the "other" Leigh's wreath

I visited my other friend Leigh yesterday.  Not my best friend, Leigh Ann, but my dear friend and often stand-in mamma, Leigh.  Here is the wreath I made for her for the 4th of July, hanging happily on the front door of her beautiful new house!

Lots of Cute

There has been a lot of cute lately at my house.

My middle child went to prom

and then he graduated




And then we got a kitten

Or actually, she got us.  This is Luna.  Luna & her half-dozen or so littermates were dropped off at a local farm by someone who clearly shouldn't be allowed to have pets.  They were all huddled together in the middle of the road.  I herded them off to the side of the road.  Except this little girl kept going back in the road and sitting and yelling at me.  And look at that face!  How could I possibly leave her there???  Obviously I couldn't and she came home to live with us.  We have had her for about 2 weeks now and I can't imagine life without her.  Our first pet in 14 years of living together.  She has managed to get litter-trained and is wearing a collar and I think she is double the size now as she was in this photo.  I love her <3

too hot...

Fun Fairy Name

Your fairy is called Gossamer Moondancer

She is the moon goddess's messenger.

She lives in spiderwebbed wonderlands and insect grottos.

She is only seen when the bees swarm and the crickets chirrup.

She wears tiny black spiders on her dresses. She has beautiful blue butterfly wings.

Get your free fairy name here!

Crafty girl

So lately my list of must-read blogs has been growing & growing. I'm hoping this weekend to give the happy needle notebook a bit of a revamp & with luck I will get a blogroll going so I can share with you the amazing talents of so many crafty people.

While my life is consumed with fiber arts, I love reading blogs of those who are crafty. Really crafty. People who have homes that look like magazine pages and picture perfect (read: clean) children. Then I look around my house and just sigh. I used to have a cute house. Then I had a Beastie. Beastie breaks things, drags things, throws things, needs constant supervision, etc etc. My once cute house is now lucky if it gets the occasional vacuum and dusting. Decorating is the last thing on my agenda.

But I do like to look at pretty things. And actually, I like to make pretty things too. Lately I've been a dollar store demon. I most recently acquired some very cute independence day decorations and decided to break out the old glue gun and get crafty. I made two wreaths for two of my dearest friends.

This is the wreath that went to live at Leigh Ann's house.  It's a wicker base that I then wrapped in a blue gingham ribbon.  Around that I put a red tinsel with mylar flags.  Then I made a bow out of red ribbon with blue & white star ribbon for the hangy down part.  And finally, I made a 'firework' using a circle of wedding tulle, some shiny red mylar paper and a bell.  I think it turned out fantastic.  Leigh Ann thought I bought it pre-made, so I guess I didn't do too bad.

Also in my dollar store adventures I have found the best bad-ass straw cowboy hats.  I got myself one with a black band.  I wear it everywhere, especially in the car.  I love the looks I get as I drive with my too-loud, too-young for me music blaring, windows & sunroof open, sunglasses & cowboy hat on, driving my mom-mobile.  I rock a little.
Anyway, Leigh Ann wanted a hat too, so I got her the one with the green band.  She wasn't home when I dropped it off, so I left it on her porch.
You can't quite tell from the photo, but the hat is perched on her little statue of the Virgin Mary.  I think Mary looks bad-ass too, sportin' the hat.

I also bought a book this week.  The first non-crafty book I've purchased since I bought my kindle.  It's A Patriot's History of the United States.  I'm politically very moderate.  I don't generally talk about politics, especially in a public forum.  But I have heard good things about this book and I do love history.  I bought the paper version because I can think of several people who might like to borrow it when I finish reading -- although it's over 700 pages, so I might be reading for awhile.  I'll give you a review as I plow my way through.