"Scrap booked" Guest Book

 

I wanted to share this idea I came up with a few years ago for a scrap booked guest book.  I really wanted to have a guest book, but I thought what a great idea to take a picture of the guests and add it to the page they signed. I wish I actually did scrapbook, but I'm happy with how it looks.  I love how it captures precious memories of visits. I actually had misplaced it when we moved here 2 years ago and just found it in time for my cousin's visit.



This is the first page of the guest book.  It is when my cousin and her family came for a visit 5 years ago.

Me and my mom on one of her visits at the farmer's market.

Of course anyone could make this look nicer than me, but I really like looking through it and thinking of those lovely visits.

This post is linked up to; Hope in Every Season

Bee's Wax Christmas Ornaments

My cousin Amy brought a crock pot full of bee's wax on her visit last weekend.  We wanted to make a few projects with it.  When I went downstairs to find candle wick to make candles, I found a Christmas chocolate mold instead and I thought to make ornaments with it.

Once the wax was melted, we held a piece of string in place in the mold for the loop, then we ladled in the wax with a plastic spoon.  I guess when you work with bee's wax, you want to use disposable utensils or ones dedicated to bee's wax. It's hard to get off. Once they started to harden around the edges, I placed the mold in the fridge to harden.  The cavities were quite small, so they took about 20 mins to harden.  I'm sure as they cure they will lose the shininess and get a white kind of coating on them like I've seen on other bee's wax items. 

I think they are gorgeous and so old fashioned!  Here are a few of them;

This post is linked up to; Living Well Spending Less; Hope in Every Season; Sew Crafty Angel; The Homesteading Hippy  The Dedicated House

A Cousin's Visit

It's always an exciting time when we can get together with my cousin, Amy, and her family.  It turned out her and her 4 children were able to come over to our house for a 3 day visit. They braved the winter weather and headed out on the 7 hour trip (with stops).  Her husband had to stay home on the farm and look after things. And my husband left on a trip to Kentucky, so it was just us and the kids.

Amy is the one who told me about Trim Healthy Mama over a year ago. I thought she was loony until she told me how much weight she was losing and how great she felt.  She totally inspired me to try it and I am SO happy I did. We had a great weekend of eating on plan.  And we are both only a few pounds away from our goal weight, so we took a picture.

Amy also blessed me with tons of clothes. I am wearing a shirt and necklace from her in the picture.

Some of our kids playing Apples to Apples (Bible Edition). You an see the piles of some of the clothes Amy brought me in the background.

Our time went quickly and we were sad to see them go, but totally happy for our visit.

Christmas Craft Show Summary

I have put another craft show behind me. Yay! Here are some pictures of the things I had for sale this year.

These are tags I hand painted snowman faces on.  I also put a very light layer of glitter over them. I sold them in sets of 6.

I cross stitched these ornaments. Then I stitched them to a piece of felt.  I sewed the felt over a cinnamon stick, which I had strung a piece of twine through and tied.  After that, I sewed on a button.

This is my favorite of the stitched ornaments.  And I finally learned how to make a french knot!!! My neighbour showed me and after 30 years of cross stitching I can actually do it.

I bought a bag of cookie cutters and little baskets from the thrift store and knew I could make something out of them.  I decided to put glue (I had model glue on hand) around the edge of the cookie cutters, then dip them in epson salts. I did this a few times until the salt was as thick as I wanted. Then I tied a bell with twine to dangle inside and then I tied the top of the twine to make a hanger. As I tied the knot just above the cookie cutter, I inserted a bit of red berries with glue.  With the baskets I glued half a Styrofoam ball in it to take up some of the space. I glued a piece of fabric over that, then I either glued in little balls of thread and 2 straight pins to look like knitting needles or just a bunch of tiny pine cones.

This was my favorite cookie cutter ornament.

I bought this canister set at a garage sale and painted the wood lids all a different colours.  I really like them. So did a lot of woman, but no one bought them. I might have to find somewhere for them in my house:)

I didn't know how this pine cone garland would do, but I was surprised that I sold them all right away.  To make them I screwed an eyelet screw in the top. Then I put through a little piece of red and white gingham ribbon. I tied each pine cone unto a 6 ft piece of twine and tied circles at both ends.

I was surprised that all of these items sold within the first 20 minutes.  I need to scout around our property again to find more wood to make me a JOY sign.

There it is.  I did fairly well and had lots of fun.