Secret Santa

I took part in Carmen's Secret Santa swap again this year and was delighted to receive a package from England.  Irene did a wonderful job stalking me.  In fact, she was so good at stalking that card she sent benefited breast cancer, a cause very near and dear to me.

I was almost a bad girl and opened this prior to Christmas, but when I opened the mailing box, the presents inside were wrapped beautifully and I stopped and kept them for a Christmas morning surprise.  When I did open them on Christmas morning, I enjoyed the sparkling snowflakes and confetti that were wrapped inside each of them.  What a fun surprise!  I received a beautiful altered journal titled "My Life" with lots of open spaces for me to add pictures and notes.  I love all the attention to detail she put into this book.  It is stunning!  I also got a beautiful, sparkly bracelet, a pretty notepad, and a very soft, cuddly pink bunny who is actually a heating pad.  I'm sure he will help out and make any ache feel better!  Thank you very much Irene. You added a beautiful aspect to my Christmas!

I had a beautiful Christmas all around and I hope all of you did too.
Thanks for stopping by!

Handmade Christmas Gifts

A branch of my family no longer exchange gifts in the traditional Christmas way. We draw names and make a homemade gift for that person. We've been doing this for about 10 years now and I love this tradition. The gifts I have received from others are cherished for the thought and work that my loved one put into making it just for me. I also love making my gift each year. Its funny, we select the name at Christmas and you have the whole year to decide and work on your gift, but we all tend to wait to the last minute to execute our gift. For me this is not about finding the time to make the gift. Its about thinking about what the person is into, exploring all the things I could make for them, and then trying to narrow it down to one thing. This year I was making for a great aunt. I really struggled to decide what to make her. I thought about jewelry, but my uncle does some really nice beadwork so I didn't want to go along that line. I thought about painting her a picture, but I dont know their decorating style or the colors of the roooms in their house. I thought about a garden whirl-i-gig and really liked that idea, but I couldn't quite figure out how to build the mechanics for that one. I settled on making her some wine stoppers. I found the blanks at Hobby Lobby. Their intended for fused glass, which I've made some with in the past. I wanted to use polymer clay. I have huge piles of canes that I've made through the years and they just sit there. Some of them are really spectacular, I just dont use them to make jewelry anymore and haven't done many other projects that incorporate them.

I coated the metal blanks in white glue and let that dry so the clay would adhere to the metal. I then chose my designs. The round stopper is just a slice of a fairly large cane. I wrapped it with a black and white striped edging to make it more polished and then stuck a crystal in the center to give it a sparkle. The oval one, I used a basketweave cane to lay down a background. I then sliced rosebuds and leaves and pieced them together to form an arrangement. On one side I added some slices from a daisylike flower. I again added some crystals to make it shine.

These were fun to make and since I had the canes already made, very easy. I like the circle one best, but the other is growing on me. It was fun to watch my aunt open the gift. I think she likes them.

A very merry christmas

I hope everyone had a great Christmas. I'm sorry I've been such a bad blogger. Things get pretty hectic around Christmas when you're a church musician. Thankfully everything went well and all my big services are over. I even pulled up the nerve and played the harp for 3 different services.

Every year my family draws names and makes a gift for someone. This year I got my cousin Sarah. She loves frogs so I made her this puzzle box. I used 5 different boxes to modify and put together the final design. I used magnets to help everything stay in place when its closed. The frog sits on a dowel which must be removed in order to open the box and get the lid covering the drawers off. Lots of clay and paint made the box pretty. I think that she really loves it.
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We got our Christmas tree decorated last night. I have to go get another thing of garland but its really beautiful already. I've been busy the past few days. Christmas in Ida was great as usual. It snowed on the parade and was really pretty with the lights. We had a great time. Sunday we went to our nephews band concert and then went to a Messiah concert later that evening. I really enjoyed the Messiah. This is the 2nd year I've gone to this groups concert of it and I think this year was better than last. Very beautiful and a wonderful way to get me in the Christmas mood. Monday night I went to a bar with a friend and listened to a jazz group from a nearby college. They were good and the evening was relaxing and nice.

My teaching was horribly hard yesterday. I have most of my younger students on Tuesdays. I really wasnt thinking when I put the schedule together. They are all so hopped up on Christmas stuff that it was nearly impossible for me to finish a sentence without them tangeting off into some activity that they're going to be doing soon, or anything else besides piano. I dont know how I'll get through that for the next 2 weeks.

I think this might be my last fairie for awhile. I gave my sis a copy of her fairie and my niece said "where's mine". Well, this is hers although she's not getting it til Christmas. This time I tried using only watercolors. I'm not very good in this medium, but I think it turned out ok. Its not my favorite. Her dress is wrong but I'm not sure how to make it better.

Tonight is our first Wednesday night Advent service of the year. I love these services as they truly allow me to slow down and meditate on the incomprehensible act of God sending us his son knowing he would be a sacrafice. Christmas truly is love.