Pay It Forward from Ralyn

One of the things I really wanted to find at the Round Top Antique Fair was vintage seam binding. I found a wonderful sewing basket with a few sewing notions that included about four or five packages of it. Feeling lucky, I met up with my hubby for a show and tell - "Look what I found" and from around the corner I hear "I wanna see, I wanna see". It’s the busy shop owner and she looked at my basket and said "I had a huge bag of seam binding but never thought about bringing it!" She just didn’t think anyone would be interested in it. So I asked about buying it and would she ship it and she hesitated and then said oh heck I’ll just mail it to you - you can have it - just pay it forward. I gave her my card and proceeded to chase her around her tent to thank her because she was so busy helping customers. You never know when a blessing is going to cross your path. Her name is Ralyn and she has fabulous shabby stuff. She and her partner have so much incredible stuff they have the whole tent. (Carnival, reception tent - not a little backyard shade tent!) This was Preview weekend. Next weekend is the real show. DO NOT collect $200, do not pass GO, Go directly to Just Us. American Legion Field. About the third tent back. Look for Ralynn. You can’t miss her - she’s the one with the angel wings!

Gone to Round Top

Do you need me to look for something? Call me on my cel. I am just soooo excited. Bye - Nancy

Packing Away Easter

How exciting - my clothesline swap came in the mail.

Those flicker gals are sooo talented. My fuzzy picture just does not do cute justice to this swap! Thanks Jessi, Eleanor, Linda, MaryAnn, Pricilla, and Sarah. It was so much fun swapping with you!

Now it's time to put away Easter. I always hate packing these cute little bunnies away.

After all, black and white checks go with everything don't they?

Pooh, what are you doing here?

A snow baby???????This is getting out of hand. See what happens when someone (and I'm not mentioning any names) doesn't get her decorations put away properly.

Goodbye bunny.

Would my "hanging out Springtime work here? A bit busy, you say? I think so, too. Better move it back in the hall.

Oh my gosh. Ms. Bunny jumped right off the shelf. What? You hate your prairie clothes? You are sooo getting kicked off the Big Love compound!

Altering a book

Here's a book I recently altered for a swap. Nice and simple but.......too plain. So I took away the flower.





Added some different flowers, stars, postcard, and ribbon. Better, but it still needs more.





Perfect. A picture of my swap partner. Add some party hats.....much better.





Now for the inside. First it was just two pages but what the heck - lets add more pages!

And a pocket. Since this was a library book I wanted to make it perfectly clear........



Support your local library - go to the book sale!

A Cross of Flowers

I wanted to be sure and share this cross from my church with you. Every year we put up a wire cross and anyone who wants brings a little bouquet of fresh flowers to tuck into it and the end result is this wonderful cross. It's one of my favorite Easter traditions. Do you have one to share?

A Happy Glorious Easter To You!

These little Easter eggs are having a smokin' good time and I hope all of you do the same. I love this little card and just like the Egg Family we are off to church this Easter day. Blessings to you all! Nancy

Hippity Hoppity Easter's On Its Way!

Yesterday, as I was taking some pictures that I can't post yet (shhh - it's a surprise for someone) this package came in the mail from my sister in law (should that have -'s or be one word?) in Ohio. What a cute towel and beautiful card just to say Happy Easter. It has the cutest little ball fringe and embroidered eggs. I had these vintage Dick and Jane cards out working on a project and I love taking pictures so thanks again Judy Cottontail! See the little chickie running to get out of the picture - he's so excited because he's soon going to a new home I'm sure he'll love.

Well - if you blinked you missed my St. Patrick's Day music on my blog but enjoy this all you Gene Autry fans! Puhleeeese! Do I have to keep sending you to your moms to ask who these people are? Okay, I'll tell. Why he was America's Favorite Singing Cowboy - here.... I'll go over to the internet and swipe a picture for you.

Gene and Champion

Now just listen to these great sound effects - boings, pops, spurrrrrring,whhhhhrrrrrrr. Play it for your three year olds - they'll love it.

