a number of things

a weekend walk

We have a small 3 acre area at the very back of our property that, once upon a time, was part of a tree farm. The result is a bizarre type of little forest with all of the trees in rows according to type. The first three rows are giant river birch, then pine, oaks etc. The very last 6 or so rows are ligustrum, a large evergreen shrub. Over time, these have grown up to create an amazing little world of their own and a space beneath them that is quite enchanting.

Hoping your weekend was a lovely one!

 

wordless Wednesday :: late afternoon shadows

 

January morning table

She likes to get up early, no matter how late she goes to sleep... so I get up with her. :)

(...And I am just noticing that she has on a pink onesie in nearly every post lately. She has several and they are her favorite, but good grief, that is ridiculous!)

 

a gift for me

 

Lilly is modeling part of a slightly early (a few days before) Christmas gift for little ole me. I am beyond excited about keeping bees in the coming year, and I am very grateful that my family shares my enthusiasm. Rose insists that she is going to be my number one helper. :)

 

merry making

So much making going on! Most of it, unfortunately, I cannot divulge (Like the sweet dresses I made up with this pattern! Oh, my.). Last night we had our second truffle making session of the season and we packaged them up today. I also bundled up some copies of a perpetual gardening calendar I made (for our deep south zone 8b) for a few of our friends and we had such fun making a little pile of these little stick Santa's (as we are calling them) to attach to gifts. The super simple tutorial can be found here at Garden Mama. Aren't they the sweetest? The 10 and up crowd carved them and then we added a bit of paint.

Tomorrow is going to be another full day of friends and festivities, but I just wanted to pop in for a minute and wish everyone a very merry Christmas!

(Chip snapped the shot below on his phone of some of the non-stop making that was happening in the kitchen today. Yes, Lilly had snagged yet another truffle and was nibbling away.:) )

 

gift bags

As I was wrapping last year's gifts with our dwindling supply of sale purchased Christmas wrap, I resolved to make 2011 the year we made the switch to cloth gift bags. Beginning in January, I kept my eye out for any (on-sale) red and white fabrics (because I like red & white) and slowly built a little stash.

I am sewing three different sizes (small, medium & large) using end-attached wrap-around ribbons, as well as side attached "bag tie" ribbons (Very much like these.) The "ribbons" I am using are simply twill tape ordered from here for another project (that never happened), but what I am most excited about are the beautiful branch tags! (*ETA - Tonya's family also makes some lovely birch tags that we are going to add to our collection.) Now I know we probably could have made something similar to these, but I have so many other things on my make-it list, that I couldn't resist. They will be stashed away after Christmas with the gift bags and re-used year after year.

Happy Christmas crafting!

 

P.S. ~ Thank you all so much for the kind words and encouragement for Anna and her herbs! :)

 

wordless Wednesday :: and now she is 3