It's Been A While

I can't believe that it has been over a year since I blogged! Whew! It has been a crazy year! We sold our suburb house and bought one out in the country with acreage. This has been a dream of ours for a while. It is now the end of a school year so this means teacher gifts!! I love making teacher gifts.

Crochet chicken pot holders, monogrammed tea towels, slumped jar spoon rests are what we made for this year's teacher gifts. Little m made a sweet card also. She is turning into a little artist!

Little m's card for the teachers!

We have started keeping bees! I have two hives so far and hope to eventually have 5.

Honey bee on clover. All worker bees are girls :)

Opened hive to make sure the queen was released from the queen cage. When you order a package of bees you have to let them get used to the queen before she is released into the hive. 

Passed the written part of the test, now just have to past the practical part in about 4 mths to be state certified.

Some assembly and paint required.

Did you know that bees have pollen baskets on their back legs to carry pollen back to the hive for food for the worker bees and larvae?

Have a wonderful night,

Holly

Fun Flower Tour

Wow! I can't believe that it is July already!! Sorry for the mini vacation. I have been busy: gardening, redecorating, sewing, summer homeschooling D#2, canning, needle felting, painting and just plain old relaxing. Here's a couple of pictures of the yard. 

Cherry tomatoes always go crazy in the whiskey barrels. 

Pretty gladiolas after a rain. They remind me of my Mama and Papa. He always grew them for Mama and would bring them in from the garden for her.

I loooovvvvee my gardenias. I have two bushes that are about 9 years old. They bloom throughout the summer. 

Garden. See the corn that the squirrels planted. I have planted corn for years and can't get it to grow above 2 feet and look at how big the squirrels' corn grew-at least 4-5 ft. I believe that it has 2 ears on it.

Gladiolas, cucumbers, & sunflowers.

Pretty day lilies.

My beautiful butterfly garden. The black eyed Susans outdo themselves every year. It is a huge plot of them, about 6 foot x 14 ft and just full of the black eyed Susans. The butterflies, bees, goldfinches and other insects just love them.

Pot of flowers covering a pump we had to install to keep the area some what dry.

 I planted some zinnias, marigolds, morning glories and a few mystery seeds in those bare spots. Hopefully the b-e-Susans will make a comeback next year. Can you see the clump of weeds in the bottom left corner. The b-e-susans had choked all the weeds out but since there are some bare spots this year the weeds went crazy. They have all been removed now.

Another pot covering up a pump.

Little gnome all spruced up.

I believe this day lily is called a "tiger lily".

Canna after a rain.

   

Dr. Seuss quilt. This year I did the quilt a little different. We had 22 kids and I really didn't want to make 22 blocks. That would have been one huge quilt. I used a jelly roll (assorted Dr. Seuss strips of fabric) to make it. The children were so sweet and I just love their hand prints! I machine embroidered each name under the hand print. You do have to be organized while doing this. I used masking tape to label each child's hand print until I was able to embroider his/her name.

Each child signed their name to the label.

Back of quilt. I pieced the back using all the leftover solid scraps. I love to use up all the fabric and not have any left over. 

Hope you have a wonderful weekend!!

Keep those fingers busy,

Holly

Having A Quilty Kind Of Day

Cutting, sewing, painting, stitching, measuring.....can you guess what I have been up to? Here are some more hints:

Yep. It's that time of year again. Making hand print teacher quilt. I will show you the finished project as soon as I finish the binding. I had to do the quilt a little different this year. There are 22 students in the class, so wonky quilt squares for each hand print was out of the question. That would have been a massive quilt! But I think this quilt came out just as cute. I hope to finish the binding this week because school's out at the end of next week. Yikes! Better get my thimble and get busy!

Have a wonderful night,

Holly

Two Barns and A Cup Of Tea!