Good Friday Meditation

Shhhhh! All are alerted by the quietness! Suddenly melancholy is present in the air. The brisk cool wind signals a change: transforming the overlay of the sky, delivering multiple shades of purple. The dry air alters to unpleasant dampness. A sudden clapping of thunders simultaneously strikes the heavens in all directions, illuminating the atmospheric deviation. Vision is confined to abrupt enlightened forms. The downpour parallels a waterfall. The weight of one's drenched clothing is sensed, joining the torrential streams upon the feet. Then the shrill yell of deliverance is heard, ensued by the stillness of silence. The presence of guilt is successively detected, tingling the spine and trembling the body. It is too late...history has been written!

Author Unknown

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

To my blogging friends - may you have a wonderful St. Patricks Day. Your blogging buddy, Nancy

Button Up

As coordinator for Community in the Women's group at my church we host a Mother's Day tea every year at the assisted living center. I've made fresh flower corsages ; paper flower corsages from an old hymnal so this year I thought why not make little button bouquets. Oh my gosh - they looked so quick and easy. Easy maybe but are they ever time consuming. So the first ones I wrapped with florist tape - way too labor intensive. I finally got in a groove and came up with these:

Now I only have to make 120 more button flowers to finish this little project. What was I thinking!?

Giveaway

Hey - what are you doing on my blog? My friend Sarah is hosting a birthday giveaway on her blog to celebrate her big day. I bet it's something fabulous so get your bad self over there and sign up. Wait, I just lessened my chance of winning the big prize so just pretend I never mentioned this!

Tagged!

My swap partner Heidi @ Dreams Intertwined has tagged me and I'm supposed to reveal five incredibly fascinating things about myself and then tag five more blogging friends. Now this is very, very sad - I only have four blogging friends unless you count my flickr friends so here are my four friends! And here are the rules that I blatently copied word for word from Heidi! "I guess I am supposed to tell 5 things about myself, quirks or oddities, reference my tagger, and then tag 5 more bloggers and let them know they have been tagged by comment or email."

Karen @ Popsicles and Lollipops. Karen just hosted the Mother Goose Swap. I called her Fanny and I don't know where I came up with that name but she let me in the group anyway because she always wanted a cool nickname. If I had a nickname I'd be Rio - Now that's a cool nickname.

LaVerne @ Riverside Studios. She's a new blogger and really talented and she never spells things wrong on her blog and uses excellent grammer ....umm... grammar.

Susan at A Slice of Life was my swap partner for the Easter Bunny's Chicks Swap. I don't know much about Susan except that she picked up a cute guy in a bar a long time ago and then she married him. She also drinks a lot of coffee and then she blogs and drinks more coffee!

Sarah has a lovely blog and sells beautiful things on etsy so you should definitely visit her.

You can learn a lot about a person from these little games. For instance Heidi my new friend who tagged me doesn't shower and admits it. I think it's because she used to live in Texas and then had to move to Chicago and frankly it's just to cold too shower up there.

So here goes:

1. I have a big and I mean big phobia about frogs. I really don't like snakes, but given the choice I'd rather deal with a snake over a frog. I refuse to let my husband put a pond in because it would attract them.

Go away -you are not cute - you are a frog!

2. I have never ever taken my wedding ring off even though I've been married forever and even though I had to have my engagement ring cut off because the diamond was loose and maybe it was summer and I had gained a pound or two and it wouldn't come off.

3. I can nurse sick animals back to health so my friend Mike nicknamed me Florence NancyGail! (You know - Nightingale/NancyGail - get it?)

4. I love Dairy Queen tacos (see #2)

Yo quiero un Dairy Queen Taco!

5. I laugh in my sleep. Like cracking up laughing - loud - wake my husband up loud and I don't remember doing it or even dreaming anything funny. I think it's rude that he doesn't wake me up but he thinks it's funny and I think

he's just trying to nose around my dreams.

Leave me a message on here and tell me something facinating about you - I promise I won't tell anyone!

