What's Up With These Bags?

Today I made a bunch of these little bags. It seems that every time I make some I end up making a ton. These are special bags which I can't tell you why as some people may be reading this blog and I really want it to be a surprise. Oh wait, if I wanted it to be a surprise I shouldn't have posted it right? Probably, but I wanted to post it anyway.

All of the fabric I used commemorate an upcoming holiday. Can you guess which one? Man, was it that obvious. Well hopefully the receivers will like them.

This week is just flying by. We have our contractor here to finish up some of the remodeling and handyman fix it jobs this week and boy is the varnish to the wood floor making my sinuses act up. I'm glad I took the dogs to grandpas house for the day. I can just imagine little doggie varnish footprints all over the house....not going to happen let alone what the fumes would do to their sensitive noses. There is only three places where he put varnish on the floors today but that's enough to smell up the whole house. I did open the windows and doors and turn off the heater...yes, I did say heater and yes, I do know it is June but it is still chilly here. I'm not sure Spring is going to come let alone Summer.

Well time to put a sweatshirt on and plan dinner. Humm, eating out is sounding like a really good idea.

Still Remodeling

This week has been an up and down week. We are planning our office remodel...what you say do you remodel in an office. Well, this is our only spare bedroom and guess what? No bed. So we are hiring a furniture/cabinet maker to make a Murphy bed with a small wardrobe along with a built in desk and overhead cabinets. To do this we must empty that room, rip up the carpet, take the paneling off the walls, repaint and then refinish the hardwoods. Now we won't be doing all this, we do have a contractor, but we haven't contacted him yet. We will get the room emptied out and rip up the carpet ourselves but we will have the contractors do the rest.

So much to do and then today our new blinds and drapery panels were installed in the living room and dining room. Unfortunately the valance did not come out quite right so they took it back and will be fixing it, but that didn't stop me from taking photos to share with you.

Before - tackie sheers in the living room as we took the heavy drapes off years ago and  nothing in the dining room including privacy.

Now - we got the type of blinds that you can draw from the top or bottom and, as you can see, the reason we did this in the living room on top of the sofa. This is Leo's favorite place to view the world and keep intruders out. I'm not sure where Buddy was when I took this but there was some snow on the ground so he was probably outside,

The color of the drapery panels is actually a tiny stripe with rust, green and gold but you can't tell from a distance.

Just had to throw in a doggie picture. Leo decided to attack Buddy for a some reason. Who knows but that was our day.

Creative Blogger - MezziG of Creative Outlet

This week I'm featuring MezziG of Creative Outlet. What a wonderful creative soul. In one of her posts this week she shows us her most recent creation that she made for a bead challenge. It just so happens that she won this challenge. Isn't this just a great design? I never use seed beads in my designs but seeing the versatility in design, I may have to rethink that.

Fringe is such a big design feature right now as well as the bib style and this has both of those. Click on over and check out her blog.

Well around here life has been quite hectic. Our kitchen is almost gutted now. Sounds very hollow in there and it is so large. Amazing how big the room looks without cabinets and appliances. We are eating in the motorhome....feels like we are camping in the back yard...oh wait we are. I can't imagine living through a kitchen remodel without having another home whether it is a RV or weekend cabin that you can retreat to. Our dining room is full of the appliances and the living room is full of the dining room furniture and boxes of kitchen stuff. I'll have before and after photos when it is complete... you really don't want to see them now.

I was really hoping to have pictures of my new craft room cabinets to show you today, but alas I haven't taken them yet and I still have to unpack everything, so hopefully tomorrow.

So, until then have a great day.

So Much to Do

and so little time. The day has come when my dad gets here. We have been remodeling my MIL's house for the past couple of months getting it ready for him to move here (she passed away this past Summer). Well that day has arrived. He gets in around 12:30..now that house isn't completely ready but it is liveable, new bathroom, updated kitchen, fresh paint all around and a new front on the fireplace. We will be leaving here shortly to go put some final touches on it and move furniture around. It is fully furnished as he is just flying here with his personal clothes. He sold his car and furniture and most of his belongings. I'm sure this was a hard thing for a 73 year old man to do giving up all his personal items, but this is a fresh start for him and that is how he is seeing it. So my brother and I are very glad he will be close by.

So along with getting the house ready for dad, I have a craft show tomorrow...no I'm not ready and a gem and mineral show this weekend. At least at the gem and mineral show I demonstrate and can work on making things as well as selling. I will be selling my book at both of them so I'll let you know which venue was better. I usually do well at gem and mineral shows since the book is right up their alley... you know how to make a gem tree, but I have high hopes that the folks at the craft show will want to make their own tree and will buy the book.

Okay, that's all I have time for today. Pictures of the finished house and my show will be posted soon. Have a good day.

The Remodel is Coming Along

How many times can I blog about the remodel? Probably a lot as after this one is finished at my mother in laws  then we will start planning ours. I'm just glad that we aren't living here through all this mess.

Came over to the MIL's house today to wait on the kitchen counter top installer to measure so that they can get it ordered and found that our general contractor had started putting up the tile in the bathroom around the tub. It's coming along, even if I think it is going slowly.

The estate sale is this weekend so I'm hoping that a lot of this stuff will be gone and we can dig our way to the fireplace to that he can get started on that when he has free time. I would take some updated pictures, but from the mess in here, you probably wouldn't get a good feel for what has been accomplished. Next time I'll post some.

Have a good day.

Even More info on Earring Giveaway

I forgot to mention in my last post that I will ship these earrings anywhere, Europe, Australia, etc., so please feel free to enter. If you are unsure, send me a message.

Don't forget the rules about leaving me a comment about how you are following me to get entered. I love my fans and followers and this is just the start of great giveaways that I have planned for the remainder of this year, so don't miss out.

In other news, we are in the midst of remodeling my mother in laws bathroom and having the whole house painted and kitchen upgraded. Unless you have ever completed a project like this you have no idea of the headaches involved. I think we have changed our minds on the kitchen counter top 11 times and now we are back to our original idea of a solid surface counter top. We are leaving the nice Cherry wood cabinets, will replace the hardware, fix the cracks in the walls and paint and have already purchased a new stove and refrigerator to finish it out. In the bathroom, we are totally gutting it. No more green tub, sink or toilet. The rest of the house will be painted, but the fireplace will get a new marble surround.

We didn't want to go over the top with granite and high end appliances as we are planning on selling in the next year, but until then we will move my dad in to live for a bit until the market recovers. Here are some pictures of the before. I'll post after pics when it is completed.

Up in the Air

It's Tuesday and I missed my Monday tutorial day, so I'll find something today to post that's jewelry related that you can make. The weekend just flew by as it always does when you don't want it to end although the husband and my cold's are much better. The coughing and nose blowing is just so tiring.

I played around a little more with my twig/branch earring design only using labradorite and pearls on one and garnets and tourmaline on the other. I'm not sure I like the garnets...seems a little gaudy to me as I like more simplistic earrings, but who knows, it might just be the ticket for someone else, so I'll go ahead and make the other one to match so there is a pair. They are both made with 28 gauge sterling silver wire.

I won't be working on new jewelry designs today as I'm off to my MIL's house to clean and continue the organization to get ready for an Estate sale. I guess I just never realized how much work there was... or maybe I knew and was blocking it out until it really had to be done. Since we are also going to have some remodeling done over there, I'll take some before and after pics. The bathroom when finished should look amazing. In the kitchen we are still agonizing over a solid surface countertop or granite.

Thanks for reading and if you have some great jewerly ideas or remodeling ideas, I would love to hear both. Dana