Judy's Christmas Inspiration Mini Book

I am blessed with two older brothers who married women who are also my best friends!  Not every family can say that ... but we can!  This year, I decided I would make each of them a mini book ... filled with Christmas inspiration. I filled the books with sentiments about being a grandmother ... the job we all love most!  I'm showing the mini books in two separate posts ... You'll find the one for my "Blue Bird Sister-in-law" within this post ... and you'll find the one for my other sister-in-law at this link ... "Cowgirl Sister-in-law"!

My sister-in-law Judy ... loves blue birds and has been successful in building houses that they come back to every year. I'm not good with birds ... other than to throw some food out for them when it snows! When I found a set of scrapbook pages that were blue prints of flowers and birds ... I knew it was for Judy!

I used a blue snow background for the pages I created in Publisher. The bells and bird are from a set of card making supplies and the vintage ribbon is in my collection.  The tiny plastic pine cones came from a candle ring that I picked up at a junk store!  Actually, I bought 9 of them!

I used the Cricut Elegant Edges die to cut these pages and cut several other elements with Cricut ... used several Christmas dies.  I designed the inserted pages using some clip art I purchased from Creative Market.

I don't care if my facing pages mirror each other ... but I try to make them match in some way. I added some cut fern fronds to this page (lower left) with layered burlap flowers.

Mother Teresa said, "I know God will not give me anything I can't handle.  I just wish that He didn't trust me so much!"  The window box is filled with pearl enhanced poinsettias ... and the leaves are added gems.

Several of the pages of scrapbook paper had beautiful full page designs that I didn't want to lose, so I started my cut carefully.  To this page ... I added the bird on the top branch ... and the ribbon, twine and gems to the bird nest. I have found many bird nests at the end of the season ... filled with things my critters have robbed from outdoor wreaths or floral arrangements on my deck! I love to find that the birds liked my creations as much as I did!

I love the layered look of the Christmas presents ... and the pearl sets them off!






The blue paper roses add so much depth to the page. Notice the vintage ribbon!









More birds in the following collage!  The ribbon and old lace make each page special.

I love the butterfly pages ... the raised bugs are from a Martha Stewart collection and I bought a batch of lace butterfies online ... I ran it through my Xyron sticker maker so it adheres to the page.

Notice the water dripping in the garden fountain in the following collage!

More birds ... more butterflies ... more paper roses and burlap flowers!

 "Sisters by Marriage ... Friends by Choice!"

I'll be sharing this post with some of the parties on my sidebar, but before you move on ... make sure you visit my other mini book post for my sister-in-law, Carol.  Click right here!

People Puppy Chow for Phoebe's Birthday!

Phoebe is having her birthday party at our favorite frozen yogurt shop. One of our best friends owns it!  I made favors to match the party theme, which is "Puppies" ... Why?  Because Phoebe has a new puppy to go with the big fuzzy dog they already have!

So I scanned the paper plates that my daughter bought to use and made these cute tags to put on my cereal snack mix.

Over the years, I've found a dozen recipes for puppy chow that I enjoy using, but I've also learned to love some of the shortcuts!

I made the red coating by simply microwaving a container of red cake frosting. That was all there was to it. I added a bag of peppermint candy discs to it. It takes about 3 minutes for all of it to be nice and smooth. I used rice Chex for the red.  The chocolate is a bag of chocolate candy disks with half a stick of butter ... melted. It takes a couple minutes for that to be smooth. I used the new chocolate Chex cereal for that batch ... then I tossed both flavors together and sprinkled them with about 3 cups of powdered sugar.  I added chocolate candies to the batch and bagged it.

I love these soft peppermints, but I can't eat them without blowing my Diabetic diet!  I added a couple to each bag of snack mix.






I found some cute "Happy Birthday" ribbon to tie each bag ... and attached the tags with teal and lime green ribbon. I used my Cricut to cut the flowers.

