Pictures of Old Pictures

Yesterday, I received a small padded envelope in the mail from my Aunt.  She told me she had sent me some pictures she'd found while going through Granny's things.

(Remember to give Thangs)

Two stacks of pictures:

This one is funny and also has a bit of trivia.  My mom was a river rafting guide at one point.  I'm pretty sure I'm modeling one of their shirts here:

Oh, I had forgotten about this.  My Granddad set a trap to catch wild birds.  It was a bird cage propped up on a stick, with a pull string tied to it, and a trail of birdseed going in.  We caught a few of them, looked at them, and then let them go.  He was always so interested in nature and sharing it with me.  I was really excited by the whole thing.  (I'm wearing my Granny's coat)

Wearing Granny's coat again, riding a stick horse?  I think - and wielding a stick as a sword.  Granddad actually made me a proper wooden sword at one point and I would gallop around in battle, whacking sagebrush with it.  

No idea, me in school at some point it looks like!

My mom bred and showed dogs, American Staffordshire Terriers at first and later, Maltese.  I was a Junior Handler and went to a few shows with a young Maltese named Sugar.  Here I am at one: 

Posing with Granny:

Clowning with Granny:

On the way home from the dog show, Granddad and I stopped to study some llamas along the road.  Here, I wanted to touch one.  The llama did not want to be touched.  Thankfully, we did not get spit on.  

I went camping and fishing quite a bit with Granny and Granddad and a few times with just Granddad.  Here I was displaying our catch of fish:

And clowning around with the fish.  

I noticed something in looking through all of these pictures.  I'm not sure I've ever liked having my picture taken.  Even as a kid, I seemed to have a few default looks: "oh no, a camera", maybe with a forced smile - completely goofing off for the camera - or somewhere in the middle, maybe when I didn't know the camera was there (or was really excited by something like a turtle).   

Exploring a lakeshore - "Oh no, a camera"

Fishing - "Oh no, a camera"

Dressed up for Halloween - "Oh no, a camera"

And so on, haha.

The same Halloween with Granny.  I can't remember what I was supposed to be, I think I went as some sort of 80's rock/pop star a few times.  

Skipping ahead some years, a 4 generations picture.  From the left:  Me, my Aunt Annie, Granny, and Granny Margaret (Granny's mom).

And back to kid me.  I found this turtle while walking with Granddad.  I picked him up, turned him around to look inside, and almost dropped him when he snapped at me.  I carried him back to the house to show Granny (then let him go).

The back of that picture:

A picture of Granddad and I on a camping/fishing trip:

Wait, what's that??

I had taken two Breyer horses with me!  After studying the picture in bright light (they are TINY in the photo), I recognize them and still have them both.  The light dapple grey PAS and grey appaloosa FAS.  This was a super fun discovery to make while looking at the pictures.  

Last one, Granddad and I having breakfast out of the back of his truck at a campsite:  

We often took his cab over camper, but at least once or twice we just set up camp in the bed of the truck with a camper shell over it, for shorter, local campouts. 

I miss those trips, Granddad, and Granny, more than I can say.  I'm so glad my Aunt Annie sent me these pictures.  

Stamps, Stamps, Everywhere

Last night I spent several hours in the Studio room.  I wanted to make some things, but that was going to be a little difficult.

Even though it's cool to see a sea of horses on my desk, it's not practical for actually getting anything accomplished on the desk, so they (and everything else) had to move. 

The first chunk of time was spent shuffling things around.  I put away my tools, paints, glues, sprays, and epoxy, and finally even more unpacking from the shows a couple of months ago.  I cleared off some of the top shelf of the desk and moved my little in progress herd up there and off of the main working surface.

Future class of 2015?  That's the plan.

Recently I had bought some empty cases for storing rubber stamps.  I decided to unwrap them and maybe do some stamp organizing since it turned out I was in that kind of mood.

This turned into a marathon of stamp sorting in which, at one point, I had almost ALL of my rubber stamp collection on the desk.

Horse stamps!

Wait... wasn't I supposed to be cleaning off the desk??

I have a lot of rubber stamps.  I think I should maybe go through them and try to weed out some that I don't use.  For a long time I had them all somewhat contained in the larger plastic cases, and stacked neatly.  Then over a year ago I joined a stamp club where I make a monthly order and my collection started to spread.  Now those stamps are popping up everywhere throughout the room.

