Hand Painted Scarves

Last week our library had a silk scarf painting class. They want to do more crafty events....yay!!! I went to the fairy garden activity that was held in spring and really enjoyed it....I am not that into fairy gardens, I just like the little gardens.

A good friend and I decided to paint a silk scarf...for free! I have always loved libraries .....'back in the day' when you had to whisper inside and could only get books; at one time my local library loaned artwork,  and now there are movies, music, toys, e-readers, e-books, and  magazines to borrow. And it's all FREE! Summertime brings lots of children in for the summer reading program and the activities...I haven't taken the boys to any this year. The library offers so many free things. I wish more parents would take advantage of it.

Back to the scarves........

We made flower centers by taking a bottle cap, twisting it, and securing it with a rubber band. Now, this didn't have to be a flower, but mine was....sorta.

Next we painted the dyes on...fun!

We watched them bleed into various shapes.

Carla and I really had a good night and loved it....maybe we'll do it again??? 

 As I was on my way out I heard a familiar voice and saw a (maybe) familiar face.

Annie and I met early this spring at an Art Night. I noticed she had her head shaved and thought she was also a cancer patient so I went to talk to her, But she had shaved it for her son who was a cancer patient. I didn't know who she was and never saw her after that. We chatted a bit and caught up, she's very philosophical and I enjoyed talking to her again. I posted this picture on facebook and a mutual friend tagged her. We hope to get together again, now that we know who each other is. 

It's a small world. 

Last week was a busy one....so...there's more to come!

Stay tuned!!!

Ethnic Fest

Saturday was the annual Ethnic Fest here. It's a big deal, people come from all over the state......main street is shut down for the day and is full of vendors,  food, and craft booths. I love to go every year, and this year was no different. 

Deb and I left later in the cool, partly cloudy morning. When the sun shone it was nice, but when the e dark clouds took over it was cold.

I loved this metal pumpkin totem for $25. I didn't purchase anything (other than food).

Several musicians and dancers entertain the visitors to Ethnic Fest. Since I am a fair weather friend I did not want to sit and watch any of the entertainment.

Heading into the food court area....that's the best part - the ethnic foods. Years ago small size portions were offered but the past few years only the larger, meal size plates are for sale. I enjoyed an egg roll, gyros, and a YUMMY banana /strawberry crepe. .....my very first crepe!

I saw some beautiful wooden bowls.They were smooth as glass and not cheap.

One innovative woman made these gorgeous brooches/pendants with old jewelry. She used a lot of big, old earrings in her designs. If I remember correctly they were about $25 each.

It was fun to go and look around, I look forward to it every year. I planned only to buy something to eat.....I don't need anything and am trying not to spend extra money. 

This afternoon I went out to dinner with some extended family for their mom's/grandma's/great grandma's birthday. She's 94! Then we all went over to Deb's house for cake & ice cream. Hubby came over when he finished work. Our youngest granddaughter was there too, it was good to see her. She is quite a character! Now we're home and I am enjoying the quiet.....I took 2 of our grandsons with me to celebrate their great-grandma's birthday.

It's the start of a new week, nothing eventful is on my calender....working 3 days....drat!!! I hope the weather is nice tomorrow for my day off! remember, I LOVE sunshine! 

Tips & Tricks

Here are a few bits and pieces of some helpful hints:

• Always rinse out your new paint roller before you use it. That will clean off the shavings and fluff left on from manufacturing and will allow the roller to soak up the water first and not so much paint. Squeeze the water out before use. 
• If your hair is dry use olive oil to condition it: I warm up about 1/4 cup of oil, rub it into my hair, wrap with a warm towel. Leave on until the towel is cool and then wash as usual.
• Use a mixture of warm oil and sugar to soften hands. Warm up a bit of olive oil and sugar (salt will work too), rub into your hands and rinse. 
• My grandchildren are preteens and do not have the latest technology with them at all times and get bored on car rides. I found some FREE printable bingo cards to download and print here. I also have a site where you can make your own bingo cards and they have lots of other free printables too. The thrift store had a great hangman game board that I purchased just for car rides and they LOVE it! It's entertaining and teaching. It's a board, about 8-12" x 11" and at the bottom has a small white board area to write down the word, On the side there's a place with an elastic band to hold the marker, and the letters and body parts are attached with elastic. You flip over the letter as it is guessed and the body part for the hangman. 
• I color my own hair and fortunately the color that I like is not the expensive brand. I'm a redhead/strawberry blond and like to put low lights in my hair pretty often. I use the cheapest brand I can find for that, the kind that mixes in a plastic squeeze bottle. Since I have fine hair and use this color on only a few strands I have lots of it left and throw it away. As far as hair-color goes red fades the fastest....and this sunshine we've been having doesn't help either. I decided to experiment and see if the darker color would be OK if I just stored the plastic bottle of color in the medicine cabinet for a couple of weeks until I wanted to use it again. About 3 weeks later I used it and my hair didn't fall out or turn green or anything else horrendous  so I think my little experiment was a success!

               (my disclaimer) I am not recommending this....just saying it works for me....it's up to

               you if you want to try it. The bottle says to throw any leftovers away.

• Wouldn't you love to put together a family magazine? I would.....I stumbled across a blog Landee See Landee Do and she tells you how. Check it out even if you're not up to it. Every year my daughter makes a photo calender for us............we love it!!! we look for it!!!! I think she knows that if she didn't do it we'd disown her (just kidding Amy).
• If you eat at a restaurant that has free refills and you can't finish all of your soda (or if you drink tons of unsweetened ice tea) ask for a 'to go' cup and take it with you. 

