Pink Roses

7/8, lay them straight...

Week 7...I made this out of the corrugated cardboard  holder that goes around your coffee cup.  I like the idea but I don't like the way I wrote the question on the side.  I should have written it smaller, or in a circle around the red parenthesis.  This is a do-over. I need to go back to Starbucks...

Week 8: Apparently I have been in a black rick-rack-ribbon mood that I was completely unaware of until I looked at these two tags together.  Not very vintage, but it's good to mix it up once in a while.  

And the last thing to make me L-O-L?  I would have to say my B-O-Y...he's always good for a laugh! 

Have a great weekend everybody!

bargaining...

Last month at the flea market I was passing a table filled with rusty old tools and guy junk , when I spotted this old box of muffin baking cups.  I looked at the old man behind the table, and I figured he would probably GIVE me the box, because clearly it did not belong here with all the rust and car parts. So I picked up the box and sweetly asked "How much is this?"

The cranky old man barked "two bucks".

There was no way I was going to pay $2.00 for a half empty old box of papers, plus he wasn't nice.  So I put the box down and said "thank you" and started to walk away.  Now, I was seriously walking away, but he thought I was bluffing walking away. He let me get pretty far when he yells "HEY".  I stopped, turned around , and in my best Robert DeNiro voice said "Are you talking to ME?"

He shouts "one dollar"...

He said the magic words (even if he said them in a cranky voice), so I walked back and paid him $1.00.  I just love a bargain, but if he had smiled and been friendly, I would have paid $2.00! Nice matters!

52Q: week 6

This might be my favorite tag so far...a page ripped from an old book, a little white paint, some paper lace, a tiny mini muffin liner (pink), a circle cut from the same book page with the edges snipped and crinkled, and a button in the center to make a flower...

I have weeks 7 and 8 completed, but my camera battery died right after I took this picture!  I have it charging now, so I'll have to show the other tags later :)

just call me...

I don't like texting.  First of all: I am a really slow texter.  (My computer just put a red line under the word texter, so I'm pretty sure that's not even a word-sorry).  My daughter will send me a text message once in a while, but usually she just calls me, because she has too much to say.

That's the second thing I don't like about texting:  I have too much to say, and can't put it in just 160 characters.  My SON, on the other hand...BIG fan of texting...HUGE fan of texting.  He sends me texts all the time.  Things like...

youtube-kittens inspired by kittens & tell me how much you love it

it's snowing and I'm wearing my new gloves

or simply...IDAHO

I had to stare at the "IDAHO" message for a minute before I realized that he was eating dinner at 5 GUYS, where they cut their own french fries, and always tell you where the potatoes are from.  The potatoes were from Idaho. 

Don't get me wrong-I love that he communicates with me. He calls me every morning on the way to class, and usually he sends texts when he is with other people, and he doesn't necessarily want them to know he is talking to his mother.  I get that.  But I also need to hear the sound of his voice, otherwise how will I be able to say motherly things like this...

"You sound tired , are you getting enough rest?"

or..."You sound like you're getting a cold...are you getting enough rest?"

and the classic... "Are you eating properly, are you studying, and are you getting enough rest?"

He says I'm a broken record.  You think?  Maybe that's why he doesn't like to call me!

hanging in there...

My Valentine's Day roses are still hanging in there.  A few have gotten droopy, so I cut them and put them in a bowl...

I think there is something beautiful in every stage of a flower, from bud to full bloom, to the fading fragile petals.  I hang on to them as long as I can!  Have a blessed day :)

thrifting...

I did a little thrifting on Saturday, after dropping off a BIG pile of stuff at Goodwill.  I'm trying to clean and organize, and get rid of stuff, so I didn't need to bring back anything.

But I just loved this hat and gravy boat and they were cheap ($6.00), so I bought them. 

I look at it this way...I got rid of a a bunch of stuff...

and replaced it with just two things.  Two things that are far prettier than the bunch of things were.  Three steps forward, one step back.  Slow progress...pack rat style.

ribbon rainbow...

A few weeks ago I received an Etsy package in the mail from  Rebecca Sower ...100 yards of seam binding...1 yard each of 100 colors!

I had no idea how to store/display all this rainbow of ribbons, and then one day my Flickr friend,  Suzy (Bella Design), posted a picture of her studio, and she had ribbons draped over a hanger...brilliant!

I had this beautiful altered hanger that I got from the talented Tammy Gilley at Silver Bella 2007...

I've had the hanger on display just by itself in my studio for 2 years...

Now I finally found something "worthy" to be displayed on it :)...

This is making me SOOO happy, hanging on the wall of my studio!

with love...

He begged me before he left for college last fall...please don't send me those postcards like you send Elizabeth...

So I haven't, until now.  I just had to send him one for Valentine's Day, but I mailed it in an envelope so no one would see it.  And I sent him a gift card to his favorite hamburger place to make up for the fact that I broke my promise...

And I made sure that his card was the joker...

Never has anything been more appropriate!

Wishing you a Valentine's filled with love and laughter!

progress report...

I've been working on my fabric collage a little bit lately...adding a few bits and pieces from the stash I bought at the flea market, like this hank of embroidery floss that was tied in a knot...

And a twisty piece of hand dyed cheesecloth from my friend Joanne... 

I'm sewing on some of those tiny little pieces of tatting...

and that beautiful, but fragile, silk ribbon...

I didn't try to bleach out the age spots-I like it this way...

Stitching down all these little loops takes time...

So that's an update on the stitching...

Still a work in progress!

52Q...

I finally made a cover for my 52Q tag book...I made it slightly larger than the rest of the tags, and made it out of cardboard so it would be sturdy.  This is the front...

...still working on the back. Here is last weeks question:

The question for this week is "If I could do it all again, would I change anything?".  I'm working on that one today...