Valentine's Day tags and such

This was an incredibly lazy weekend.  I prefer weekends wherein I have a sense of accomplishment and feel rested and refreshed by Monday morning.  Ah well, hopefully I won't regret what didn't get done this weekend as I move into a busy week.

The one thing I did do is play around with tags and stamps for Valentine's Day.  I will definitely be stamping on torn strips of muslim to make ribbon for other occasions also.  I love the way that turned out. 

Here are my bits and pieces from the weekend.

Linking up to some of the parties I enjoy. Go check them out and see what everyone else is doing!

My current favorite and a dog story

Do you sometimes save things even though you have no idea what you are going to do with them?  (Wait, who are my readers?!--of course you do!)  Well, I had been saving those metal Fossil watch tins. 

I recently rediscovered the joys of Modge Podge.  Modge Podge meet metal box.  Throw in bits and pieces of vintage paper, saved tags, and other collected papers.

(Tracy from French Larkspur might recognize the tissue paper with which my latest Jeanne de' Arc magazine was wrapped.  Thank you!  I love ordering stuff from Etsy as the wrapping and extras are a good as the ordered object!)

I tear bits and pieces and Modge Podge them to the inside of the box.  I cut larger pieces to fit the bottom/back of the box.

Then my husband introduced me to Rub and Buff.  I love this stuff.  Rub it on and you have a metallic finish.  A little goes a long way.  And there are endless uses for it.

Then once everything has dried, decide what to do with the mini display space.  Here are some of my past choices.  These last two are waiting for inspiration to strike.

And while I was busy decopaging and buffing, we had a visitor.  I was stuck at home today because of the major blizzard covering the upper midwest.  In the midst of these 50 mph winds, cold temps, and whiteout conditions, a loveable golden retriever showed up at our house.  Now we recently moved to the country and our nearest neighbor is about 1/4 mile away with a marais and trees seperating us.  Poor puppy had no tags so I didn't know where he belonged.  We haven't yet met our neighbors and after doing a county property search to find names of the nearest neighbors found that no one had landline phones.  So, I couldn't track down phone numbers.  After a very lengthy internet search I finally found one probably work email address and sent off a message.  10 minutes later my phone rang and the dog owners had been found.  By this time, 'Frosty' the dog had been at our place about 4 hours.  He wouldn't stay in the garage where he had shelter, water, and food.  Oh no, he had to sit at the patio door hoping to come in the house. 

Unfortunately, a strange dog with no tags was not going to get to come in.  I finally pulled out a blanket and draped it over the patio furniture to give him a windbreak and he settled in and napped until his owners arrived.  All ended well.  'Frosty' was happy, amazingly warm and good natured despite the snow and wind, and got to go home.  We met our neighbors who seemed very nice.  The moral of this story--please make sure your pets have tags!

I am linking up to the following parties! hosted by the most generous bloggers.

Visiting Silver Sunday Party

I thought I would drop in and visit Silver Sunday and the Gypsy Fish Journal.

I just started picking up some pieces of silver when I find them. I plan to keep collecting silverware so that I have enough silver for those times I have guests for meals. And I started picking up silver platters because they seem to sell for next nothing are are great for decorating and projects.

Here is my small begining collection of silver ware.




The small silver pieces are spoons that my husband inherited.  They are very interesting.  I often wonder what their story might be.




Right now, the silver ware is displayed on my very eclecticly decorated mantel.

More of Jack Frost's work

I so wish I were at home rather than the office so I could take pictures of the winter wonderland out there.

Ice Fog

I had to rush home this morning to get my dog Ginger and bring her into town for an orthopedic sugery consult (a story in itself).  It was sunny and bright when I left town, but halfway home ran into beautiful ice fog.  I grabbed my camera and took some pictures and thought I would share.

I am pretty sure it is not recommended to take pictures while driving down the highway with limited visibility related to fog while there is a dog leaning over your shoulder--but hey, here you are anyway...

Warm winter days means time with my horses...

It is 36 degrees outside at 7pm in the middle of January! So much better than the -20 degrees it could be. It also means my fingers and toes don't freeze when I am out playing with my horses.  And you are stuck with get horse pictures instead of decorating and crafting pictures.

Love (aka as Lil Miss Blackjac) is my reining mare.  She is watching me get treats out of the tack room.  I think this picture nicely captures her smart gentle yet spirited nature.

Love checking out the bridle and bit selection.

This is Honey (also known as A Crusing Investment) my Western Pleasure mre wondering what is going on in the barn aisle.

Honey is my laidback sweetheart with just enough mare attitude to keep in interesting.

A couple more months and horse show season begins again.

And while I have been doing things around home, my girls have gotten a bit more of my attention again this weekend.  And grooming and riding are so much more fun than a treadmill or weights.

Mini mannequins

I want a mannequin but have never found one, or at least one I loved enough to pay the price that was being asked. And then I dreamed up this. (Yep, last night while sleeping, I dreamed these up.) And just to keep my title as dropcloth queen, they they are made of scraps of dropcloth.

The bases are made of wire hangers from the dry cleaner.  The necks are made from spindles we removed from some old 80's style trim in the kitchen of our old house.  The rest I cut, sewed, stuffed, and glued out of materials in my craft supples.  They are so much fun to make!

This skirt is made of cheesecloth with one of those handmade flowers everyone is making.

It is so difficult to find good lighting when you are impatient and can't wait until daylight.  Plus, the days are so very short yet that there is not much good daylight available anyway.  (Gotta remind myself that June will arrive and it will be light until 10:30 for at least a couple of days...)

I think the dragonfly necklace is sweet!  A charm and gold thread add a nice dash of bling.

Ready for the runway, or my dresser, or someplace.

I am joining in the following parties:

the girl creative