Thank you!

I've wanted to do a giveaway for some time now, but with just 12 followers it seems a bit silly. Then I was thinking back about my first year of blogging and how it feels when someone new starts following or when someone leaves a comment. I really appreciate everyone's comments! However, there has been one faithful follower who consistently leaves me such encouraging comments. So, I decided I would make something special for that follower in special thanks for all the devoted comments.


This follower of mine is an a very talented Craftmaster who sews , loves vintage stuff, and loves owls. I had an idea in mind of something I wanted to make but I wasn't sure if I would find the fix-ins for it. But I did...

Thank you Robbie! I hope you like it!

Project Sharing

I've been doing a lot of knitting and crocheting lately and I have some projects ready to share. I had planned to get a bunch of stuff done and share it all in one big blog post, but I don't have all the photos taken yet. I think it'll be best if I share them in several smaller blog posts.


I'm still technically finishing my Christmas knitting... things I would have liked to give as gifts had I had more time. Sure, I could tuck them away and save them for next Christmas, but what fun would that be? I just can't be that disciplined.


So, I finished another hat and fingerless mitts set and have given them to the loveliest of young ladies. The blue and grey look great together and look especially beautiful on her. (No, that's not her in the photo, silly!)

On Valentine's Day we had a valentine exchange between some of the women who work in my building. The idea was to exchange children's valentines like when we were kids. A couple of years ago we did this and it was fun going to Walmart and looking over all the themes and choosing one that I thought was the most "me". I can't remember which theme I chose, but I remember all of us laughing at the choices we made for ourselves. Who loves Winnie the Pooh? Who relates to Hoops and YoYo? Who thinks they are a super hero?


This year there were quite a few more people who wanted to join in the valentine fun. At risk of seeming like an overachiever, I decided to make my valentines. I (of course) wanted to make something with yarn, most likely involving a heart, something quick and easy to make, and I wanted it to be something useful that wouldn't be just tossed out later.


I finally settled on these heart bookmarks.

I stitched them up and added vintage buttons from my mom's and mother-in-law's button boxes.

Then I attached my little valentine wish. "Slip this crocheted heart bookmark between the pages of a book you love. Enjoy!" I thought this was a nice generic wish (what do you say to another woman you work with?) while subtly explaining what this silly yarn thing was... just in case they weren't sure.

That morning at work it was really nice to see so many of us arrive a few minutes early and scurry around from department to department delivering our valentines. One woman even had a decorated box on her desk to collect them in. Another woman taped the ones she collected up around her door jam like Christmas cards. It made her office look so festive. In a time when we are experiencing tough times, budget cuts and layoffs, this simple little activity was really good for morale.


This bookmark project was a  "use what you have" project. I've done some other projects recently using only materials that I have on hand and I'll be blogging about them soon. Until then...

August Tag Sale Finds continued...

Back in August I posted about some tag sale finds I scored. Remember all those ties? Well, that was only part of the wonderful finds of the day. Those were the items that I would be keeping and using for crafting. Here are the items I found that I'll be posting in my etsy shop, Maple Street Treasures, soon:

The collection consist of: 

1 Polaroid Square Shooter camera

1 Minolta Pocket camera (we must have had bigger pockets back then)

1 Kodak Brownie camera

1 very decorative wooden bowl with lid

1 decorative carved wooden bowl

1 small round glass jewelry box

1 vintage linen calendar from 1968

1 set of vintage appetizer plates

1 collection of View Master slides

I had planned to get these items photographed and posted to etsy today, but I sort of pooped out and took a nap instead. I'm headed to bed early tonight, so I should have plenty of energy after work tomorrow to get it done. At least that's the plan... g'night!

A Sampling of Tag Sale Finds

It was beautiful and sunny in my part of the world this weekend. I took a vacation day on Thursday since that was supposed to be the very best day temperature-wise, and it was! Although I worked on Friday, it did give me the feel of almost having a long weekend anyway.

We hit quite a few tag sales Saturday and I got some awesome finds. Here is just a sampling of what I bought.

Some vintage items for my new Etsy shop, Maple Street Treasures.


A great wooden bowl, some kitchen utensils, buscuit cutters, and some books.

Some cool flower pots.
Also vintage although not quite as old as the other items.

I also found a great assortment of craft items. I’ll be keeping some of these and giving some to my fellow “crafties”.

Group shot of the great goodies!

An assortment of zippers... all for just $.50!
Can you believe what a great find this is?

A whole baotload of maps! Can you guess what I'll be doing with these?
I'll show you in a future post.

A bunch of brand new craft scissors in different scalloped patterns.
I’ll check the ones I’ve got and give away the duplicates.

And glitter!

Hmmm, I think I know someone who might like the glitter.

Oh, and I forgot to take a close up picture of the little spool of Daisy trim that you can barely make out in the center of the group photo. This is going to be perfect for some throw pillows I’m making. They will be featured in a future post as well.


So there, now there are more posts for you to look forward to. It seems I have more post ideas than I have time to write actually write them!

Hope you had a wonderful weekend!