Christmas In September...

Yes, I'm starting to get the Christmas-bug already. I just love the decorations and the time of year (snow hopefully!) and all that it entails....
(even though we still had 80F/ 26C yesterday!)




Christmas time 2010...

  I've started some brainstorming for my sister's x-mas present. I think a small sampler will be in order this time. These two I sent her last year..

I also always make something for our nicest neighbors and I'm thinking about making one of these:


 I found these fabrics by Michael Miller online at the fabric store yesterday:

 

Aren't they just the cutest?  {smile}

I wanted to show you what I've made in the past for the neighbors, but now I cannot find the relevant pictures. Anyway, last year I made them all these rice-filled hot bags and the year before I think it was an cross-stitched ornament.

My wrap dress for tonight's book launch is just about ready. I had to do some rigorous cutting into the pattern here and there to make it fit better but I think I've got it. I'll have my hubbie make some pics tonight...

Hey Ho, it is Friday already!!!  {smile}

What A Difference A Day Makes...

What a Glorious Day today!  {smile}

It started in heavy, heavy fog that just started to lift as I drove through it early this  morning, treating me to absolutely beautiful moments of color. Now the skies are bluer than blue with a slight breeze passing by. Perfic!  {smile again}

I had time this morning to stop by a different Value Village (= second hand store) from the one that I usually go to, and look at what I found:

A dark-grey voile blouse from H&M! I loooove it!

I also found this lovely glass Ball Mason jar with glass stripes on the sides... (a bit difficult to see that detail on the photos)

And this fun little metal container...

Its head comes off and I think it will fit my crochet hooks perfectly.  Now if I could only crochet properly...  <wink>

Fall Blues...

We have only been experiencing real Fall weather for the past two or three days or so and I feel it is time to start using my light-therapy lamp again! Bleeegh!

Don't get me wrong, I'm doing things but my heart doesn't seem to be in it...
Of course the fact that my wrap dress isn't quite looking as I had hoped (too big again!) isn't helping either. I would really like to wear it to Tif's book launch this Friday but not the way it is looking at the moment. I still have a few days left though to see if I can alter it enough that I feel comfortable in it. Don't worry, photos will come!

We did have some fun stuff happening last Sunday. A friend of ours had kindly offered us one of those IKEA Expedit bookcases a month or so ago, but I just couldn't find the necessary room for it so I declined.

Sunday though, when we made our youngest child choose between finally cleaning up her room or else, said child remembered the bookcase. After a quick phone call to make sure that the friend still was holding on to it, we raced off in our pick-up truck to well... pick it up!

Upon our arrival we were greeted not only by the bookcase (and the very excited friend), but also by a fabulous dresser and an even more beautiful leather couch! Yes, we took it all... Said friend now has a lot more room in her garage and we have a lot less...

Garden Round-Up...

What incredibly gorgeous weather we are still experiencing!!! Super warm and humid this week with temps up to 80F/ 27C!
Tomorrow will be the last day of all this goodness however so we're enjoying it while we can...

I'll start with some pictures I took yesterday morning at 6:45. The sunrise was just so beautiful. We can't see the actual sunrise from our house since we live in a valley but the skies were pretty nevertheless...

And then I did a garden round-up just now of some of the goodness still found there...



Katsura Tree


  






Lavender

   





Sedum

   





A pretty weed.

   





Green beans.

   





Blueberry bush.

   



Swedish colors: yellow & blue...

 

Not bad for the 23rd day of September! Now I'm going to sit down with these library books....

In this spot...

Have a great weekend everyone!

New Fonts...

Over the weekend I discovered (with only a little bit of help of my lovely husband) how to install free fonts and then how to add them to the HTML of my blog!
I will probably be changing the fonts several times over the next few days so bear with me...

The Post Title and the Gadgets are now in 'Penmanship Print'.

The Tabs Text is in 'Velocette'.

The Page Text is in 'My Type of Font'.

I found them on DaFont. Go check it out, they have soooo many fonts! 

Happy Happy Joy Joy!

Finished Agenda And A New Project...

Haha you guys, I have never received so many comments on a blog post and about Pink Clogs at that!  {smile}

I was indeed very lucky in finding them since they were placed at the 8-8 1/2 sizes and I actually wear a 9 (= 40 in European sizing). I was disappointed to find any fun shoes in my size so I thought to better have a look around at the other sizes, you never know!
I also found a great pair of Aubergine / Eggplant colored Dr. Martins but I already have two pairs of those... 

Anyway, fun shoes for a fun price! My next project will be this to go with the clogs:

Out of that fun fabric I showed you last. I won't have time today but I'm thinking tomorrow...

But I'm going a bit fast here. First I wanted to show you my finished agenda project:

It didn't come out as neat and tidy as I would have liked it, but I love it anyway and it was so much fun to make. And I am using it already as we speak!

