couple years ago. Just love this Santa.

















Another Santa with a fun curly beard hanging out on top of a newer little cabinet I bought on etsy recently.

















This is probably my favorite Christmas item. This folk art Santa was made by a local gal and I bought it several years ago at a local shop I used to work at. I love it! The detail is so sweet. The deer I got at a bazaar a year later and I thought the two would make a great pair. Don't you think so too? So much cuter in person.










Another little spot in my living room. The blocks are suppose to say "Merry Christmas" but my son thought it would fun to mix them up. The nut doesn't fall far from the tree, does it?

Some more Santas hanging out. I love the weird one in the front left. It is actually a rough piece of wood someone painted on.

On top of my birdcage. Some pottery, a tree, bottle with more buttons and mini tree and a repro girl chocolate mold I got recently.














Some cute ornaments. The glitter star purchased recently at Target.














We are so lucky to have a really neat Christmas store right in our community. It's called "Sleighbells." I made a quick trip there yesterday with my daughter to buy some much needed cedar garland for my mantel and a wreath for my front door. My mantel looks so much better now. Will try to get a picture for another post.

Today I am finally going to get my act together a do a little housecleaning. I really need to. I have been playing far too much lately. I did spend one day this week working at the High School, but for the most part, I have been goofing off.

Joy just emailed me last night to see if I would be interested in getting together to do lunch and some Christmas shopping tomorrow. Isabel is going to come too. So see, this is why I need to get some work done today.

If you haven't already, make sure to leave a comment on this post. I will be drawing a winner for a Christmas banner ornament (see last post) and a tin full of crafty goodies. I keep finding things to put in so it will be jam packed with fun stuff.

If you would like to take a look at the other homes in Karla's Holiday Home Party click here.

I've been a lazy blogger lately

When I first started my blog, I would post everyday or at least every other day. Lately I've been posting only twice a week. What's up with that you say? Well, with the holiday's quickly approaching, things have been a little more hectic than usual, but I know that's no excuse.

I'm getting a little tired of looking at the double chin pics (as you all probably are as well) so I thought it was time to do a new post.

On Saturday my daughter had her basketball game. I don't know if her team mates were up late, but they weren't doing too well and pretty much got creamed. The other team was pretty good, but very aggressive. After the game we decided it was finally time to go get the tree. It was a perfect sunny day which we haven't had much of around here. We drove 5 minutes from our house, which is pretty much "in the country" to get our tree from friends of ours that have a tree farm. I don't know how it works in other parts of the country, but there are a million places near us that you can go and cut down your own tree. After we got there, it took about 5 minutes to find our tree. I'm not too picky, I just want one that looks good and will fit in our already overly packed home.

My son decided he wanted to chop down the tree with an ax so that is just what he did.

My two favorite guys posing for the camera.

What a lovely family picture. Wait a minute. Why am I leaning like that? And what's up with my hubbies legs? Doesn't my daughter look happy to have her picture taken?

We haven't sent out a family Christmas photo since the kids were babies, this is probably why.

Didn't get a lot of help decorating the tree once it came into the house, but I finally got it done. I will show you tomorrow which is the day for Karla's holiday home party.

On Sunday morning I was feeling a little crafty and spent a couple hours making these.

I had so much fun making these little banner ornaments. Not sure what I will do with them. Maybe give them to friends. Hey, you guys are my friends. Why don't I do a giveaway? Yeah, I think I will.

If you leave a comment, I will draw a name on Friday morning and the winner will get to pick one of these ornaments. I will also include a Christmas tin filled with all kinds of Christmasy goodies. How does that sound?

I had so much fun doing my last giveaway, I just think it is time for another. So leave a comment between now and 12am on Friday morning PST and I will rise and shine on Friday with a winner. Good times!

Friday Funday!

Isabel and I had a great time today. Her husband was home taking care of her 4 year old, so we had pretty much the whole day to play. We are both short on funds right now with Christmas on the horizon so we didn't really do much shopping. More of how we spent our day later.

Yesterday, as I mentioned, I hit a few thrift stores on my way to Monticello to pick up our November check. This is what I found at Value Village and Goodwill.

