Sunday Praise

Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas

I have a couple of good blogging friends that have asked where I have been and when I am going to add a post to my blog.  I have been busy with family and getting ready for Christmas as I  know everyone else is.  It just seems to take more time for me to accomplish things as I have gotten older then it did for me to do the same amount of projects and participating in Christmas gatherings just a few years ago.  We are really done with the celebrating with family at this point.  Hubs and I are spending Christmas Eve and day together except for delivering a couple of gifts to some neighbors.  The rest of the post is going to be mostly pictures to share what our Christmas looks like here at our home in the woods.

 Nativity was built by my hubs for me when we were first married.  It is the first thing I bring up every year.

Some of my hand painted ornaments.  I have not painted very often the last few years so these have been around for a while.

Next to a star made by a grand.

Hallmark close to 30 years old with a picture of my oldest daughters and a new one I received for a gift a couple of years ago.

In the living room.

Some of my favorites.

In one of the guest rooms.

Around the house.

Birthday gift from one of my daughters.  Largest poinsettia I have ever had.

We celebrated Christmas with our family here this past Sunday.  I was so involved I did not take a lot of pictures.  Waiting for my daughter and sister in law to post theirs to Facebook so I can steal.  But this is a glimpse of the grandchildren along with a niece and nephew.  

And here in Michigan most of us are having a very white Christmas that started out with a lot of sleet in parts of the state which has left a lot of families without power.  Say a prayer that they will get it back sooner than later.

Our deck this morning after yesterday and last nights snow fall.

This is looking down our drive.  It is always so pretty after a new snowfall.

Wishing you all a very Merry and Blessed Christmas from our home in the woods.

Brenda

The Desk

My Mom in Love gifted me a desk a couple of years ago that I just love. It is small, I am short, and it is perfect for me to sit and write and do that chore we all hate, pay those bills.  I loved the color of green it was already painted but then I moved it into another room and I painted this room a shade of green which made it disappear into the background of the wall.  The chair was a gift also and the smaller size that I love.  I have not decided if I want to paint it or not, I like the seat but it does not really go with the new color I picked.

This is the first time I have used chalk paint and I did not use the brand everyone else has been using. I used paint from American Paint Company and the color is Surfboard. I did not really distress it a lot and decided to use a poly instead of a wax for the topcoat.  

I bought a set of the Martha Stewart adhesive silkscreens to stencil the feathers and I want to tell you there is such a difference in these and the stencil's I used years ago.  It was so easy and a quick project.

Should have taken the pictures away from the wall so you would not see the cold air vent where I have the desk sitting but I decided I might as well be real about it since that is where it sits. I have a wooden shelf and file box that I have given a coat of the same color to sit on the desk but I am going to do some decoupage and a different finish so I will show how I dress the top later.  

I could not believe how little of the paint I used and do not feel so bad about the price that I paid for a quart.  I think I need to buy a couple more colors and work on some more of the items I have piled in my work area waiting for a coat of paint.  

So glad that you stopped by!  Blessings from our home in the woods.

Brenda

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A Finish and a WIP

I am happy to show you a finished project today.  If you remember a while back I posted about the Kaffe Fusion Blanket SAL/CAL here.  I finished it about two weeks ago took pictures and really did not have any time to post about it until now.

Could not decide which way I wanted to hang it on the back of our sofa at first but I think I like the next look better.

Close-up.

If you are making one of these from the Tutorial you will notice a lot of differences in the one that I put together.  Started out the same but decided I wanted my corners to meet so used my knowledge of past granny squares and made the corners squared off instead of round.  Then I decided that I wanted the throw to be larger and added another color around each square but used the same amount of squares the tutorial called for at the Sewing Daisies link.  After crocheting all the squares together I decided it needed a boarder.  I went around the complete throw twice with 1/2 double crochet then I used a boarder that I found in the Around the Corner Crochet Boarder book by Edie Eckman.  You can find it here.

As for my WIP, I just finished a block for the Girls Own Stitching Club over at Red Brolly.

Here is the lay out so far:

I am using the 30's fabrics that I have been using in the Great Granny Square quilt for one of our guest rooms for this wall hanging. As with the quilt I am trying to get that scrappy look.  I am working on the center block right now, the next block comes out in a week or so with the last block to follow the beginning of next year.  Is anyone else working on this BOM?  Let me know I would love to see how yours are coming along.

I hope everyone is having a great week!  Blessings from our home in the woods.

Brenda

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A Grand Party and Time with the Grands

I decided it was time to play a little catch up and start posting here on my blog again.  I have some finished  projects and have a lot in the works to share but I will stretch that out over the next week.

First off I want to share a few pictures from a Grand Party given for my husbands parents for their 50th
Wedding Anniversary by their children and children's spouses.   My camera seems to be taking fewer clear pictures of late but I picked out the best that I took, hubs and I sure hope that we will get some of the better pictures that others were taking.

My husbands Mother, Father and children.  They are sure a photogenic family. This family means the world to me and my daughters.  They are the best.

Just some random shots.  I picked out the best that I took.

Hubs and oldest daughter.

Sis-in-law and a favorite Uncle.

Mom-in-love and one of her best buddies.

This area is at the front of the church we attend.  It is rather large and was full most of the time.  There were tables sat up in the sanctuary and we had food and cake for the guests.

Mine and hubs project for the event was to put together a memory tree.  Took my wonderful man three tries but he put together some branches from our woods and I made the tags for the tree.

We also put my hubs in charge creating a poem to go with the tree.  I think you might be able to read it if you click on the picture to enlarge it.

That was the best of the pictures for the Anniversary party that I have so on to the Grands.  We have had some of the Grands visit this month over a couple of weekends.  These brothers were here earlier this month and spent some time in the wood shop with Grandpa building boxes to keep some treasures in.

There are two more brothers in this family but they were not able to come this time around.

This past weekend we had  the three children of my youngest daughter visit.

We put together a quick tea party.

Cookies and hot chocolate.  Of coarse instead of sugar on the table there had to be marshmallows. And the girls picked out their favorite tea cups to use.

Grandpa cut out airplane pieces which the girls glued together and painted.

This little guy spent the weekend zooming around and most of the pictures I tried to take were a blur until finally:

That is all I have for now,  I know there was a lot more going on around here since I last posted but these were the highlights.  I hope everyone is well and safe from all the storms that have gone through the states and hope you leave a comment letting me know what you have been up to.  I will try and catch up with everyone soon.

Blessings from our home in the woods!