crafts for Christmas

I am doing my best to have a bunch of hostess-gift type items on hand to give out to people who show up at the door with cookies. My favorite little gift for this year is cloth dinner napkins. Well, they are sized more like lunch napkins. I get 6 out of a yard of [...]

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crafty: drawing books for kids

This summer has been packed full of stuff that is not crafty, sewing, painting, or me sitting-around-reading-a-book related, so I have not had so much to post about. “We went swimming today,” or “we went to the park,” is good only so many times. I have done a tiny bit of sewing though, and am [...]

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1-day-projects: apron

I made this apron for a friend who’s getting married. It’s a fairly quick project, but since it fits kind of snug it needs to be measured for the recipient. I measured me, because she’s about the same size (okay, she’s a little thinner! After her first baby, I bet it will fit perfectly!). It’s [...]

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1-day-projects: Making candies

Of course you knew that I couldn’t buy the candy molds and then wait until Christmas to make candy with them. Not when Valentine’s Day is upon us. I used white Ghiradelli chocolate from the baking aisle, and made a filling of creamcheese, confectioners’ sugar, and raspberry juice strained from berries. The filling was a [...]

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More jelly making

A friend shared with us some blood oranges her son grows in Florida. They were delicious, and got me thinking about a recipe I saw for blood orange marmalade. I couldn’t find the recipe, of course, so made regular orange marmalade. I used the book on Fine Preserving published in 1969 that I thrifted, for [...]

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Are you ready for Christmas yet?

I’ve got my cookie-drop-by gifts ready to go. If you show up this week, you get an orange too, but I can’t guaranty they’ll last more than a few days. I have salsa for the people I know who are off sugar, and raspberry jelly for everybody else. That’s a flower pin on top, good [...]

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making Christmas gifts

While I’m blogging, I did want to link to some of the things I’m making for Christmas. I can’t figure out how to make a hidden post, so if you are someone I am likely to give a gift to–don’t follow the links! This first one is a quicky for either a stocking stuffer or [...]

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Pretty things

The latest issue of Victoria magazine is out, yay! It’s dedicated to the blue and white color scheme. Don’t you just love blue and white? Of course I love pink and yellow, too, and red and white…I love so many colors, who can pick one theme? Anyway, from the latest issue I draw your attention [...]

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Working on Christmas early

If there’s any chance I’m giving you a Christmas gift this year don’t peek at the following link and ruin the surprise. Everybody else go here.

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