Being Crafty

Sunrise Over the Back Yard

(a camera cannot truly capture the work of the Creator)

Good evening, ya'll. I guess you thought I had left the Net but not on your life although I thought I was losing mine. A bad cold is named correctly for it is surely BAD. I have coughed, sneezed, blown my nose until it looks like Rudolph's, hacked up my toenails and felt like death warmed over. It is probably cold mixed with allergies for I have sneezed and sneezed. Not fun but I am still alive and will make it. Haven't gotten a lot accomplished but did read a book and began another one. Being shut in is not all bad, is it?

Thought I would share about 3 crafty projects I have done lately. Mama could take most anything and make it pretty. I remember one time she bought many yards of dark, green taffeta material but I don't remember where. It was inexpensive so she bought a whole bunch. She made the beautiful drapes for the living room from it and they looked tailor made. I think I also had a dress out of some of it later. She didn't throw away any material, ever.

When I was about 10, I was given one of the bedrooms for my very own since I was the only girl and "the princess" as my brothers called me. She went to the grocery store and got 2 wooden orange crates and daddy cut a piece of plywood to put on the tops. She placed them about 3 feet apart, placed the board on top, painted it all white, and made a gathered skirt to put around the front and sides. The crates back then were sturdy and this also gave me 2 shelves for the crates were divided into 2 sections. It was pretty as a picture and when I put a little stool in front of it and looked into the mirror mama placed on it, I thought I had died and gone to heaven. It was made with love and good taste and I thought, and still think, it was wonderful.

She made curtains to match the skirt around the dresser and and a bedspread to match. It looked something out of McCall's magazine which is where she probably got the idea. Our house was tastefully decorated and mama made most of it and made it a wonderful home.

The genes came right on down for from the time I was a little girl I helped mama. I learned to paint furniture, sew curtains, make cushions and lots of other things. All my doll clothes were made by mama or me and she taught me to crochet, embroider, and sew. What a wonderful heritage. These crafts skills still come in handy and I thought I would share my 3 latest projects.

This was a plain, little blue lamp with a plain white shade and I thought it needed a little decoration. I like to buy those little bags of odd and ends of trim from fabric and craft stores. It's like Forrest Gump's box of chocolates, you never know what you will get. In one of them I had a short length of blue tasseled braid and used it to decorate the little shade.

I used a glue you can use on cloth, put some on the shade and the braid, and held it on with clothes pins until it dried.

I think it turned out pretty well, don't you. It's just enough but not too much. That's another thing mama taught me - know when it is enough and not tacky. Tackiness in next to poor taste in the South and you don't want to have either.

I had another plain shade and found a length of blue braid in another stash. It was glued on the same way as the other one but I glued on buttons in a random pattern around the bottom - not too many for tacky is unacceptable. Simple and tasteful is the look you want.

This is a picture of a camellia taken at the home place in Camden. It is a huge shrub which daddy grew from a small branch he cut from another bush. The original bush had dark pink blooms but the one daddy rooted has light pink and almost white blooms on the same plant. He said it had to do with grafts and genetics which I don't know anything about but he did. The blooms are prettier than the original.

I took the picture and used picnik.com to tune it up a little. This is a free website which allows you to make your pictures look much better. I used the matte finish to blur the edges to make it soft and glowing. It is printed using my HP color jet printer on Kodak photography paper. I had the frame and used black poster board to cut a mat. When I cut my own mats, I use a craft knife to get sharp, clean edges. I think it is right pretty, don't you? I have another one of the pond to frame soon and I will show you that one when I finish.

That's about all the air I have left for this cold really has me wishing for more air. Hopefully tomorrow will be a better day for today was and I look forward to feeling good. I have lots of cleaning to do before Noah (great-grandson) and Brooke (granddaughter) come on Sunday. It will be so wonderful to have them and I just wish the grandson could come too.


This is the sunset over the pond taken from our front porch this afternoon. Again, God's creations are hard to capture with a camera.

By the way, we now have many, many little fishes in the pond. They are about and inch long and I sure will be glad when they grow big. We plan to feed them lots so they will grow quickly. Fried bream and hushpuppies- yum.

Good night and ya'll come back to see me.

Nuff said,

The Georgia Peach