Last weekend we had rain for the first time in at least 6 weeks and it was really nice and cozy inside. Mr. G. was first baking bread and then Indian Dal from scratch: the house smelled soooooo good! I sat at the crafting table working away on my agenda, the kids were doing their homework and life was good!

Fall is my least favorite time of year. I really dislike all the Fall decorations everywhere not to mention the Halloween ones. Probably because I didn't grow up in the States, but I just don't like them. I love all the Christmas Americana however! All that is starting to show up on the shelves already which is way too early of course, but what to do... I am starting to think about making some nice x-mas cross-stitch project(s) for my sister though...

Well, in other news, yesterday I had some 'acoutrements' added to my teeth and I have started using my second Invisalign tray. In total I will have at least 14 trays and one tray stays in for 2 weeks. Very slowly my teeth will be pushed into an even more lovely smile!  [wink]

Really, I am so excited about this. I've had so many bad things happen in my mouth, I am now ready for something positive. And..... I'm already losing weight because of the no-eating/ snacking rule: yahoo!  {smile}

So, Fall is here and so is the morning fog. Look at these beautiful shots I took about an hour ago...

But, the summer weather is back once more. Today and the next 4 days or so they are expecting the temperatures to be in the mid 70's! (= 23C) Yay, one more burst of summer!

Thrifty Finds...

Ha, I had some extra time today between volunteering at Little Bit and picking up Miss M. and a friend from school. I decided to go to Value Village, because after all, I hadn't been there yet this week!  [wink]

Look what I found!

They are Hanna Andersson clogs and they will go great with whatever it is I will be making out of that fabric!  And, drumroll please,  they look like they have never been worn before and they only cost me $8!!!   {smile}

When I showed them to Miss M. I received some mayor eye-rolling. Of course, what did I expect?

I also bought a lacy curtain!

Right now I've got it hanging in the front room, on the upper part of the window. This is where we don't spend a lot of time. I will probably get mayor eye-rolling on that one too and I must admit, I am not completely convinced yet either, but I will give it some time...

What a great start to the weekend!
I'm going to celebrate with a glass of wine and then I will be cooking dinner with a recipe from Photo-Copy. Chicken in Peanut/ Yoghurt Sauce with Rice. Sounds pretty good right?

Random Ramblings...

Back from Headache Land...

There is something in the air and I mean germs. Almost everybody I know is feeling achy and tired. Of course the weather change, which was Huge, didn't help either. On Sunday we were in the upper 80's with tons of sun and on Monday we were in the upper 60's with clouds around our noses. I'm just saying, that was a bit quick...

I haven't done much creative stuff since I spoke/ wrote to you last but I still wanted to show you some collages that were taken over the weekend before it all becomes old news. Here it goes:

First up is our lovely son Master C.  He ran his first race of the season in Bellingham when it was 85F/ 30 C. Not great conditions to say the least...

The guy in the red (# 785), used to win all the Middle School events in our league!

He doesn't do this any more but he is still ridiculously fast.
Somehow he often ends up in my pictures...

Master C. ran almost 2 minutes faster than last year though so: Success!

Next up some pictures of our lovely Katsura tree in the back yard with its wonderful heart shaped leaves and some of the other plants still in bloom... (and yes, one of those bees/ wasps with those dangling legs: igat!)

I also found a feather in the grass with pretty droplets on it...

And I received a lovely package from my friend Sabeth, still for my birthday...

For those of you not from The Netherlands, this is a baby product brand that has now come out with an Eau de Toilette smell: I love it!!!  {smile}

And last but not least two pictures from way back when (two weeks ago) when we were visiting in Tacoma with G.'s parents. This is the old light keepers' cottage at Brown's Point...

And a cute seal is winking at you and saying: Bon Weekend!  [wink]

Still Here... (sort of)

Oh boy, I was really busy the last few days (in a good way) and today I would finally have had the time to do some posting.

I started out with fresh energy on that agenda project that I showed you last week..

Here you can see the two covers in the foreground, the insides facing up. I bought a nice scrap booking sheet and some matching stickers and started working with those. All this after I had printed a whole bunch of pages, found the mid- line and cut the mid-line of all 23 sheets. (I don't own an actual paper cutter. I've looked at them in the store so many times, but can never bring myself to actually buy one...)
I've also numbered all the days (with a pen, because I didn't want to spend lots of $$$ on the number stamps) and used the letter stamps to put on the days etc. I will show you pictures of all that later.

I stopped working when I reached the first of January 2012 because my head was killing me! I took some acetaminophen (= pain killer) but after two hours it was still pretty bad. I took a nap and felt a bit better. I have to feel better because tonight we have an important event at school that I really want to attend so I think some more pills are in order...

In the mean time I've made some delicious Mac & Cheese. I'm going to make myself a bowl now and sit on the couch in front of the tv and rest some more until I have to take off. Hopefully I will feel better tomorrow to show you some more stuff... Bye for now!

PS The last few weeks quite a few new followers have joined: Yippie! I know that doesn't really mean that much, but it feels good anyway. Thank you!  {smile}

Wishing You 'Strings of Happy' This Weekend...