Hello, sweet people! Two more Quilty Barn Along blocks completed!! I just wanted to thank you so much for the wonderful comments on my previous post and on all of my other posts. I truly love and cherish each one! I use to reply to each comment that I received but a while back I realized that less you go back to your comment that you left me you will never know that I replied back :( I wish blogger would automatically send my reply to you. I will try my best to email a reply to you but my computer is so sssslllloooowwww that it takes me forever to switch back and forth from internet (web) to my email account. My computer is very old, at least 150 years old by computer years, but I digress. Here's the fun barn blocks! Lori now has a barn with a silo! Guess I am going to start on another quilt soon so that I can have a silo too :)

Farm fresh eggs and my grandmother's wooden spoon. Look! This material has "barn" cats on it.

My grandmother's mixer (which I sometimes use even though cord needs repairing), a sweet potholder my sister made me and a vintage cookbook that she also gave me. The darling apron is one that I picked up at the antique store for around $2. 

D#2 finished school this past week and I wanted to share what she and I gave the "specials". These are teachers that teach computer, library, music, p.e., etc. We gave the two men mugs with coffee and a muffin. 

I embroidered tea towels with the teacher's last name initial. Along with the coffee cake muffin, we included two types of tea, tea cup and saucer and a tiny bottle of local honey. I only had 6 tiny honeys so I metal stamped two silver plated tea spoons with the word "TEA".

I used the towels as the wrapping paper and tied them with tulle. My two most favorite towels:

 the  top row middle one and

the bottom row to the far right. This one also had teal ric rac on it. Cute! These were Martha Stewart towels. 

Here's the tag that we used. It is an old library card. Remember those days when you use to have to sign your name to the card and they would either write or stamp the date due? I used my vintage typewriter to type the greetings on the card. Fun stuff! 

Hope that everyone is having a wonderful weekend,

Holly

Love, The Ester Bunny

I cannot believe that the weekend is almost at a close. My family and I have packed a lot into this past weekend and worked until we couldn't move another muscle. Saturday morning started by yard sale hunting. For some reason here in our little neck of the woods you have to hunt the yard sales. Very rarely are the yard sales in the newspaper. I was on the hunt for teacups. No luck. Headed back home with a few books and a vintage globe. We went to the rock "store" and picked out some natural rock to go around the pond. Trucked on over to Lowe's to pick out some flowers for the yard. After lunch we worked in the yard, building the pond and planting flowers. Dear hubby had to go back to Lowe's for pond pump (the old one stopped working) and pond hose. Got the pond "working". Finished the yard, washed up and then the neighbor children came over (so their parents could celebrate a birthday) for dinner and a movie. What fun! Today we had Son's graduation recognition service at church and boy am I tired this afternoon. We tried to finish up some loose ends in the garden but lightening cut that short! Close flash of lightening and a big clap of thunder and poor D#2 running into the house screaming like a banshee convinced hubby and I it was time to call it a day. D#2 has finally calmed down, it did take a while though.

Photos below for Grandparents and aunts and uncles (I am sure everyone else will find it a tad boring).

He is the tallest.

It took an Act of Congress (or as he use to say when he was little "That took a tot of Congress") to convince him that the recognition service would be fun.

He complained a lot about the collared shirt. Usually he wears a nice "T" or polo shirt to church. I don't like the "T" but it's what most of the teenage boys wear (big sigh.....). 

Shaking hands with the pastor. The minister of youth is in the pulpit calling out the names.

School ends for D#2 this week and I finally finished the teacher's gift and let the children give it to her on Thursday. It is another Dr. Seuss quilt and this year I had the children make cards for her. I put their cards and a photo of them in a scrapbook. I didn't take a picture of the scrapbook because I didn't dress up the pages. I wanted their artwork to shine so I thought simplicity was the best way to go. I also had the children write a 3 sentence letter to the Head of the School (principal) and draw him a picture. I really stressed to the children to: "Make sure to sign your name to the letter and to both pictures. I don't want to get home and find out y'all left your names off and now I have to play the guessing game. Please, please, please don't forget. In fact, write your names on the two papers right now. Because if you don't, I am not going to know whose paper is whose, so I am going to write on there "Love, the Easter Bunny"." A lot of giggling. Great, they thought it was funny so I know they are going to write their names on the papers. Yea!!! I have worked with kids for far too many years to trust they will write their names on stuff without any prompting. I get home and am making the scrapbooks when, what is this?!?! Written on a letter and on a picture is "Love, the Ester Bunny". Oh man, remember, this is first grade after all. After I stopped laughing and promising myself to never again use the Easter Bunny as an example, I set to work figuring out who really was Ester Bunny. Maybe Ester is the Easter Bunny's sister? I <3 children! Now you know the meaning behind the title (>'. '<)