Packrat or Not?

Am I a pack rat or not? Are you?
Wikipedia's definiton: Packrats are nest builders. They use plant material like branches, twigs, sticks, and other available debris. Getting into everything from attics to car engines, stealing their ‘treasures’, damaging electrical wiring and creating general noisy havoc can easily cause them to become a nuisance. A peculiar characteristic is that if they find something they want, they will drop what they are currently carrying, for example a piece of cactus, and "trade" it for the new item. They are particularly fond of shiny objects. They can also be quite vocal and boisterous.
Yes, that is the definition for the animal that the slang description of human hoarding comes from...but do you see the similarities?
I'm a nester
I don't steal my treasures.....but they are treasures
I like how they will 'trade up'.....I've done that at the thrift shop or garage sale
Shiny objects are good, right???

I've been known to be vocal and boisterous
I've watched HOARDERS and my house does not look like that so I guess I am safe. My mom (raised during the depression, so can you blame her?) has pack rat tendencies. But she was always the one who had what you needed to fix it or could fix it herself. I know I am a collector....of books, clothes, jewelry, toys, craft items for the grands, paper and embellishments for my scrapbooking/cardmaking adventures, and just things I like.

Can it be good to be a saver of 'things'? Sometimes............for instance, I received this 19" TV from freecyle to replace the 12" TV that was in our spare bedroom. It's a small room, but a 12" TV is pretty darn tiny. Last weekend my granddaughter and her friend wanted to watch a movie but I didn't have a DVD player in there so I asked and located one on freecyle. The next day I saw an ad in the paper and the DVD players were on sale at a price I would pay, so I picked it up. A brand spankin' new one has to be better than the VHS/DVD player with a missing cord and a non working VHS player, right? Yesterday afternoon I decided to hook it up to the TV for my grandsons.....but the new one wouldn't work the way I needed it to so I packed it up and will be return it on Tuesday. My next option was to attempt to hook up the free one. I looked in my 'extra cord box' in the basement and found a cord I hoped would work....it did! I didn't get the remote to work but that doesn't really matter. As you can see it's an older TV and DVD player but it works and the price was great....FREE!!! I don't know exactly what the stand is for that it's on. I wanted hubby to put it in the basement for me but he carried it out to the garage so I had to drag it back in and it works perfectly in the room. Grandson J picked out some movies for 'his room' and placed them on a shelf. He always keeps his amphibians on top of the TV and now he's happy that there is enough room for the frog, the snake has to be on the side of the TV "but he's OK with that". Yes, we are a strange lot. :-)


And sometimes keeping a few extra odds 'n ends is not all bad, you might find just what you need.
I cleaned out the closet in that spare bedroom too and:
If I tell you I bought another Red Hat MAKE me get rid of one or two or three......
I found some more toddler items to try to sell.
I found a bag of things I was saving but haven't needed so they will be donated to the thrift store. Grandson J and I also cleaned out the movies and stuffed animals and found some to donate.
The closet is still pretty full but I did make a difference in it.

It Was My First Time

Yes, you read that right, Saturday evening was my first time........now you know I don't mean 'that'....this is not that kind of blog and I am definitely not that kind of girl. We did have a good time, albeit a bit wet. The community I live in has a Holiday Fantasy parade the Saturday after Thanksgiving and our church participated this year. About a dozen people walked along and handed out glow sticks....the theme "Jesus is the light of the world".

We had children walking along and being pulled in wagons. No big deal you say....well.... It rained all afternoon was raining that evening too, not very heavy, but raining all through the parade. I probably wouldn't have done it if I hadn't made the commitment. If I say I'm going to do it I almost always will. My 6 & 7 year old grandsons walked with me. I thought it would be a good for them to get involved in some more church activities. We dressed warm but it wasn't cold at all, I didn't even have my gloves on. While we walked the 3 blocks to meet up with the rest of our group we each had an umbrella but I put them away while we walked the parade route. I put on a lightweight rain poncho......but noticed several blocks later that the hood was not on my head....so my hair was wet, and I looked like a drowned rat. Oh well, it was dark and I didn't care. I had my arms full with 3 umbrellas and a bag of glow sticks. When I ran out of glow sticks I was able to use the bag for 2 of the umbrellas and the candy the boys got. What a relief! After the parade we walked to the community house to have hot chocolate and see Santa, then back to the car. I don't think I've walked so much in a long time. On the way back to the car we found the end of one of the umbrellas we lost on the way there. I had been looking for it and was really surprised that we found it in the dark.

I'm thankful that I was able to do something unique with the boys that I hope they will remember. We didn't let a little rain stop us!

I'm also thankful for Dropbox because I usually type on my laptop and now I can just save it and print it from our desktop when I want to. Dropbox is a free and easy to use and install on all of your computers.

Free Calendar Download

As the (self) designated person who often knows what's going on/what there is to do, I sometimes make up and print out a monthly calendar filled with the month's events for my Red Hat friends. You can type in any event or sometimes it's easier for me to copy and paste from the community calendar online. Calendars That Work is where I find the free down loadable templates. You'll find many different sizes, for the year or just a month. Of course, you can pay and get more but I only use the free templates. Make on up for the kiddos, for grandparents, teachers, friends, YOURSELF.

Free Downloads for Paper Crafts

At Canon's Creative Park you can download all kinds of free stuff for paper crafting....from calenders to cards to background papers to photo frames to 3-D projects and many more. Check them out!