the tree!

Well my tree is just about done (minus a few little things here and there as i unpack them!) Every year my tree tends to get more vintage. I'm not using some of my other ornaments as much as the vintage ones i pick up at the flea markets. that combined with a few favorites and my handmade ornaments is what i find so appealing.

my tree topper this year (every year it is different) She is a vintage Bunnies by the Bay collectible bunny (of which i have quite a few!)

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there were a couple of other things i put on my tree this year that are fun and easy to make (didn't think to get a close up shot of them...), but they are tissue flowers. I made some out of vintage pattern tissue paper, but you can use any tissue paper you want. this is another way to fill up gaps in your tree where ornaments won't really hang well. here's a youtube video on how to make these easy flowers:



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so that's it for today - tomorrow is the day that we are unveiling our top hats. You've already seen mine, so i didn't make another one, but i'll post my pic anyway. So after a few days when all the hats are in, i will pick a winner.

if you are participating, here is what you need to do:

do a blog post showing off your hat (please try to include a picture of yourself wearing it; this isn't the Miss America contest, so don't be so hard on yourself!), make sure you've linked your blog post to my blog as well. then come over to my blog and find the linky spot for you to enter your blog information so that we can easily hop over to see your hat!

black friday!

i'll be leaving early in the morning and heading over to Summerhouse for black friday. just wanted to post these pictures of my soldered holiday ornaments that i made using vintage images off of holiday cards found at the flea market this year. there's one i really love, so might not be able to sell it! hope you had a lovely day and looking forward to hearing what you did (if anything) on black friday!

4th of July ornament swap

these are the ornaments from the 4th of july ornament swap. they are all so fun and unique.

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festive packaging from Allegra

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wire ornament by Joanne Thieme-Huffman

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floral ornament by Zhulia Abrok

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vintage child star ornament by Lonnie Jenck

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beaded card ornament by Danielle Greene

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vintage card ornament by Allegra

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crepe paper ornament by Pam Huntington

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star ornaments by Lori Guerin

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paper ornament by Keli Hansen

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"Cape May bathing beauty" by Jane Blanco

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star ornament by Melissa Merrill

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Patriot ribbon ornament by Vivian Neroni

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this was my ornament. i made copies of a dolly doodle image and then made a fabric snippet from them. i wrapped them in vintage quilting and made the little tags from another image in my dolly doodle book.

Lemoncholy's Easter Swap photos

I invited 16 of my friends to participate in an Easter ornament swap. it was alot of fun and i love how different everyone's ornaments are. mine have been hung on my tree and now we are just waiting on the Easter bunny.

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fabric collage by me

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polymer clay frame by Laurel Steven

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paper mache lamb by Pamela Huntington

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soldered charm by Amy Huff

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wire nest "home" by Kim Boehm

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recycled lid frame with clay flower by Denise Mares

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collaged egg with flowers by Allegra Smith
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"Blessed" by Danielle Green

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fuzzy chick in egg by Vivian Neroni
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hollowed egg with bunny inside by Lori Guerin

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Easter egg hunt basket by Melissa Merrill

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fuzzy chick sitting in crepe paper basket by Heather Bluhm

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fabric egg by Keli Hansen

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paper bunny inside flower by Zhulia Abrok

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faux scrimshaw by Brenda Bliss

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sewn little blue bird by Lonnie Jenck

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sewn bird with fabric dyed like an Easter egg by Joanne Thieme-Huffman

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here is miss lilly helping me with the packages.

blog giveaway

well, i 've been quiet for a few days and that usually means that either i'm not feeling well or Tucker isn't feeling well. well, Tucker, it turned out, has bronchitis. wednesday night he was up til 5am coughing, coughing and coughing. i stayed up with him, suctioning, singing to him, talking to him, keep him company, etc. and then i spent the next few days trying to recover! we took him to the doctor on friday and she started him on an antibotic. i swear a few hours after the first dose, he was already sounding better. Friday i ended up sleeping in until 11:00am, something that rarely ever happens. i'm just not one to sleep in. i have some many things i want to get done on a daily basis and usually sleeping isn't one of them! but i was exhausted, had a horrible headache and needed to rest. so rest i did. i'm still a bit tired, but getting there!

my project for the last few days was working on a wreath. i decided i wanted to make a wreath using vintage ornaments. i've been collecting these for awhile, so i had plenty on hand. i started it last night and got about 1/2 done before i ran out of glue stix. stopped at Michale's this morning to restock my stix and back to work (why is that they only had 1 cashier on a saturday morning, a few days before Christmas and with a line 12 people deep? ugh!)

i made my first wreath when i was in college and had gone home for Christmas break (that was also the time i made all these adorable "gingerbread people" ornaments out of felt. ) my mom was making them and she showed me how. we would go deep into their property (she was living in Greensboro, NC at the time) and we would look for grapevine. then we would wrap it in a circle and begin the decorating. we used a glue gun and whatever supplies she had on hand (i really don't remember what it looked like!) i just fondly remember the time. so now that my wreath is completed, i thought it'd be fun to guess how many ornaments it took to fill in this wreath? whoever comes comes the closest will win a prize (a prize i am still determining)