I was actually kind of shocked when I realized last night just how many stamps I have!  I found a bunch of them that I can't even remember when or where I got them.  I was pretty confused, until I remembered that my Granny gave me a ton of stamps when I helped her move this past summer.  That's where all of the new ones came from.

My Granny did this once before and last night I couldn't help but to take another picture of one of the favorite stamps she gave me then.

I have no idea why I am so amused by that stamp, but I am.  A chicken marching band!  Have you ever seen something so funny?  I may need help...


After the unplanned rubber stamp wrangling, I did actually clear off the desk and make something - my intent when I'd first set foot in the room a few hours before.

When I finally left the room for the night, the desk was all cleared off and ready to go.

Slow Start Here, But Busy!

A much belated Happy New Year to my readers!  I hope you all had a great Holiday season and that your 2013 is off to a good start!

The year has been off to a slow start as far as blogging and such (obviously!) but I have been very busy "behind the scenes".  I have several new greeting cards that will be on ArtFire very soon.  I've also gotten back to work on Project Stagecoach, after taking a bit of an intimidated hiatus.  I had to build the wheels and I was very nervous about that.  However, it went MUCH better than I had expected.  In fact, I had so much fun that I've given serious consideration to going into a side business of making miniature wagon wheels!  Yet another iron in the fire I suppose...  First it'd be nice to finish the leviathon stagecoach project.

I will be catching up on Stagecoach posts here soon; I've been continuing to take pictures every step along the way.  In the meantime, here's a bit of a teaser photo - the finished wheels:

"Finished" is a loose term, because after this they had to be sanded, painted, wheel tread applied, and itty bitty nails put in around the rim.  I'm in the midst of all of that now.  So in that picture, they were finished as far as the rim, spokes, and hub all being in place.  I think they looked pretty sharp as plain wood.  I hope I can get some more wheels made from scratch in the future for different projects or maybe just to try selling on their own. 

I've also been tatting away.  I made several bookmarks and gave a few out as Christmas presents.  I also finished my first doily, using a two color thread technique that my Granny explained over the phone.  I'm now working on a pattern Granny sent me that is a wedding dress for a Barbie doll.  She told me that she won a blue ribbon at the county fair with the dress.  I'm hoping to enter one of my own in our fair - in August.  I hope I'll be done with it by then!  So far it's been slow going.

I guess that's it for an update.  There is a lot more to talk about, but I don't suppose anyone would really want to read 20 pages of my ramblings in one stretch!  So, until next time - stay crafty my friends.

Best. Thanksgiving/Christmas. Ever!

We went to Arizona to visit my Granny for Thanksgiving.  Years ago, before my Granddad passed away, Thanksgiving used to be the time for our family reunion.  Their Anniversary falls around Thanksgiving and it just became the time for all their kids and grandkids to gather.  We would also do Christmas at the same time, since everyone would be together.

This year was the first big family get together since Granddad passed away.  It was a bittersweet time for me; I loved seeing my uncles again, my Granny, and my mom.  It was fun to see my cousins again, they sure have grown up!  However, I still miss my Granddad and it just didn't seem right to be there as a family without him.  I like to think he was smiling down on us and laughing at our crazy stories and the good times we had.


My husband, Jeff, and I were the first ones to arrive, so we had some time to spend with Granny before everyone else got there.

Granny gave me a box of earrings that were from her mom.  Her mother never had pierced ears and neither do I!  It was a neat thing to find out about my Granny Margaret, that we shared.  So Granny gave me a box of beautiful vintage clip on earrings.  I was really excited, but she was just getting warmed up!

Some of my readers may remember the box of stamps that Granny sent me a while ago, including the "infamous" chicken marching band stamp.Granny is who I get most of my creativity from; growing up with her making all kinds of neat things inspired me. 

Granny pointed to a blue tote on the floor and said "You're not gonna believe what's in there and it's all for you!"

She took it to the kitchen table and said, "You like rubber stamps?" then flipped the top open. 

 

 

 The tote was chock full of stamps!!  Plus all of the side pockets were full of clear acrylic stamps, colored pencils, assorted embellishments, and..  even more rubber stamps!!

I was in shock, but there was more...  She also gave me two scrapbook paper cases - full of paper:

Plus a crimper tool, which I had never seen before, but here's what it does:

How cool!! 

Thank you SO much, Granny!  I'm going to have SO much fun with all of these goodies!  (I already am!) 


My Granny and I: