Happy Easter!

Happy Easter and remember:

He is not here.

He has risen

just as He said

He would. Come

and see the 

place where

he lay.

Matthew 28:6

(from pinterest)

Have a wonderful Easter and after a short break I will be back with some fun stuff,

Holly

A Swap, A Parade and A Shaker

Look at the adorable banner! Debby of Cozy Blanket coordinated a Spring swap and then she made the swaps into a banner. It is so cute above my Easter Parade.

Easter Parade

Adorable bunny by Debby (Cozy Blanket). Thanks Debby! And I do think he looks like a Suzy's Zoo. Sweet paper duck by Jane (AraliaJane). I love the gingham paper! And tiny pom poms. Thanks Jane! 

Cutie pie bunny by Carol (Arts and Sand). I love how he seems to be leaping across my craft room. Thanks Carol! PS her stitches are so tiny! Look at this sweetest little wreath by Michelle and Ashley (The Tattered Quilt Cottage). 

A closer look because it is such a wee little wreath! And a tiny little bee! Thanks Michelle and Ashley! 

And look at this adorable prim bunny! He is in a packet of carrot seeds! So fun and cute. I have put him in my dining room on the pie safe. He feels right at home there. He was made by Penny (At Home in English Valley). Thanks Penny!

These ladies are one talented bunch! I am so thrilled at all of the bunnies, ducks and bees that I received. You can tell that each one is a true labor of love! I am going to proudly display this banner & bunny seed packet year around in my craft room. Thank you again ladies! 

Here's the little duck that I sent. The two rules: make 5 and it had to be something that reminds you of Spring. He also had a felt half egg that I placed him in. I made the egg also. He is about 2 1/2" tall, that doesn't include his feather tuft.

I hope that you enjoyed looking at Debby's Spring Swap! She has pictures of all the swap items at Cozy Blanket.

Thanks Debby! I had a blast!

Here's a close up of the Easter Parade.

Since everyone else had a Grand Marshall of their Parade, I figured that mine needed one too. Poor thing. She started out like this:

In pieces and with just her undies on >:0

Glue, fabric,tulle ,ribbon and flowers later and we have a well dressed Grand Marshall with an Easter Bonnet! She feels beautiful now.

Lamb shaker. Spring or Easter Lamb Shaker.

I used a material that looks like shaggy fur on her. I bought it at Hobby Lobby. It is real slippery and the back is kind of silky. I call it fun fur.

Make the shaker out of plain felt first. Then cut out the fun fur circle and glue it onto the felt on the side that you will be using for the face. Since this material looks like it would be hard to work with I thought that just gluing a circle of it onto the front of the shaker would be the easiest thing to do.

After letting the glue dry, trim the fur face so that you will be able to glue the actual face on. I trimmed it all the way down to the silky material. 

Palmer Bunny and Lamb

Glue the ears on. I used Elizabeth's (Creative Breathing) tutorial for the felt flower necklace. I think that she looks so much sweeter with the flowers around her neck. If you don't want to make flowers a ribbon bow would be just as cute.

*Don't forget for the head, cut 2 from felt and 1 from fun fur.

Have a wonderful day and please share if you have joined in on the Easter Parade, I would love to come visit,

Holly

Swapping Fun!

I participated in Sandy's (521 Lake Street) Easter Swap. I was paired up with the talented Laura (VintageBettys). She makes the most adorable paperclay characters. This swap was so much fun! I really enjoyed every minute of it.

Here is what Laura sent me (left to right): most adorable bunny with a top hat, adorable spring Spoolie with her paperclay bluebird, Victorian spoolie (yes, she sent me two spoolies!!), egg decorated with paper flowers, and a lamb Nursery planter! Click on the picture to get a better look.

She also sent me this exquisite hand painted egg. Two butterflies and flowers are painted on it. The lovely hankie (which I must confess, vintage hankies are my latest obsession) and a beautiful silver rose broach. I have plans for the broach and hankie that I will share later on :)

I don't have very many Easter greeting cards. I have just never thought about collecting them until this year, which is of course thanks to all the wonderful blogs that I visit. Vintage Easter cards are posted everywhere and are so adorable. Well...look what Laura sent:

Vintage card images!!!! With a post it note sticky back! Oh my, I can't wait to craft with some of them (I am going to leave some plain too). The little framed girl is the sweetest. I have her tucked among my vintage nursery planters. * That kidney bean shaped blob is just a chip on my enamel top. It looks ugly (sorry, I should have covered it up) but it reminds me that my vintage Hoosier 

table was well loved before I bought it.

The basket tutorial that she demonstrated on her blog. Yes, she sent it to me!! I think it is so adorable and I love the lamb image. He fits right in with my other lambs. I love the flower ribbon and chickie bookmark. Later on in the spring when I plant the seeds (forget me not and sunflower), I will think of Laura and her friendship. She also sent some abc/word stickers that look like tiny Scrabble tiles-you know that I love my Scrabble tiles!

Thank you so much Laura. I loved opening my box and each little present within. We couldn't have been better paired, as you and I both love the same things :)

*small disclaimer: Laura sent candy but I shared some with hubby and D#2 and hid a few pieces in my craft room to enjoy later. Thank you so much-the chocolate was well loved! 

I didn't take any pictures of what I sent Laura, but she did a blog post on it. Just click here.

And a big thank you to Sandy!! She was so wonderful to coordinate this swap. Without her this swap would have never happened!!

The alarm went off this morning at 7am! So that I could wake D#2 and dear hubby up from their Saturday morning slumber. To go on an adventure to buy this:

and all of this:

and this: 

D#2's school was having a yard sale for a local church. The church was making money for a mission trip to Africa. D#2's school teacher was in charge and she told me that they were going to have some good stuff! Lots of Christmas stuff, but mostly from 1980s and up, a little too modern for me. But I did find some vintage Christmas. Only two Nursery planters. Look at the little elephant. His original plastic flowers still intact. What a find!

Another church yard sale. Not a plentiful as the first but different stuff. 

Charlie Brown A to B dictionary, Disney book (I love this type), Richard Scary (can never pass these up), and 4 Hardy Boys books (ohhh...I love these even if they are new), & Lefton Christmas salt and pepper shakers. D#2 bought some toys there too.

In 4th grade I had to do a report on our state, Alabama. It had to be hand written, bound, pictures of state bird, flower, flag, etc. Yep...this is the book that I used as my reference. Oh the memories when I flipped through this thing at the yard sale. We had a contest for best Alabama report and guess what? I won first place with a blue ribbon and everything. Yes ma'am, this books coming home with me! Can't place a price on memories. But I do have to admit, it is very useful, it is a dictionary after all. So as long as I don't need to look up anything past the letter "b" then I'm good.

Well, that's our Saturday morning adventures. And for dear hubby and D#2 being such good sports I promised them breakfast at MickeyD's. 

Just a little side note: I do have one more Spring/Easter craft coming up. Hopefully I can get it posted tomorrow. 

Until then have a wonderful day, 

Holly

**If you are having a little trouble understanding Baa lamb's instructions I have uploaded some easy to follow pictures that should explain in a little more detail. Just click here. Enjoy!

Shaking In To Spring!

I am so glad that Spring has finally arrived.......at least it has on the calendar. It is still very cool here and they are talking about a freeze warning tonight. Well, nothing like little lambs and fuzzy chicks to make it feel like Spring. These shakers are a little different than my normal ones.  

1. Cut 8 sections out of pink wool felt. These sections are for the head. 

2. Sew one section to another, and so on until 4 sections have been sewn together. I used the buttonhole stitch.

3. Transfer the face onto the 4 sewn sections. Stitch mouth, glue nose and glue the eyes on. The teeth can be added now or you can wait until the head is finished to glue them on.

4. Now sew the other 4 sections together.

5. Take the two halves and sew them together. You can add a shaker box before sewing the head closed, but I didn't bother, so really my shakers are not shakers :) . Stuff the head.

There will be a small hole at the top of the head that you can either sew shut or put a party hat on him. I cut a small circle and stitched it over the hole. 

6. Cut the ears out of wool felt. Cut two out of the same color felt as the head and cut two out of white felt.

7. Stitch the ears, I added pipe cleaners to mine so I can pose them.

8. Cut two tiny slits where the ears will go. My slits were a little smaller than 1/2". Stitch or glue the ears in place.

9. Make a collar.

10. There will be a small hole at the bottom of the head. Insert the prepainted wooden dowel into this hole. You can add some glue to the tip of the wooden dowel before inserting it.

11. Now add the collar and whiskers for the bunny. I used crochet thread for the whiskers.

Chick

The chick is made the same way with exception of the face and ears.

I used a pom pom for her collar.

I wanted to make a lavender chick but didn't have any lavender in my wool stash :( 

(same picture, different background. And look! The little chick with party hat popped in to say "Hi!")

Birthday party chick in a cloche. She is celebrating with a tiny felt cake. I wanted to make one of these for Christmas, so I bought a bunch of these cups. Well....the Christmas season was so busy that I never got around to making any. But now, I am not only addicted to party hats but also plastic cloches! You will probably get tired of seeing these little dioramas (because by now you must know that I love wee, tiny, little things), but I promise they will all be different *<:)  I might just make it a "Where's Waldo" type of fun- "Where's Cloche"! 

Funny bunny with party hat!  

I think bunnies with bent ears are so cute!

Just thought you might enjoy looking at some pincushions that I just completed.

Domestic Divas!

Vintage Diner theme.

Cherry Pie

Shasta Camper 

Mermaid

Bluebird of Happiness

Just if you are interested, there are more photos of the pincushions in my Etsy store.

Have a wonderful night and keep those crafty fingers busy,

Holly

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

Happy St. Patrick's Day from my craftroom to yours!

Have a wonderful day,

Holly

The Grass Is Always Greener........

Busy in my craft room has brought may hours of joy. Easter and Spring swaps to be made and decorations to assemble. Oh how I love this time of year! 

Vintage paper Easter grass is hard to find. I love using the paper Easter grass instead of the plastic. I remember that the vintage grass was a type of wax paper that was very narrow, much narrower than today's paper grass. My wide paper grass looks vintage but not vintage enough for me, especially when I tried to pair it with those adorable tiny fuzzy chicks. It is too wide and dwarfs the chicks. So here's my solution. Cut the grass in half length wise. It works and looks oh so vintage!

Left: regular unaltered paper grass. Middle: straighten the grass out by gently pulling it between you fingers. You can also use your fingernail to "iron" it out by gently pulling it between your thumb nail and the tip of your pointer finger. Right: now fold the grass in half, keeping it aligned, then in half again and one more time, keeping it all aligned. You can finger pinch it to make it stay. Now cut the grass in half long ways, just don't let it slip out of alignment. 

Grass cut in half long ways. Use very sharp scissors.

To give it more of a vintage look, crumple it.

See the difference. On the left- grass uncut and on right- the cut grass. Now you can cut it into any length you want. Sometimes I cut it into 1" pieces and sometimes I leave it the full length.

Little spoolie chick, he is on a nest of full length, cut in half grass.

 Can you tell that  I am addicted to party hats? If you stay in my craft room long enough, you are going to end up with a party hat glued to your head. They are such fun! and oh so simple to make! A little trick: I like to copy my pretty papers onto copy paper using the color copier. This makes the little hat easier to curl (because the copy paper is not as thick as the scrapbooking paper) before you glue it together. And I curl the hat around a pencil, to give it a kind of "memory" so that when I glue it I am not trying to fiddle it into a cone. And if you copy newspaper to make cute party hats or sailor hats, you don't get the ink all over your hands!

Dress up a simple egg cup with ribbon and a handmade rosette. I made mine from plain scrapbook paper, felt circle (used my Cuttlebug to cut out the beautiful, perfect circle) and pink pom pom. Need to make her a party hat! Her grass is non cut paper grass. The larger size grass fits her well.

Pom chick on a spoolie. Spool is plain one from Hobby Lobby. Vintage style flowers are made using my tutorial and eyes were made using my black pearl tutorial.

Sweet little fuzzy chick. His grass is cut in half and suits him well. He is wearing the tiny party hat. And a simple ribbon bow.

Here's some more sweet vintage wrapping for your personal library. Have fun! 

Notice the tiny doll rattles. Elizabeth of Creative Breathing made the most adorable doll rattles from paper clay. They look just like the one on the wrapping paper.

Have a wonderful crafty day,

Holly