Around the House.....

Above is a picture of my magnet board filled with pastel christmas cards and holy cards...I just love these gentle cards...their colors, the beautiful pictures of Mary and children......
I also found a love for mercury glass this year and asked Santa for some....

sorry for the bluriness but the candlesticks and little birdie are from target...I'm in love!

I bought these two mercury glass candle holders before xmas at Marshalls and Cost Plus...don't you just love the discount stores?

Now this next pictue is on penant on a banner I made for our house and of course, I uploaded all these pictures backwards! I am a lame-o when it comes to computers...but you will get the idea by the end...it spells out Merry.....

Well, sorry for the bad pictures and loading!... but I'm still loveable! hee! hee!

Happy 2 days before New Years eve...... karen....

Ho! Ho! Ho! ?????

I know I have been quiet for most of the month and for that I apologize. This month has been a doozy for us in not necessarily a good way so this wonky tree was a perfect depiction of how we all have felt... We lost a dear friend at the beginning of the December, a friend who spent several days out of month with us and had been around my whole life and it was a blow to us all, including the kids. We will miss him dearly but will also always honor the friendship and companionship we had with him forever....
I had to get that off my chest....
Our Christmas was a really nice one. Our family get-together was delayed because of flu's and surgeries etc... so it was just my immediate family and it was quite charming. A friend came over on Wednesday and we crafted some candles and sachets for her to give as gifts, I really enjoyed that!
For Christmas eve we ate a wonderful dinner and played games with the kids and listened to carols...it doesn't get any better than that!
This morning we opened presents and made our traditional eggs benedict brunch...Yummy! Here are the pics of the eggs....

Well, I just wanted to stop in and say hope it was happy! Here is a picture of Marissa's new jammies and gnome socks (she likes gnomes) It might turn into our christmas card next year!

Hug the one's you love! I will be back soon! Hugs...karen....

Hello My Friends!!!!

I hope you all had a wonderful thanksgiving. We did! We ate turkey and ham and all the fixings but most of all got to spend time with the special people in our lives....
Sorry for the blog break...life has been very busy, hmmm lets see:

1. Son's birthday and our Anniversary ...check
2. My birthday....check
3. Daughter gets evil life- sucking flu.....check (unhappily checked!)
4. Family car breaks down..... check ($140.00 , not priceless)
5. Garage sale....check
6. Work 2 Saturdays (check...okay paid for the car breakdown)
7. Deep clean for Thanksgiving..... check
8. Hubby feeling bad...off to the doctor for a bunch of tests.... (results...life too stressful,watch diet and excersise)..... check.... hmmm...you think?
9. Prepare for wonderful dinner.....check
10.Have and eat wonderful dinner..... Yum! I mean....check
11. Birthday dinner party for good friend....check (now this is priceless!)
12. Hubbies car breaks down..... (most definitely not priceless...$350-400)....almost checked

But you know what? We made it through all this and still are as sane as we were as we started! (we wont discuss the state of our sanity on a regular month!)

Anywhoo.... I joined wonderful Robin of Thrifty Miss Priss fame's white fat book and here are the pages...sorry for the bad pictures, I forgot to take pictures so quickly took them before work and these are the one's that came out....

On Sunday we went to a local nature center and took their 2 mile trail, we had alot of fun and both kids came along...that is always special since they are teens and are rarely seen near their old parents!

I will be back soon with pictures of the christmas banners that I have made!

Happy December! karen.....

Busy, busy.....

So it has been a whopper of a week! First off I want to show you something I forgot to show you last week that I got at the flea.... the snowflake, pointsetta and santa earrings will probably show up in my christmas banners.....

The week started off with Marissa getting the flu. She went to a sleepover on Halloween and shared an air matress with a friend who was diagnosed the next day with the swine flu.... Well, needless to say, when she came home monday eve. with a sore throat we were very worried! The fever didn't start until tuesday night but she was miserable...and her asthma also kicked up! On wednesday we went to the doctor and she said it wasn't H1 N1 but there was a chance she could still contract it on top of the flu and she needed to be closely watched...Uggghhhh! do you think I got a wink of sleep? I was worried sick about her... Fortunately it was just a bad flu that whopped her on her butt and she is doing much better now...still coughing but actually getting out today a little!

We had more excitement on wednesday....this little devil pushed out Marissa's screen while we were at the dr. and went missing for two days. We could hear her in my neighbors garage on the second day and went in to find her but couldn't...we went in 3 times and couldn't find her! Later that evening I could here her again near a vent so I had Ben hop the fence and we finally got her to come out! She may look angelic here, but don't let looks fool you! She is a rascal! Here she is in the suitcase I store my wool in...I took some out and went to the kitchen and when I came back, here she was:

I am on my way on christmas banners...some traditional, some pastels......

