Made: Lace! ; Etsy Shoppe Update

Hi, everyone!
I’ve been so productive lately. Such lovely light coming in through my window and prompting me to sit and soak it in with a crochet hook in hand. Anyone else enjoying the summer?

These are my first attempts at doilies! I’ve made lots of little motifs, but never made them this big! (To most people this is still pretty small, though) Baby steps!

Beads, too!

I’ve updated my Etsy Shoppe with some of the necklaces I showed last week. Take a peek!

Making: Sneak Peak

Working on new things- maybe you’ll see them in the Etsy shop soon. I’m pretty excited about the color that’s seeping into my work, not to mention the beads!

I’ve always loved beads and a friend of mine has started pointing out where I could be adding them to my work. I think it’s pretty with or without them, but I love using them, so I’m adding sparkly beads wherever I can.

Walk: An Afternoon With a Bumble Bee

I’m a Colorado girl at heart, but if there’s one thing I love about living in Maryland, it’s all the flowers! I always enjoy my walks to the metro or in to town when I walk through these cute neighborhoods to drink in the beautiful lawns and architecture.

There are tiny houses with faded white-wash bricks, tall oaks and maples towering over the sidewalk, fences of draped wisteria, bushes of fluffy lavender falling over the grass, and miles of clovers laced in with the fescue. It seems impossible to keep weeds out of the yards, and I really don’t mind. It’s gorgeous, lush, and green!

Most of all, I just love the wild, color-spotted gardens that call out to me from their beds. I wish I would hop into their world live Alice in Wonderland and leave the rest of the day behind.

Here’s hoping you find plenty of color in your walks, too!

Make: Wine Tags for Father’s Day

Happy Father’s Day!
Is it just me, or are men ridiculously hard to make things for? Maybe I just have the wrong kind of men in my life, but I always fret over what I can make that they won’t look at like a macaroni picture frame, especially on Father’s Day.
If I would have thought of this idea sooner, I would have written this post a few days ago, but it just came to me last night when I was wracking my brain for a gift to make my father.

Wine Tags!

The idea is that when a person gives a bottle of wine (as my father is prone to do) they have this cute handmade envelope with matching card inside that fits over the neck of the bottle and decorates it without having to go through the trouble of a bag or bow or anything like that. I’m so glad I thought of it in time!

Here are some further images- I used pages from an old book, maps, old tags, stamps, and sheet music, then simple layering of paper on the inside with iconic stamps. I didn’t want to get too girly, but I may have done so by using the birds. Whoops. Trees, fish, boats, and such might be a better image idea for stamping and whatnot.

I do love birds… I think my family suffers for it.

To make it even easier, I put double-sided tape on the corner of the envelope’s top flap, leaving the sticker on it so he can take it off later to seal the envelope. Cause if I know my dad… he won’t be able to find tape when he needs it.

Wrap up together with a bit of string and you’ve got yourself a clever father’s day present!