CRAFTING FRIENDS TRIO: January Giveaway

CRAFTING FRIENDS TRIO: January Giveaway: Giveaway Time There will be 3 winners!  Dani, from Sweet Home Stitchery will  be giving away 3 hand stitched note cards (with envelopes)...
Lynn, from RaggyAnne  is giving away a cute mug rug..great for the table..this can be used also as a candle mat...very pretty! And Nancy, from Huggins Haven will be  giving away some bath salts and bubble bath.....just yummy stuff.

Go to the above link for fabulous photos of great gifts!

Be sure to tell them what you would like to win! 
Smiles, Cyndi
 The lucky winner will receive the following: 4 oz. bottle of Bubble Bath (Ocean Flower Scent),
4 soap petals (Rain, scent),6 oz. Bath Salts (Fresh Linen), Heart Shaped Soap (Lilac Scent)

Collecting Spider Webs, Nature, Mushrooms, On My Early Morning Walk!

I have a nature collecting book I go at a Second Hand shop and I love the ideas in it.  It tells how to collect spider webs, who'da thought?

Here is how I tried it and not perfect but a start:
If there is a spider it the web, touch i with s blade of grass for it to  leave.
Hold White Spray paint about a foot away and lightly spray the web.
With Black Matte heavy card stock, gently get under the web and lift it onto the paper, Straight Up!
Let the paper dry for two days before touching it.

Oh la la! Well, I just got pieces at it stayed attached to the sides
I could got get the complete orb but I got strings of it.
That is satisfactory for  me. And, I will keep trying now and then.
They will be good backgrounds for my nature findings.
Try it yourself and see how they turn out!

Here is a web before I sprayed it and after spray before I collected the web
Before

After

I added it to the long black piece that was not completely covered.
It was really pretty large to get under one piece of paper anyway as I cannot get directly underneath it.
I was going in from the side to collect what I could and it distorted the web but I still ran my paper under it and pulled straight up by the way, yes, Pull straight up!


I have been working on cleaning off my porch to hang our under the porch hammock, we have one in the yard but it has rained so often here it just stays wet.

My husband got in it to read and of course Emma and Bailey wanted to be close to him. I sit in the chair a lot in the mornings to look at our wall of nature growing and stones. I took the stone photo in the rain, they just shine when wet is why I love them so.

Do you see the heart stones in the second photo?

You can see from the inside porch photos, the wall is clay and very shady, so I can't get much to grow there, I just finally let nature take over, there are many blooming ( weeds) growing there. But, I do native gardening so they are OK for me.

I am still finding the chocolate covered mushroom rosettes ( Deceptive Craterellus) growing across the street in the forest.
They are so pretty to me.

We also have many Amanita Mushrooms growing in our yard,

 A Panther Amanita tan color

As I walked up the hill to my neighbors house, I really freaked out when I saw these, they are the size of saucers and plates ( yes!)  I should have had a ruler with me, and they cover maybe 5 feet of ground space or more. I did not get them all in the shoot.

I think I will be returning here for more. pictures! And more morning photos an inch size mushroom under the spider web

Leaves are turning colors

Teeny Tiny mushroom growing on the beautiful moss

These are pod sprouts on a nearby forest tree

Thanks for going with me on my morning walk today!

Reading Books and Magazines

I was reading a blog spot from Sandra at Thistle Cove Farm  and it got me thinking about my books and reading, plus all the projects I think I should be doing!

I read in the Chattanooga Sunday newspaper where books will be obsolete in the future and children in schools will be using I Pads for their textbooks.   As it is they cannot afford to buy new books and ask for donations for them. I love books and I cannot imagine a home with bookcases. I love shopping the Thrift Shops for books as I never know what will be found and I look and read at books and magazines I would not have sought out on the internet! I love finding books about traveling and biography's, peoples experiences, crafting, vintage patterns are as good as new except new tools are always coming out to make it easier to make things!

I love to look through magazines while sitting on my front porch and being outside. We have had so much rain lately it has been just a let the gardening go week.  I got a surprise yesterday when I went to get a tool from my gardening box of popsicle sticks, markers, etc. I saw this color in my box and I wonder what that might be? On a closer look it was this:

Our porch frog that I see a lot, he has a couple of  toad houses and I see him frequently but he stayed there all day and was gone this morning when I checked. Thanks goodness, I didn't want him living there as I move the box around.

Sandra spoke of some books and magazines and I replied this:

.  I got several library How - To Books I have been looking at;  folk art projects, Pioneer Women and how they got by, Felting, Beading, and Papermaking!