I just have struggled getting started on these puppies but now I am motivated...



And to end the week nicely.... Ben turned 18 yesterday! My 6'4 baby! (actually he is my oldest!)

Life sure happens quickly! Hope you are enjoying yours right now! hugs! karen....

One last view around the house......

I know this is not my standard picture but this is a sight you will see frequently in our house....Mila into everything....this paper bag is actually holding magazines that my mom was sorting thru to share with a friend and guess who snagged it ....watch your feet! she will attack! Luckily she is usually good about keeping her claws in but boy is she the rascal!!!

Anyway, my sweet girl is down with the flu... hopefully not the swine flu but I think it is...she has all the symptoms and her friend has a confirmed case...Boo!

I will be taking down halloween but wanted to show you some pics from around the house before I do....I had these done last week but then couldn't find them on the darn computer...of course I blame the computer because I'm not lame or anything??!!! hee! hee!

I found some cool Martha Stewart glitter stickers of ravens and owls and added them to a couple of things...the pumpkin above and the glass beaker 2 pics ago....she has such a fun line...I find something almost every season or holiday that I like of hers!

Well, I am off to take sickie's temperature and administer tylenol and tlc...although she is being quite the troll so the tlc part has been a bit difficult..... Wish me luck! I will check in soon!

karen...aka nursemaid......

Snow White ....

My Sweet girl went to a birthday/halloween party last night...Isn't she a lovely Snow White? Of course I am totally partial to those rosey cheeks and lips......

Last weekend Robin and I hopped over to the local Antique fair and I found this wonderful victorian blouse...I just couldn't leave it there! I will probably post it on my etsy eventually because we just don't have room to display such lovelies but for now I have to admire it!Here are all the small goodies I got:

Mostly Christmas...I have started making christmas banners but I just loved that little dolly and the bride cake topper with real lace. I just couldn't pass them up! I also got a bolt of the prettiest fine victorian lace which I will launder and start using and also add to my etsy....

This morning I went to Target at 8:15 to see what left of halloween, I love to get paper goods (paper towels, tissues, paper plates etc...) at 1/2 price, I don't care if they have a halloween theme! Well I could not believe how much candy people were buying! What do they do with all of it? People were leaving with whole buggy's full of candy! I did buy one package of m & m's but left the rest there for others....curious!!! Happy Sunday! karen....

Crown Tutorial

I think a ghost has jumped into my blogpost because everything is wonky!

As hard as I try, I cannot move my pictures around or type anything between the cat picture and the witch...it is haunted space! Anywhoooo! I am doing a crown tutorial for the year of color and finally finished it last night and sent it out but thought I would share a picture of what they look like:

And my cute mommy was kind enough to model them for me...they are simple and fun to make and can be embellished as much or as little as you like...

Isn't she a good sport?

The halloween photos are there for the taking...some are from my collection, some from copyright free sights so enjoy!

Well, we are more than 1/2 way thru the work week! Yipppeeee! My little flea market is on Sunday so even though I am working SAT's on saturday, I have something fun to look forward the next day!

Hope your week is going along well! karen.....

More Glitterfest....

We had great neighbors at Glitterfest! This is Linda also known as Ms Gotrocks...she makes wonderful jewelry, beautiful turquoise crosses and she had some awesome candlesticks that would have gone home with me had I not come to make a dollar! A picture of them is next....

And this is the awesome Jami Santos..she had this great vintage orange cape and black vintage parasol! People couldn't help but stop and talk to her! Below is a pic of her wonderful halloween characters.... they were to die for...


She was featured in Better Homes and Gardens take a look and you will see why....

And here I am making a sale..... (As you know, I rarely show pics of myself but this is just my head so I let this one go...hee! hee!)

These are the last of my pictures that I will post of this event but it was just so much fun and so many wonderful people that I had to show more!

I hope you are having a spooookily good week! hugs! karen....

The Party's Over.....

Glitterfest is over but it was so worth the effort! It was filled with wonderful artists and artful goodies to purchase. This post was loading verrrrrry slowly and then finally sped up so I added more pictures in the end and now it won't let me put them where they belong so... just bear with me! The above photo is of Lisa Lori's booth. I can't find everyone's business cards so when I do,I will give you info. on the artists....

This Mary picture is one of Robin's awesome creations! I want this!

When people arrived, this cute scene was greeting them:

Here is one side of our booth:

Here is the top shelf:

My banners:

A bigger picture of our booth:

Lisa Lori's awesome art:

And here she is with her booth:



All in all, it was great fun and very inspiring.... I will post more pictures soon ...Have a hauntingly good week my friends!!! karen....