Remsen Barn Days Festival (Part 1: Welsh Dragons)

I went with my Mom and Grandma on Saturday to the Remsen Barn Festival in Remsen, NY. It's a fall festival that's near the Adirondacks. Remsen was a town that was founded by Welsh immigrants, so the red Welsh dragon, which is on the Welsh flag is everywhere. (I happen to be a little bit Welsh on my Dad's side). The image fascinates me since it's very medieval looking, so I took lots of pictures of it...

This barn is on Rt. 28/12. We pass it every time we go to the Adirondacks and I always want to take a good picture of it (but never can in a moving car!) So Mom was kind enough to pull over so I could get a good, clear picture of it. The sign and red dragon are on the barn year-round.

Painted on the sidewalk in front of the Remsen library...

Last year's dragon, now faded (also on the sidewalk in front of the library)...

My Fellow Monstermakers: ZookieQ

While I was at the Remsen Barn Days Festival in Remsen, NY this weekend, I was elated to see this booth with colorful, quirky sock creatures! It has been the first time I have actually seen one-of-a-kind handmade sock creatures at a craft show. The woman's business is called ZookieQ and the creatures are called Zookies.

"I’ve always made sock monkeys, puppets, costumes and love anything that requires one’s imagination. It was my attempt to give my daughter a sock monkey baby shower that caused the birth of zookeys. I ran out of the regular Rockford socks used for traditional sock monkeys and decided to use up the “one of a kind because the dryer ate the other sock“ bag of mismatched socks. " (from the ZookieQ website)

Her sock creatures are bigger than my own tend to be and her style is very different from my own, but is still very charming and lovely.


In talking with the owner of the booth and giving her my card, I was even more pleased when I learned that she'd actually been to my Etsy shop before! I'm not sure I've ever actually met someone who has been to my Etsy shop before meeting me!

My Happycloud Thunderhead Monster Finger Puppets!

I recieved an email from Happycloud Thunderhead today telling me my finger puppets will be in the mail tomorrow morning! He also gave me a sneak peek of what they look like from his Flickr...and you know I just HAD to share!

I LOVE them! They turned out so great! He does good work considering all he had to work from was this little digital doodle I sent him!

Newest Nubbins...

Here's what the lucky winner of my giveaway will be recieving! Her chosen colors were brown and green...

I was intrigued by 00noctum00's color combo choice of "grey and mustard yellow". At first glance I thought "That's a weird combination!" But then I thought about it and decided to try it out...

I had mustardy yellow felt (actually the sticker says "goldenrod"), and found some of the same yellow in a flower pattern fabric I have. I like the purple and turquoise it added into the color scheme. I'm very satisfied with it. It will be in my Etsy shop soon. I actually will probably be making a lot of owls in the color combos people chose. Keep watching...the next one could be yours!

Then there's the brown dog I made as a custom order (to go with the yellow dog I sold the customer before) .

I want to make a black & brown dog that looks like Luna now! And I bought some flesh tone colored felt at JoAnne's today, so I will be making Max from "Where The Wild Things Are" sometime in the next few days.

And The Winner Is...

I'm pleased to announce that the winner of the Custom Owl Nubbin GiveAway is...

FoundProdigalDaughter!

Congratulations! I will be contacting you soon regarding the details of your custom Owl Nubbin!Thanks so much to everyone who participated! I will be sure to do more giveaways in the future!

Last Day of Giveaway!

Today is the last day of my Giveaway! Go to the original post HERE to enter! The giveaway closes at midnight! Go enter now!

Weakened By The Cuteness!

We inturrupt your regularly scheduled blog entries for a Cuteness Alert!

You can't escape it! Just succumb to the cuteness!

Sunday Morning Walk

I tried to go to a local Swap Meet/Flea Market this morning, but found out that parking was $4. I only had about $2 cash in my wallet (don't ask me why I was going to essentially a big yard sale with only $2 cash...I was going for the sake of wandering). So, disappointed, I headed home. I spotted a yard sale down the street from our house, so the hubby, the puppy, and I went for a walk before getting ready to go to church. Nothing good at the yard sale, but saw our first bit of fall for this year...

And the concrete remnants of a water tower...

It kind of reminds me of a huge stone table...like the Stone Table in "The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe"...

Goin' For A Walk...

I love living in the country. We have a pretty substantial back yard now (almost a quarter of an acre), where I take Luna for walks along the edge of the woods on our property. Just beyond our property, I discovered some paths through the woods...

I didn't see any "No Trespassing" signs, and no one has yelled at me yet when I'm back there...

I'm not sure just who owns the land, but someone keeps those paths mowed and has campfires back there...

And then we came across these cool, crazy looking huge mushrooms that were just too cool not to photograph...

Wild Thing...I Think I Love You...

I made the Wild Thing Nubbin today! My inspiration for this Nubbin was because of the Terrible Yellow Eyes blog. This little guy was a challenge to make, let me tell you.

It was the black "mane" that was so difficult. Originally I was going to use some faux fur for his mane, but my black faux fur is in a box that is kind of buried under other boxes in my craft studio right now, so I decided to go with using black yarn. Let's just say that it wasn't easy, and I'm sure I could have done it more efficiently. But I think it turned out looking good.

Now it's on to Max. He should be a lot easier.

Primele

A shout out for my friend and fellow artist Tricia...

... go check out her (and her sisters') etsy shop Primele. She does some really lovely art, as well as some really nice calligraphy if you have any calligraphy needs (such as wedding invitations, etc.).

Wooden Castle Building Blocks

If you walked into my house, sometimes you'd never know that we have no kids. I have a good supply of toys and children's books though, since lots of my friends have kids. Plus, the hubby and I are just big kids at heart. I found this block set while we were packing before moving to the new house. I found it still in my car this morning while looking for any stray soda bottles or cans to take to be recycled and gave it to my hubby to take inside. When I got home this is what I saw on the coffee table...

I don't quite remember where I got this awesome little set (but whenever I can't recall where I got something, I usually figure I got it at Goodwill back when I worked there). I also don't remember why I had it stashed away for so long! CJ said to me "Where has THIS been? YOu've been holding out on me!" Wooden building blocks are one of the most awesome and most classic toys of all time. We think this little set was handpainted, since the same pattern on some of the blocks looks slightly different...maybe a thinner or thicker line...different enough to know that it wasn't stamped.

Blog Shout Outs...

Every once in awhile on my internet travels, I'm on one of my favorite "big" sites like Craft: or Ohdeedoh or Apartment Therapy, and I'll click a link for a project tutorial and come across a lovely blog I've never been to before. Then I proceed to go back and back and back until I'm looking at entries from months ago. These three blogs have done that to me this week...

http://obsessivelystitching.blogspot.com/

http://www.twigandthistle.com/blog/

http://tutusandturtles.blogspot.com/

Fun with Flashlights and a Camera

More fun from the bonfire the other night...

Anyone else ever done this "trick" with a flashlight and a digital camera? It's a great nighttime activity to do with kids...particularly when at a bonfire or camping.
Make sure the flash is off on your camera...tell your child to make big circles with the flashlight, or to shake it up and down or back and forth in a big line. Older kids (or a fellow adult) can do figure eights and other shapes. Take a picture while they are moving the flashlight and see what happens!

(up and down)

(figure eight)

Then we tried it with the light sticks. They create a different effect.

The kids (as well as the adults) love seeing how the pictures turn out. And it can be an educational experience, since you can explain to the kids about how cameras work and why the picture comes out that way because of the slower shutter speed because the camera is trying to let in more light. An early photography lesson!

Fun with Light Sticks & Paper Lanterns

We went to a friend's bonfire Saturday night. The kids had lots of light sticks and CJ and I ended up taking some home. I had the idea to put some inside some of my paper lanterns...



Speaking of paper lanterns, I used some to decorate my craft room, along with those tissue paper poufs left over from the baby shower

(that green fellow at the bottom is Jake...my Muppet Whatnot.)