I made a big card to match the party decorations ... but the dog in this picture is "Sugar" ... the new fur baby at Phoebe's house!

Sugar was adopted at a pet fair ... where doggie and Santa pictures were also made!

Here's Miss Phoebe with her pets .... and Santa!

I'll be sharing this post with some of the parties that I list on my sidebar. Make sure you click through to see the other posts!

Thanksgiving 2015!

Thanksgiving at our house this year was all about lots of colors ... a casual setting ... pumpkins and a turkey constructed of sticks and natural dried grasses!  

I have two sets of china that I use for Thanksgiving ... my Johnson Brothers "His Majesty" and this green Bordallo Pinheiro. This year, I added cobalt blue to the setting.

My tablescapes are usually inspired by a single element, and for this one ... it was the table runner! The green was a perfect match for one of the several sets of pumpkin shaped soup bowls I have ... and it was easy to match all the other colors with a variety of ceramic pumpkins! 

These pumpkins came from World Market and the maple leaf cobalt blue salad plate is Depression Glass. My favorite elements of the tablescape are in the following collage ... I love the covered turkey bowl! The big turkey platter is so nice to have and I use it all year long!

The blue glasses are Mikassa and the flatware is Cambridge.

The big turkey and the little turkey napkin rings also came from World Market! I printed our menu and wrapped a candy bar to use as favors! Miss Phoebe expects candy at her Thanksgiving Table place setting!

Phoebe told me several weeks ago ... what she wanted on our Thanksgiving dinner menu! So, of course ... I made what she wanted. She also wanted to keep the menu a secret from her mom and dad ... so we did!

You can find the template for a Hershey bar wrapper online and I used Publisher to create the wrapper that I wanted! Easily done!

I'd like to introduce you to our turkey cheese ball!

The fireplace mantel in the dining room is usually decorated for the season! Green ... pumpkins, a tole painted tray and my beautiful pilgrims set the scene! I love making banners .. for Phoebe ... and this one matches our menu cards and favors!

Hope you had a wonderful Thanksgiving. I'll probably share this post with a couple of the parties listed in my sidebar. Make sure you click through to see the other posts!

Thanksgiving Prayer Mini Book

This week a friend of mine had a big birthday and I made her an inspiration book filled with Bible scriptures and prayers related to Thanksgiving! I used clipart for some of the content; cut some of it with Cricut and added all kinds of other embellishments. If you've seen my mini books before, you know I like depth and dimension in my books!

I used plenty of vintage ribbon and lace! I cut the pages using the Elegant Edges patterns.

On these pages, I cut some pieces of the clipart ... an added some packaged embellishments.  I love the burlap flowers!

 I used birthday greetings for the center pages and one of my favorite Thanksgiving songs on the next two pages!

The final two pages are filled with layered burlap flowers, faux pearls and colorful leaves.

I'll be sharing this will a few of the parties listed on my sidebar! Make sure you click through to see the other participants ... and hang around my home page a little while to see my other posts!  Happy Thanksgiving Week!

Last Bouquet of the Season!

Here are our last flowers of the season!  We've had a couple freezing nights, but some of my roses are sheltered a little bit, so I still had a few blooms today! Phoebe's herb garden is still producing, too! Beautiful leaves are falling from the Maple, Oak, Ash and Sweet Gum trees in my yard ... and our "bird feed shrubs" as my husband always called them ... add beautiful red and orange berries to the mix. The squirrels and chipmunks are really working hard gathering acorns, so I suspect we are headed for a bad winter and all those bird feed shrubs will be well used! I love bringing a little of the outside inside!

The purple and green flowers from the Basil plants add a nice scent to the boquet!

These two precious tiny pink rosebuds will open overnight and remind me of the warm sunny days of June when they first start blooming!

I'll still have these vibrant orange berries for a Thanksgiving tablescape!

I'll be sharing this with some of the parties listed in my sidebar, so make sure you click through to see the other posts!