Cute vintage end table/magazine rack, half jar of white glitter, old Wolverine toy stove, two floral tins, floral print in shabby frame, two vintage brass/mother of pearl frames, wire watering can, Victorian style box, little wood box to hang, vintage perfume atomizer, asst. vintage Christmas wrapping paper, pink floral fabric cosmetic bag, green planter, silver dish with handles, package of small gold balls, and finally, another tin can rocking chair with matching footstool. My picture is a little on the dark side, but if you click on it you can see better detail.

I got to Monticello and checked out our booth to find that nothing big was missing and cleaned up a bit. And since I can't go there without looking around, I just happened to find a few Christmas items to bring home with me.

Everything was very inexpensive. I got blocks spelling "Merry Christmas", garland of silver stars, two tin cones, three bottle brush trees, Metal "Joy" thingy, some vintage linens for projects and a cute little vintage baby shoe embellished with balls and greenery. Again, I apologize for the dark picture. I was in a hurry to take it and didn't do a good job of making everything look pretty.

So back to my day with Isabel. We started out by heading to The Original Pancake House. Alicia has blogged about this fine establishment before. I had been there several years ago with my husband, but Isabel had never been. They were a lot busier than I thought they would be at 9:30am on a Friday morning, but we were seated very quickly and enjoyed some wonderful potato pancakes. We snapped a couple pics while we were waiting.

The first pic we took of ourselves. Man do I ever have a double chin. Ugh!

Here we decided to hide our double chins with napkins. What dorks!

The waitress finally came over and asked if we wanted her to take a picture. Much better, but I still can't hide that chin. Did I mention that would like to lose some weight? I'm sure the potato pancakes were low fat. Yeah, right! ha ha

After the yummy breakfast, we headed to downtown Portland to go see "Atonement" which was just opening today. It was a pretty good movie, but somewhat dark and certainly not something I would recommend if you are looking for something entertaining or amusing.

We also managed to squeeze a quick trip in to the Goodwill in Portland which was just a block away from the theater. This apparently is a "boutique" store and prices were very high. Isabel got a couple things, I for once, didn't buy anything.

After the movie, we headed toward home with a stop in Multnomah Village to visit a couple antique shops and Grand Central Baking where I got a yummy chocolate croissant and some cookies for the kids.

We then decided we should head for home. The kids were coming home from school and I promised to take my daughter to Target to spend some more of the gift cards she got for her birthday.

Tomorrow will be a basketball game for my daughter and hopefully getting and decorating the Christmas tree. I can't wait! I think I'm finally getting into the Christmas spirit. It's about time!

Have a lovely weekend!

I finally figured out how to put words on my pictures, so I was able to fix my header. I'm looking forward to playing with this a bit. Boy, do I feel smart!

Long Time, No Post

For me anyway. Thanks Sandi, for telling me I better get busy and do a post. You are right. I do have a picture or two to share. This week has been crazy, which is why I haven't been blogging. I worked at the HS the last two days. It was fun, but tiring. I'm pretty much dead for the rest of the day after working my lunch lady job.

Some exciting news! Isabel and I decided to do the Farm Chicks show in June of 08! We turned in our contract/money so now we are committed, or maybe should be committed. Just kidding. We have never been, but hear great things about it. If you are a reader of Country Living magazine, you probably already know about the Farm Chicks. If not, check out their website. Click on Antique Shows, then click on Vendors. You will see us in the vendor profiles. Our good buddies Joy and Cindy will be there too, so I'm sure it will be a blast. Wow, that sounds so 80's. ha ha

On Sunday, after doing my post, I decided to take it easy and do a little project. I was so inspired by seeing all the adorable things at Joy's house, that I decided to make a little banner of my own. This was my inspiration.

This banner was hangin in Joy's bedroom. She said it was made by artist, Karen Otto. I just love it. Kind of hard to see, but you can click on it for a close up.

I am incredibly good at starting projects, (that's always the fun part for me) and terrible at finishing them ( think I have mentioned this before). I just get bored easily.

Here is what I have managed to do so far. Nothing is glued down yet. It was so fun putting all the papers and embellishments together. I cheated and got the letters from Target. You can get a whole bag for about $8.00 which I thought was a pretty good deal and easier than making them myself.