.

Now, to put them to good use. I got an issue of Our State magazine which is about North Carolina, a wonderful looking article on Screen Doors, Tobacco Barns, Cheerwine Drinks, and Grits but I don't like Grits and never have,

Our State Magazine:

I did make a fairy necklace that I don;t now like how it turned out so I will change it up some. I went to a local beading shop and got some jewelry findings, silver rings is what I ended and I ended up with some seed beads, needles and she was able to help me to get the correct sizes for what I was purchasing.

 So, I got a book on seed beading and we sill see where it takes me. I don't like to follow a pattern but it gives me ideas.
I got these beads at "The Beaded Bunny Hill" and Vivian, the owner was very helpful to me. She also teaches classes a"t William Holland School of the Lapidary Arts " which is located in Young Harris, GA. Anyone can come here to take classes and stay on campus. They usually last a week.

I like to make things and make it up as I got not knowing how the finished product will look , maybe just an idea to start with.

My fairy Forest Necklace I am working on:

 Add Finally I want to show you the Moonflower that bloomed on my Birthday Wednesday!

It was as big as a Plate! 

So, go read a book or Magazine and Get Inspired! 

Smiles, Cyndi

Ebay, Fairy Starshine Dust, Camilla Flowers, Moss gardens and Books!

http://myworld.ebay.com/frstyfrolk

I also have some listing in eBay which seems to be selling better for me right now! I used to have an eBay store but I closed it a long time ago. eBay and Etsy are by best selling sites but I also have newer listing on Bonanza under frstyfrolk too.

I make some candles with no wicks yesterday just to see how they would turn out. They are very slender is why no wicks but I will keep at it and see what happens. I used or I should say re-used some Christmas candles I had them both outside and the cold weather was dropping the silver and gold glitter off the edges of them so I collected the glitter and ground it up real fine, then I put it in the molds first and added some candle was from the same candles. I adore the Kewpie molds I found and I had the angel molds from a while back.  The Kewpie's have a front and back side so I guess I should now mold them together.
I used my Tim Holtz melting pan that I had only used once with some beeswax to cover some Sassafras leaves last year.

Our yard is covered in Sassafras trees and I love their leaves which are three different lobes.  I put a few in picture frames with the Sassafras meaning behind the leaves but the ones I framed were not the best leaves I found. I later found fabulous ones and will re-do them also.

I even named our cabin, " Sassafras Cabin" because of the many trees on this property. Maybe I should get some shirts made up saying that! I have read in Log Home Magazines that you should always names your cabin and then make advertising shirts with the name. But, we do not rent our cabins so it would just be for us. There are many rental cabins our area, even in our neighborhood. So many people come here for vacation time, I can;t believe I now live where we used to drive 6 plus hours to come to pet- sit and we fell in love with the area.

Here are the candles I made but they really are just adornments, maybe in something using mixed media that I love. I have in mind to make some curiosity boxes with m forest findings I have so many to share of my collections.

The small "Kewpie s" do not have a back on them and I really prefer them. 

I also saw a fabulous Camilla Bush on the way to the recycle place Friday and I had my husband stop to let me ask the home owner if I could take a picture of it. Well, they would not answer the door so I took them any, and then of course I picked up the fallen flowers from the ground. They are SO Beautiful, one of the prettiest flowers around. 

SO pretty! 

Pretty good for on the ground!

I also started making some fairy dust starshine filled bottles for a jewelry project. 

Isn't is cute to the owl face in the nut shell. The squirrels do that! 

The tiny circle tops are mushrooms I find, green circles and fairy wings, plus Sourwood tree dried flowers (Like lily bells)  I find everywhere.  So many fairies dance in my moss gardens! 

My Moss garden jars and container are doing very well just sitting on the front porch, even in the cold weather. We had a dusting of snow again last night but just that.  These were covered by the porch ceiling, the pine cone is nibbled on my the squirrels also and they look like a rosette I think.

Well, enough for m=now, I have a staircase of books to clean off. I am starting to list my, books, magazines, and patterns as fast as I can also.  I have been collecting crafting books and magazines forever it seems , well, since 2003 when I started replacing all the ones I lost in our household auction. That isone of the things I found I missed the most, so I started scouring Charity and Thrift shops along with  Auction and Estate sales for them. I have loads of Vintage ones to get my findings from and then I will have to start sharing since I am loaded down and need more room very bad. 

Later, 

Smiles, Cyndi

I so so much appreciate all your comments!