Another Dr. Seuss wonky quilt. This is my own design and the 6th one that I have made! I am now a pro at making these. They do take a little thought to make them wonky. I also do the machine quilting. Since there are only 11 children, the 12th square was a cute Dr. Seuss print. I also bought a book, a collection of many of Seuss' stories, for the children to sign, kind of like a year book that she can keep in her classroom library. 

The back of the quilt. I used some of the left over solids and a fun print for the back piece. I love incorporating my left overs from the quilt into the back piece. This way I am not left with odd shaped pieces taking up valuable space.

Label-all the children signed it. How cute their signatures are!

Our teacher loved this gift. I know it will bring her joy for many years to come. She even talked about using a Dr. Seuss theme for her classroom next year. That would be cute! The principal said that in all of his 30 years teaching and being a principal that he had never received such a gift! I think that he was really surprised. The children worked so hard on the letters and pictures and were so patient with me as I made their hand prints.

I love it when a quilt is completed. There is nothing like putting that final stitch in and knowing that you are finished. But what to do now? It's like when you finish a good book, you are excited to finally know what happens but you also will miss the book. I am glad it is finished but I will miss working on it. Now? On to the barn quilt!!

Have a wonderful night and keep those crafty fingers busy,

Holly

Teacher Appreciation Gifts

This week has been teacher appreciation week at D#2's school. We love her school and absolutely love her teacher! Here's what we gave her sweet teacher (in case any of you wonderful people out there need suggestions & because I know that I am always on the lookout for adorable/clever things to give as gifts and I also love suggestions):

Day #1: (pamper your teacher gift) card and car wash gift card

Day#2: (flowers) Roses cut from the garden

Day#3: (handmade card) handmade card from D#2

Day#4: (school supplies) pencil vase with hershey kisses

Day#5: (something sweet) this will be tomorrow-Friday

This is the cute craft that we made for day#4. It is a pencil vase. I saw an adorable pencil vase years ago in a magazine and couldn't really remember exactly what it looked like. Thank goodness for Pinterest. Up in the top left corner is a little box that I don't use as often as I should. It's the search box. I typed in "teacher gift pencil vase" and voila! Several pictures popped up! Yeaaaa!  Tag found there too!

Supplies: 16 oz can, 3 pks of pencils (around 60-you won't need that many but it's best to be safe than sorry), ribbon (large and medium), glue gun, glue sticks, gold paper, rubber band and hershey kisses.

1. Glue paper onto can, using glue at beginning of paper and end of paper. Not necessary to go crazy with the glue. 

2. I drew a line around the center of the can so I would know where to dot the glue for the pencils. I only wanted a dot of glue because if the teacher wants to remove and use the pencils, I didn't want her fighting with the pencils to get them off. So, one dot of glue then stick the pencil on, making sure to point pencil label out. Do this all the way around the can. 

3. Put the rubber band around the pencils. This way if any pencils come loose, they won't to fall off. 

4. Now tie the ribbons around the pencil vase.

5. Make a label and tie on with jute.

6. Fill vase with hershey kisses.

The label is a free print out from the pencil vase site. For some reason when I went back to pinterest to source this label and idea, I couldn't find it. I will keep digging and try my best to source this sweet little craft! Her label rocks!!

I added school theme stickers to the bottom of the kisses. I found these online (pinterest) and printed them on sticker paper and then punched them out. 

Hope you enjoyed this cute "write" stuff gift.

Have a wonderful and blessed day,

Holly