Mushroom Love

After making some for my wreath, I couldn't resist making a bunch more.  I made ten of these little ornaments for my tree.  However, this photo was the last time they were all together.  After seeing them, our friend insisted on buying half of them for his family.  It was a tough decision, letting them go, but he won me over with his incredibly sentimental and touching story about how much they would mean to his family.  I was incredibly shocked that something I was just making for fun for myself was actually selling.

Since I love them and what I have left of these are all packed up for the year, I'm going to make a few more for my craft room. As I type this, I have a few stems drying.  Hey, ornaments aren't just for Christmas!  Like I mentioned before, I adapted a tutorial from Hannah's Blog.  Since I changed a few things, I'm going to take progress shots to share with you guys.  That way you can see a different way of doing it, as well as see some little tips that helped me along the way. 

Bye!  Have a craftastic evening.  I'll check in soon with some pretty ladies, more mushroom love, and a glimpse into my newest obsession.

It's Done!

My wreath is complete and I'm all hung up on it!

I ended up adding a lot more stuff than I originally expected, but I think it all works well together.  The toadstools where inspired by a tutorial I saw on knick knacks & ric rac.  However, I changed it up a little bit.  Instead of thread spools, I used painted corks.  I used felt for the spots, instead of pom poms.  Gotta work with what you've got, right?!  I liked the mushrooms so much I made a whole bunch of ornaments for our giant tree.  Those are up next!  

I'm enjoying a relaxing day, so it's about cocoa time 'round these parts.  I have one more day of work then a three day weekend with my honey!  I'm so excited.  And lucky.... a 3 day weekend in retail....over Christmas?!  Guess all those weekends in a row with crazy hours are paying off for me.  Oh, and New Year's Day off?!  I'm practically giddy over here.

Christmas Cheer

Hi, guys!  How are you all doing?!  I'm pretty good.  Working my behind off, wish I could say literally, with tons of extra hours at my job to get ready for the holiday.  Although it's been decorated at my job for months now, I'm starting on the house now.  

This may not look like much now, but pretty soon all this stuff will be made into one of the cutest darned wreaths you've ever seen.  I can't wait to finish it!  Can I tell you that wrapping this thing is taking forever?!  Although Dillon did give me some advice that will probably make the next one go a little faster.  We'll see...

Besides being festive I've been busy stitching up a few things for my etsy.  This is a custom request I received, ready to head out to it's new home.

So, yeah.  That's pretty much what I've been up to lately, working and working on embroidery.  Exciting life, I know.  To make it a little more exciting, I think I'm going to give my blog a bit of a make-over.  Any suggestions?  I really want to change the layout so that I can share bigger pictures with you.  These seem a bit small for my liking.  I don't know, you tell me.

Be back soon, hopefully with a wreath!  (If all this wrapping doesn't drive me crazy first.)  Bye!

Phew?

Since Saturday, I've heard. "Phew, it's over.  Finally!" about a million times.  When you work retail, that is to be expected.  However, I have a confession.... unlike everyone else working in this field, I actually love the holiday season!  Strange, I know.

This year it was great, we actually put up lights and decorated a tree! Almost picture perfect, except for the whole snow thing.  Not one flake 'round these parts, I wish.  Just plenty of rain.

If I could say one thing about our tree this year, it has "us" written all over it.

Yay for Tree-Bots!

Yes, that is a real pine cone on our tree!  How cute is that?!  We were lucky enough to find two of those little guys on the tree once we brought it in.  As for the pickle, I've heard some debate as to whether or not it's really a German tradition.  Oh well, even if it isn't, I still love pickles.  So why not one for the tree?

Christmas included wearing PJs (Jammers around here), Scrabble, cuddles, football, movies and tasty beverages all day.  We exchanged awesome gifts and basically took advantage of a quiet day together.  A rarity.  I hit the jackpot with my presents, lots of cute things to share with you.  And lots of supplies to make cute things to share.  Oh, my babycakes knows me so well.

At the moment, I'm taking a break from crafting to enjoy a cup of coffee...Santa brought the house a Grind n' Brew.  Yum!  

I hope that you enjoyed a lovely holiday with the ones you love.  Wishing you many more in the future.  I also hope you are having a craftastic day.  See you soon!

Christmas Stitchery!

Hey boys and girls!  Sorry it's been so long since I've said hi.  I don't want you to think that I've forgot about you though.  Earlier this week I went shopping for some extra goodies for the ATC kit giveaway and I've been stitching like crazy for the hand-embroidered piece.  Don't worry- I'll post some teaser picks for those of you who just can't wait to see.

This year I stitched up a few of my Christmas cards.  Of course, it was meant to be one those projects I slowly worked on all year so that I could have tons of them but, yeah, that didn't happen.  There's always next year.  I've been such a naughty crafter.  Anyways, onto the holiday cuteness.

I couldn't get good pictures this time around.  So, the green looks totally different in all of them.  This first one is probably the most representational of the true color of the card-stock.

 

 

 

 

I covered the backs to hide the stitches.

 

 

 

 

I used some Sublime Stitching patterns to make these bad boys.  Giggly Mama has some super cute, crayon tinted ones she made using the same patterns.  Check them out here!  We even used the same set up for our penguins, great minds think alike!  Got to give her props on her tinting, she said it was the first time she'd ever tried it.  Well, you'd never know, because they look great.

Thanks for looking and have a great day!