Fluffy Little Pillows

My latest creations are these great heart shaped throw pillows.  I have a ton of fabric lying around, bric a brac, pom poms, buttons and I've just learned how to felt wool.  I have had so much fun putting them together, finding the finishing pieces to add to them and then adoring them.  I reluctantly must sell them, because a girl can only have so many pillows in a house.  I will just keep on creating, but if anyone happens to see one that they just can't live without please visit my Etsy page http://www.etsy.com/shop/Pollyannacreations?ref=si_shop 

I also have some pincushions and miscellaneous Antiques.  Something for everyone.

My Creative Side

I haven't posted here for a while, but still trying to take care of my creative side.  Still doing my jams and also started making homemade Kahlua, which everyone loves.

And made stockings to sell on Etsy this year.  Was a lot of fun getting them done and more fun when they sold.  

I also sold a teacup set that I had painted a few years ago and decided it was time to sell.  Thought that I wanted to hold onto it, but the time came to clean up the crafting area and so it reluctantly went on Etsy as well and sold within two weeks.  So "Sugar and Spice" went to some sweet little girl for the holidays.

Now on to Valentine's Day, I better get my rear in order and get busy.  Hope you are all still creating as well, whether it be painting, photography, sculpting or whatever keep your creative side flowing.

Happy New Year and Happy Crafting.

Sewing

I love sewing, just the calmness of sitting and creating something is really appealing to me.  I used to cross stitch, I really loved that.  But then we had kids, so that was something that I couldn't just sit and do for hours.  Things had to be taken care of.  I'm slowly working my way back into all the fun crafts that I used to do, especially sewing.

Now it is my daughters turn to learn and so with the help of her grandmother they are bonding and sewing together.  It is something that my mother taught me and now my daughter will learn as well.  I hope that it will bring them closer together, for my mothers sake.  She has never been the "traditional" grandmother type.  I am no where near as good of a seamstress as my mother.  She began sewing by hand first and then on a machine.  She was the greatest and sewed all of us girls clothes.  

I have made dolls when I was little sewing by hand out of old sheets that my mother didn't need anymore.  And some even of old nylons that my mother had discarded.  Crocheting clothes for them or sewing them out of discarded material leftover from a dress or shirt that my mother had made for one of us.  I had so much fun making my own things to play with.  I wish I would have taught my daughter a little earlier, but they want for so little these days. Most of my creations were out of necessity because we didn't have a lot of money.  But we still always had a good time.

  

Circa 1970-1973

Canning

This year I went absolutely banana's when it came to canning jam.  I haven't done it in a while and boy did I have fun.  I used to make it all the time before the kids were born, I don't know why I stopped.  But they are old enough now that I am pursuing my jamming with passion once again.  My husband and kids absolutely love it because they have fresh jam to pile high on toast and pancakes.  And there really isn't anything quite like fresh jam.

We moved on to a property last year that already has established fruit trees.  And one of my new favorite jams is now white peach.  Along with the strawberry-mango that I just couldn't get enough of, and the strawberry apricot, and the raspberry.  The jam has actually disappeared faster then the stuff I buy in the stores by probably three fold.  So I know what I will be doing again next year.  I will be Jamming!

Remembering

My parents bought me a 110 camera when I was quite young, I know some of the younger people will not know what it is (a small camera that took a film cartridge that you twisted everytime you took a picture), but I was thrilled to have it and took many pictures with it.  I would even set my younger sisters in poses and take pictures of them.  I had a lot of fun and so did they.  It gave me a life long love of photography.  I even took a photography class when I was in high school.  We took pictures, developed the film and then developed our pictures.  I mostly worked in black and whites, which I love to this day.  You can soften a black and white and make things look like as if they have no blemishes at all or you can sharpen them to a point where you can see absolutely everything.  The grit of a black and white, you could never accomplish with a color photo. 

I have a stock pile of pictures to go through of my family and friends that I took with my old 110 camera and my old 35mm camera.  Photographers of today especially the younger set, have no idea the work that it took back them to accomplish what you can accomplish today.  Even if you had your own darkroom, you still had to develope the film, and then develope your pictures to see how well they turned out and if you were even going to like them.  Today you can point and shoot, take it to your computer and then coax out of the pictures what you want by editing them.  The process was a lot longer back then to, you took it to the photo shop (and I don't mean the photoshop on your computer) they developed and printed pictures for you and you got them back in a few days.  I waited sometimes as long as a week or more for my pictures.

I wish that I had stuck with it and really fine tuned the art, but life happened.  I'm happy that I now have the time to do it, as they say "better late, then never".  I'm enjoying the instant gratification of shooting, editing and printing that we can now enjoy.  Now it's time to go out and get a better camera and a really nice photoshop program for my computer so that I can have even more fun shooting what I love.