The post man in my best friend!!

Last year I did a post about wanting to send some artwork in to Sommerset Studio magazine. Well, I procrastinated so long that I decided they were not the pieces I wanted to submit for my first try. I did however, come up with something else and finally took the plunge and sent them in. One was for Halloween, and one was for Christmas. I was thrilled when I got the email from Christen Olivarez saying they wanted to put the Halloween piece in the Sept/Oct issue and they wanted me to write an article to accompany the artwork. Then, I got a little panicky. Write an article?? Oh ****!!! Well, with a little help from my hubby (who is a wonderful writer) I got it done and sent it off.
I have been anxiously awaiting the arrival of the magazine for weeks now! Finally the postman delivered it to me yesterday.


It's a pretty exciting thing to see myself in print. It's interesting to see how different photographers capture things on film. I'm just so pleased with everything, and so very grateful to be in the magazine.

I'm looking forward to getting it back from them (hopefully before Halloween) and displaying it in my home for the Halloween Season. Speaking of which.... It may be time for me to start working on some new Halloween projects. There are some wonderful ideas to be found in the pages of this issue!!!

What I do for fun...

Oh my goodness! I have been away much to long! But truly I think it was a much needed break!
We have been so busy with the house here I barely have had time to think of anything else! (Although I have managed! LOL!) The bedroom is still not finished because we decided to replace all the yuchy molding and doors etc.. and we are doing it all ourselves on weekends so it's taking ffffffooooorrrrreeeevvvveeeeerrrrr!!! But in the mean time I was able to work on the living room with some fun stuff. I've been wanting linen curtains in there for a while now, and the burlap curtains got old pretty quickly. So I went to JoAnne and bought a linen blend that can be washed and dried in the machines. The fabric was only 7.99 a yard and with a 40% off coupon it was really affordable. I bought some shirring tape at Hobby Lobby and not only used it in the linen drapes but I also sewed it to some sheers to keep the look consistent. I still want to paint the rod and rings tan instead of that dark mahogany that they are now, but that will wait until I pull everything down to paint the walls and lighten them up a bit. ( That comes in a couple weeks) So now I had 6 yards of burlap to play with.


I finally hung the chandelier my friend Julie gave me (which I left the original brass color instead of painting it white), and added a burlap chandelier cord. I think it took 12 yards worth of cord to go all the way up and down to the socket! Needless to say... there was burlap fuzz everywhere that day!


The other burlap project came from a post that Flea Market Trixie did on her blog several months ago. Then she gave the directions how to do it, and I had to try! The grain sacks are soooo expensive for the real thing! It came out so well, my husband came home and said "where did you get the old french grainsack!" I wanted to play with him and tell him it was only $300.00 but I didn't want to give him a heart attack!


This is a garage sale table that I got last year and I finally got around to painting it! Lisa's beautiful bottle looks perfect there! I also finally painted the dark brown frame that surrounded this beautiful landscape I bought several years ago. It's amazing how much painting I can do when I am able to do it on the concrete floor in my bedroom!

I still have lots of burlap left over so I got a little quirky the other night and wrapped it around my candlesticks with some silver wire and old keys. My husband thinks I'm weird... maybe he's right.

WooHoo!!! Big winner announced... plus a surprise!!!

I just got an email from Jo. It seems there where so many awesome studios this year she had a hard time choosing just one!! So I am very happy to announce there will be three lucky gals getting a photo shoot in Where Women Create. And so.... drum roll please......... oh, this is so exciting!!!

Suzan of Old Grey Mare is our first lucky gal!! Suzan's studio is full of so much rustic charm, I totally see why Jo picked her. Our next lucky winner is Karla Nathan from Karla's Cottage. It's frilly and girly and full of the most yummy goodies! And last, but not least..your friend and mine... June from Laughing with Angels! June's studio is the epitome of white done right! I cannot wait to see all these gals grace the pages of Where Women Create. I am so happy for them.!!!!!

I also wanted to let you guys know that the link is up and running to take you to the Where Bloggers Create blog, where all the direct links are being housed this year. It is on my right sidebar near the top. For those of you who are still working through all the studios, you will find it much easier now to find the posts because there are all linked directly to their studio tours.

Congrats again to all three winners.!!!!

Whew!!! I'm finally finished... and winners announced!

Well it only took me 3 weeks, but I finally made it through the whole list!!!! The participants in the party this year blew me away with their creativity, their ingenuity, and their amazing assortment of supplies!!! I could only wish to have half of the goodies many of you have filled your studios with. Thank you so much to everyone who participated and everyone who just came to visit. I couldn't have done it without you! I will keep the list up on my blog throught the end of the month and then it will be available on the "Where Bloggers Create" blog. (I will have a link to it on my sidebar)

I know you have all been anxious to hear who one the prizes. I am happy to announce the winners for the goodies from Where Women Create, but Jo still needs to look through a few more blogs before she makes the final decision of the photo shoot winner. And so without further adieu... the random winners!!!

Cerri from The Little Pink Studio and Stephanie from Art of Stuff won the Free 1 yr magazine subscription to Where Women Create.

Marcy from Queen Marcy Originals and Sherry from Blessings from Our Nest won the sets of wonderful books written by Jo Packham herself.

and Cherie from Humble Pie Designs and Violet from Create Beauty won those pretty charm bracelets.

Congratulations to all the winners!!! I promise as soon as I hear from Jo about the big winner I will let you know!!!

Again, thank you all so much for making this years party a smashing success! I think we all made some new friends and gathered up enough creative inspiration to get us through until next year!
XO,

Have your heard the buzzzz????

Many of you have probably seen this cute button or something similar popping up all over Blogland. If you haven't clicked on it and been over for a visit let me introduce you to Sarah and the gals over at The Blog Guidebook. When I first went over for a visit this site was pretty new, but I was blown away by it. I thought to myself... "Finally! A place to go to search for new blogs that share my interests!" What makes them different from other blog "catalogs" is their categories. In other sites like it, the categories that were offered to place our blogs in were very vague. We could place them in "Life styles-Home and Garden" but, that lumps us into every kind of Home and Garden blog out there. In The Blog Guidebook we can place our blogs right in a specific categories that pertain to us. Here is a sampling of some of the categories:
Arts and Crafts
Cottage and Country
Fabric, Sewing and Quilting
Flea Markets and Antiques
Gardening
Thrifting, Junking and Collecting
Vintage and White

See what I mean!!! It's fabulous!!! Think of all the new and wonderful blogs we could find if everyone signed up! You can place a simple listing for FREE! Or, you can put your blog button on there for a very reasonable fee. I listed Valentine Design in a few of the categories I thought pertained to me.
Anyway, I was very impressed by the whole site, so when they contacted me and asked if I would like to be featured on their front page in the Spotlight section I was thrilled! If you would like to check it out you can click here to go visit them! I hope you will all consider listing your blogs over there. You have nothing to lose and everything to gain!
See you there!!!