This is Some Vacation! 2

During vacation, the Sisters group at church had a paint party and I signed up for myself, my mom, and a friend to come.  My friend claimed she wasn’t a painter and I said that it would all be fine and that my mom has probably never held a paintbrush in her hands.

For not fun reasons, my friend was not able to come.  I then sent a text to another friend, one of my MOPS moms, asking if she’d like to come.  It was my treat, she just needed to come.  She was thrilled and all the child care worked out easily for her.  So one friend was sad and one was blessed to tears by the opportunity to come to a Sisters event.

I had hoped it was a paint party of copying the design the teacher had for us as I’ve seen many friends participate in doing.  However, it was a plaque/wall board and phrase paint class.  We used chalk paint and learned the benefits and the properties of it and it was fun.

This was shocking…. my mom doing a craft project!!

About 40 were there, we had snacks but once we started with the project we were too busy to think much about more snacks!

We had a good table of friends.  Fun evening and we were happy with our projects!

Mom was sort of a celebrity when I had her out for events.  She was thrilled to have “come the farthest” and everyone was thrilled she was out traveling and her age.

I’m taking bets if she has this hidden in her room or hung in the main living area.  What do you think?
Mine is ready to be hung…. I need to choose what will hang on the wall area and do a layout.

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My Christmas Craft

I saw this image and some basic directions and thought this would be something fun for the weekend… and now it has morphed over many days … over a week and several weekends!  🙂

Instead of chipboard & papers, I incorporated more fabric & fiber….

I used fabric paper for the background that I painted various shades of pink.

Then I layered it with white felt and did some free-motion quilting on them.

Once they were applied to thin cardboard, I cut them to size (3″ x 5″) and I couched a fuzzy yarn around the edges.

I backed the cards with Christmas hymn paper that I had “aged” with Distress ink in Antique Linen.

All 6 cards:

Working on the letters put me in a tizzy once again (I saved you the drama over the edges)… Trial 1:

The letters are too big & too much like the green paper….

So I tried covering them in pink glitter but that just looked gross.   I still (sort of) wanted the Christmas look of the glitter so tried again.

I used smaller letters and covered them in green glitter.   That pleased me and I continued on.

I had no way of punching a hole through such a thick layer to hold the cards together.  So I glued 2 rows of gold ribbon to the backs of the cards.

I printed 2 Christmas images that had a bit of a vintage feel to them and covered them in a white glitter for the ends of the piece.

I had bought a delicate gold ribbon at the scrapbook store the other day and used that for bows on each end.

Let the decorating continue!!  🙂

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A Christmas Luncheon

Monday (12/8) I had the most amazing time at Pam’s!  She had invited my friend Becky to come for lunch and suggested I come along too.  I have met Pam on a few occasions and it is always a treat to be with her.  We are very like-minded.  

But for hostessing… Pam wins!!

She would make Martha Stewart look like a slacker!  And all the while Pam is a loving Christian woman caring for us.  It was so fun and refreshing!

Her home is lovely and decorated in such an exquisite way.  Everything sings Christmas there!  (I don’t even have our tree up yet!) We visited for a while and admired her lovely home.  Then we moved to the warm & cozy kitchen for our meal.  

Me & Becky

For lunch she had 3 kinds of homemade soup for us to choose from!  I had tomato that she had canned during the summer with her own garden produce.  Yummy!!  Another recipe I’ve already found online (Olive Garden’s Zuppa Toscana) and plan to make it for us this winter sans the potato chunks.  She also had Wild Rice & Mushroom soup.   

Along with our choice of soup, we had a bowl of home canned peaches with homemade granola sprinkled on top.  The muffin basket had homemade bacon cheddar muffins!  I had water to drink but others had her blackberry fizz, also home canned from her blackberry patch and then she added ginger ale.  

(Yes, I totally cheated on my eating plan but sacrificed for the joy of female fellowship.  I knew I could rest the next day.  I was thankful it didn’t bother me too much.  Maybe a perk of getting better?)

Later around the craft table she passed around cookies and some of the ladies had a cappachino drink Pam had made.  

So yes, after a wonderful lunch we moved to the dining room area.  We had been asked to bring a project we were working on and she suggested I bring some soaps.  So I had an assortment in a basket and let everyone choose a bar to take home.  

Rhonda brought a full size quilt she had made.  Diane brought several large gourds she had painted!  Beautiful work!!

We gathered around Pam’s dining table and she told us about the candle wraps we could make.  She felts her own wool from thrift store wool sweaters!  

She makes mittens from the front, socks from the sleeves, and frequently sells the backs online!   But still she had a large box of scraps left. On the table was a basket of longish scraps and then a bowl had little pieces for our decoration.   

Pam cut out a mini mitten pattern for us – they are so darling!

I have my wrap done but it is too tall for my candle in current use.  I may pour some soy wax into quart canning jars and use the wrap on that.  🙂

Thanks for a wonderful time, Pam!!  I hope we get together again soon.

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