A la Tif...

Little Agenda Project...

Click to enlarge ( a little)

Yesterday I was working on this agenda project. I was inspired by the Flow agenda from this year. It will be running out around Christmas and I need to start making dentist appointments etc. already for the new year, so time to make a new one myself.
Of course their new agenda is gorgeous but the present model worked better for me (the rings in the middle) and I still have lots of stickers left from this one to use on the next one. Plus I can find my own stickers too of course!

I made three templates and printed them out. I only had off-white card stock available but I think I prefer plain white. I'll have a look around to see what other colors I can find...

Anyway, I bought some fun fonts stamps in red and teal a couple of months ago so I will be using those to make every day look a little bit different.

Here you can see those little fonts stamps. I think they will be great for this project!
I just realised that I don't have any number stamps!
Too bad, now I just have to go out shopping again...  [wink]

On the right in the top photo you see the version that I came up with on the computer using Picasa/ Picnic, just to give you an idea what it might look like...

I only did it on the middle one since I think I like that one the best. I will attach a ring in the middle so that it can lie flat on my desk. A fun little project that has been in my head for a while now...

And Hey Yay: It is Friday already!!!  {smile}

Master C. will have his first Cross-Country Running race of the season tomorrow and it is all the way in Bellingham! (a 2 hour drive!) At least we are still experiencing gorgeous weather over here with temps in the mid 80's (30C!) and the drive up there is just plain beautiful, so no complaints. I'm sure there will be plenty of meets coming up where we will be shivering down the sideline...

Have a great weekend everyone!

Drunk Elk...

Oh boy, I just had to share this with you guys... Too funny!

Drunk Swedish elk found in apple tree near Gothenburg

The elk was apparently searching for fermenting apples when she got stuck

"A homeowner in southern Sweden got a shock when he found a drunken elk stuck in his neighbour's apple tree.

The moose was apparently on the hunt for fermenting apples when she lost her balance and became trapped in the tree.
Per Johansson, from Saro near Gothenburg, found the elk making a roaring noise in the garden next door.
He called the emergency services, who helped him free the boozed-up beast by sawing off branches. She spent the night recovering in the garden.
The next day she took herself off into the woods with her hangover.
Drunken elk are not an uncommon sight in Sweden during autumn, when there are plenty of apples about.
Other residents of Saro had seen the elk on the loose in the preceding days.
Mr Johansson said the elk appeared to be sick, drunk, or "half-stupid", the Associated Press reported."

I found this on the BBC- Europe website...

Table Cloth...

Here is the new spot for that vintage table cloth I bought yesterday (for only $4 can you believe it?) ...

I was afraid to put the table cloth on the actual dining table for fear of stains that will inevitably happen so I think the wall will be a good place. It also ties in with some of the other red features that are featured in there...

This is where that lovely Ikea horse fabric used to hang, but I have found a different place for that (for now....)

This is probably only temporary but it is not a bad spot perse, we'll see...

Sorry if I don't sound too inspired today. I am feeling a little bit off, due to those trays in my mouth. Actually I think it is not so much the trays as is the fact that I can't snack! Food is on my mind constantly all of a sudden...

Hopefully this feeling will only be here for a couple of days and then I will be used to it. The trays don't actually hurt (yet! The orthodontist will add some accouterments to them in a week or so) so that was a nice surprise.

I think I will sit myself down with a glass of water (bleeegh) and Tif's book (yay!), which is absolutely worth buying by the way. I love it!

I only met Tif in person just after Christmas I think it was, but she is truly an inspiring person and just so much fun to be with. My first true friend since we've moved here 4 years ago, and yes, I do feel I can call her that...   {smile}

Fab Find...

After I survived my first official orthodontist visit this morning (I've started using 'Invisalign', clear plastic trays to realign my teeth for the next 6 - 9 months or so) I felt that a visit/ treat to Value Village was in order...

Good thing because I found this most fabulous vintage table cloth!

It measures 4 x 4 feet so it is a good usable size. Don't quite know yet where I shall put it (on the table maybe?) but I'll figure it out. Love it!

Now I am going to try to get those Invisalign trays back in. (I almost could not get them out just now for lunch: panic!) You can't eat or drink sugary drinks with them in, so I think this is not only day 1 of my new teeth but also day 1 of my new 'diet'! No more snacking for me!

Some Presents, Some Signs & Some Cows...

Yahoo, look what I received in the mail this afternoon: Tif's book!!!! 

And look at all the cute little tid-bits that came with it! It was already a good day, but now it truly is...  {smile big time!}

On another note, I wanted to show you a place where I had breakfast this morning with some friends of mine. It was an old school building and the owner had all these huge (some of them ceramic) signs everywhere...

What a crazy place but so much fun! It is in Maltby for those of you in the know...

And this is what I came across 'along the CowRoad'...

Gorgeous as always!