Today is the day the winter theme has officially worn out its welcome.
We've loved this recycled sap bucket evergreen piece in the yard all winter, but now it's time for bunnies and eggs and flowers and Spring! to move in.
And judging by the bunny "frolicking" we have witnessed lately the first litter of bunnies may not wait for the snow to leave before they appear.
Perhaps Paul will have another bucket for our next outdoor decor theme scheme.
No website, no Facebook page. Just call him, show up at his house or catch him at a local craft fair.
The young people in the family, ever aware of how our actions affect the planet, suggested that we strive to use less throw-away wrapping at Christmas time. "Hear, hear", we said and promptly got to hemming fabrics that we had aquired for their jaunty holiday patterns and/or attractive July sale prices, to use as wrap in the style of Japanese Furoshiki.
It was fun to both sew and wrap with these pretty fabrics that had been purchased with no real plan in mind.
One can only make and use so many stockings, table runners, and tree skirts with all the amazing fabrics available.
These wraps, made in a variety of sizes should hold up for many Christmases to come.
And, post Christmas there are plenty of other uses for the technique with other fabrics.
This two bottle wrap is great for gifting, or for transporting party supplies.
Furoshiki also works for carrying loose objects such as a stack of books, awkward items like your potluck casserole, or anything that needs a temporary carrying handle.
Pre-made fabric pieces like handkerchiefs, scarves and dishtowels work too. And fabric with raw or pinked edges can of course be used and may even double as part of the gift for your favorite sewists.
Here is the basic wrap we used for most of the Christmas packages:
But there are so many more possibilities. Check out Suika Tsutsumi, the watermelon wrap.
And, while it is great to have one more idea for saving the planet, we all know the true value of this project.... reducing our fabric stash and acting like that was our plan all along.
Getting in the holiday spirit we got back to the sewing machine for a seasonal home accessory update. A very generous friend shared some painterly deer print faux suede from Spoonflower with us. Wish you could feel it. Isn't the design great?
And so fitting as on Christmas Eve eve morning we saw three deer walking right down the middle of Columbia Street. Speculation was that they were doing advance intel for Santa to make the Chippewa Falls run go more smoothly. Probably they were noting details such as the loss of one of our two chimneys when we got new shingles and that our Norway maple has grown another 10 feet up into sleigh airspace. Important time saving tips like that make Santa's job easier for sure.
It must have helped. Santa was very, very good to us.
Poutine potato chips. No knife, fork, or napkin required, and perhaps minus a few hundred calories and the ensuing stomach ache one might receive from eating real poutine.
Hope the relatives leave room in their luggage for a bag or two of these when they come to WI this week for Christmas in July.
Warning: Santa has been sited in a red, Princecraft fishing boat powered by a 50 horsepower outboard motor named Rudolph. Last chance to make sure your name is on the "Nice" list.
There was a period of time when one could find in every discount retail store a kiosk with a motion activated device that would play clips of the CDs on offer from a certain easy-listening music/relaxation sounds genre label. We blame the regrettable '90s and George Winston in particular.
You would be walking down the aisle headed for the Rubbermaid bins, potting soil, or printer paper and all of a sudden you might hear waves rolling in and out of the ocean onto a beach, the rustling of aspen leaves in a gentle breeze, or frogs peeping in a pond at twilight. After realizing you were not crazy you would go way out of your way to avoid that aisle on all future trips, but if you forgot, as we usually did, and passed by it again you might be surprised by one of those aforementioned sounds or, perhaps one of the many, varied, haunting calls of a loon. Our memory is that that particular CD was titled Loon Magic.
Here at NDL studio we have created, with a little help and enabling, er, encouraging from a Canada-connected friend a little loon magic of our own.
To do so we revived a craft first seen in Canadian Living magazine two decades ago to make a new flock, or as some sources call it, a raft, of peach pit loons. Yes indeed, these little cuties are at their core humble, naked, peach pits.
Ta dah! Incredible, eh?
And, since the original instructions are lost somewhere in our archives of pages torn from magazines we have had a devil of a time finding any guidance for round two of peach pit loon making. So, to get this almost lost art on the Google radar (personified new technology meets old technology in this wording), in other words make it Googleable here is a visual of what is needed to turn a peach pit into a loon. And just to make sure a Google search can find it. Peach pit loon. Peachpit loon. Peachpitloon. (Google may appreciate this effort, but Spellcheck is having a fit.)
And why would one want to make peach pit loons? Well, can you think of even one reason why not?
Thank you to the relatives both American and Canadian for consuming a half bushel of peaches during Canadian American Friendship Days 2015.
Loons are pretty magical. We never fail to be enchanted when we hear them.
The 2015 Bachman's Holiday Ideas House closes today. Here are a few photos to show just how thoroughly the design team carried out the Make it Merry theme.
Have gnomes, will travel.
We wish for you much merriment in your household, and suggest you take some "merry" with you wherever you may go this holiday season.
Specializing in random gardening, sporadic quilting, constant collecting, avid nature appreciation, back fence news, front porch sitting, neighborhood intrigues, and smalltown trend spotting.