My Saturday Morning Bargains

I really found some buys at a couple of garage sales Saturday morning. I asked about this wooden thingy -very disinterested-ly of course - and the lady told me it was a sewing machine cover- hmmm (birdhouse my brain was screaming) looking at this picture now it's sort of saying Casket but anyway........ When I asked the price she said just make me an offer so I said I'd give her a dollar if she'd throw in those three games over there - after all they were OLD with wooden pieces - not even the newer ones inferring I'd practically be doing her a favor getting this stuff off her hands and out of her driveway. Holy cow - she took it. My hubby wanted to know what the heck I was going to do with it and I told him HE was going to alter it and make a birdhouse and sell it at the art show in April. He's all into it now and it's going to be a church birdhouse. The problem is I never want to sell this stuff once it's done!

One dollar - I just amaze myself sometimes! Makes up for some of my incredibly amazingly extra stupid things I've come home with on other occasions!

Oh Susan in Seattle- here's your package. Wish I could drop it off personally and have some of those delicious pastries and coffee you blog about but I'll have to mail!

Wynken Blynken and Nod

Wynken Blyken and Nod,
originally uploaded by NancyGail.

The Mother Goose Swap was so much fun. My partner Sarah sent me a really cute wallhanging of "Three Little Kittens". and a paper clay Mother Goose hat that is adorable. Of course I don't have pictures yet but trust me they are just adorable and I love them.

Blogger is blogged down tonight and just won't upload my pictures so I'll try using the flickr one which I've never done. Can you upload more than one picture at a time? Well, anyway here's a poem I love from Mother Goose - Wynken, Blyken and Nod and if there's only one picture check out my flickr photos. I altered a children's book that had the lovliest images - mostly of a couple and their dog at the shore - I think that's exactly what Sarah and company do on weekends so here's to you Sarah! Fill with your dreams and memories.

I'm just loving swapping. My Easter Bunny's Chicks partners are at opposite ends of the spectrum. Susan from Seattle likes vibrant colors and whimsical, eclectic things and Maria from Sweden has a white very shabby look to her home. I am done, done done and what fun making and gathering everything. Now if my assistant will just mail them for me - wait - that's right I don't have an assistant!

Hanging Out Springtime

This swap is on its way and I'm so anxious to get back my very own clothesline from Sarah at Gypsy Mermaid. Thank you Sarah for hosting the swap. It was loads of fun!

Here's a whole page of them.

Another Date with Craig

I had a hot date with Craig tonight. I think my husband wants me to stop seeing him but how can I? Just look at this chair! I still can't believe I bought it for $40! Austin is Craigslist heaven. I guess there's such a mobile population - students and the tech employees constantly on the move and it makes for incredible bargains. This is the pic from CL but I'll soon put a pic from my living room after the cushion is redone. The actual cushion is perfect but the seller had this cover on it. The young girl who sold it was so sweet and had a lovely apartment however on our departure my grandson who notices every tiny detail announces that he just didn't think she was a very nice person. "Why, Brandon" I asked. "Well for one thing she had a picture of a nude man on her refrigerator plus she had a huge television and that's just of waste of her money". So if any of you need moral or financial advice I know just the 12 year old guy for the job.


I wanted to get a wingback chair like this and upholster it ala MacKenzieChilds but I think I'm going to save a bunch on labor with the wicker chair not to mention fabric!



Completly off the subject now - my husband told me the most interesting tidbit of information. It seems like we're always driving different cars and never fail to pull up to the wrong side of the pump to fill up. He says that on the fuel gauge in all cars there's a little arrow that will tell you which side the tank is located. It's on my new car - let me know if it's on yours.

Works In Progress

Wow - I managed to put music on my blog and it only took me about three days. I hope you like it - this is my absolute favorite song of all time - does anyone else remember "A Summer Place"? Oh well, ask your mothers - I'm sure they remember it!

I'm trying to get some Easter things done for my Etsy store but I keep using the stuff to decorate with. Here's a work in progress -

I decoupaged black and white toile inside and then glittered eyes half closed and that's as far as I got. I decided to take a picture but my table was still all valentiney so I decided to change it

out to spring and this is why everything is a "work in progress". Then I started working on the little curtains

The center part is my husband's grandmother's petticoat. I wonder how she would feel knowing her petticoat was hanging in the window for all the world to see. Well, my store is unchanged but my table is done! And just look at this African violet - I had no idea it would bloom like this and last for over a month.

Uh oh - this is before I put it in a pretty container but as I said - it's a WIP. Have a wonderful Sunday - Nancy