I have to admit that most projects I show on my blog are not my original ideas. I wish I could say that they were. What I usually do, is find something I like, and try to figure out how to do it and make it my own. I definitely wasn't the first person to make shopping cart liners, but I like to think mine are special because of the fabrics I use and the way I put them together. Plus, they come with a neat shopping cart too. Isabel and I are always joking about how many liners we have made (she makes lovely ones too) and neither of us has one for our own shopping carts.

Anyway, I find that I am constantly inspired by so many artists I see on blogs. Their originality and talent just amazes me.

For example:

Here's a picture of a couple things I got at the Tarte/Apples & Antiques Holiday Sale last Saturday. The little Santa box and the bear came from Martha at Vintage Trifles. She makes the most incredible things. One of the truly talented people that I admire. Cindy too, has such a nack for making ordinary things into works of art. I'm kicking myself right now for not taking any pictures at their sale.

Isabel and I are going to have a "fun day" tomorrow. We will probably go shopping and maybe to a movie. I really need to do some holiday decorating. I just can't seem to get motivated. I have bought a few ornaments recently and they are just waiting patiently to be hung on my tree, which hopefully we will get this Saturday.

Here they are hanging out in some of my pottery collection. At least I will know where they are when the decorating begins.

I have more pics to share with you of some thrifted finds, but I will save them for another post as this one is getting kind of long.

Happy Thursday everyone!

Too Much for One Post, But Here it is Anyway!

What a busy weekend. So glad it's finally Sunday and I can sit down and do a little blogging. On Thursday I went over to Monticello and did a little thrifting along the way. I didn't find any OMG items, but I picked up a few cute things.

I found a cute green wood tray with handles which I already put some vintage wallpaper on the bottom. A set of 4 candlewick like glass coasters that have roses on the bottom, a large glass jar, enamel pot, cool vintage mirror with a guilloche rose on it, silver and gold beaded garland, four tea strainers which I think will make cute ornaments on the Christmas tree. I might fill them with dried lavender and glitter them. Not sure yet. Roll of pink and white checked wallpaper, a cute little handmade barn and a pottery lamp base with flowers and a bird.

Thursday night I headed out to Joy's Holiday Sale and Open House. I took a ton of pictures so now is a good time to go get that cup of coffee or go to the bathroom, as this will take awhile. I have said in the past, I am not a very good photographer and my pictures don't do Joy's home justice. I got lots taken in the house, but I completely forgot to take any in the shop. Here they are in no special order.

I spent the night on Thursday at Joy's so I could help her on Friday with her sale. I was in the house mostly acting as host to the people who came through. It was a lot of fun and everyone was oohing and ahhing over all of Joy's cute decorating. I even had several people ask what was for sale in the house. The weather was pretty dreary on Friday and we didn't get the number of people we were hoping for, but it was still fun visiting with Joy and Diane who was also helping that day. Thanks so much Joy for letting me bring some things to sell and for letting me be part of your special event.

On Saturday morning Isabel and I met Martha and Diane at Cindy's sale. It was so cute and of course, I forgot to take pictures. I was good and only bought a few little items. After that we all went to breakfast in our little town. Here is a picture of the four of us. I think Martha has a better one but look at the snow falling behind us. It was so lovely, but it didn't last. I had to hurry home to get ready for my daughter's first basketball game of the season. She did great and her team actually won! She was great on defense and even scored a basket. This is only her second year of playing and I'm so glad she is. She really seems to enjoy it and I think could be an excellent player. She really only plays for fun. After the game we hustled on over to the store to pick up her cake and other stuff for her 14th birthday party.

As I mentioned on a recent post, her birthday was last weekend, but since we were out of town, we postponed her "friend" birthday until this weekend. We ended up going to the mall to do a "scavenger hunt." They had to do things like take a picture of a person eating a hamburger, go to a store that sells girl stuff and buy $5.00 worth of items, etc. There were word scrambles and puzzles to figure out. They had a lot of fun doing it and it only took about an hour. After that we came home had cake and ice cream and they had a little hang out time before their parents picked them up at 10pm. One of the cool things was the items they bought on the scavenger hunt got divided up and were their prizes. But the best part was they all went home. I kind of put my foot down on sleepover birthday parties this year. I just don't want to do them anymore.

Well, that's it for now. I told you this was going to be a long one. I hope you enjoyed all the fab pictures of Joy's lovely home.